September 4-5
It's now the day after Labor Day, and the Daly boys (Mick, Ben & Kevin) started building the
decks. Slow progress at first, but by the end of Wednesday we had 5 logs in place, and they look great. The
framers continued to work on the house floor, although they ran for cover during a heavy rain shower and moved
to another indoor job - we were not impressed!
September 6-7
It's proving invaluable having Steve, Ray and Richard (and sometimes their boss, John Creech) on site
do the framing - they are a great source of information and advice, as well as being fun to work with. With
their advice, we're making progress building the deck; it's slow, because we are amateurs and are being very
careful. The end product will be great.
By Friday afternoon the floor was almost finished. John told me that his
original estimate of 8-9 weeks to complete all the framing has grown to 12 weeks, and the cost will be much
higher. This is because, first, his bid was based on old plans (why didn't our builder give him the latest
plans?!), and second, the Superior walls are so out of true (parallel, level, etc.) by anywhere from 3 to 6
inches, and they are also not plumb. We are going to have some interesting conversations about who will pay for
the extra costs.
September 10-14
 What a week it has been. Words are totally inadequate .... (in the words of a
favorite Christian song: "so let my words be few"). If you are interested, please enjoy the reaction
of another Daly (John - no, not the golfer, and not a relative of ours - an acquaintance in England): Terrorism.
On "911" day very little was done. Kevin and I awoke to KLOVE music
and at 7:05 am Mountain Time they announced the first plane crash into the WT Tower, we turned on the TV and
didn't move until almost noon.
Since then, we've continued building the deck and our framing crew have
completed the garage lower level ... But it seems almost trivial now. We thank God for all our blessings, and
that we know Him to be a loving, faithful, heavenly father.
September 17-21
This week, after losing much of Monday to heavy rain storms, we made good progress. Ben came
down on Wednesday and with his help, Kevin and I moved to the middle of our 3-tiered deck. John, Steve,
Ray and Richard completed most of the framing and on Thursday they set the first of our logs in place - yes, we
will have a log home!
September 24-29
With record-setting heat (90°F) and dry weather all week, we made solid progress on our decks (the
complete 3-level deck turns out to be just over 1000 square feet: no wonder it's taking so long!) With Ben's
leadership on Tuesday and Thursday afternoon we built and installed two sets of stair "stringers"
from the top to middle deck and from middle to lower deck.
The faming crew completed the log walls for our first floor and most of the
interior walls. They also started on the garage roof. In 2-3 weeks we should be fully dried-in (roof, windows
and doors).
Because the house foundation/basement was built 18" higher than planned,
the floor was "hung" (saving 12"), but the extra 6" is not acceptable to the home owners
association. We went back requesting a modification which would have lowered the offending ridgeline, while
still giving us the desired ceiling height in the living room (15'). This was turned down: we think they are
being unreasonable, but they want houses built in Elk Springs to have a very low profile, and ours is not low
enough for them (too low for us!).
On Saturday Jenny and I started to measure and build the
foundation for the hot-tub, involving 6x6 and 2x10 timbers. It was good working together. We look back on
September with very mixed feelings - 9/11/01 will always be remembered with sadness.
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Come back soon to check on our progress.
God bless,
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log home
