Glacial (S)till

It's not yet Good Friday but, as of 8:15 last night, I can say of this hardwood installation, "It is finished." It took six days to complete the last 500 sq.ft. and, on two of those days, I managed to do approximately 125 sq.ft./day, that being the middle, open section of the loft.
As I worked through the 60+ bundles of flooring, I set aside the very few piece of bird's-eye that managed to evade the sorters and incorporated them into the stair landing. I can't imagine what Geoff Hayes' grandmother's house on Furby must have looked like with its bird's-eye maple throughout – including the pantry!
So, what the heck do I do if I don't need to be bent over the hardwood nailer anymore? There's always the unending and ever-growing to-do list should memory fail me. Today, I'll clean up the tools and left-over flooring, and then ensure that all is in readiness for Beaver Flooring. Larry and his crew will be here later today or tomorrow to do the sanding and oiling of the floor. With that step completed, we can then actually move to have the 53' trailer unloaded and begin putting some of our lives back in order. I'm a clean & order freak, so this period of complete and utter chaos has been both inordinately trying and liberating. I have learned to function even when all around demands that I should just throw up my hands and move to Australia (kids' book reference, don't you know).

One of the first tasks will be to get the closets set up so that Ruth & I can begin to select from more than two or three changes of clothing, as has been the case for the past four months and more. Then follow a raft of tasks related to kitchen set-up, electrical fixtures/receptacles, floor tiling and bathroom fixtures.

Of course, with spring rapidly approaching, the verandah and siding projects beckon. The prospect of working outside again holds great appeal.

Ruth has bravely soldiered on with painting over the past weeks despite the alarming rapidity with which her arthritis and carpal tunnel syndrome have diminished her ability to function normally. Happily, she got a call from a first-rate surgeon yesterday, and it appears she may be scheduled for surgery this week or next. She and I have been brought up short by the potential impact of this relatively recent ailment. Ruth is so crafts-driven, so active; and the prospect of any significant diminution of hand-function is daunting and sobering indeed. We are both prayerfully hopeful that the surgery will address the carpal tunnel issues and that the new über-techy drugs will wage successful battle with the arthritis. It's ironic: based on history, I should be the one getting hit with the arthritis. My fraternal grandmother almost died when she was hit by arthritis shortly after my father was born, and she spent the last twenty-plus years confined to bed as a result of the damage done to her joints.

That said, we continue to love the day-to-day camping in our new home, and are buoyed with enthusiasm at the relatively imminent shift to more conventional living situation.

Happy spring.

The Glacial (S)pace

A quick update on some glacially slow progress.

The areas of the main floor which were slated for hardwood (great room, dining room, master bedroom, bedroom closet, front entrance and kitchen/back hall – 800 of 1,300 sq.ft. in total) are now officially completed. The areas on the board for tile are pending. The last of the upper kitchen cupboards arrived and are installed. The microwave is housed in its permanent location and has been wired up.

On the spring front, I spent a couple of hours yesterday and then again this morning opening up the snow drifts on either side of our driveway to get the run-off flowing through the culvert rather than over the road.

We now have two cats (Jasper/gray and Daisy/not so spooky) resident, with Chester rejoining us at month's end. We'll then be back to our full complement of three cats and two dogs.
With a bunch of luck and – mainly – a good back, I should be able to have the landing and loft hardwood flooring installed by this time next week. Once the sanding and oiling are done, we can then get to installing closets and dragging in furniture.

A spring full of promise around the corner.

And Then the Kitchen & Garage

Buoyed by the delight of seeing permanent lighting in the great room, I delayed the return to hardwood flooring and got busy with hooking up the kitchen and garage lights – both being areas where the lights were not dependent on the coincident hook-up of receptacles on the same circuit.

After getting the relay for the heat detector wired in (using macro photography inside a wall cavity to determine which wire was which) – as the detectors are to be on a frequently-used circuit, I was pleased to find that the kitchen light switches were already installed. Imagine my surprise, then, when I got the circuit wired into the panel and heard the detectors set, but was unable to get the lights up. Suffice to say, after a period of pondering, puzzling and such, I was able to determine that the three-way switches had been wired up incorrectly. Shortly thereafter, there was light in the kitchen.

With that knowledge in hand, I went out to the garage where I thought I would be able to apply the same solution to the problem of non-working lights out there. After much testing and retesting, no luck. I even tried installing another four-way switch, thinking it might be the culprit. Finally, I checked the Leviton website. Happily, their listing for the 5604 switch also included a wiring diagram. Imagine my surprise when their diagram in no way resembled the one in the Black & Decker guide I've been using as my electrical bible.

Small, but important progress today. Tomorrow, back on my knees.

Hey J&J, what light from yonder windows breaks?

Oftentimes our dear friends and neighbours, Jim & Johanna Rodger, will ask if I've made any of the interior lights operative.

As of this afternoon the answer is, "Yes, folks, I let there be light."
Now, back to flooring in the morning.

I'm Down on my Knees Prayin' "How Long, Lord?"

