Pink foam

I'm sure that May arrived with more sunshine and warm temperatures than we ever saw in all of 2014.  The heat came on suddenly, making us look desperately around the cabin for lighter clothing; shorts, t-shirts and even baseball caps to help protect us from the unexpected heat and UV rays! The anticipated bug season began, but the black flies were few, the mosquitoes are just starting to bite now, and the deer flies came early. Usually we see a good long season of each one, followed by the next. This year they all seemed to arrive, albeit in smaller numbers, at the same time.

We had humidex levels in the mid 30's followed by cold fronts that brought a sudden and severe overnight frost.  I first noticed an odd look to the sumac trees, and after checking with a nature group that I follow online, heard that many other varieties of trees in the area were affected by that same frost. Rob later noticed that our oaks were also hit.  We aren't sure yet what this means for the trees - it's highly unusual for such a late, hard frost.

May brought the return to Canada of our "old" friend Joe, and we were extremely happy to see him on the two occasions that he kindly took the time to drive up here to visit with us. I hadn't seen him in 25 years, and Rob hadn't seen him for a good number of years either.  Within minutes of his arrival though, it was as though he had never left.  I was amazed to find that even hearing his voice in our new house seemed totally familiar. We sure have missed him, and it was lovely to reminisce a little, and catch up on some of the details of our lives.

We also were lucky to have a chance to see our friend Mose, who we hadn't seen in about 7 years!  When he called to say he was about a two hour drive away, we dropped our plans for building that day and made a quick trip down to see him.  It was a short visit - as we have to try to organize ourselves around cat and dog feeding times, meds for feline diabetes etc. but still - it was a chance for a quick chat and we were glad to be able to do it.

May is also the month that I get to accompany my very sweet and generous friend Elizabeth on her yoga retreat in the beautiful Northumberland countryside.  It was a wonderful weekend of terrific vegetarian food, great yoga, kirtan and a "therapeutic art experience", all in the company of 20+ amazing women.   A big "thank you" to Elizabeth for the awesome weekend!

(And kudos to Rob as well - as he had to look after our 4 cats (with various diet and medication requirements) all weekend while I was gone, while still working on building the new house, and doing the volunteer work he does each April/May for the amazing group of people that work so hard to put on the spectacular fundraiser "Sounds and Tastes" for ACCESO International!)

The May Long weekend fell a touch early this year, and we both thought it would cause problems for the unsanctioned annual "float down the river event".  Usually the river would be high, fast and extremely cold. This year the river was slow, low and warm!  The floats cruised slowly in the current, and often would hang on the rocks below. Some of the occupants would casually hop off into the river and push the float along a ways. The lovely weather brought out a lot more entrants, and it was fun to watch them go by during the day.

While we were both busy with visiting old friends, weekend escapes, and river gazing, we were also admiring the annual return of the migrating birds. This year, for the first time, a male Baltimore oriole showed up, singing away, and I was fretting that there was no female in the area. Sure enough though one showed up, and they have stuck around, so hopefully this will become an annual occurrence. As well, another one of our favourites - the red wing black birds, have set up on our side of the river!  This is the first time we have seen them here, although in the past we could hear them on the other side.  We hope this will be a regular occurrence as well.

Every day we noticed more of the spring flowers in the forest, and loved inhaling the rich scent of the woods and river on our daily walks. Somewhere in there - there was also some progress on the new house!

Sometimes Rob laments that he is not making progress, especially after a day of planning, or redoing drawings and calculations. But I am always amazed as I look back at the photos for the previous month at just how much work has been done.

Putting the foam up on the outside of the house has been a bit of a learning curve, and as always, Rob was keen to work out some interesting ways to approach the project.

Cutting foam can be a messy job and a tricky one. Rob rigged up some cool looking hot wire gizmos that easily cut the sheets at different angles, with little mess.

Just to show how it works, he cut some fancy shapes too!

He is putting up two layers of  foam on the outside walls, and three layers on the roof. Wood strapping, and house wrap follow, then a layer of plywood.  The metal roof will be added as soon as he is finished (after we finally decide on the type of metal roofing, and get it ordered!) The wood siding will be added much later. (Hopefully some time next year)   

The foam board is quite pink when it goes on. I could get used to a pink house!  The pink fades pretty quickly though.  Rob was pleased with the way the corners worked out. (If he wasn't so busy building  - he would fill this blog in with a lot more details - like how he has to stagger the layers so the seams don't line up)

The foam cutting hot wire gizmos worked beautifully.

