Not all fun and games

This summer hasn't been all work and no play. Once in awhile Trevor and I are let out of the house to romp around. Among some of the things we found are geocaches on top of mountains and Grampa's old coupe.

Who knew?

Well, one of the tasks that we wanted to accomplish this summer is almost done.
But it has nearly killed me. I don't know if it was because I came down with a bit of a summer cold just before I started or it was really that difficult but laying the hardwood floor has been a real chore. We installed 3/4" thick solid oak hardwood in 2-1/4" random length planks.
At first, I thought just do one row at a time. Before you know it I'll be done. Well, two days of backbreaking labor, I realized it was going to take 120 rows to get all the way across the room.
We did rent an air powered nail gun that helped but ran out of time before the job was complete. I will probably finish it by hand, pre-drilling and hand nailing the last 20 rows or so. I can't use the nailer under the stairs anyway.
Here are a few pictures of the semi-finished product. We are very pleased.

Small touches

Some of the finest details of the cabin are the small touches. Here are some of them.
We had this mirror we got for 2.99 at Wal-Mart that was hanging in the bathroom last year until we got that done and a new one in there Glenda got at Custer State Park. So I took the mirror out of the cheap frame and made a new one out of small logs. Then I took these hand made square nails that we found while hiking the Flume Trail and made it look like the mirror was held together with them. The nails are neat and all different sizes. The Flume trail is an old log flume that is 17 miles long dating back to the last turn of the century. It was basically a wooden trough filled with water that transported logs to market from the Hills.

The other touch is the buffalo stencils that Glenda put around the window frames. Very personal and fitting to the surroundings.

Work Week-end

The first week-end of August was a work week-end. I didn't even get out to play. Trevor did get down to go fishing but he was having "bad luck". I think that means "no luck".

It is Rally week here in the Hills so it is best to stay off the streets anyway. The hundreds of thousands of bikers spill out way beyond Sturgis.

We have a running joke between Glenda and and I in the "off-season". We always say, "The first thing we are going to do is..." We always have a long list of the "first" thing to do. This year it was getting the interior polyurethane on everything. It sounds easier than it was. You see, some of the ceilings and beams are well over 20' up off the floor. And some of that is over the stairs. How do you get up there? Scaffolding was an option but we didn't have any and it didn't solve the problem over the stairs.
So I pretty much extended my 23' ladder all the way out and climbed on up about 50 times with a bucket and brush. Then I set up two ladders on the stairs with a plank between them to finish the rest.
So that "first thing" we were going to do is done now.

I also got up the log railing in the loft. And the floor is done up there. We used a different kind of polyurethene that is suppossed to be better for floors. I had to move my office for the wek-end to get it done. The picture posted is the upstairs railing and the Brazilian steer hide on the floor.