Today made the fourth day of hardwood flooring installation: I've marked last Tuesday as an orientation day – and not just to make my daily productivity look better!
So far, I'm crawling at between 50% and 33% of the rate of an experienced installer. Greg Martin of Finmac Lumber says a good solo installer will rack (arrange the pieces) and nail 100 - 150 sq. ft. per day. After four days, I've installed about 220 sq. ft. I'm not sure if this is good or bad, but 'zat is vot it iss.' Given that we decided to go with mill select (sometimes known as Country Grade) unfinished maple, the colour and grain variation is quite dramatic. Add to that random lengths between 9" and 84", the desirability of randomizing all variables, having every other spike hit a floor joist, generally having 6" of separation between adjacent end-joins... well, you get the picture of what is involved in creating 1,400 sq. ft. of abstract mosaic.
We bought a pneumatic MasterCraft floor nailer which was desperately lacking in useful "how to use this sucker" information. Unfortunately, the 1-800 number so prominently promoted on Canadian Tire's in-store brand provided no more help so, with some careful testing, I divined the inner workings of the nailer and it has delivered fine results.

Meanwhile, Ruth has been spending three-to-four weekend days painting.

And, everyday, the light outdoors continues to inspire as we labour and perspire in what will – some many months down the road – be our dream home.

Off to bed to dream about it (I hope). The waking thoughts of protracted timelines as I roused at 4:23 this morning were definitely not dream-like.


P.S. A few weeks ago I again took a huge trailer of trash to the dump. I noticed this stuffed horse abandoned in the pile next to where I was unloading and, knowing Sadie's of things plush, brought it home. Yesterday, after watching Sadie head downstairs several times a day to visit Horsey, Ruth finally brought it up, where Sadie immediately tried to nurse (we think) from it. Of course, it may just have been typical doggie butt-sniff behaviour.

Second New-Year Post from the Ridge

Happy New Year, blog watchers if, indeed, there are any left.

It's been well over a month since the last post, and the reasons for this lapse are various. Firstly, as a mostly single-man crew these days, the pronoun "I" would be too much used. I really loved telling the story of time and building creativity shared with others. That time is now past.

Secondly, there have been few signs of substantive progress until this past week or so. The old saw, "more fun than watching paint dry," comes to mind. Much time and problem-solving effort has been consumed by issues regarding paint, the nature of which I will spare you.

Lastly, the sum of the above has resulted in a lack of motivation for blogging. That situation, I hope, is now being put behind us.

The foregoing notwithstanding, the time up here on Ruth's Ridge continues to delight the eye and inspire the soul. The profound good fortune of having the sun shine in our kitchen window each morning, watching the awesome march of light and colour throughout the day, and then having the moon rise outside the kitchen window most every night has made every hold-up or setback seem relatively insignificant. Ruth & I continue to marvel at the gift of this magical place. For the first time in a decade or more, I am enjoying winter... even if mostly from the confines of our new home. My friend, Jim, says he hasn't seen me this happy in years. Funny, I have never equated exhaustion and happiness until now.

The number of creature comforts continues to slowly improve. From the New Year's Eve first-flush, we have moved on to a tub and sink, clothes washer and dryer, a heat-recovery ventilator and an array of kitchen goodies like a kettle, griddle, coffee maker. Still, the one thing that I will never again take for granted is the flush of a toilet. I now know how much work goes into such a seemingly simple function, but every time I actuate the toilet, I thank my lucky stars that it worked in the first place and continues to work repeatedly.

So, other than wallowing in pigment, what remains to report? In short, the addition of lights, fans, smoke/CO2 alarms, the installation of kitchen cabinets and the immanent installation of hardwood flooring.

Ceiling Fans. A 70 lb. fan now hangs in the great room, thanks almost entirely to the extended use of David Ives' scaffolding. Another fan graces the stairwell, and a third hangs in what is sure to be the 'hot' master bedroom!

Lights. Pot lights in the kitchen and loft, hanging lights in the great room, main entrance, water closet (a huge school classroom globe restored by my father after reclaiming it from the original Plum Coulee Collegiate), and dining room. Ceiling fixtures in the closets, washrooms, mudroom and pantry. Lights and receptacles in the basement.

For the past week, I have been engaged in demystifying the workings of Ikea packaging and kitchen componentry. I have to say that Ruth did an amazing job of designing the kitchen, and I have had the privilege of bringing her conceptualization to life. As of this morning, all of the cabinets (save two, which are in transit) have been assembled, positioned and secured to the walls. What remains is to install the Ikea butcher-block countertops, the oven, the cooktop, the sink, the dishwasher, and to tweak the door and drawer alignment.

Perhaps even more exciting for me, is the start of hardwood flooring tomorrow morning. I have been greatly aided by Greg Martin of Finmac Lumber. He supplied the unfinished 2 1/4" maple and, in addition, has been a font of invaluable information about the installation procedure.

Yesterday, after allowing the hardwood to condition in our home for 12 days, I distributed the 4,500 lbs. of wood to the sides of the great room and lugged 36 bundles up to the loft. Today, after doing some work on the kitchen and enjoying a visit from Jim & Johanna Rodger, I established the starter line for the first course of hardwood in the great room, then stapled down the wax paper, and prepped the equipment for the morning.

