Post Funk Action

So... as soon as the hardest part of the house got done we had to go on to even harder things. Dan's sister, Jan, passed away at Christmas from a thyroid condition that went undiagnosed too long. Jan had a hard row to hoe due to some mental illness issues that had worsened in recent years, so her condition got chalked up to that and to her stubborn, "Don't help me, I can help myself" nature. Her late night phone calls were sometimes a trial, but now we miss them.

Then there's my Dad, who has been our mainstay through this whole project - part of the reason we thought we could do all this ourselves is because he did it, twice, with three small children to get in the way . So he knew what to do about all things building. He gave us tons of advice, mostly prefaced by " It's none of my business, but..." or "Call me a meddling old fool, but...". He had an injurious fall last spring that had him feeling down and out for most of the summer - every time he'd start to feel like he was healed up he'd over do and be right back to feeling crappy. He finally went to a sports doctor who found he had a torn rotator cuff and did surgery in October. Dad whined a lot about the physical therapy and subverted the "no driving" rules whenever possible, but he seemed to be getting better for a few weeks. By early December he was back to feeling lots of back pain, probably more than he told us, and had been in to the doctors several times trying to get some help and sort out what his problem was. The pain meds they gave him stopped him up something fierce, so he was choosing between the kinds of pain and relying on industrial strength doses of Ben-Gay and back rubs from anyone he could talk into giving him one. The day after Christmas the doctors were able to say that they suspected he had some form of cancer in his trunk that had metastasized to his bones and that was why he was having such back pain. They scheduled him for an MRI and a CT the following week and then a biopsy to determine where the cancer started and where to go from there the next week, but in the course of that two weeks he went from being in lots of pain, but mobile and lucid to being delirious and needing help for any movement. The Friday his biopsy was scheduled Mom and I were only able to get him out of the house and to the hospital by dint of adrenalin and desperation. From there he was admitted and had the biopsy and an MRI, but by the time the results of that came back on Monday his kidneys had ceased functioning and he was beyond the help of dialysis, much less treatment for the cancer. He died Tuesday, January 13th.

As you can imagine, we haven't been super active on the house since we finished the walls. I am so glad that I was able to spend those last few weeks with Dad, helping Mom keep him comfortable. And then afterwards everything sent me into a state - I keep thinking of things I want to ask him and now I can't, want to borrow a tool and don't know where to look, want to see if he knows the answer to the 12:30 Quiz question on WPR. But lately we have managed to emerge from our funk and are making some progress. Dan has all the interior walls framed up, which don't look overly exciting in the pics, I admit. I've been working on flooring, laying tile around the masonry heater, which we've named Norbert. We always derided Dad's habit of saving things, but it has helped us a lot. He had enough tile left over from doing the floors in their house to do the hallway and border around the stove, including a bucket of leftover pieces that had been cut and saved us from having to mess with tile cutting a lot. The weird angles in Mom and Dad's house are almost the same weird angles in our house.And I like it a lot more than any of the spendy tiles I've seen around town. I'm doing a faux limestone finish on the kitchen floor and a leather look flooring made with brown paper and polyurethane on the utility room floor. The electrical work should be able to happen in the next couple weeks and I'm ordering cabinets and thermopanes for the areas between the beams on the living room side of the house. So we're back at work, trying to do Dad proud, and just glad he got to see the finished walls if not the whole enchilada.

It Looks like a House!

It's so nice to be able to say "I'm going out to the house." instead of "I'm going out to the building site." As of today, we have 1/3 of a wall to go, but as the high today is supposed to be 2 degrees, it's not a good time to mess with mortar. But before weeks end it should be done!! Then we can clean up - I am looking forward to the day when I no longer traipse sand and lime into the farmhouse - and can put up interior walls and floors! It will be nice to go on to something else, although it happens just as we've gotten really good at the cordwood. The northern wall has a tree bottle mural in it which turned out great. Unfortunately the flash on the camera overpowers the light coming through the bottles, so it's not super obvious in pics. The final wall that we're working on has the Big Dipper and Orion done in bottles around the window, although they're not done yet so no pics just yet. You'll just have to come visit to see them properly! As usual, Deb and Mom and Erin and Dave and Matt and Leya must be thanked - they've been dynamos of action.