The windows were covered over briefly.  We sure missed the view of the river when we were sitting inside having our afternoon tea break!

(And yes - one year later we still don't have all of the windows we ordered. Sigh.)

Rob cut away the extra wrap, tucked extra foam in around the windows and tucked the wrap in around them. 

Then the eaves went in as he started his way up the first roof.

Rob was really dreading the roof work. It's a lot of ladder work, and pretty hard on knees, calves, and hip joints! It also means moving the scaffolding around. A lot. Taking it down, moving it, and putting it back up isn't the most fun part of the job.

 Luckily the foam isn't too heavy to carry around.

It's hard to believe, but when it rains, water still works it's way through some areas and drips inside. Not a lot, but some.  We will be so glad when the final roof is on!

Rob has a safety harness that he uses of course.  However, the weight of the straps, the tool belt, and the various tools, while working in full sunlight on the roof can be a bit much. The glare off the foam is pretty strong so he has to wear sunglasses too. He says the worst part though, is when he sprays foam into the cracks, then moves along. The harness rope drags through the spray foam and gets really sticky, and he then gets it all over himself as well. Nice.

And so, June arrived, and with it came early sunrises and late sunsets. Rob manages to put in a pretty long day of work at the new house. Even on rainy days, he can continue to work on projects inside the house. For the most part, he tries to take advantage of any decent weather and work as long and hard as he can outside.

We do try to take time together to sit out in the morning for a few minutes in the screened in porch of the cabin, and enjoy watching the hummingbirds come to the feeder, and the sounds of all the nesting birds in the area. One morning I saw what I thought was a shaggy dog, trotting down the path between the cabin and the river.  Rob says that I could only stutter  - "Rob, Rob, Rob.... Bear!"  A few seconds later Jet got a whiff of it and started barking. My first bear sighting!  It was a smallish one, so presumably young.  We called the neighbours to let them know it was heading their way, just in case their grandkids were outside.  They said in all their years here, they've never seen a bear.

For those of you who know how much Rob and I used to love our daily walks in a stunning wetland area where we used to live, and our devastation when that area was destroyed, along with the wildlife that lived there - you will understand how very pleased we are to have a gorgeous area here, that is home to beavers, and muskrat and turtles and other wildlife.  When a snapping turtle showed up in the garden and tried to lay her eggs, we were in awe.

We think the area is too rocky though, as she moved out of the garden, and stood staring up at our doorway for quite a while and then left.  Later in the week she tried out several spots near the new house. We don't think she was successful there either. Still, it was lovely to see her.

And just as lovely to stand in a rather spectacular spot, just steps away from the new house. It's filled with channels that the beavers and muskrat and turtles use, and we hope that we spend many, many more years here, in this lovely space, as we learn a little bit more about the wonderful creatures that live here.

Spring Arrives...slowly

I am beginning to think that I should call this blog "the weather blog" (or maybe No Skin Exposed and Slightly Fed Up) as each and every posting seems to dwell on the weather, and the fact that it usually isn't cooperating with us very much.
But as I look through the photos I took over the past  month, I can see that despite the below normal temperatures, we really did move somehow into Spring. It is most apparent with the changes in the river.

It's funny how it goes - one day there's nothing but snow and ice and more snow and ice - then one afternoon you realize you are walking on a smaller patch of snow, and a few days later you peer through the woods and there's just - bright green moss and brown leaves! There's no more white - well maybe a patch here and there... but you know that the snow is finally melting. Next thing you know, the coat you're wearing is too warm, and winter boots feel totally unnecessary!

I would say though, that I was glad of that coat later in April when it got really chilly again. And I haven't put it away - not just yet.

Throughout the month, Rob did his best to get some work done on the new house.  It wasn't easy though.
Even though he could manage sometimes to work in the cooler temperatures, all of the jobs seemed to require the use of something that was temperature dependent. (Requiring warm temperatures, not cold ones!)  He had hoped to finish up the work on the outside concrete, permanently attaching the foam slabs and sealing the screw holes with spray foam, and applying a finish on top. He realized that it was still too cold outside to use the spray foam or the finish. The north side of the house still had snow around it, and he couldn't even get at the concrete on that side for a while. Sometime around the middle of the month though, some warmer weather arrived (briefly!), the snow finally melted around the house, and he was able to get at some of the concrete slab.

