Barry has always wanted to make a playhouse for the kids. This year it was time to make that dream a reality.
I told Barry that since out kids are getting older we couldn't call it a playhouse or they wouldn't use it. So we are calling it "the cabin". It is built in the woods on top of the hillside in front of our house.
It has been 6 years since we finished building our house and this was a good project to keep our skills sharp. Thanks to my dad and the many others who taught us how to fish, build a house.
We set aside our week long spring break to work on the cabin, but two things got in the way of that plan. One: we all were sick the first few days of spring break and two: there was a mix up with our supply order and most of the materials were delivered the Tuesday AFTER spring break!
We still had plenty of things to do during spring break to get ready to build the cabin. We had old cedar boards that we used a planer to plane off the weathered part of the board so that we could use cedar for the interior. It will be able to be used as a sauna once we get a wood stove to put in there.
At one point we had all of the power tools that we own being used by everyone in the family.
Except Marianne, who thought it was just too loud!
We leveled out the ground, made a platform, and raised the walls.
The dimensions for the cabin are 10ft by 10 ft with a four foot front porch.
There is a front door and four windows, one on each side. The window on the back wall is able to open.
We built the bunk beds before putting on the trusses so that we could stand on them to position the trusses. That was a good plan and we were glad we did.
Luckily it didn't rain before we got the roof on, but since the cedar boards were salvaged from an old deck, we figured it wouldn't be the first time these boards had gotten wet.
We invited the missionaries to come help us put up the trusses and nail on the boards for the roof.
Elder Trosset proved to be invaluable and didn't mind the height. His dad was a general contractor and owned a construction firm. He was handy with the nail gun and we were happy to have his help.
Maddy used her skills that she learned in shop class. We followed Uncle Steve's advice to measure twice, cut once!
The roof has a nice, steep pitch so the snow will fall right off.
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The roof was so steep we had to put the shingles on while standing on a ladder. You can't see from this picture, but the ladder is fully extended, and set up in the bed of the pickup. That is me nailing on the final row of shingles. I have the black and blue thumb nail to prove it!
We decided to insulate the cabin to keep it cool in the summer and warm in the winter.
We had to juggle our schoolwork, sports practice, piano lessons, Barry's business appointments, but still ended up working on the cabin 2-4 hours/day.
We took a break from building to roast hot dogs and marshmallows.
It was still cool in the end of April when the kids had their first sleepover.
We still had the siding and ceiling to go.
The outside is finished with tyvek. We'll worry about the siding later....maybe next spring break.
The cedar paneling for the walls and ceiling turned out looking very nice. One of the first things we had to do was make curtains since it stays light until 10pm in the summertime.
I made super thick black out curtains that roll up completely out of the way. They can be easily removed for when we want to turn it into a sauna.
The kids have slept in the cabin many times, even in a thunderstorm!
Barry did a good job planning out and building this playhouse/cabin. It will get much use in the many years to come. I'm glad I'm married to such a clever, hard working man.
We got walkie-talkies so that we can communicate from the house to the cabin.
This is the view of the house and valley from the front porch of the cabin. Even without the walkie-talkies we could yell up to the cabin and be heard.
