First Half of 2012

I know, it's been a while - so this is a long post. We have been busy with the cabin and life and I just didn't update the blog. Recap: This is where we ended for winter - all of the tongue & groove (ceiling/paneling) was up and was covered in roof wrap to try to keep it dry.

We started back up this spring once everything was dry. Because we had to quit abruptly with the snow, there was a lot of cleanup to do around the building site. And then we were off.

The way we put up the tongue & groove to optimize the pieces we had, left some overhang off the ends. Rather than cut everything ahead of time, we decided to leave it long and then we would go back later to make it straight. This is what it looked like when we finished in the winter.

The next step is to put up the "internal rafters". The stained rafters that are visible as part of the ceiling are really the structural rafters, but you need something to contain the insulation and help with the roof. These are 2x10 (vs 4x12 for the big ones), and there are twice as many, which is 80 2x10s to be placed 16 inches apart.

As proponents of planning tasks down on the ground and developing tools so that no "thinking" is necessary up on the roof, Kenyon planned out a way to know where to put each of the rafters using brackets. But, before we started doing all of them, we wanted to try it out on one set. Unlike the big rafters, these ones have to be cut to perfectly match up at the peak.

Next, we needed to lift the remaining 78 rafters. This is where our friendly crane driver comes in. He has been a great help! To try to best utilize his time (and minimize cost) we wanted to get all of the rafters up and then place them afterwards. We took them up in bundles.

Kenyon built some safety stops to hold them up there so then he could put them in place.

Progress on the first day with the rafters was much better and faster than expected. We thought it would take quite awhile, but this was after just that first day. Kenyon, his dad, and our good friend, Hunt, got it all done.

It didn't take long to get all the rafters up and done. A lot of nails were needed to do all the brackets and then up and down the rafters.

Kenyon also had to go back and cut the tongue & groove. It was pretty scary, but the cut ended up really nice.

Once all the rafters were up, the cross-bracing was needed. One row at the log wall and another row up at the top above the ridge pole. These are all individual ~16" pieces.

At the ends of the rafters, we now need it to line up with the big rafters below. The roof trim will then go on this part.

Since there is no real attic space, just the ceiling-insulation-roof, any wiring or lights that we need in the ceiling need to be done now. So, being our usual particular selves, we developed an elaborate way of measuring out where the lights should be (we have can lights, and light fixtures/ceiling fans). It sounds like this should be easy, but it's not. Factors include - dimensions are 2-dimensional from a "flat" ceiling, ours is sloped, there are no internal walls yet, there are no real solid measurements because the walls are logs. We then had the electrician out and Kenyon helped him get all the wiring done pretty quickly. These are the lights for the family room.

We then decided to go with the foam insulation. This was after a lot of research and weighing pros and cons. So, if you disagree and think we should have gone a different way - keep it to yourself! Once the insulation was installed, we covered up the whole thing with OSB.

Once the OSB was on, the whole thing was covered in roof wrap. The next step is the actual metal roof! Kenyon did the last few steps in a couple of days time (I was out of town) with the help of his dad, our LHBA friend, David, and our friend, Hunt, it was a lot of work in a short period of time, and he couldn't have done it without all of their help!