Emily Carr quote

"You will have to experiment and try things out for yourself and you will not be sure of what you are doing. That's all right, you are feeling your way into the thing."

home sweet home.jpg

Day 35

I am done. Tonight the moon was full and beautiful when I looked at it I thought she looked pregnant. Later as I lay in bed resting I felt the baby moving for the first time. Yes, little one, now we have room for your crib.

Day 34

I spent the morning struggling again with putting the tin around the stove flashing. My neighours are back and have been watching me the last couple of days and this weekend they have eighty people coming up for a wedding. I don't like to be looked at that much. A neighbour and former roofer showed up around lunch time to check my progress and in forty five minutes it was all installed including the stovecap.

Day 33

I put one sheet of tin on and then put the strapping in place for the stove flashing. Then I spent the remainder of the day attempting to put the tin around the stove flashing. Am disgusted with the instructions that accompanied the piece as it is obvious it is dependant on the silicone not to leak.

Day 32

It was pouring rain and I needed no excuse to take it off and rest and putty windows. Its been 13 days since I did nothing and I almost feel guilty.

Day 31

16 weeks prego today. I am feeling more tired than usual and pushed myself and put up 7 sheets of tin and ridge cap. Went to thanksgiving dinner at my neighbours. There was about 60 people there. Had a lovely time and the most delicious piece of homemade oumpkin pie.

Day 30

Extremely tired this morning but put up the last of the facia before attending my friends husbands service. It was simple and beautiful. His ashes are buried in a lovely box in the corner of her woodland garden. In the afternoon I put up the first six sheets of metal! I'm almost there.

Day 29

I went to town and brought back my stove flashing, more roofing screws and some stovepipe. I had to order more as they never had enough in stock.

Day 28

It didn't rain last night or today! Got all the strapping up and some of the facia. I couldn't help but notice from my view from the roof the vibrant sun yellow plumes of golden rod in the garden shaking there plumes waving gently on there long stalks in the wind.

Day 27

It was difficult to get myself motivated to go to work. It was raining again. At half past eight, I was fifteen minutes late I got out the door and started with the strapping. By the afternoon it had quit raining and I was clambering around up on the rafters. I got one side completely done and went home at a record five pm.

Day 26

Why is it if you have a handful of screws and one nail eighty percent of the time you will pull out the nail? Got the gutter on, the stovebox framed and went and went to paid work and stacked wood for two hours.

Day 25

It was a long day and I never got back until 6:45pm. Lunch was a quickie~eaten while standing. Its been raining every night. Everything is so wet. One nail at a time and I am getting closer.

Day 24

15 weeks prego today. I put all ten foot ceiling joists in place and then I went to my neighbours for a delicious fish dinner and some great conversation.

Day 23

This was the one day I never wrote anything. But the next day I noted that all the blasted rafters and gable ends were at long last up.

Day 22

It was a bad day. I felt perpetually frusterated. It felt like everything was going to slow. And then it started to rain and I just ended up crying.

Day 21

I got ten rafters up. The weather was beautiful. I am very tired and as usual as soon as I ate supper I went to bed.

Day 20

I finished off all work on the walls. I had to nail them down and put plywood in the top four corners of the end walls. Then I put the first sixteen feet of ridge board into place. I made a mistake here and put the bow side downwards facing. I already had the first set of trusses in place when I realized this and I couldn't bear to take it apart at the time.

Day 19

I went to town. I heard the baby's heartbeat for the first time. It sounded primal. The doctor said its stronger than most babies at this time. I talked to the owner of the lumber store and showed him the picture I'd taken of the lumber with the tie straps still on. I don't have to pay for the new wood just the cost of the barge. So thankful about that. When I came back I found the other two walls raised.

Day 18

I spent the day in bed resting and watching the rain outside the window.

Day 17

I'm 14 weeks prego today. Sometimes this incessant peeing thing drives me crazy especially when I have to go down a ladder or two in the rain to get to the outhouse!

Day 16

I framed the last wall!

Day 15

My two twenty four foot walls were raised today with help. I completed one end wall.

Day 14

It didn't rain today. Yesterdays wind blew the fire yellow cedar tips out of the trees and they were floating serenely on the surface of the puddles.

Day 13

I started the day with last nights careless mistake. I took the blade off the skillsaw to ungarble a partially cut cord. I took it over to my mechanically inclined neighbour whose wife lent me his saw until he came back home and could fix mine. It rained off and on and I worked in it and got soaked. Later I went for a walk with my friend who earlier in the week lost her husband. I returned back to work and by the end of the day felt I'd fought and won a war.

