Return to Montana

I just returned to Montana after spending 3 weeks in Minnesota. My younger sister has been fighting cancer for quite some time and they finally had to stop all treatments as nothing was working. She passed away last Thursday and the funeral was this Tuesday. She will be missed by all of us. She was only 42. She left behind 4 wonderful children ages 15 to 25.

I have rescheduled the electrical inspection for tomorrow the 18th. Then I will finish the soffits and begin the siding. Hopefully I will get my cousin in next week to do the pads for the deck stairs. He will do some leveling with the Bobcat and we will put down plastic and then rock over it to prevent any further erosion from water coming off the roof.

Soffits over deck close to 50% complete July 23, 2011

On the 22nd we finished about 50% of the soffits over the west side deck up to the light cans. I'll check Monday to see if I have to have the wiring inspected before I cover the can wiring up.

Below is the east side soffit progress. It is about 45% completed. I ran out of tongue and groove boards today. I have an order being delivered on Monday the 25th. We will stain them on Monday and continue installing them on Tuesday. My plan is to complete all soffits by Thursday of next week. I will be taking some time off to go back to New Hampshire and spend time with my wife, Betsy the following week. Tony has been on site quite a bit in the last few weeks caulking the seams between the logs with the Log Jam. He should have the outside 100% in another few days of work (when I can get him).

Decking completed July 20, 2011

Today I finished laying down the deck boards. What a relief! I went through 60 pounds of screws in the process. I'll probably build the railing next year. I will have to get a permit and cut some green poles to build it.

I finished wiring in all the lights over the deck today and started installing the soffits. Below is a picture of what we finished today.

This process goes pretty fast. I expect to have the outside portions completed on both

sides of the house by tomorrow night. We have to use the forklift for these portions of the deck soffits. The rest of the soffits will be completed off ladders or scaffolding.

I can see some difficulties scribing and cutting the holes for the can lights.

Decking progress July 18, 2011

Here is the completed east side deck. I finished this before I went into the mountains on the 15th. I started the front deck on the afternoon of the 17th. It looked like I would run out of 2 X 6's. I pulled the extra 16 ft 2 X 6's from the loft that were left over from last year. I purchased 18 more 12 ft 2 X 6's this morning. This should complete the decking.

As I was putting down the decking today I realized I was going to run out of deck screws again. I will need to purchase at least 8 more pounds of screws in the morning if I want to complete the decking tomorrow.

The front deck is coming along very well. Once we are done with the decking, I will install the light cans over the deck and then install the soffits over the deck on both sides.

I should have enough tongue and groove (T&G) boards to complete the soffits. About a third of the T&G I have on hand have been stained and are ready to be installed. Other than a slight problem with the east side TGI's, the soffits should go very fast.

I still have not made up my mind on the color of the siding for the end gables and the dormers. Help!

Recharging in the mountains July 16, 2011

I took a few days off for research. We went into the mountains above Sheridan, MT and saw quite a few different log cabins. Some, like the one I am sitting in front of here were probably built in the late 1800's. Some were built in the early to mid 1900's. A couple were less that 20 years old.

It's interesting to see the different ways they were built. Some have weathered better than others.

We were above the tree lines several times. Here is a picture I took looking across from one mountain to another. We hit a lot of snow in some places. Jim and I tried going across a pass only to be stopped by a field of snow a quarter of a mile wide by at least three miles long. Jim thought it had to be at least 80 feet deep in places.

Time to get back to work!

Side decks close to completion July 13, 2011

Today we finished the west side of the deck. This portion is about 52 feet long and 10 feet wide. It was a little tricky getting the last board installed against the base of the house. The sill logs extend beyond the edge of the basement walls.

The second photo shows the progress on the east side deck. This portion of the deck is the same size as the west side. I plan to complete the east side tomorrow and begin the portion of the deck on the front of the house.

The front section of the deck is the final phase for the deck board installation. The dimensions are 36 feet long by 10 feet wide. There are 4 poles I have to scribe out.

I bought a lumber straightener a few weeks ago to help keep the 2 X 6's straight as I screw them down. It appears the longer they stay stacked together, the more bends they develop. I broke the tool today. Triple S in Butte replaced it at no charge. I also had to buy more deck screws. I started out with 42 pounds; I purchased 10 more pounds today.

Once the decking is completed I plan to install and wire in the can lights over the deck. With these completed I can begin installing the soffits over the deck. I will need to get back to tiling the shower at some point very soon.

Deck in progress july 10, 2011

Here is the deck after the second day of installation. I went into the mountains today on dirt bikes with my cousin so I did not start work until 5 PM. I have a little over 50% of the decking completed on this (east) side. I have lost my hired help for the next three days so I will start the west side tomorrow. Scribing around the logs is the most time consuming so I will get this completed before Jimmy returns on Thursday.

Jimmy has been doing an excellent job cutting the deck boards to length, routing the ends and staining them. When he comes back I will be training him to screw the deck boards down. I found out today that I can easily cut the boards to length using my portable circle saw, which will eliminate a lot of extra handling of the boards.