Teach a man to fish . . . and he builds a cabin in the woods - Our Spring Break project

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. 

sewing, skiing and schooling

Maddy and I were matching so we had to take a selfie.

Mindy's good friend Iliana moved to Seattle right after Christmas.Mindy was sad to see her go, but her grandparents live close to us so we will see her again.

We had a nice Christmas break and it was hard to start up schooling again in January. Here are Mackensey and Marianne doing homework on the couch in the living room. I offered to Mindy that if she wanted to look into taking another class at the jr high (she takes band right now) we could. She is so social I thought she would enjoy taking an academic class with her friends. Her response "Not unless I can take my couch with me!" I guess she likes the ease and comfort of doing her schoolwork at home...

Makayla got a sewing machine for Christmas. Here we have two desks set up in the basement with Mindy and Makayla's sewing machines side by side. When Barry saw the set up he had to laugh. When he was growing up his sister's had their sewing machines set up side by side in the basement. Makayla did an excellent job sewing this skirt. I think it turned out pretty cute. Stay tuned, her three sisters are all working on sewing projects at the moment.

 Ben was learning about inherited traits in his science schoolwork. I was explaining to him that was why he looked like his daddy. He said, "I don't think I look like daddy." I said, "Yes you do, you have blue eyes and freckles like daddy." Ben: "But my hair isn't like his he has a line down the side." He was talking about Barry's part. We explained to him that a part isn't something inherited. The science lesson segued into nature vs. nurture. :-)

We've had lots of snow to play with in the month of January.

Trying on ski boots. 

Makayla teaches Marianne how to ski. 

 

I have been giving Marianne ski lessons while the older kids are in their lessons. This week was Marianne's third ski lesson and it was time for her to graduate from the tow rope to the ski lift. We used the practice seat above and then went for it. They slowed it down for her to get on and off. The way off was not very graceful. I ended up grabbing her coat and basically dragging her off the lift. She had fun skiing on Animal Trail for her first time down the bunny hill. She fell down a lot and asked, "Why is skiing so hard?' I told her that it was a lot easier to learn as a kid than as an adult.

Skiing with Mackensey, Makayla, Ben and Mari.

This is Animal Trail. A side trail off the bunny hill. It is not very steep and very beautiful. 

It has been my routine to update my blog on Sunday evenings. Lately my Sunday evenings have been taken up in family history indexing. The website was down tonight, so I took the opportunity to update my blog ( I also posted a video of Marianne skiing on Facebook if you want to see that). I'll have to see how I can keep up with both my blog and indexing in the future.

Have a great week!

Decorating the Perfect Tree and Pictures with Santa

Stockings are hung on the banister with care.

Going through the lights. All of the strings had half of their lights not working.  We made do, but I think we'll have to throw them all away after Christmas and start over with new lights next year.

The store where Maddy works puts up and decorates 15 trees every year. She has the training and took over the lights on our tree this year.

There is a little more motivation to our Christmas decorating this year. We have volunteered to host the Chewelah Camber of Commerce Christmas party. Barry is the chamber vice-president, and the people who come to the chamber party are people like the mayor, Maddy's boss and other business owners and is basically a who's who of Chewelah. 

This week Makayla (front) and Mackensey (back row) had three choir concerts. Christmas is a busy time for their elementary school choir.

Marianne had to be talked into sitting on Santa's lap. She was very brave (and pretty darn cute if you ask me).

Speaking of cute...

Have a great week! We'll let you know how the party goes.

P.S. This is my 100th blog post. That is something to celebrate! Thanks for reading so we can keep in touch.