Hidden Bend Retreat, Romney West Virginia

Romney, WV

Thursday, January 29, 2015

Cabinets Installed in Kitchenette

Cabinets mounted in the basement kitchen area next to theater. Seem to
fit okay, just have some final trim work, installing the sink and
plumbing connections, and then a counter top to finish. Need to get some
handles for the drawers in the cabinets as well. Most likely will make
the counter top from tile as I have a bit of this from previous
projects that should work.

Truss View from Inside House

Here are a couple of pictures from inside the house once the trusses
were set. Hard to recognize anything but this is looking from the back
sliding glass door in towards the kitchen/stairwell.


A lot of wood!

Trusses Set on House

Got a break in the weather today and we were able to get a crane in to set
the trusses on the house. Job went smoothly, only took about 3 hours to
get them all in place. Temperature started about 9 degrees but had warmed to 35
by mid day.

We used the same local crane company, D & B, that we used when we did the
guest cabin.





Kitchenette Cabinets Nearly Completed

Cabinets for basement area are nearly done- ready to finish. Finish will
be a clear coat of poly so you're able to see the wood grain. Hope to
get them up on the wall in the next few days.

Sunday, January 25, 2015

Roof Trusses on Site

The trusses for the roof arrived and were unloaded. Ready for a crane to
help set them next week.

Outside Walls are Up

On Friday, the outside walls were completed and most of the internal
walls were up as well. The last part of the day was spent getting the
top boards in place and marked for the roof trusses. Hope is to put up
the trusses on the next day with good weather- calling for snow on
Monday as this is written but will wait and see. A crane will be used to
set the trusses in place.


Front Wall Going Up

Front wall going in place on Thursday, things moving fast now!



View out the Front Door

These three pictures show the view from where the front door will be
placed.

Straight out from door/porch
Looking Right
Looking Left

Subfloor in Place

Here's the subfloor laid and hole for the stairs to the basement
completed and ready to start the walls.

Subfloor Joists

Last week there was a lot of progress on the house. Here are some
pictures of the main support beam and floor joists going on the foundation.
Weather looked threatening a lot of the time but no real delays.



Tuesday, January 20, 2015

Well Drilling

Here's Delores as the well drillers finished drilling a 500 foot well
for the new house. Water flow is low but with the depth, the well should
be more than adequate. Drillers will be back later in the week to cap
the well and get it ready for adding the pump once we have electricity
to the site.

Waterproofing Basement



Here are some shots of the foundation, ready for waterproofing and then to start the subfloor and walls.

Forms Removed

The forms for the basement walls were removed late last week, looking good. We'll finish up the drains on the outside of the walls, then should be able to move on to getting the sub floor in place and the walls framed. Hope to see a lot of progress in the next few weeks.

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Basement Kitchenette Cabinets

I've finally started making some cabinet for the small kitchenette area
in our basement next to the theater. The room is narrow so won't be
using a standard size cabinet, these are 22" deep instead of the normal
24". The main panel are made from 3/4" oak plywood and all the face
frames are made using oak. This is oak lumber that I have from trees
that I took down from the house in Leesburg.

The oak has been drying outside for a few years and doesn't look good
when you start working with it, but once planed and jointed, it looks
nice. Will use a natural finish that doesn't add any color to the wood.
The pictures show the cabinets almost ready to be sanded and finished.
The last picture shows the two base cabinets sitting in the room where
they'll go- wanted to make sure the fit and the layout will work. This
will get the small refrigerator we have in there up to a more convenient
height. Will also have a small bar sink.
Upper Cabinet with shelves
Door Panel
Test Fitting
Test Fitting

Basement Walls Poured

Last week, the walls were poured for the basement. The concrete
contractor used a pumping truck to shoot the concrete through a long
hose on a crane to get it in to the forms. Took about 5 trucks worth of
concrete to finish all the walls.


New Lithographs

Mary asked me to make and frame a couple of lithographs from pictures
she had of a couple of old pictures of her and her dad. Since the photos
were different size, I tried something different to frame and hold the
lithos and think it turned out okay. The wood for the frame is 1/4"
thick paduak and uses about 30 small LED lights to get the effect.
Hoping she'll like it but she's only seen pictures so far!

Lithographs are made using my CNC router to carve the picture in to 1/4"
thick pieces of whit Corian counter top material. One the picture
without the light being applied to the back of the Corian, you can see
the carving, it's goes about .12" deep in to the material. Viewed from
the front without lights, not too impressive but as soon as you add the
lights from behind, all the details of the original photographs can be seen.

I'll try to post a couple of other pictures I've done this way in a
separate post.

House Wall Forms

Another cold day for the concrete crew but they put up all the forms for
the basement walls- ready to pour when the weather is warm enough.
Note that the truck used to carry the forms used to be a Dr. Pepper delivery truck!

Church Camp River Iced Over

We had a couple of weeks of really cold and windy weather in early
January. We took a trip down to our Church Camp to make sure all the
pipes were okay and found that the river was nearly frozen over with
really rough ice, must have been from all the wind. Most should have
cleared by now as we've had a few days of warmer weather but the river
flows very slowly in front of the camp so had a chance to freeze.

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