Walls, Stove, & Windows

We're proceeding apace with the walls, which look so lovely when they're done - from a distance they look like stone. Labor intensive and messy, but beautiful. We also have the framework for the round green door done. So we're looking hobbity! The masons from Rock-n-Stone returned and gave us a chimney, so we've been working out the idiosyncrasies of our stove and seasoning it gradually. We've had loads of help from Deb in spite of a hand injury, plus Sam and Erin and Dave. Loree and Fran put in an admirable and beyond the call of duty effort last weekend- bless you both! Mom and Deb started on the bottle wall this afternoon while I was at work and it is lovely - the pictures don't do it justice. Matt's family has put in their two cent's worth too, splitting and laying up wall. Lauren likes to split wood - Matt starts her on the wedge and she pounds like a madwoman! Dad, our advisor cum laude, has been sidelined by rotator cuff surgery, but is healing up pretty well. It looks to be a long haul for him healingwise, but thankfully they were able to figure out what was with him and fix it.

Roof, Part 2,3,4 and more

So... we've got the waterproofing layer down with the help of the Hoy/Pate clan from Illinois. Cousin Tracey, her husband Lowell and their two kids Weston and Casen came up last weekend for work/airshow enjoyment. Saturday we got rained out, but as it was Lauren's birthday it worked out OK. Sunday we stuck down Hydroseal like mad and cut insulation. This week we've got insulation stuck down, with plastic, Enkadrain and dirt to follow and pending approval walls! The roof now must be blinding planes taking off from the airport, as it's a giant aluminum foil covered disc! It's also been wildlife central here - large treefrogs have visited the building, newly hatched snapping turtles have appeared in numbers on the road between the new house and the old, snakes have been seen, sandhill cranes have circled, turkeys have made a ruckus, and someone, an owl or hawk or eagle, ate breakfast on top of our roof insulation and left the innards for us to discover this morning. A charming way to start the day, I must say!!

Roof!

So we now have a giant gazebo!! Dan is ironing out a few tricky bits at the center and we'll be putting on the waterproofing layer this weekend. The camphering and splitting is all done. We have a start ont he round green door too. On Sunday I did a trial wall to see how several different mortar mixes work. This week we are building the temporary posts for the interior and framing out the windows and we should be able to do cordwood next week. And isulation and Enkadrain and dirt on the roof! Finally!!

Beam Me Up, Dan!!

So... we've got the central steel beam support up, followed by the Douglas Fir beams. As of 7/13, we have all of the beams up. Despite several moments of extreme fright, no one was permanently injured. We'll be centering and attaching with giant spikes for the next bit - the roof should be here in ten days, followed by the Enkadrain and then the great dirt extravaganza, combined with laying up the walls. And windows - Dan will be picking up about half of them Wednesday so he can frame them up with a drip edge. Deb and Sam have been a great help - we have roughly two thirds of the logs chamfered, in a shady tent kept upright by Deb in spite of the recent winds. Matt Hicks, Matt Hoy, and Dave Kranz have also been burly/wiry workhorses that we could not have done without - bless you all!! It's starting to look like a house - soon the boxes of tile in my porch will be of use!! Once the roof is on, the masons will return and give us a chimney, the walls will go up inside and the electricians and plumbers can work their magic!! Keep an eye out for work weekend e-mails - we'll be happy to see anyone who cares to wander out our way!!

Bricks and Beams

Spring has purportedly sprung, although you wouldn't know it from the frost advisory tonight in mid-May. What has sprung up is our stove! The masons came a few weeks ago and faced the heater with a lovely brick, a mix of reds and oranges and purples, oddly enough, and put on a nice limestone for the bench. They'll return to do the chimney and the insulating cap on the stove once we have a roof on, at which point we'll be able to fire the stove up and try it out. We've taken down the little straw shack and are putting up steel this week for the center supports. Which means we can go on to nice big Douglas Fir beams next week, since they have finally arrived!! We had a moderate delay when the beams arrived from the west coast with only two sides sawn, which makes it a little hard to balance. Kind of important, when you've got sixteen of them and they weigh about 300 lbs apiece. So they had to make a little jaunt back up to the Cities and visit the man with the giant plane. Now they look beautiful, all twenty eight feet of them. Doug Fir has a nice almost pink grain to it. I'll post pics shortly - my camera has been on the fritz recently, so I'm relying on the cameras and kindness of family for documentation. We've also got the flashing installed around the edge of the foundation so our insulation is protected. Now it's on to splitting the wood for the walls and getting the beams up. As ever, onwards and upwards!!