I haven’t updated anyone on our plans to live in a motor home over the summer as things have kind of been up in the air this past week. We had full intentions of roughing it for the summer while we tried to piece together something to live in for the winter. Well, last Saturday I came home from putting our garden fence together to keep out those pesky deer and was ready to pack up and move our little family out onto our land. While I was away a neighbor had been to visit in regards to the building below. We were interested in this place but the price was more than we could afford and besides, Milly never dreamed that she would live in a log cabin when she grew up.   I on the other hand have watched with admiration over the past three years as a local builder was erecting the start of a log house on his back lot. Anyway, he came by and was interested in further negotiations.  So after talking, yelling, figuring, praying, yelling some more, (Milly and I, that is) and with a promise that I’ll eat all my vegetables, Milly agreed to the deal. The positives I mentioned in my pleas to Milly are as follows:

• Natural local material
• No off gassing
• Walls can be put up in fairly short order
• We don’t have to mess with a temporary shack
• Landscaping will be set the first time instead of having to figure things out for a second house
• The builder will cut in the doors and windows as well as help reassembling for the price we agreed upon
• We wanted a house about 1000 sq ft for our final place anyways
• It’s unique
• Doors and windows can go wherever we like
• I get a balcony out of my office overlooking our kingdom

  The negatives Milly presented were as follows:

• We are poor. We are not going into debt to build a house

That was it. Her only complaint was we have no money. Pshaw I say. Things will work out. So now my summer plans include collecting bottles on weekends and completing the rest of this house. Hopefully things work out. But for now we are the proud owners of four beautiful graying log walls. Back to some pictures. The builder brought in some huge logs and peeled, shaped, and pieced together the walls for a 30’ by 35’ structure. The logs range from 14 to 8 inches in diameter. Average around 10 inches.  The builder is from Norway and has built several log homes just like they made them back home. The logs are flipped end for end and planed by hand to fit snugly. The walls have been outside unprotected for a about three years and have started graying. Not sure what we will do with this. Both Milly and I don’t mind the gray so we may keep it unfinished and let it age naturally. The walls are about 9 feet high and we will put a roof on the top. There is a center pole in the middle of the house with beams that will be used for a loft. Amazing how snug the walls are. We will put wool in between each log when we reassemble on our land. Milly is concerned about   chemicals and off gassing materials. These logs have sat outside for a while so there will be no problems of those sorts. You can see the two left loft logs are shorter than the other three. The stairs to the loft will go up there. Uneven versus even ends. The builder was going to cut them off straight to match but I kind of like the uneven look. What do you think? So this place will probably be smaller than this Montana log house but who wants something that big anyway. If you haven’t noticed, our plans change about as often as the weather in Southern Alberta. We are hoping to have a full basement dug, the walls erected and a roof on by wintertime (October). I just need to get collecting those bottles.