When the weather was too wet or too cold, we took the opportunity to go pick up some of the items we had sourced during the winter.  We try to pick up the items we want when they go on sale. We now have two very nice low flush toilets, a kitchen sink, taps, a bathroom sink and tap, a second hand bathroom sink and tap, and a bathtub! In the end (see last blog posting) I wasn't able to try it out first in the store. But we did open the box and set the tub up here in the porch so I could climb in and check it out! It seems fine.. and is narrower and deeper than our current tub, so shouldn't require any more water to fill it.  We still need to find taps for it.

One day when it was sunny but too cold to work inside or outside, we took the time to drive up to a local sawmill to pick up the flooring for the second floor.  Although the wood looked good when they loaded it, Rob discovered when we got home that a lot of it was not good quality at all. On the plus side, it was a beautiful drive to the sawmill, on some roads we'd never been on.

Fortunately, he found another sawmill close by, and was able to pick up some much better quality wood.
Unfortunately, we now have rather a lot of v-joint pine sitting in the house! We will have to be creative with the poor quality wood we bought at the first sawmill. (It's too expensive to become firewood for that wood stove in the background!)

Ideally we should be staining the underside (which will be the ceiling of the guest room and bathrooms and mudroom) before we install it. But it is still too cold in the house to use the staining products, so we will have to do it later. I know that painting overhead is not my favourite job - or Rob's! But it made more sense to get the floor in now while we had a chance.

Rob wanted to glue the floor down, and some days it was too cold to use the glue, so he'd move on to a different job, like building interior walls! Well - the framing part at least.

Slowly, we are getting our second floor in too. It's going to be a funky little area up there, and will make for great studio space.

And yes, there will be railings!  I am really not good at heights, so it's pretty amazing that I even went up and got that shot.

When it got even colder, he moved back into working on the stair design on the computer in the cabin. It's probably just as well, it gave him a chance to slowly work back into the long days of physical labour. As a lot of the work this month involves him being on his knees, and although he wears the best of knee pads, it still means he's rather sore by the end of the day.

With the arrival of the wall studs, I could begin to picture the interior of the house. It's funny because I have looked at the drawings for months, yet for some reason I didn't have the right placement for the guest room at all ! I picked up some paint chips and started to think about colours for the various rooms. Of course we are a long way away from that just yet, but it was fun to think about it at least.

And then these beautiful glass trivets arrived, a gift from my brother and super-sis, and although they sit here in the cabin for now, shining out their lovely blue light, I can't wait to get them into a place of honour in the new house! Thank you both !!

If April didn't bring us a lot of warm days, it did bring us a lot of glorious sunshine, and deep blue skies. And the return of lots more migratory birds. After hearing the haunting sound of the sandhill cranes for a couple of days, but with no sight of them, four of them flew directly over the cabin one day. Despite their enormous size, with their wings stretched out, and their feet straight back, they simply floated higher and higher on the thermals, calling all the time, until we could barely see them, and then they just floated away. Apparently they make good use of the thermals to go longer distances with less effort during their migration! What a sight....and what a sound...

One of our other favourite sounds of course it that of the "peepers". Even now I can hear them, and all the windows are closed!  It's such a lovely sound to go to sleep to. During the day we hear the other frogs calling, and I was totally enchanted when the grandfather of all frogs hopped up the driveway this week, and up onto a rock where he sat, corners of his mouth slightly upturned, and allowed me to sit and watch him for a while. He had the longest toes I have ever seen on a frog. He slowly made his way off in the direction of the other frogs later that afternoon.

We've yet to see any turtles, but with the last of the snow disappearing around the beaver channels, we are hoping to see some soon.

The robins have returned of course, the yellow bellied sapsuckers are busy chasing each other around, the grouse is drumming in the forest, and this week the swallows arrived. (Oh dear, a sure sign that black flies and mosquitoes will soon be here too!)

