Cabin Project

Project update. Sorry its been so long.

2008-10-06T19:45:00.000-07:00

Alot has happened with the cabin project since the last update. The roof was completed and then the windows went in. We were able to get these windows at an incredible price off of criagslist. And they matched quite nicely.

Here is another view of the building from the back with the windows in and the roof completed. Also in the middle of this wall the load center and meter are now installed.

Side view with the porch. We are going to add a banister around the porch for the kids and other not so careful people. Like yours truely. I stepped backward off the porch thinkng the steps were behind me. It was not to bad, just wigged out my leg. Could have been worse since it was like a 5 foot drop. Oh well. I guess i pioneered that for everyone.

Big happening, Bill Breeze came from Cali for two weeks and helped the team make huge progress. While he was here the power went in, and the dry wall and the bathrooms. Thanks a million Bill for your help.

Here is what the bathrooms look like. Very professional.

John put in the ceiling paneling with the exhaust fans. it all came out looking sweet. There are 3 lofts the biggest one being about 15 by 20 feet spilt level. And the drywall went in as well.

Dale wiring up the whole house. He even took the time to counter sink spot lights into some of the loft supporting logs. definately a nice touch.

Another view of one of the smaller lofts. They will be handy for living or working spaces, or just for lots of storage. which is kind of strange idea, as we never have any storage.

Stay tuned for more frequent updates.

Progress..... on other fronts. The Teen club house.

2008-09-30T06:59:00.000-07:00

Here is the story of the new club house building which was recently donated. The 30by40 building is for the Safe teen project and we had to find a way to get in from the road to its site. So we rented a bob-cat and first made a ramp. So we could get it in off the road.

Here is the cool bob-cat which was like driving a large Computer game console with joy sticks and everything. It had genuine force feed back. I.e no suspension and solid tires so it was a bit jarring to drive around. Esp for 8 hours. So we took turns.

Then we filled a large ditch and leveled it all out so the building could come through. We had plenty of grade around in piles which was donated by the manuciple road works when they were digging a pipe line near by and needed a place to dump the displaced soil. So they gave it to us.

Here is Dale taking his turn. He actually liked driving the bob-cat and i had to pry him out so i could get my last turn in. Just kidding.

We finished all the dirt work and the building rolled in 30 minutes later on a cool building moving trailer imported from New zealand. It was attached to a truck but the back wheels of the trailer had about 5 hydralic adjustments for the angle and height and you could control the whole thing from a little hand held remote. Biggest RC vehicle i had ever seen.

Another picture of the building going into place. It hit a bridge and some road signs on the way in so its a little scraped up. but nothing that won't buff out. PTL. Now we have a cool building sitting next to the kids class room. They have began to have weekly area teen meetings in the building. And we will fix it all up soon. Stay tuned for more updates on that project. When they happen.

a little progress update on the cabin

2008-09-02T21:30:00.000-07:00

And the roof is done. God bless John who did almost all of the work on the roof. It was a great big job but it all worked out and got done. Here are a couple of pics of us putting the shingles on the back side of the building.

The pitch of the roof was so steep we had straps to keep us from slipping and rolling off the roof.

Work now is being done on the inside of the building and its moving forward. more pictures coming shortly.

The porch roof

2008-08-05T15:08:00.000-07:00

Here are pictures of the porch roof going in place the rafters for the porch roof are 4 by 6 and the boys cut a design into the end of each one. It took a bit of time but the effect is definitely worth it.

John looking all happy with his work. Good work John.

Here is a better picture of the porch roof. Tim from Blanco came over to check it out so we snapped a picture of him on the roof too. Hi, there Tim.

Here is what it looks from underneath with the planking. we wanted to do it in planking instead of OSB so that the nails and anchors we use for the roofing material won't come through.

Here is another view. See how the porch roof changes the look of the building giving it quite a bit more character.

Now comes the roof

2008-07-29T20:14:00.000-07:00

We had quite a bit of rain this last week because of the hurricane Dolly. but still the work went on. Matthew came over and helped us frame the roof. i was not involved at all, as Leila had the baby last week and that kept me pretty busy. But check out what did get done.

You can see the framing of the porch roof supports in this picture.

Here is John and Phil putting on the OSB for the roof. Note: how steep the roof is.

Soon we will be out of the weather. Hurray

Here are some more pictures to show what has been happening in the last week or two.

The roof, and porch, and inner walls.

