DECK TIME

I got help today.

Raising the timbers for the deck is a 3 man job.

It took 15 man hours today to get the timbers up and the deck trusses up.

The snow started around 2:00 .

Not much fun working in this stuff.

Everyone was complaining.

Except me. I wanted them to stay and finish.

We had hoped to get a little farther into the deck by the end 

of the day but it was just too snowy.

I've never seen flakes this big.

THE BASEMENT IS READY TO POUR

What a job.

Building a house in the Canadian winter.

It's made this experience not as much fun as I had hoped.

But we're getting there.

One week ago we started to do the back fill around the lower level.

The weather certainly has been terrible

It has thrilled me to see the yard start to take shape.

No more 10 foot deep holes to fall into.

The beginning of a nice sweeping driveway.

Sunday morning Northern log and Timber showed up with 

the deck posts.

We'll start the deck on Wednesday.

Beautiful Douglas Fir deck boards.

It's come a long way from pouring the walls in December.

And lifting the ridge beam on December 24th.

To this stage on January 20th.

Brandon has the Radon Rock laid and levelled.

It took 4 dump truck loads to bring it up to grade.

Now all I need to do is lay the poly and tie the rebar.

I'm going to leave that until the spring.

Now I want to start building the house.

DOING THE BACKFILL

I managed to get the dimple membrane onto the foundation Monday.

Wednesday morning I dug out the fire pit and we roasted hotdogs for lunch.

Wednesday morning I had Ironhorse excavation over to start

 loading the drain rock over top of the Big O .

I rigged up a system using plywood to help guide the rock into the right spot.

This saved us from using up excess material.

All down by the end of the day and it was looking good.

The city inspector came Thursday morning and approved everything so far.

Now we can backfill.

 I'm really enjoying this stage,

We can now get an idea of what it's going to look like.

It's a thrill to have that big space filled in.

I don't think I've been this dirty since I was a kid.

IT'S A NEW YEAR

I Haven't felt much like doing my blog since Daisy died but I guess I should. 

I miss my little buddy. She made me smile inside my mind all the time.

She was so cute. 

I liked her especially because she always looked in my eyes to see what was next.

On December 10th Ruth and I invited everyone living on the street that leads 

onto our property over for a bonfire and wiener roast.

18 houses in total.

It was to start at 3:00 in the afternoon so I got the fires started around 1:00.

This pit for the wieners and the other one for heat. 

It was a cold day.

Ruth did up a pot of chilli as well as other goodies.

Everyone brought something and we had a feast.

Ellie came out of the house for the early bird dinner.

I'm guessing that there were about 35 - 40 people showed up.

Last one's left at about 6:30 when it was freezing out.

Next on our list was to get the foundation done on the carriage house.

We passed inspection for the rebar the next day and our pour was scheduled for Tuesday.

This has been a huge undertaking thanks to the weather.

Tuesday at 2:00 the concrete arrived.

It was about 12 below and we were in a blizzard by the time the 3rd cement truck left.

Not fun. Concrete scares me. It's so unforgiving.

Me and Carrie were so happy to get to this stage.

We had a good crew working with us today.

!0 foot walls with a step down at one point.

It took about 2.5 hours to get it done.

The only problem that freaked us put was when the south west corner started to separate.

We had missed something here when building.

Luckily we managed to brace it and keep it together.

Two days later we are getting ready to build the floor.

The Truss company couldn't do my driveway so he dropped the 27 foot x 24 inch x 8.5 inch truss 

at the top of our property about 300 feet away from where it had to be.Yikes.

Glad it was snowy out. 

I did it up to a strap and dragged it down.

The guys I'm working with are all young and wanted to lift it into place.

I don't think so.

For a couple of hundred bucks we saved ourselves weeks of pain.

It took 20 minutes.

These young guys are nuts. 

I'd have used my 12 foot ladder to get to the straps and undo them.

I was standing beside the crane operator while he installed the smaller beam. 

We both laughed at about the same time as we both noticed Ruth

 sitting in the kids tree fort watching the operation .

She had the best view of all of us.

We had so much gravel spread on the driveway the crane truck whistled up the hill 

and off the property like it was summer.

We need to show the inspectors how the beam post is attached to the foundation.

It's never going to move.

Carrie gave me a stocking on Christmas Morning.

Guess what this is.

It was a nice quiet family Christmas.

Brad slept over for a few nights and we all enjoyed the kids.

The gal who co-owns the log home building company that is doing our build

 got this bear for Ellie but Jack loves it as well.

Christmas day afternoon the family went tobogganing.

I jus took pictures.

My knee is still bad.

I think I refractured an old break on my tibia.

Ruth and Carrie were racing .

Very aerodynamic.

Ruth was by far the fastest on the hill.

Lots of laughing.

I think this was her Christmas PJ's she was wearing with her nice mink.

So Ruth gave me a drone for Christmas.

I took it outside and fired up the controller.

It flew directly up into this 120 foot tree and is still up there near the top.

I don't think I'm getting it back.

Boxing day we stripped all the scaffolding out of the build and had to take it uphill

 to the driveway for the boom truck to pick up. 

We carried 2 pieces up and decided that was nuts.

I sure am glad that I have a John Deere.

Yesterday my neighbour and myself were trying to figure out 

what made these imprints in the fresh snow.

This is in our back forty.

The prints range from 6 to 10 feet apart from each other.

We got on the net and discovered that these are cougar prints. 

They lunge like this when running thru snow.

There has been a cougar hanging around not far from here so I guess 

he has decided to expand his hunting area.

This might explain why the deer aren't in the yard anymore.