closed in!

wow! it's november 1st and we are closed in, roughly!!! All the windows are in, we finished up the six in the basement this morning, hung the front door, and even built some temporary stairs into the house so we can finally stop hoisting ourselves in or climbing ladders in. Tomorrow afternoon the woodstoves are to be delivered. The metal roofers were here in a flurry of amazing productivity yesterday. We have an easy roof to roof (we designed it that way since we thought we'd be doing it ourselves!) but these nine guys swooped in out of the morning mist, and worked seven hours straight and left in a flurry, leaving little trace but a few cigarette butts (which I went around and found, since i can't stand them and don't want them on the land!).

It's pretty hard to believe that we built nearly the whole thing! The windows were quite easy for us (the highest ones were done by the same people from Roy's crew who put our attic trusses on for us) after the first ones. We did the high side above the mudroom shed roof, and all the lower floors (with the exception of the french doors in the rear of the house).

We've also started cutting and splitting wood (feels great!) and we got some garlic planted, we'll see how it does, the soil isn't too hot and I didn't do much amending beyond some kelp meal and compost brought up from the garden here in cushing). just as we were finishing up some stacking of wood, some rain started. What a delight, for the first time since we started building, to hear!! No worries about it pooling in the living room or getting under the roof guard! I think it's been three months since I've really enjoyed the sound of rain, so it's nice to be able to relax about that rather large part of the natural scheme of things. You can't do much to change what the sky gives you for the day, so it's best to be closed in!

The insulation is scheduled for later next week, or around the 19th or so, and then we can be renters no longer! YAHOOOOOOOO!

I'll post a few more pics...