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Entries made in August, 2014

August 2014, in Photos

Sunday, August 31st, 2014

Finishing the Exterior Brown Coat

Sunday, August 31st, 2014

Below, a summary of the week of August 23rd, which was mostly spent working on the exterior brown coat (the second coat of plaster) for the house. "I'm tired, but oh my god, this is so cool! It's so much prettier than the scratch coat!" ...

Book Nooks

Friday, August 29th, 2014

When Will came over to talk with us us about spray foam insulation, he suggested we use the space in our eaves for some kind of nook, since they wouldn't be completely stuffed with the blown cellulose we had originally planned to fill them with. Hi...

Our Hearthstone Arrives

Thursday, August 28th, 2014

Our slate hearthstone is done—we picked it up from Ed's Masonry today! ...

We Have a Wood-Fired Hot Tub!

Wednesday, August 20th, 2014

When we were living with Tyler's mom, Jodi, both before and after our big bicycle tour, we took full advantage of the fact that she had a hot tub. In winter, Tyler would shovel a tunnel through the feet of snow on the deck to get to it, and we'd ru...

The Little Mortar Mixer That Could

Tuesday, August 19th, 2014

It has been a long time since I felt a deep fondness for a machine, and, thanks to our journal, I can pinpoint the last one exactly. It was four years ago when I fell in love with the little red toyota that Tyler and I drove across Europe and Asia....

Exterior Scratch Coat Completed! And Karina & Ivica Visit!

Monday, August 18th, 2014

High atop our scaffolding, Tyler and I stood with hawks and trowels in hand, applying a scratch coat of plaster to the last section of the last exterior wall. We had about an hour’s worth of work left when two of our favorite people rolled up the d...

A Tale for a Dark, Cold Night: Jenna's "The Legend of Birchthorn"

Friday, August 15th, 2014

Last winter, Tyler and I developed a weekly tradition to while away the long, dark evenings with our good friend, Jenna. We'd lounge in front of her computer with a few ciders, and watch a horror movie—not the bloody kind, but the creepy, paranorma...

Plaster Master

Wednesday, August 13th, 2014

As it turns out, I really, really like plastering. Sure, it has downsides: it is tiring. Lime turns my hair into a grey rat's nest. It chaps my hands and dries them into rough, old-person appendages, and makes it so that the slightest of bum...

Impromptu Garden Update: August

Wednesday, August 13th, 2014

The garden is doing amazingly, despite (or perhaps because of?) my lack of care: I haven't weeded at all, and I only watered once at the very beginning when nothing had sprouted yet and we'd had a few days without rain. Now, everything is do...

Manic Monday, Part Two: Spray Foam Insulation

Monday, August 11th, 2014

I am mid-plaster stroke, and positively covered in plaster, when Tyler comes running up the rocky ridge towards our house, followed by Will, a man we met a couple weeks ago a party we attended with Charlie and Becky. Will works at Vermont Foam Insu...

Manic Monday, Part One: Solo Plastering

Monday, August 11th, 2014

This morning, Tyler starts a couple batches of plaster going in the mixer, then heads down to the camper to program for the day, leaving me to tackle plastering by myself. I'm reeling from the sudden change of pace: Tyler took the last couple days ...

Pressing Back & Scarifying

Sunday, August 10th, 2014

Once the first coat of plaster is leathery (has dried enough to be pliable, but won't stick to our fingers when we poke it), it's time to "press back." This is where we go over the wall with our trowels, pushing with all of our might to compact the...

This is Kevin & Joy: Part Two

Sunday, August 10th, 2014

Sunday morning started with coffee and plaster in equal measures... Kevin Joy: Sunday, we spent the morning and afternoon plastering. Once we got the plaster mixed, it was time to smash it into the wall. It's not like spreading fr...

For Better or For Worse: Plastering Begins!

Sunday, August 10th, 2014

Our entire home-building process has been full of unknowns and steep learning curves, but the plastering part of it has loomed largest and most daunting of all. While everything about our project feels vitally important, the plaster is most critica...

This is Kevin & Joy: Part One

Saturday, August 9th, 2014

Kevin and I spent the weekend at Tyler and Tara's homestead ostensibly to help plaster (which we did do), but mostly to ask approximately a million questions. Joy Kevin: Visiting Tara and Tyler on their land is something Joy and I ...

Dad Visits

Friday, August 8th, 2014

When I was a teenager, my Dad restored/rebuilt a dilapidated farmhouse in rural Minnesota. Like Tara and I, he'd never done anything of the sort when he started. I remember coming along to lend a hand a few times, but mostly, I was too busy being a...

Winter is Coming

Wednesday, August 6th, 2014

With each passing day, our cottage is looking more and more like an actual home. It is with a bit of trepidation that I can finally say: if we were to plaster tomorrow, I wouldn't freak out about all the things that aren't good enough yet. It's not...

The First Pancake

Sunday, August 3rd, 2014

Lately, in the mornings, I've felt like the first shitty pancake in a new batch: the one that gets stuck to the pan, is gooey in the middle and burnt on the bottom, and falls completely apart. When I told Tyler this, and explained that he'd have to...

Quilting the House

Saturday, August 2nd, 2014

Tara: We've arrived at the stitching phase of our building adventure! Like pretty much every other part of this process, I've had a looming fear about it. I was afraid that "quilting" the house—attaching the exterior wire mesh to the interior wir...

A Blur

Friday, August 1st, 2014

The past couple of weeks have been a blur of post-baling, pre-plastering tasks. As usual, emotions have been running high, vacillating between the extreme "total meltdown" and the more moderate "miraculously keeping it together" levels. Most recent...