You may have heard — you may even have noticed personally — that this has been quite the winter for snow in the northeastern United States, where we live.  For most of the past two months, it has also been routinely 20-30 degrees below freezing during the day and colder at night.

A winter’s snow, mid-February. That’s the end of the first floor deck, the surface of which is about four-and-a-half feet off the ground. I reckon that’s about four feet of snow and ice perched atop it. And we’ve had a few storms since.

That has meant a very busy and happy time at the day job, but it has caused work on the cottage to cease, as noted.  Beyond the inconvenience, there have been added challenges.  Continue reading →

This picture is about a month old.

There’s even more snow on it now, and more to come — I oddly hope. There’s a big chunk of ice on top of Clark; I need to get up there and sweep it off. The roof is bowing.

Continue reading →

Peace on Earth and goodwill toward all. For one day, at least.

It’s been pretty quiet in our small wood, lately.

Our Thanksgiving travels and other obligations have kept us from the work for a while now. It has snowed and rained and melted and snowed again, and rained again in that time. The wall isn’t standing yet, and there is a snowstorm predicted for this Tuesday and Wednesday. Continue reading →

When particularity gives way to expediency:

Good morning, Mr. 11 Degrees!

Our first wall… Continue reading →

Winter is upon us.

If you live in southwestern New York, you know this already. But even in the comparatively soft and gentle lands of New England we’ve noticed the cold. When I arrived at the site last week, the muddy ground had turned to rimey crust, hard to the foot – if not quite to the wheel. A skim of ice coated the work of the week before. Continue reading →

At some point along the way, it became obvious that we weren’t really building a camp in the woods, but rather a second home. Continue reading →

Apologies if I’ve put a corny 60s song in your head.

I was able to devote four nearly full days to the work this past week and although much was done, it wasn’t the kind of work that yields stunning process photography. Nor was my mood the kind that yielded much in the way of philosophic reflection. Sometimes things go slower than you’d like them to and sometimes that’s all there is to it.

Looking back at last week’s post, though, I have to say that we’ve gotten along. When I left Vermont the last time, I’d set up the frame for the first deck and measured out a pile of joists to cut. And that was it.

Today we have all of the joists in place, all of the blocking completed, almost all of the sub-bracing done, and half of the floor decked over. I’ll let the pictures tell the tale this time. Continue reading →