Just as we were lamenting that the bugs would arrive, and we wouldn't have had a chance to experience any nice, warm and bug-free weather - the temperatures rose back to normal, and then beyond.  Bliss!! The weather we've been hoping for arrived this week.  Rob quickly changed gears, stopped doing inside work jobs, and went back to the outside concrete work.  With two good days in the forecast, and no chance of rain, he got two coats of  the finish on to all sides of the house, and started the same process (screwing in the foam slabs, foaming the holes, and applying the cloth and finish) on the workshop slab.

Suddenly, instead of hot cups of tea, I was bringing cold drinks to him.  It was a fast switch. Wearing winter coats and multiple layers one day, t-shirts the next!

Almost daily now a "new" bird arrives, and the scenery changes. I love hanging out at one of the "pond" areas and listening to the frogs on one side and the sound of the river just beyond.  This little area will dry up quite a bit once the river levels drop in the summer, but for now it's a busy spot. The ducks check it out every now and then, and later on the heron will do a little fishing here.

I even caught sight of a rather shy porcupine one afternoon (whew - glad Jet wasn't with me!) as he scuttled away through the woods and up a cedar tree, keeping a good eye on me the whole time.

After the quiet solitude of the winter, the air is full of sounds now.  There is a lot of nest building going on around the cabin, with lots of birds flying around with bits of building materials in their beaks.  I guess Rob and I are sort of doing the same - ramping up that building process! It will be interesting to see how far we progress between now and the next blog posting.

February... March.... bring on Spring!

February is known for it's unsettled weather, with extreme lows, and occasional thaws. We certainly had the lows, but there was no sign of any thawing for the entire month! We had several "extreme cold warnings", wicked wind chills of minus 35 to minus 40, and bitterly cold nights.  But, as we watched the snowy weather patterns on the east coast of Canada and the US, we decided that we were feeling pretty lucky overall! We did get a bit of snow, but nothing major for the entire month.

For us, February is also "the month of love". We celebrate the anniversary of our first date, Valentine's Day, and the anniversary of our moving in together.  (Don't do the math  - we did indeed move in together after knowing each other for a pretty short time.) We met 37 years ago - so far it seems to have worked out pretty well....

So while some people say February is their least favourite month of the year - we are rather fond of it.  We spent most of it cozied up next to the wood stove, or heavily bundled up and walking with Jet outside. Rob kindly made sure the truck would start every morning that I had to go to work, and I would fill the passenger seat with extra mitts, hat, and scarves, in case of any problems with the truck during my commute. I discovered that the beautiful Alpaca wool wrap that was a gift from my friend Elizabeth was perfect for wrapping around my knees, or draping over my shoulders, keeping me warm each day until the truck really warmed up.

I experienced some of the most stunningly beautiful views on my ride into work; cold winter sun barely glowing through the early morning ice crystals, drifts of snow blowing over the farm fields, and shaggy, frosty cattle grazing on their morning bundles of hay.  One morning I passed one of the Mennonite men, in an open buggy, well bundled but still looking awfully cold, and the horse pulling the buggy all covered in ice. One evening I looked in my rear view mirror and caught the sight of a lovely big grey horse pulling a buggy up a dark and snow covered lane way - the horse perfectly lit by the lights that were mounted on the wagon. Of course I have no photos of these moments, but the images are firmly in my memory!

In fact, I have few photos from this month at all.  And many are ones I took from inside the warmth of the cabin!

Each time there is a fresh snowfall, I like to go out and look for new animal tracks. There are snowshoe hare tracks all over the property, but I rarely see the actual rabbit. One day as I sat inside at my computer though, I caught some movement outside the window, and there was a lovely hare, browsing on some cedar. Thanks to the German Shepherd who seems to have put nose prints on the inside window - possibly not my clearest shot - but it was lovely to sit and watch the hare eat for a while.

The number of animal tracks crossing the river increased in February as well. The river appeared to be frozen, but when we stood at the edge of the river there were sections where we could still hear the river flowing beneath the ice. In an area one afternoon, it sounded exactly like lovely steel drums.  We always walk cautiously along the edge, and don't venture out too far.  The coyotes, deer and fox seem to have so such qualms. One thing I haven't seen this year, is the tracks of the wild turkeys. They usually show up along the river edge, and all around the cabin but this year there have been none.

