June 28, 2016

What Was Once Old...


When we first started thinking about a house on the river, we knew we wanted it to look rustic and like it had been there for awhile.  Not too shiny and new looking, if you know what I mean.  The house Jim Belushi built on the Rogue River was sort of a jumping off point for us.  His was just a little too rustic, too barn looking and too expensive for us to build but we really liked his use of reclaimed barn wood.  We decided we'd like to use it on both the house and the barn, the question was how much of it would we use and where exactly would it go?

I spent a few hours with some colored pencils and some little copies of our elevation plans to try out a few options.  



This is what I came up with and although it's still a work in progress, this is basically the vision of how it will look someday. 

Mike looked online for about a month, looking for the right place to get some reclaimed barn wood.  He looked at a place in Utah, one in Idaho and even at the local lumberyard. There is a company that makes a product called Ghostwood, which is new wood that they do a process on to make it look old.  

There have been a few places he found that had barns for sale but you had to come and take them down and remove all of the nails and then transport the lumber.  That takes a lot of time. 

Last week he found a listing on Craigslist of a barn being taken down in Star.  There is a lady who owns a business where she removes old barns. They either take them down or sort and salvage the wood from barns already down and then sell the barn wood.  Arrangements were made to go out to the location and see the wood for ourselves.  
The Star Barn


When we got there we saw that the barn was all smashed and fallen in on itself.  A big pile of old, dirty, barn wood, but with almost all of the nails removed.  Yay!  Just what we were looking for!
There wasn't quite enough and it was not quiet as grey as we were hoping for but the lady who listed it assured us she had more wood that was similar from a barn in Garden Valley.  

The Garden Valley Barn before it was taken down.
After some negotiations, we were the happy owners of some beautiful old barn wood!  
I love that I know exactly where this wood came from and what it looked like in it's first life.  I like that it has a history and that this old wood will not be left to rot or to go to a landfill, but that it gets to have a new life on our house and barn.  That's just so sappy, but those who know me would tell you I really do have a love and appreciation for old things and history.

So once the wood was ours, but now the trick was to get it out to the river house.  Mike was able to get about two thirds of it loaded on his flat bed trailer and then he brought it over to our friend Betsy's house where he pressure washed both sides of each and every board and then grandson, Palmer and I took it off of the trailer and put it on the ground to dry.  Then the two of them went back and got the other third and did the whole process again.


After that we wrangled up some more hands (also known as free labor) and with four generations of family out there helping, we loaded it all into the enclosed trailer in one big load and trailered it out to the new barn and then...you guessed it...UNLOADED it all in to the barn!  
My hard working Dad
My mom, the excellent babysitter!


A full day's work and everyone was sore, tired and dirty by the end of it.


We celebrated a job well done by chowing down on some really good pizza.  

Good times, Great memories.  


Other exciting news (exciting to us anyway):

Mike parked his truck in the barn for the first time. That folks, was an exciting moment, I'm sure!


Heating and AC guys got in and out in record time.


Electricians are doing the rough in today and tomorrow.



Ollie checked out the new digs and came home with a little souvenir..a tick!  I will be making an appointment at the Vet to get him some tick, mosquito and flea meds right away.

A huge thank you to the amazing Galloways and to my parents for your quick response to the SOS call. And to those family members who weren't able to help this weekend because of work etc...just hang on, your turn will come!



June 20, 2016

Thank Goodness for Family

Another busy week at the little river house...


Martin and his framing crew put a few more days in and they have maybe another day or two to finish up completely.  

They are happy, hard workers. It's so fun to hear them singing loudly along with their traditional mariachi music.  They also set up a little cook fire surrounded by some slapped together benches made from scrap lumber.  I think they cook tortillas with some fillings and corn.  Someone likes to spit out their corn kernel husks all over the place.  I know this because my job this week has been to sweep, sweep and then sweep again.  

















They've finished the stairs to the bonus room over the garage, the shed dormers on the roof, and put all of the windows in.  They look so good!






The fireplace wall.

The plumber came out and did his rough in.  There's now a tub/shower combo sitting in place in the hall bathroom.  The master will have a walk in tile shower and an an antique claw foot tub (a subject for a later blog) and the guest room bath will have a tile shower.  So that's why there is only one fixture in place now.  It has to go in now because it's too big to fit once the drywall and doors are in.




Mike's brother, Joe, came out all day on Friday to rough in the built in vacuum system.  He used to do that for a living, so he helped us out so much by installing all the piping in the crawl space etc..   It's not pleasant work.  He did say we had a very nice crawl space to work in.  It's tall enough to sit up in and there weren't any rocks.  For that he'd have to give  thanks to the grandkids who cleaned out the foundation before the floor was put on.
A little Sonic lunch on the back porch.


Daughter, Codi and the kids all came out too. Mike had hired grandson, Palmer to do some work out there.  He kept him busy for two days cleaning up and pulling nails out of scrap 2x4s so they could be reused as blocking for the reclaimed barn wood siding.  

The other kids got put to work loading the garbage trailer at both our house and Uncle Pat's.   They never complained and just worked hard.  Such good kids!



The well drillers were at Pat and Donna's this week, their windows were all put in and  framing is about completed.  




We noticed as we came through the cut on Freezeout Hill the other day, that you could actually see the houses and barns from there.   (If you know exactly where to look..)

Right in the middle of this pic is a white dot.  That is Pat's barn.  It right at the foot of the hills, dead center. That's us!


Life at the river is busy, but so beautiful.  This week we saw deer and pheasant, we watched the horse guy cut his hay field and took some time to enjoy a few beautiful sunsets.  
Life is good.















June 13, 2016

Another Week of Framing


The framers continue to do what they do...work hard and make things work. 
After a well deserved weekend off, they are back to finish up the last few details, like getting the roof to meet in the middle, moving a wall or two, fixing a pretty major design flaw with the great room vaulted ceiling (I'll take partial credit for that, but I'm not an architect nor do I claim to be an expert in truss design) and adding three fake windows on the roof.

 Mike and Alan worked on the barn all weekend.  These two "older" guys just don't slow down at all, even though they also deserve a weekend off.
Mike handing up materials to Alan.


Taking a lunch break inside the barn.
  The barn is almost completely framed!  


The windows and construction doors have been delivered and are just hanging out in the garage until the framers are ready to put them in.  We've chosen an energy efficient vinyl window in dark bronze for the outside color and white on the inside.  I can't wait to see them in!


Today we spent about two hours walking through the house and barn with the electrician.  He was marking where all the lights, switches and outlets will be.  


Meanwhile, over at the neighbors...
They have a house with a roof!
Things look great!


I spent a little time cleaning up around the place while Mike and Alan were working on the barn.  It's definitely a construction zone every direction you look..

The framers are actually pretty good at keeping things clean and organized.
The back view..
Here's a few pictures that capture the progress so far.
The front view...



The river view...I just love it!