2008-07-22T15:15:00.001-07:00

Okay now comes the gabled ends of the building. Here they are going into place. John anchored the logs at the apex. It was about 18 ft off the ground and we did not have a ladder tall enough so he just shimmed up the log and anchored it down. Very brave man.

Here is a view from the inside of the building we were going to complete the gabled ends with Logs (Ie fill the holes in the triangle thingy) but we decided to go with siding instead as it was faster and so much simpler. And we could move on to the roof without completing the sides. We have Mat coming to help us put the roof on this week so we wanted to jump to that phase of the building. (remember Matthew from the blanco home who helped us move the studio?)

In preperation for the roof we have to have the porch posts in place. Here we have a pic of Dale craving out the porch beam to accept the posts. The beam and posts are 6 inches by 8 inches. it will have a robust look. At least it should.

framing out the inside of the building checkout how high the center wall is.

Pictures from the other side of the dividing wall

Here is a picture of the slots we had to cut above the door and windows to accept the top trim of the windows as the walls shrink and settle. Oh joy.

God bless John and the boys who did all that.

And the last of the perimeter logs......

2008-07-12T16:38:00.000-07:00

This was a momentous day. Why? ‘Cause the last of the perimeter logs went into place. We carved our names and symbols into the last one dropped in place. So in 100 years when this building is a national heritage site and they need to move it they will find all of our names for quick and easy reference.

Here is pic of the view from the top of the wall. It's kind of high from up here.

Dale atop the wall anchoring it down. Note the wires coming up through it.

We put in these really nice large windows cause we got a very good deal on this size window. I think it will work out nicely. Each window will have a nice view and let in plenty of light.

Next comes the gabled ends which we still have not quite figured out how to do yet. Pray we can figure it out/make up our minds how we want to do it. And then comes the roof and then finally we are out of the Texas sun. While it is good vitamin D and all, according to experts you only need 10 minutes of exposure to get your daily dosage, and in Texas, on a hot day that would probably translate into like 30 seconds. Anyway, all that to say we are looking forward to having the roof on and working in the shade. Stay tuned for more pics and progress.

Its happening just as it was foretold.

2008-07-10T05:02:00.000-07:00

Here are more pictures of the progress that has been made lately. You can see the smaller bathroom window frames behind Gabe and his large hammer.

Sam laying the pink insulation foam between each log

Check out the corners. They have 12 inch flyaways on them. It really gives it the authentic cabin look..

Sam feeling all powerful atop the wall. This is basically how the corners will look from the inside.

John using the 10 inch chop saw to do some fine cuts.

Over all the progress on the cabin has been great. the wheather has been good and each day we go up a few more courses of logs. Soon will come the gabled wall ends and the roof. Stay tuned

More progress.

2008-07-02T20:42:00.001-07:00

Here are a few more pictures to see the next steps. The project is moving along nicely and John is happy with how fast installing the logs has gone. You can see the window bucks going in. Thats kind of like the frame for the windows so that the walls can shrink around the windows. We thought it would be very complex to factor that in, but considering how very "professional" our work crew is we did not run into any difficulty with it.....yet.

We picked up some pink colored foundation foam it comes in a roll and is so much cheaper to put in than adhesive weather stripping. it goes between the window bucks and the logs and helps to seal it all up good. (Cool tip from Jeff the man who sold us the logs)

Sorry no pictures of the guys doing the work. i will include more of those next time. We have had a bit of rain this week and that has set us back a little.

A A picture is worth a thousand words so i will let the pictures do the talking. Enjoy.

Pray for us as we keep moving forward with the project dispite the ever increasing price of gas. (it sort of effects alot of things like the price of materials and transprotation etc.) The Lord has gotten us this far so we are confident He will continue supplying for the project. So send us a prayer when you get a chance. Thank you.

Back to the log cabin

2008-06-26T06:26:00.001-07:00

Okay, now the phase we have all been waiting for. John and team have began to put down the first course of logs. I have not been so involved with this part of the job as I am trying to figure out how to get electricty to the studio and this cabin. But rather than bore you with pictures of wires and junction boxes, I thought to show you the progress the team is making with the logs.

Here is a pic of the very first log going into place

nchoring the first log into place with 10inch lag bolts. Apprantly all the logs are going to be secured with those 10inch lag bolts.

More action on the site. They got alot done in the first day

Putting down the logs is plenty of fun but you do have to account for boring things like doors and windows. Check out the door opening and also the new addition to the crew, Gabe, a long time friend and missionary from Thailand. Not that he is Thai but rather that is where we knew each other as young teens serving the Lord in the faraway land of Thailand.