We like to follow the deer tracks, as they seem to have a bit of a highway running in front of the cabin, along the edge of the river, and over to the new house where they cross in front of the living room windows.

It was also nice to be able to walk along the frozen river edge and look to see how much of the house is visible from the river. (Not much!)  I couldn't do it in the fall when the house first went up, as the river was too high, too cold and running too fast!  Funny to think that was just a few short months ago.

With the cold wind chills we didn't manage to get out for any snow shoe hikes this year. We did don some snowshoes briefly one afternoon when we went to help our friend Bob take down a dead tamarack tree.  We needed the snow shoes to get through the snow and down to where the tree was. It's a bit of a slope down to the lake where Bob lives, and Rob took a few minutes to show us some excellent techniques for getting up when you fall over! Here he demonstrated the roll method, and the use of a pole.

Later on he demonstrated the tree hugging method.  I am sorry I laughed - but I did manage to ask if he was all right...!  We still wonder if Bob didn't wax those snowshoes!

In terms of the house building, obviously not much has been going on in the house. But Rob has been extremely busy working on the plans, and sourcing items. He twice had to cancel travel plans for picking up the off grid system due to the weather and poor road conditions.  But he was pleased to be able to finally pick up the panels, inverters, and controllers, one cold bright sunny day.  I think I pictured some sort of major celebration when he arrived home with them, but it was cold and dark when he arrived home, and we simply carried in what we could, admired the boxes, and decided to celebrate when they system is actually installed!

The reality of going off grid did however, become a bit more "real" with the arrival of the panels. Rob has been working on the lighting plans for the house, and had to think carefully about putting in multiple switches to ensure that we could turn on a light when we entered a room, but also turn it off as we exited into the next room.  We've been practising here to turn unnecessary lights off more often, but I think we will find ourselves improving on that! I picked up a good indoor drying rack for drying clothes and have been using it for the last couple of weeks to see how it does. (It's great!) Although the clothes dryer would have to be on propane, we are seriously considering not bothering with one at all.

Rob has been researching bath tubs - (acrylic vs. cast iron vs steel - I think marble is out!) and here's the problem.  I LOVE the bath tub here - there is something about it that is just really comfortable. But I don't know what it is!  I'm told the best thing to do is to go to the store and get into the tub you want - and check it out for fit. Well - most stores have them on display stacked above each other on a rack, way up high. I don't think you can ask them to please just bring it down so you can get into it!  I guess we will have to look into it a bit more.

Other items on the list - low flush toilets, bathroom fans, wiring, (Rob is reading the entire newest version of the Electrical Code book!) wood stove installation, interior wall designs. Final design for the kitchen (the peninsula is now an island!) Rob's been trying to simplify the workshop design. The solar panels will be mounted on the roof of the workshop, so the sooner they are on the better. The workshop is not yet built however!

February was a great month to spend time planning and researching. But I think our brains are getting full, and both of us just want to get on with the actual building. I know though, that when Rob is in the thick of it - he'll be glad that he took the time to think things out first.

Unfortunately March arrived with a forecast for below normal temperatures, and we woke up one morning to a thermometer reading of minus 33 ! Rob had expected that he would be able to get back to building by the beginning of March, but has been frustrated by the continuing cold. Suddenly though, in mid-March, we were teased with a brief spell of above normal temperatures, blue skies, and glorious warm sunshine.

The concrete pad inside the house began to warm up a bit, and Rob even opened some windows in the house during the day to allow the warmer air from outside to come into the house.

The river began to show some signs of thawing, and we were hoping that the warm trend would continue.

Rob decided it was time to remove some of the snow from around the house, in hopes that he would soon have some bare ground, and access to the east and south sides of the house at least.

Of course, March being March, another storm blew in, and the promised rain arrived as snow instead.  On the plus side, it was very beautiful!

We will get building soon. This week the jays and the chickadees moved into a different song, the song of spring. The deer have been more active in the woods and on our roads.

There was a bit more warmth in the sun, and it is beginning to set a little later in the day. We've been able to go for a walk most evenings when I get home from work.

 Despite the cold, spring is surely on it's way.

And with the imminent arrival of spring, our "winter hibernation" period is about to end. We are enjoying our last few days of relaxation before the work on the house begins again.