Day 12

Beautiful weather today as I ripped the windows apart and reframed them correctly facing out. When I pulled the galvanized nails out they destroyed the wood so I had to cut new headers and one stud. My neighbour showed up near the end of this operation and he showed me how to square a wall. Then he demonstrated how to cut the plywood on the wall and how to do the plunge cut. Tomorrow its my turn. I went to another neighbours for supper and we had fresh cod, potatoes and veges. It was delicious.

day 11

I got my lumber after I made two trips down to the barge landing. In between tears I framed the twenty four foot wall facing north and had to re~do everything almost twice. By the afternoon I felt exhausted. Due to the pregnancy and the softening of the muscles in my lower back I found it impossible to bend over to frame as is normal. It was more do~able sitting. But only for awhile. After several hours baby protested and my abdomen ached. At 10:00 pm I realized I built the wall upside down.

Day 10

I reframed two windows on the main floor and decided on the windows for the upstairs.

Day 8

Pretty sweet. Other than a sheet and a half I got the entire t@g plywood floor laid down and the stove pipe hole framed in the rain.

Day 7

I am exhausted. It was pouring rain this morning so I started at lunch time when it had subsided and worked till 6:15 pm. I was somewhere between the wall and the top of the ladder above the baby's room when the ladder collapsed. Somehow I pulled myself back up onto the joists with the hammer still in my hands. I had another ladder set up at the opposite end of the wall so I was able to get down. That scared me.

Day 6

My mechanically inclined neighbor and I used a come along and pulled the walls in. It worked beautifully. Other neighbors lifted seventeen two by ten sixteen footers on top of the wall for me. I spent the afternoon toenailing them in place. Worked eleven hours with no break.

Day 9

The unforseen stress sent me into tears. Today I cried and cried. I went to build my walls and discovered every board all 115 two by fours missing. The lumber store swears they delivered them and the barge owner swears he didn't see them. Late in the afternoon I finally reordered the lumber that I will have to pay for.

Day 5

Had a lovely lunch with the church ladies. Removed the remaining rafters. Wonderful!

day 4

Horrible day. Getting the rafters down was horrendous. They were heavy and I had to let them fall. I worked twelve hours and only got half of them down and two floor joists up and then I found my walls are all wonky so I just wept. At 3 am iwoke up with a terrible backache and cramping. I feared I was miscarrying. I walked in the silver moonlight to the cabin and stood inside and wept.

day 3

I broke one pane of glass in the french doors when the sheet of plywood I threw off the roof caught the pane.

Day 2

I got the cupola taken apart, the skylights and frames removed and all the roll roofing off. Finished earlier around 5:15 p.m. Had a nice supper and walked the dog.

The beginning friday sept 09 2011

The only thing that matters about a nail bar is that you have the right one for the size of nail you are removing.

Making room friday sept.09 2011

I have found myself five weeks pregnant and alone. At twelve weeks pregnancy on the eve of all of my earthly belongings sitting in a moving van outside my fence under the watchful eye of the starlit night sky I have decided to remove the roof, add another floor and put on a new roof. I am in no way a carpenter and have never done anything on this scale. Infact the chicken coop I started remains unfinished. I am doing this out of faith and necessity. Necessity because my tiny cabin is not enough room for a crib or for the baby to have its own room. I am doing it out of faith that as I proceed the solutions will come on there own. I believe in God that if I begin He will provide. Due to my physical condition and the deteriorating weather and that friends have graciously lent me the use of there cabin I am feeling pressure on myself to get it done.
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Grandma's black daylily

After a brilliant and lengthy display this was the last blossom for the summer. Grandma may be gone but the flower brings me joy of her memory.
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Stephanie Quainton Steel quote

Vancouver Island watercolourist Stephanie Quainton Steel cried as she sat at the confluence of two rivers beside a mountain whose top was obscured by snow and fog. With the blank paper in front of her she said how was I to capture this,how get my awe down on paper, how uncover what lay in the deepest layers of my heart?...practice was the secret, and then, practice some more. ”

Freshly picked coreopsis blossoms

Apparently there are 114 species of coreopsis. 28 of these are native to North America. The others come from Central and South America. These blossoms are in a dyebath. They give the colors of a sunset.
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Firewood

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firewood

My day began with a search for my wedges so I could split a large cedar block perfect for kindling. Since it was pre~8 am borrowing was not an option. Neither was an excuse not to do it. I found the wedges after I filled my boot with water and disturbed a sleeping mouse in the woodpile.

Message box pict

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message box

Yesterday by my gate I put up a birdbox. Its a whimsical colourful box handmade from cedar sawn from this place years ago. I've got lots of boxes and they adorn every building on the place but this one is red. The only red one in about a dozen. Now when I'm gone working at my real job and when people come to visit my studio they can leave me a note. I'd like to know they passed by. The box is mounted low so you can write on the lid which opens up. There's a pen sticking out of the hole which would otherwise be the bird box entry. Please if you stop by and I'm not here leave a message and let me know. And I'm sorry I missed you.