It's wonderfully quiet up here on the ridge this evening. Ruth & I had a lovely Valentine's weekend. Ruth was especially Valentine-minded after spending a few days in Winnipeg with our grand-daughter, Kate, and her parents. She discovered the little person growing inside Kate this weekend and, frankly, fell in love. So lovely to see... and Kate is truly a lovable child.

Our family is more dispersed than usual, which makes life even quieter than normal. With Lee in Vancouver for 5 weeks with the Olympics, Jill headed to Arizona for a few weeks with her mother. Cole and his girlfriend, Sarah, flew down to join them for a couple of weeks. Claire and Thomas are immersed in university. Since we're going to adopt Jill's cats, and since our place isn't quite ready to accomodate them, Ruth offered to house-sit Jill & Lee's house while they're gone. Less commuting, more proper bathrooms and mirrors, more comfort for her until our home looks more like one by month's end.

Well, enough for today. I hope to be posting again in the next few days with updates on the progress of our flooring.

'Till then, schritt fuer schritt.

Return of the Someday Blogger

I've finally made some time for this, by now, too infrequent building blog. The intervening three weeks have delivered a number of important milestones, though I still find myself thinking too often of what hasn't yet been achieved.

Gone are the nights of flannel-wrapped sleep in Jim & Johanna's guest room, though Rebus & Sadie shared a snooze on the couch here on Ruth's Ridge the other afternoon. Looking at the picture of R, R 'n S reminds me that we seem to have identified the cause of Rebus' sometimes grouchy demeanor at bedtime; it appears that his ten years may have brought with them some arthritic aches. We began giving him some coated baby aspirin a few days ago, and he seemed almost immediately to become happier, more spry. His getting up on the couch with Sadie happened within 12 hours of getting his first dosage.

We actually did have a bit of a first Christmas on the Ridge on the 25th. Jill, Lee, Claire & Thomas all braved the slick driving conditions that descended on Manitoba for the Yule holiday. They brought snacks of all kinds, which were largely consumed before Ruth served up the slow cooker of beef stew. This feast was topped off with a competitive game of Blokus, which I mostly slept through.

Finally, on the morning of the 29th, Steve Hintz showed up with the satellite dish that had gone missing in UPS's holiday warehouse. By early afternoon Ruth's Ridge had a functioning internet connection.

On the 30th, I began working on the most important room in the house... the water closet. This task was made all the more critical given that I'd finally been hit with the stomach flu Ruth had contracted some days earlier. By Ruth's return from work, I had managed to install the sub-floor, lay the tiles, modify the drain lines, install the toilet flange and mount the toilet. We finally had achieved rudimentary indoor plumbing... using a pail of water as the mode of flushing.

New Year's Eve was a momentous day for Ruth & I. Though we were both still suffering with a bout of stomach flu, we soldiered on with what tasks we could. Happily, we'd been able to get a well water sample in for analysis just before Christmas. We got the results by email shortly after lunch on the 30th. I called Filtrex, a water conditioning supplier in Winnipeg, with the analysis. Doug called me back 30 minutes later with a cost, which we accepted, and then promised to have our unit ready for pick-up the following morning.

I returned to the Ridge with the water conditioner and a number of other items by mid-morning. It had occurred to me that a working toilet would mean starting to load the septic tank, so I first got the pump wired into the panel and confirmed that it was fully functional. Then I plumbed in the conditioner, the hot water tank and the toilet water supply, then wired up the hot water tank and the conditioner.

Our New Year's celebration on Ruth's Ridge consisted of Ruth executing the first official flush in the throne room at 9 p.m. That done, we were ready for bed.




Another advance in creature comfort occurred this past Thursday. We managed to find many high-end plumbing pieces and appliances at ridiculous prices on Kijiji prior to and during the build. One such purchase was a Kohler bathroom suite with Price Pfister fittings. In an ideal world, our loft bathroom would have housed this suite except for a small, but major oversight on my part. The first oversight was not checking the dimensions of the jet tub prior to the walls being erected. The second oversight was not checking those same dimensions prior to my roughing in the main vent stack. Long story short, the space for the tub was too short.


Short addendum to long story short, I installed the Price Pfister tub fittings on a new tub after some considerable modification and cobbling. Once again, around 9 p.m. we had added another basic household function to Ruth's Ridge. No more snow baths or outhouses. It's astounding how much one appreciates these common conveniences when faced with the amount of work required to bring each of them to completion.

Today, after many time-saving hours of using Dave & Carmen Matthews' airless paint sprayer, Ruth & I began the task of applying the supposedly final coat of ceiling paint to the kitchen, dining room and great room. While I had learned how to run the sprayer quite well, we came to the realization that the finish we desired would require going the slower route of rolling the paint on and well as out.

Suffice to say, by mid-afternoon, Ruth & I both had seriously cramped necks after painting said three ceilings, nominally 800 sq.ft., with 2.5 gallons of paint. It was time for a short walk off a long driveway with our two lovely pooches. The light was, as always, breathtaking. So was Ruth and the dogs.

Perhaps I'll post again soon. Off tomorrow for a long-overdue visit with my parents down in Winkler.