I must let you know how sorry I am at the distinct lack of communication from my end these many long months. So this here is a bit of a long post with many catch-up pictures!
By way of explanation and excuse: I became somewhat ill in the early spring and into summer and have been learning to navigate the treacherous waters of the American health care system. We still don’t know what the cause is, but I am finally able to manage the symptoms and am feeling more myself than I have since leaving YK. On a positive note, I have lost quite a bit of weight and feel very svelte (though, I probably look older too).
I suppose, in the end, I simply didn’t acknowledge the stresses involved in packing and moving from my beloved Northern home, purging and packing 45 years of my parents’ life in Niagara Falls a month later (my mum went into a home due to early onset Alzheimer’s), ferrying my dad and kids back across the country and being separated from them for 3 months while going through the mosh-pit that is US immigration: all in a six month period. I used to be able to push through stuff like this, but lesson learned. Respect the stress!
Somehow, despite becoming increasingly sick, I doggedly tried to keep up with a summer’s worth of kid and family activities and a plethora of chores. It began in the spring when I allowed the Hairy Half to acquire a new mistress!
Pick up day!
We christened her ‘Green Slip’ (what a pilot picks up for overtime). And we took her out to Neah Bay, WA in July to launch and crossed the straight of Juan de Fuca to cruise Barkley Sound (west coast of Vancouver Island) with the kids for a week. Magnificent weather and a special place we remember fondly from our lives BC (Before Children)!
At achor
Exploring
Taking it all in
We also did our fair share of prawning and crabbing right here off Bainbridge Island.
And we got one more fishing trip (sans kids) to bring home some chinook.
The kidlets took some sailing lessons and we managed a couple trips to LaPush to round out the summer.
As usual summer went by too fast.
So now that I appear to be on the mend, it is time to focus on our upcoming build. I know you’ll want to pay attention to this since this is where we will put you up when you come to visit!! 🙂
Our architect is wrapping up the engineering drawings and submitting the permits for approval on the studio/guesthouse. The first concrete step was the removal of 3 massive firs. I was devastated to lose even one, but no matter how we tweaked it, the foundation would severely compromise their root systems and they would have to come down eventually, if they didn’t fall on our lovely new building first.
No way we were scaling a 120ft tree. Brought in the professionals!
Timber!
Tree litter
On a very positive note, none of it will go to waste. All the timber has been milled (right around the corner by the great guys at Coyote Woodshop) into trim and lumber that we will use on property. I am even have some fabulous live-edge slabs milled for a future dining table and other furniture.
Picking up sticks.
Couldn’t get it all on the truck, so some will be firewood.
All our rough-cut lumber actually arrived back here last night and looks fabulous!! Now it will sit and dry for much of the winter while we get on with building.
Look at those lovely fir slabs (even smaller maple ones too). I am stoked!
Of course, after all the tree felling nonsense, we were left with some monster stumps, which we needed to remove.
One of three.
So a very excited Hairy Half rented a lovely baby excavator to dig around the roots and hopefully pull up the stump and root ball. He dug; Uncle Tony dug; I dug; we chainsawed the roots and power-washed….
Nothing.
The excavator almost tipped over. More than once.
So we broke down and hired a bigger excavator and a guy who does this for a living….
Yup. That worked.
Now we are ready to level and trench for the footings. Hopefully all will be in place for the first pour the day after the permit is approved.
I think our architect is in a state of disbelief that we are going to do this ourselves. Truth be told, I have to keep looking at this project as a series of small tasks or else I do freak out a little myself!