WE HAVE WOOD!

Yes, we really have posts and roof trusses up!  

We had been 're-scheduled' (again) for this past Tuesday and as hubby and I drove up the road to the property, with *bated breath,  we were both ready for the disappointment again of not seeing anything happening.  BUT ... not to be this time.  We actually had posts up ...

  

and they had been working on assembling the roof trusses too.  If you look at that second photo you will notice a little black  'thing' attached to the top of the post. That thing is actually a Hoist.  It doesn't look like much does it?  Well, they actually take four of those and attach them to the top of the four posts that a whole roof section will be attached to. Then, those 4 little hoists lift the whole roof section up off the ground up to the roof level where the fellows then set, and fasten them.

We left Wednesday and I went back up on Thursday alone to follow the progress. When I got there they already had the back truss and rafters up and set.  As we have been told several times, no one has built a house in Mullan in years.  : /  So . . . we have become the Social Center for a lot of our neighbors who come out to watch the progress daily (such as it is) on the house.  One of those neighbors is a wonderful lady by the name of Flossie.  Flossie just celebrated her 90th birthday last week.  She is sharp as a tack and an absolute delight.  On Thursday Flossie and I sat on her front porch together and watched as they worked to set the rest of the trusses.  

Dodger, our dog, . . . supervising the job.

If you look at the wood band around the bottom of the framing you'll notice, over on the left, that we are still 'slightly' not level.  That seems to be our nemesis.  That area will still need to be filled in before they can proceed with the foundation.  You can see the Hoists a little better from this angle.  Hard to believe something that small can lift that whole section of roof.

When we were moving things in to the garage for storage a few months back, we stuck our wrought iron divider up along side of it.  The overhang is very low and everyone kept bumping their heads so we thought that would help to avoid that problem  Well, then it needed something to hold it in place so we put one of my big Planters along side of it to hold it.  Snow was still on the ground so no plants were peeking out at that point.  A few weeks ago I went over to that area of the garage and, much to my surprise, there were my Lillies and Clematis in full bloom.  Despite being very neglected, they had managed to thrive and bloom pretty much on their own.  I'm taking that as a good sign.  :)

 

The Lillies originally came from my Garden two houses ago in Idaho.  Only fitting that they come back home.  :)

I came back Friday hoping to see the actual roof(ing) being put on.  NOT.   No one was there, or had been there.  Guess we are back to the 'Who knows when they show up next' chapter.  But, Glen and Bob will be working on the plumbing this weekend so we will just keep forging forward.

So . . . * 'Bated breath' (when you almost stop breathing).  As I wrote that I wondered who ever came up with that phrase in the first place and for some unknown reason I decided to google it.  I, of course, spelled it 'Baited breath' because that's how I've always seen it.  Well, I was wrong.  It is 'Bated Breath' ~ well, it was originally  'Bated Breath' ~ and Shakespeare was the first to use the phrase in The Merchant of Venice.  In 1933 a Poet, by the name of Geoffrey Taylor, used the spelling 'Baited Breath' in his book 'A Dash of Garlic and thus, changed the meaning . . .

Sally, having swallowed cheese,
Directs down holes the scented breeze,
Enticing thus with baited breath
Nice mice to an untimely death.

So . . . now aren't you glad you stopped by . . .

til next time . . .

Charleen

THE ANSWER TO THE QUESTION I ASKED LAST TIME IS . . . NO

'This is called a 'Transit'.  This particular one is a $2500. piece of equipment.  It is suppose to tell you if the ground you are measuring is level.  If you remember from the last Blog, we wound up with a  3 1/2' difference from one corner of the house to the other.  (I did suggest we just put in a sunken livingroom but the humor was 'overlooked')  :/

Soooo . . . the next weekend it was back with this transit, the bulldozer, the bobcat, the excavator, the dump-truck, a dump-trailer and son-on-law Bob (oh yes, along with dear friends from Boise who came to visit for the weekend. It was suppose to be a Golf weekend for the boys, but . . . uh, that didn't quite work out . . .)  Bob drove all the excavating equipment  

  

and kept filling both the truck and trailer with a total of over 20 loads of dirt.  Glen just kept driving back and forth to the dump site and unloading either the truck or trailer, whichever was full.  They worked all day until dark...

and started up again on Sunday morning.  They finished about mid day, satisfied it was close enough to where it should be for the posts to be re-dug.  They were satisfied because the 'Transit' told them so.   Now . . . it still looked off, (I'm just sayin')  but 20 loads of dirt had been removed from the property and the Transit never lies.  

OH YEAH??!!

Workers back on Monday to re-dig for posts.  :)  Workers left on Monday without re-digging for posts.  :(

Seems the property was still not level.  Hmmm.  Twenty loads of dirt out and we were still 2 1/2' off.  Their $1500 Transit said our $2500 Transit lied.  Who you gonna believe?  Them.  Cause they are the ones digging the holes, and while they said they would dig the holes if we wanted, the offer came with an ominous 'But we're not guaranteeing anything and you'll wind up paying for it later' warning.  A little sour if you ask me. . . .

