Sycle went to the farm the Wednesday before Labor Day, I had planned on joining him on Friday, but my sinuses had a different agenda. He spent two days working the saw mill, trimmed 10 timbers to work with and finished cutting a piece of oak that was on the saw. He cut the 4 – 22 foot logs and not only got the 4 – 22 foot timbers needed but also a great amount of other dimentional timber, including a 2.25″x 12.25″x 22′ piece for the center ridgepole for the roof of the cabin.
When working off the grid, sometimes you have to get creative. Most people will say they are just working with what they have, we like to call it “redneck engineering”. For example, sycle constructed a makeshift “jib” for the front of the tractor to assist in lifting and placing timbers. And did you know a clamp could double as a timber wrench?
The finest in “Redneck Enginerring”
Some of the trees that were felled on our property were red oak and wild cherry, and we were gifted some white oak and walnut. All of those hardwoods have been planked out to 5 quarters and will make beautiful mosiac hardwood flooring. We’ve got it in the water barn drying. I know sounds like an oxymoron, drying in the water barn… but that is the dryest place on the farm at the moment. It is where we have a 1500 gallon storage tank for water from the spring.
This weekend there were some scary moments when the tractor forks were as high as they could go and a 22 foot 7×7 timber is perched on them. Moving that much weight, overhead, in tight spaces, is very dangerous work. But the craftsmanship that sycle puts into each cut, making the joints fit, creating cutouts and making everything fit is equally as awe inspiring to me.
We did place 6 timbers on Saturday, the cabin is really tighenting up with the double windows and long beams set. Well, the windows aren’t in yet but the openings are framed. We decideed we need to go up 1 more row to get rafters up over 8 feet. We’ll work on that next weekend. Hopefully the next post will be that the ridgebeam and rafters are up! We really wanted to be under roof before deer season this year, not quite there.
One thing I was able to work on was filling the woodshed for this winter. I split and stacked the cutoffs from the sawmill. It’s not enough to get throught the entire winter but it’s a good start.
A good start 
Still left to split
I am so excited about the progress we are making on our little farmstead.
City Girl on the Farm 