One nice feature of working with logs is the "R" factor or the thermal properities, or in layman terms it helps keep the place cool in summer and warm in winter.

The fourth layer staring to go down soon there will be openings for windows etc.

The work area looking like a old ship builders yard with all that heavy lumber. Stay tuned for more pictures and progress.

PS Please keep us in your prayers as Leila is getting very close to having the baby. So I might be a little busy on the domestic front for a little while. Many pictures of that coming your way but not on this blog.

2008-06-24T17:35:00.001-07:00

Here we are again! Sorry I have not updated this blog in a while but here is the latest. We completed raising the studio and then we rented a double axle flatbed trailer that could move 12000 pounds.

We carefully backed the trailer under the house

Here is another picture of placing the trailer under the studio.

And then we lowered the house onto the trailer it took quite a few hours to load it on just right. God bless Matt who came over to help from the Blanco home with his serious truck. We could not have done it without him.

And then slowly we began to move the building it was sort of a magic moment as the whole studio became mobil

We had to turn around the studio, not because we had taken a wrong turn but because we had to change our approach to the drop spot which was about 300 yards away.

Here is the drop spot right next to a large oak tree. We had to cut some trees to fit it in.

It took a few days to lower it down and reattach the deck. but that is basically how it looks now, all good to go.

The Studio project

2008-06-03T15:51:00.000-07:00

Hi there, here are a couple of pictures of the studio moving project. But first a little history. We sold the back property which was a super answer to prayer and we just needed to move a couple of things off of it.

The studio was built as an extension to donated shed/office so we had to put in new skids under the floor joists to tie the hole building together before it could be moved. We bought the 16 ft 4x6 preasure treated skids and bolted them up through the floor joists. Then we slowly started lifting the building in preperation to move it.

Here are the jacks that we used to lift the building. one under each skid.

John showing us how angled the building is as we lifted one side then another.

The building started off being about 10 inches from the ground but here we have it up 36 inches. We don't actually know what we are doing. The professionals would not touch it cause of the way it was built and those who did wanted 5000$ to do it. So we are doing this by faith pray it goes well and that we don't drop the building or anything.

The building on a slight angle. More proof we don't know what we are doing, heh. Hopefully the next pics will be of the actual moving of the building.

2008-05-28T20:46:00.000-07:00

Here we are again with more tips and short cuts to building a cheap and simple log cabin. In this post we will talk about one of the primary componets of a log cabin..... logs.

The logs arrived today all the way from Wisconsin where they were carefully cut and hewed into shape by the Amish (I kid you not). Stephen spent many months on the phone figuring out the logs, buying the logs, comparing the logs, shipping the logs, etc. so naturally he was very happy to see the logs sitting on the drive way.

Nice truck, with even nicer looking logs, for our even nicer log cabin to be.

You can unload 25,000 pounds of wood by hand, or you can rent a lean, mean, log moving machine. It let us do the work in one day what would have taken us weeks to do. The only catch was that we had to drive the fork lift about 20 miles from the rental place to home. which was a little freaky roaring along our country road with a 16,000 lb machine that does not have suspension and the steering is attached to the back wheels. I quickly learned how to drive it with about 40 cars lined up behind me eagerly observing my progress. Over all it went without a hitch and we only crunched one small tractor, two cheap sedans and half a dozen mail boxes (just kidding).

Thats 4000 pounds of logs. Each load had to come off the truck and get hiked through the woods and over rocks to the building site. It was like driving an ATV with two elephants attached to the head lights. Well not excatly ('cause I have never driven an ATV with two..... oh, never mind. You get the idea).

Lots of help from the boys to set things in the correct place. It all got done in one day with everyone working together. And then we got back to moving the studio. More about that in the next update. Stay tuned. Don't go away. And that concludes our broadcast day, etc.

PS. We got the logs for a much reduced price from a company in Wisconsin. Really nice people who have been more than helpful. Check them out when you get a chance:Classic Log Homes, Inc.Contact: Jeff Glaza(715) 887-2550http://www.classicloghomes.biz/

2008-05-28T20:35:00.000-07:00

Now here comes the fun part, adding the insulation and the flooring. We have worked quickly and efficiently without delay. Actually the back property sold so it looks like we will need to move buildings, clean up stuff and clear off four years worth of junk (err, i mean storage) . But at least check out how far we got before we stopped for a couple of weeks.

Dale and Sam had a great time putting in one thousand screws to hold the OSB in place. Note the insulation, which did not fail to go in like normal insulation does..... with lots of itching. But still we moved forward.

