Rustic Life

Have you ever made a comment to someone else and realized you've never said anything so true before.  I have.  The other day on Facebook I said ~ "Reminds me Why I love this Rustic Life!" ~ Suddenly I realized that I DO love my Rustic Life.  But how does one become Rustic?  For me it started when Baby #2 forced us to change our living arrangements.  We decided if we were going to build we wanted to build a log cabin.  After much planning and the birth of  Baby #2 we finally started building our Cabin on the Hill.



The Very Beginning

This was our first set of delivered logs.  As you can see they arrived flat on top and bottom but unpeeled.  My father-in-law (who was logging the Adirondacks at the tender age of 12) taught us all how to peel the bark off the logs.  A simple but time consuming task in warm weather...a nearly impossible task once the winter cold sets in.



Freshly Peeled Hemlock





We were so happy when we saw how pretty the Hemlock was once it was peeled.  And we felt so proud of what we had accomplished...Litte did we know that we'd have to repeat the process for a dozen more times!  And then log stacking began!

 

 

So what happens to a partially completed cabin when you run out of sunny summer days?  You Tarp it to protect it from the Northern NY Snow...

 

 

And then you spend the winter cleaning off the snow before it rips the "temporary" roof!

 

The Sunny Days returned with a Vengence in April!  Bringing temps in the 90+ range!  So Hubby took his vacation time and work resumed!  I was amazed by how much the skeleton crew got done in such a short time.

 

It wasn't long before they were ready to put up the 2nd floor joists...at least that's how it feels now.  Back then every accomplishment seemed to take forever.  But handcrafting every log is a time consuming process and it goes without saying... a ton of hardwork!

 

Of course, the ladies worked hard too!  Here's what we liked to refer to as "Another Peeling Party". 

 

I got to be quite handy with the boom truck!  And I have to say...I loved every minute!

 

Of course the log delivery is the easy part of the job... Not long after this picture was taken Hubby's chain on his chainsaw broke.  It flew up past his face parting his beard as it flew by.  After his brush with death Hubby called a lunch break, and then put a new chain on and went back to work. 

 

There are so many things wrong with this construction photo...safety violations everywhere but with my brother on one ladder and Hubby clinging like Spiderman the last of the logs were put in place.

 

Rafters made our log pile finally look like a home.

 

For those of you who don't know my Dad he is notoriously afraid of heights.  So this photo below is what Love looks like.  My Dad and My Hubby hard at work 32 feet in the air!

 

Add Windows, Doors, and a Metal Roof and Voila! You have a Cabin!  (By Voila I mean it took us 18 months of constant hardwork in every spare moment and tons of help from our family and our friends.  And Voila!!!)

 

That was the beginning of our "Rustic Life".