S o o o . . .  last weekend, once again, Bob, the Bobcat and the Bulldozer come back.  (Along with Jeff, our grandson Seans friend, who was lured with the promise of being able to try out the jack-hammer they thought they might need to break up some of that foundation Glen found when he went to the lay the water/sewer pipes.  Never had to use it so Bob let him jack-hammer dirt in his yard when they got home :) ) This time Bob and Glen pushed and pulled all the dirt around (what was left) and FINALLY got it to grade.  

Of course, this threw the scheduling for the house to the wind so we are now in limbo-land.  They were going to be here this past Wednesday and then, surprise,  it became next Wednesday.  Supposedly they didn't finish another project when they should have.  Our guess is they slipped a new project in front of ours.  By next Wednesday we will be a month behind where we thought we would be.  It's all about patience.

     

Since we actually had a free Sunday we decided to take a ride up in the hills behind Mullan.  This is the road (?) we wound up on.  It just kept getting narrower and narrower and . . .  Glen thought there would be a turn around but but no such luck.   It's then called 'backing up the Jeep the last quarter mile you just drove'.  Better him than me.  But then, I would have stopped driving on this road about 10 feet in.  Just sayin'.

Sunset on the way home.

See you soon!  (I hope!)

Charleen

DO THINGS EVER GO AS PLANNED . . . .

It's been a while since I've written but the building supplies that were suppose to be delivered July 1st . . . weren't.  They were suppose to be on the back end of a 40' truck that had another delivery in Montana and our supplies were going to be dropped off on the way there.  Unfortunately, the Company did not check our location before they made those arrangements.  The road up to our property is narrow, with several sharp turns and does not smile at 40' trucks.  They had to rethink their strategy and it took them an extra week and a half to do that.  

The Building Supplies.  :)

They had big, deep holes they had to dig for the Building posts.  They didn't want to start that until everything was here.  Delivery finally happened around the 10th and the post hole digging was again scheduled to start the next day.  

They sent a nice young fellow up with an Auger.  The holes are suppose to be approximately 4' deep.  This area we are in is called 'Boulder Canyon' or, as the locals call it 'Boulder Draw'.  The only thing the Auger managed to hit was Glens newly laid (and functioning) water and sewer pipes. That ended the work for that day (and the day after, and the day after, and . . .)  Pipes get fixed and back they come.  This time with a mini excavator ~ much more suitable for digging in this terrain.  But, before they start digging everyone realizes that the pipes are in the way and are only going to get hit again.  Re-measuring is done and the whole house (fortunately just string at this point!) is moved 5' in one direction.  Holes are dug with promises to be back the next day.  

  

This is not just any hole.  This is the hole with the broken water and sewer pipes.  :(

Three days later  the 'team' (2) shows up to set the posts.  BUT, what hadn't been noticed is the drop-off level of the property.  Yes, everyone could see that the property sloped but what no one realized is when the house was moved the 5' it threw the slope off expotentially and now we had this 3 1/2' difference in the floor level from one side of the house to the other.  Not a good thing.

Glen and helpers will be re`excavating one side of the property this weekend in order to level it off so 'maybe' next week they will REALLY get to start on the actual building.  

In the meantime, we have had more company in the last month than we had in one year over in Wenatchee.  I'm thinking that friends and family are glad we are back  :)  But, remember, we don't have a house yet!  So it has been fun figuring out who is going to stay where.  Tent, Trailer, the one bedroom in the apartment . . . We've had company from Coeur d'Alene, from Newport,Wa., from North Carolina, from North Dakota, from Lewiston, ID (and most of them all came on the same weekend ~ Thirteen people and 5 dogs!)

     

On the left:  Friends and family around the campfire.   Up at the top that's us at about the 9th hour of the Wallace Blues Festival.  We manged to last about 11 of the 12 hours it went on. :)

On the right:  Tents, Trailers, ATVS, motorcycle and Bikes all on our property.  Our RV is not in the photo.  (This is not a big piece of property by the way . . .)  The drink in the corner is mine!

                                                 
The Campfire at Night.  We needed something for a Campfire.  In the past Glen has built us some very nice Fire pits but for now we needed something temporary until the house is built and we have a permanent spot.  So, this is our Washing machine tub.  Uh huh.   They certainly don't look like much during the day but at night they just glow with the flames showing through all the holes in the tub.  The owner of the appliance Repair Shop said he can't keep them in stock.

Some Treasures from the property.  During the initial excavation the 'Cap Gun' up at the top was found.  Anyone remember those?  I had one.  I played Annie Oakley with mine . . .

