Unfortunately the owner came in and threw much of the contents outside and burned them. A real pity because there were many blue canning jars, old books, letters, etc in the cabin before he "cleaned" it. We told him not to worry about the rest, we'd do it. So we were able to salvage about 30 blue jars, several other types, a few old letters, cards, etc. I will post photos of some of the items we saved in a future blog.
December 26, 2002: Here is the way the cabin looked when we bought it. Some of my sons would not even get out of the car to look at it when we first purchased it--the ground around it was poorly drained because someone had added a pond nearby and had not down the grading properly, so the ground was muddy, something smelled rank and trash was strewn everywhere.
As you can see, the foundation stones were giving way and the roof was nearly gone so the cabin would not have stood much longer.
January 5th, 2003: I didn't get pictures of removing the roof as I wasn't there on that day. Here you can see how the logs were lowered. We tied ropes to the ends and on the other side of the wall are two people desperately clinging to the ropes as they gently lower the log down the ladder. Primitive, but it worked. The logs are mostly oak, with some chestnut, poplar and a few pine. They are 8" thick, and the ones on this side of the cabin were 19 feet long.
January 20th: a few of the work crew that helped carry the logs and get them moved: from left, me, Steve Baldwin, Tommy, Timmy Crook, and Derek ,along with our beloved old dog Pup.
July 2003: I don't have too many photos of the rebuilding process because Larry and Tommy worked on it during the day while I was at work, and I just didn't think to take photos. Larry laid the block foundation in May, then we saved money until July for the floor joists and sub floor. We used 2x12 joists spaced 12" apart to make the floor extra strong for the slate we planned to use on it. Larry used a block-and-tackle pulley rig that looked for all the world like a gallows to lift the logs into place. He did many of them alone or with Tommy's help.
Our son Aaron helped with this part too. Actually, all our sons helped at some stage of the building process--a real family affair in the end.
The exterior of the finished room in 2005. To say we love this room is an understatement!Cost: the total, including the fireplace, foundation (it's about 8 feet high in front, I think, so it took a lot of block and mortar), framing, insulation for the floor and roof, and inside finishing : $5000. We also had to build a new deck, and it's a lot bigger than the old deck. So that was an additional $1500.
source