John added the steps to the front porch. He did an awesome job and they came out great. Serious solid steps to match our seriously solid cabin.

2008-05-28T20:24:00.000-07:00

Welcome back! Here's the latest on the progress with the cabin. Check out what's been happening.

Okay, once all the piers are nice and dry you can add a little wood on top to make the floor.

And then you can add a little more.

And some more

And if you feel like it a little more.

John led the way when it came to figuring out where to add more wood. When the pro's examined what we did they thought we used a little too much wood. Oh well, it was fun framing in the floor.

2008-05-19T20:03:00.000-07:00

Today we wanted to show you the next step of progress and what is happening now that the cement is dry.

We have these nice poured little cement blocks in the ground with little strings around them to show where we were suppoesed to put them.

Not just one of them but many, all dried nicely in the San Antonio sun and ready for the next step.

Here we are building the piers. I mean not we, just John again actually. I was too busy taking pictures to actually do any work. NOT

All the finished cinder blocks are in place. We filled the load baring holes with concrete and rebar. After all that the professionals told us they are all going to fall over anyway. Oh well, the bumble bee is not suppoesed to fly according to the professionals. So, we taped bigger wings on to the bumble bee (adjusted things slightly) and now it flies much better.

2008-05-13T18:18:00.000-07:00

Now that we have collected everything, we need to start on the actual project. We figured it was a good time to.... well actually start. So on a tuesday eight weeks ago... we started.

And the first step in starting was to dig but in our case we pounded and pounded and pounded some more . Here is a pic of the guy that did most of the work. He is sort of short and yellow and says brute on him.
PS John we feel you also did a lot of the work.

After a week of fun filled pounding we had 15 of these little cute holes in the rock face. at this point we felt unconquerable like real men should.

We formed up the the holes after much measuring and leveling. Actually we did that before we even started pounding. but we did it all over agian right before we formed up with rebar drilled into the rock. Then we got this old cement mixer and it was suppoesed to change our lives, but it didn't quite perform as expected. But we got our money's worth out of it... I think.

Dale closely surprivising the pouring process.

Adding the finishing touches. We showed great care in getting these just right and made sure they looked good, even though it was obvious to all of us no one was ever going to see them.

All of us professionals feeling very impressed with how hard they worked and what a good job they did.

Yours truly carrying the lunch box and an occasional bag of cement. I am being modest here, we had to hike about 90 bags of them in all. Makes for a good work out.

2008-05-13T08:25:00.000-07:00

Here come the supplies. Did I mention that you might need building supplies? Well just in case I didn't, I will mention it here. YOU NEED SUPPLIES. (PS this is not an advertisement for Lowes. Most any hardware store will carry building supplies, like for example the Home depot may also sometime have some building supplies. It's the store with orange everything, where they love to annouce that they are working very hard everyday for your safety, so please bungee down your children or pet Alligator to the shopping cart so they don't get run over by the fork lifts.)

Speaking of fork lifts, here is a picture of a nice forklift that came with the lowes truck, that nicely forked our new supplies into our new pole barn for safe keeping from the elements. (Lowes offered us the fork lift in exchange for a good word about them and some biased honesty about Home Depot. but we could not afford the gas so we had to politely decline.)
Speaking of gas prices its at $3.60 a gallon at the moment. There are two ways to beat the rising prices according to the professionals, you need to either buy a bicycle or buy a gas station. buying anything else just hurts when you need to fill up.

2008-05-07T20:41:00.000-07:00

Okay, now you need a pole barn to store all your supplies. Check out the proper post pouring technique in this picture.

And just put in as many posts as you like, or think are needed. At least one for each corner is recommended.

And once you have the posts in place it's really straight forward, you just add the roof.

And before you know it you have a pole barn for keeping the building supplies out of the weather for your quick and easy cabin project. You are welcome to try this at home.

2008-05-06T21:11:00.000-07:00

And you need good equipment. Here we have our very cool Generator/arc welder which the Lord supplied.

Also check out the jack hammer which we could not have done without. More about that later. The Lord supplied tons of neat tools in the months leading up the to project. All that to say, to build a quick and simple cabin, tools are a must.

And rather than walking for miles each day to and from the shop for our tools we decked out a covered trailer to be a our mobile sound machine which also we keep our tools in. It has been awesome to have it all on site.

2008-05-06T13:48:00.000-07:00

First you need a good work crew who are willing to put in the hours and know how to handle their tools well.

Meet the full team. James, John, Sam and Dale and I am behind the camera

And you need a truck with big tires.