In the mint green and violet trimmed garage that was on the property when we bought it, the other treasures were found up in the attic.  The fellows decided to get up there and see what was what.  Among other things, there were 3 old wooden boxes filled with books where Smokey the Bear was found, the old sled, and that's about a circa 1960 something International Pickup Tailgate.  Believe it or not, I've come up with a use for the Tailgate.  I'm going to let that be a surprise when we get to that point.  :

A Mullan Sunset over the property.

More Company arrives tomorrow from Boise.  They are (very) 'old' Friends.  :)  Hope they bring their work clothes!

Charleen

THE BEGINNING . . .

1. 
   
   

   A few months back we made the decision to leave the Orchards and Vineyards of Wenatchee, WA  and move back to the Western Montana/Northern Idaho area. We actually started looking in Western Montana and eventually settled on the small town of Mullan, Idaho.  Population somewhere around 800.  It sits about 6 miles from the Idaho/Montana border in the beautiful Northern Bitteroot Mountains.  Definitely no Orchards or Vineyards here!
   
   In fact, this is the property as we first saw it . . .
   

   

   
   

   That green building (with light purple trim!) is sort of an old garage.  I say sort of because there was just a gaping hole in the front where garage doors used to be.  There was no house and that was o.k. because we decided we wanted to build our 'Forever Home' ourselves.  O.K. . . I say 'home' which most people would equate to mean a 'house'.  I want to clarify that, especially to people who have seen and/or have been to one or more of our prior homes.  I don't want to mislead anyone and send you off down the wrong path.  This is not going to be like anyplace we have had previously.  This is going to be more like our 'Forever Cabin'.   (After all, we are up in the Mountains now :)  This will be small, simple (well . . . maybe not so much) and fun.  I thought I was being clever when I came up with the term 'Rustic Industrial' to describe our plan until I googled that phrase and found literally hundreds of references to Rustic Industrial Interior Design.  Obviously not so clever after all.  The object is to do this and then, at some point, guilt free, be able to head south in the Winter.  This will be our warm weather haven and official Home.  At least, that is the plan.

   
   

   The reason I decided to do a Blog about this is because a lot of our Friends and Family keep asking 'how are things coming along on the house?'  This way, with a click of the wrist, anyone can come see the progress for themselves.  Granted, a lot of it will probably be pretty boring, BUT, I have a funny feeling, since we are building this ourselves (o.k. since hubby Glen is building this himself!), there are going to be some mis-adventures along the way that will bring a laugh or two.  As to the title of the Blog . . . We have decided to name our new Home 'Camp Dunmovin' (wait . . . it may take a minute . . . :).   Thus, The Adventures at Camp Dunmovin.

   
   

   Excavation is done.  Not as level as it should be but I'm told a truckload or two of gravel should take care of that.  :/  Sewer and water lines are laid, hooked up and actually working!  We brought our RV to the property and had access to all the amenities.  :)  Then it rained for two weeks straight and turned everything to mud  . . .

   
   

   Below:   Just before the excavation began.  You can see the walkway remnants of the original home which has been gone for many years.  When the ditches were being dug for the sewer and water lines the fella's came across an old basement buried deep in the ground.  Needless to say this caused a little diversion to the original  layout of the pipes.  :/  The patio and walks were all buried under the snow when we bought the property.  

   
   

   

   
   

   The digging has begun . . .

       

       

    

   

                              
   

   
   

   
   

   We needed to remove some of the sod and HUGE rocks that were dug up during the excavation.  We have a friend who owns a Trucking Company in Coeur d'Alene so Glen asked if he could borrow one of his trucks for the removal.  He said "Sure. Take Old Blue."  Old Blue is an old 1974 Dump truck that I'm sure is kept around more for nostalgia than anything else.  For some unknown reason I wound up having to ride up to Mullan in Old Blue with hubby.  The photo below shows us discussing whether or not I am even going to get in the truck!  (I am only including these photos because I promised you some humor.)  There was a passenger seat (of sorts) and even a safety belt, but these trucks evidently don't even necessarily have passenger seats because who in their right mind would ever want to ride along in one of these!  I felt like a mixed drink, shaken over rocks, with no hearing left, by the time we completed the 50 mile trip.  You can't talk because you can't hear.  Therefore any bad words I might have wanted to use would have all been wasted.  

   
   

   

   
   

   There is NOTHING for me to grab hold of to get myself in to the truck so  . . .

   
   

   

   
   

   The next photo I'm not showing because there is nothing funny about the look on my face once I finally got up into the truck!

   
   

     Out of the mud  . . . a smile.  

   

   
   

   Building materials to be delivered July 1st!  :)

   
   

   
   

   
   

   
   

   
   

   
   

   
   

   Posted 36 minutes ago by Charleen Martin

   Labels: Cabin Charleen Martin Idaho Artist Moving Mullan Idaho Rustic

     

   0
   

   Add a comment

2. 
   
3. 
   
4. 
   
5. 
   

Loading