Okay...It's HUGE!!!!

Well- as you can see we have been busy beavers on the house. We had to attend to lots and lots of tiny building details, but at last- we have completed the roof and frame of our house. We are both extremely excited. It will be sad to be leaving the roof for a while, as you can imagine we are both very fond of heights. In fact, the view from our roof is fantastic, and the current cabin and outhouse are completely dwarfed by our new house.

Raise the Roof

After much frustration Joey and I finally have completed putting in our roof rafters and second story ceiling joists. We each read about four roofing books and worked hard at calculating our roof angles. We tried a couple of test pieces and...failure. Steam was coming out of our ears.


Just when we thought all was lost we called our trusty lifeline engineer- Johnny, Joey's brother. He told us to hold up the rafter to the desired level on the outside of our bulding and trace the angles. Seem too simple- we'll it wasn't. It worked. Hooray.

It has been quite rainy the last few days so we now have the rafters covered by a large brown tarp. The next sunny day will be mayhem- we will try to work very swiftly to get the roof sheathing in place.



We had a lot of debate between ourselves whether to go with shingles or a metal roof. Based on the snow loads, occasional strong winds, and the coolness factor- we have deceided to go with an unpainted metal roof. Rainy days will be awfully cozy with the pitter-patter of rain on the roof as we relax in front of the woodstove......

Today we started framing in the mud room and calculating the second of three roof lines. The final roof line to design will be over the front porch.

Second Floor Here We Come

After 2-weeks in the mountains I came home to quite a surprise- Joey had finished the front porch and finished framing and sheeting all of the walls for the first floor. After a quick shower, hug, and a kiss it was back to work. "Hand me another board, please."

Last night we completed putting in the tongue and groove flooring for the second floor, which will double as a finished ceiling for the first floor. It looks lovely and we will have to work hard to keep it pristine through the construction of the second floor walls. We hope to have the walls for the next floor framed in the next two days so we can begin construction on the roof. It has been raining quite a bit lately- we feel like we are in a race to get all the wood up and the structure protected before it beings to warp.

Our favorite part so far- the view keeps getting better the higher we get.

First Floor

In an action packed four days Joey and I were able to get most of the components of the first floor in. We framed and partially sheeted four walls. Next comes the remaining two walls of the mudroom and the front deck.

Joey just left for 10-days of work on the Matanuska Glacier teaching students to ice climb. I starts work this weekend and will be flying back into the Alaska Range for a 12-day mountaineering course. It is hard to leave our new house for other projects but we will be blissfully reunited at the end of the month and hope to complete the second floor. I took a brake from framing yesterday and went paragliding in Girdwood..... Joey doesn't know yet- ha ha ha.

First Floor In!

Our lumber has finally arrived and we are fast at work getting the frame of the house up. After digging the sewer line by hand, it feels good to be done with dirt and switch to wood.

Joey was excited when our main beams lined up perfectly with our foundation tubes. We framed the floor quickly and spent a day tinkering and making it square. Last night we attached the subfloor and had a few friends over to spill the very first beers on the floor.

Hopefully we will get the walls up today and tomorrow...if the mosquitoes don't get us first.

Breaking Ground in Talkeetna!

Big News... Between mountaineering expeditions we were able to put our own foundation in.

In 5 solid hard days of work we cleared the land, dug twelve 4-foot feet deep holes, engineered them to the right distances, mixed and poured our own concrete....whew. We are tired. We are actually looking forward to our next Denali expedition, it will be less work then building our own house I think.

It is very exciting. We were able to get this project done a month ahead of schedule. Also, we were forced to install our own pump in our well so that we could have running water for mixing concrete...what we failed to realize until later is that we have our own running water now- Yipee.

Here are the results:


Thanks to family and friends for your support. Stay tuned for more updates on our progress. We should get back from Denali June 22- unless we summit early.

Cuba!!!

Joey and I are safely back from Cuba. We spent just over two weeks there rock climbing and smoking cigars. Actually smoking cigars was cheaper and easier than burning citronella to keep the mosquitoes off. The country is amazingly poor and lacking what we consider many basic human needs. The area we were in, Vinales, was one of the worst hit villages from hurricane Ike. Many homes are still without roofs, even though they were still in the heart of their rainy season. We met many local climbers and we left them much needed climbing equipment so that they can continue to develop a strong local climbing community. We hope that their economic condition improves with increased diplomacy in the upcoming Obama administration. It is hard to see our neighbors doing so poorly. We had fun but it is nice to be back with our families for the holidays.