Sheathing the roof

When we left our heroes, the rafters were up, and light snowfall was drifting gently between them to land on the tarp laid out on the subfloor. Time to get some plywood on top so that, at a minimum, we can get through the winter with a tarp holding the snow out.

On Saturday, we put the bottom 8-foot row of OSB in place. We really appreciated the pneumatic nailer for this part of the job!

It wasn't supposed to snow at all, but we picked up about half an inch.

It wasn't too bad, and now there's only a couple foot slot letting snow into the interior. Good thing, because snow was forecast for Sunday, with sunny skies on Monday. We laid the tarp back out and went home.

When we got back on Monday, several inches of snow had appeared, so we started the day by shoveling off the roof.

Siggy enjoyed watching this video of his big brother using the nailer:

On Tuesday, we finished sheathing the ends and gables.

Our neighbor Russ came over to help.

We worked late into the night to button it up, thinking this may be the last thing we can do before the cabin has to suffer the winter. We wrapped the house in Tyvek, and pulled the tarp over the top.

Pulling the tarp over was a comedy of errors. Two tired Howells, plus neighbors Russ and Daryl. Lots of lengths of rope to guide it. A screwed-together beam to coordinate the leading edge of the tarp. It kept getting stuck on nails and then on the ridge. Finally, we got it over the ridge and started it down the other side. It slid, and slid, and kept sliding, pulling all fifty feet of the tarp right over the ridge and down the tall side of the house. Oops.

A few more ropes and we tried again. This time the leading edge board broke, so we had to take it down. The third time was the charm. We got the tarp lashed into place, tensioned it up against the wind, and walked down the hill to leave our little building to its wintry fate.

(In the back of my mind, of course, I started thinking about ordering some roofing metal, you know, just in case we got another break in the weather.)

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The trim finishing journey begins

The last time we installed wood trim (almost two years ago!), we sanded and cut the material inside the cabin (it was winter) and installed it unfinished. Finishing it meant taping everything off and applying three coats of finish in place. Removing the masking was frustrating (the finish glued it to the wall in places), and in other places the finish still got where it didn't belong. Now the cabin is full of nice, finished floors, cabinets, and counters. It's not a shop. So this time, I'm sanding and pre-finishing all the boards outdoors. Thankfully, there's still pretty nice weather; that black tarp garage heats up pretty well when the sun's out. Today I got the first batch of wood sanded and a coat of finish applied. Christina installed eight receptacles in the kitchen and great room. My mom came up to enjoy the warm ambiance of the not-yet-active wood stove.

Uncrating the wood stove

I drove up to the cabin today to meet a tree contractor. Since I was up there anyway, I took care of some other business. I got the wood stove out and ready to install on Monday. I vacuumed up the tiny particles of styrofoam packaging material from last year's roofing panels that would have been much easier to clean up last year. I put the bathroom outlet back into its adjusted place above the backsplash. I corrected my installation of the heat pump wiring with a pair of reducing washers. Now it's really done. I replaced the emergency brake battery system in the flatbed trailer. I bucked a bunch of old logs into rounds for firewood.

It is DONE!

The final inspection was today. This guy is Levi, the county inspector, and as you can see, we passed! He only had two questions for me. One was about the energy efficiency credits and the blower door test, for which I had the compensating paperwork for the low-flow faucets already prepared. The second was asking for a smoke detector outside the bedroom; I pointed up and he saw that we already had one tucked into the alcove. And that was that! I got up at 5am to be certain I'd be here before the inspector, and I was ... by about five hours. In that time, I took another truckload of tool buckets down to the storage container, then picked up all the floor protection in the great room and vacuumed and mopped. It's glowing! Then I went back down to the storage container to get a hammer so I could glue in 32 wood plugs to cover the screws for the french doors. I fought with installing the screens, but the frames are too big! The manufacturer said "yeah we don't even make th...

Howell Cabin

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