Seven Months of Progress

We’ve been in Sointula for seven months now and things are moving along.  

We work outdoors when we can and then shift to indoor projects when it’s raining or too cold.  

We’re learning where the rain water wants to travel through our property and how well protected our house is from southeast winds.  

We’ve moved dirt, cut trees, created our ICF house, shaped cedar boards, collected rocks and much more. This will give you a glimpse into the last few weeks….

April 2018 - you can see the old foundation left after a house was removed 11 years ago. 

November 2018 - A bit of a change!

Jim and Chris Chateauvert, our contractor, installing the underground electrical conduit and cable conduit to the house. 

As soon as the driveway was back together the crew moved the scaffolding into place. A four person job!

After the scaffolding was in place we focused on inside as much as possible, adding studs and creating the interior skeleton of our house.

A big open space...

But not for long! Notice Jim's working in the evening, squeezing in another hour. 

I hope this isn't on our future TV ! It'll will be installed in a cabinet,  hidden behind a hinged painting. 

Time to start framing the lower level walls before carrying them downstairs.

Open space no more. First one in place separating our bathroom and laundry room from our bedroom.

View from the bathroom looking at the future bedroom area.

I know there's a plumbing pipe in here somewhere! 

Bathroom, hall and bedroom walls framed.  

The curved wall between the bathroom and bedroom takes shape.

This will be covered with a thin piece of bendy drywall then finished with
a fun design in tile.

As soon as walls were framed Kane Gordon, our electrician arrived to provide juice to the house.
This chainsaw has a special set of wheels that prohibit it from cutting too deeply into the ICF blocks
but it creates a space for the wires to go.

Fall is in the air everywhere, even Sointula.

Check out the next blog if you're curious about our pretty cool gutters and soffits that Jim and I have laboured over for a few weeks.  All worth it.

Until then...

Jim and Tricia Bowen

tandjbowen13@gmail.com

A Pause to Contemplate Life

Friday Oct 26, 2018

It's 5 PM on a beautiful sunny Friday evening and I'm sitting in a camp chair taking in the view from our living room during a well earned break for the first time in what seems like forever. 

It's a wonderful solid feeling space with dazzling bright rays of sunlight dancing off the walls.  To the northwest I see a big swirling dark gray cloud approaching but right now the sun is warming this house just like we knew it would. 

We've been pushing ourselves for nine days now framing everything we could before our electrician, Kane Gordon, started roughing in the electrical.  He's here now for a few days and we're enjoying getting to know him better and learning lots too!

So... it's 5:00 and I plunk myself down in front of our beautiful huge living room window and watch the sun dance on the water. Two eagles fly by and then I hear them chatting above me in the trees. I take a walk around in the quiet.

Now the actual spaces are starting to take shape. I walk through what will be my kitchen and see the sun at different angles bouncing off the exposed studs and future walls.

I walk down our wonderful stairs that Jim built and imagine the type of carpet that we might have and what our lower level doors might look like. I take in the construction materials everywhere. 

What's the?  It'll be explained in the next blog post.

I know the bath tub plumbing is in here somewhere...

A couple of step ladders, rolls of wire and tubing, stacks of plywood, drills and drivers, all coated with sawdust and styrofoam shavings. I see the table saw and the sail bags stored on hooks suspended above a pile of lumber. I turn around and walk into what will be the future office /guest bedroom. I imagine the color of the walls in that room. Right now I'm thinking one of them might be bright yellow. Hummm...I walk into our future bathroom and close my eyes and envision the unique tile pattern that we've come up with and will to create together. 

There are so many decisions, as anyone who has ever build knows. So it 's really nice to just come and sit and think and absorb and observe.

Tonight I feel very grounded in this house. It's starting to take on a personality of its own, with a little help and commitment by two old hippies who have chosen another wild and crazy adventure to embark upon together.

Until next time...

Jim and Tricia
tandjbowen13@gmail.com

Our Sointula summer sites

Jim's brother and partner, Kathleen, joined us for the Salmon Days weekend.  It was great having them here and they provided some of these pictures.

The rest are from our neighbourhood.  Enjoy!

The Salmon Day Parade!

A buck checks out the new house.

I have my own personal petting zoo.  Now the kids are beginning to eat from my hand too!

Our ferry - to be replaced...sometime!

Sointula from the ferry.

Alder trees reaching for the sun.

Our daily visitor.

Mark, the Sumo rooster.   When I go to feed the
goats, he comes flying.  You have to see him run!

A late October view from our property.  This is one of the many reasons why we bought it!

Bella...she lives with the goats, ducks, Grace the St. Bernard, chickens, Mark the rooster and a rabbit.

Pedestrian traffic!

Our neighbours Jim ad Kathleen with the tame dear in the neighbourhood.

Winterfest is less than a month away.   This will be our first year here for it.  If you like good food, great crafts, entertainment, etc. come to Sointula!  It's the weekend of November 17, 2018.

Until next time....

Jim and Tricia Bowen

Roof, Windows, Doors are Happening!

Where did the summer go????I know....building our home!  

Jim finishing the Welcome sign on our temporary front door.

Our property was a beehive of activity for most of the summer as we worked towards lock up.

The warmth of the sun was welcome as we worked outside on our property, prepped inside and escaped when we could, occasionally heading to Kaleva Beach in search of either cedar for our future deer fence or unusual rocks.  

The deer fence will be a combo of cedar slats and metal deer fence.

Jim found some great pieces of cedar on the shoreline

We spent days enjoying our task of
accumulating cedar slats for the deer fence.

We made a point of creating beach time at least once a week.  Pack a lunch and away we went. By the end of summer we had a substantial pile of cedar slats ready to be installed next spring and we had found more beautiful stones for a future project.

The Ford F150 truck and lumber rack have sure come in handy, especially when you're carrying 12' slats of cedar home.

The gorgeous slats are at least 6' tall with the majority being 10 - 12' long.

Meanwhile, back at the house...Things were happening.  The team helping us build our house had some vacation time in August but they were all back by the last week of summer under spectacular sunny skies to get the roof on.  Chris, Campbell, Brian and Billy installed the roof trusses then roofing materials. It was a welcome site to come back to from a quick down island buying/research trip. Windows, our dining room french door, sliding doors were all added next.

Most of the plywood is over the joists here.  It was a very wet day.
The plywood floor was soaking up water like crazy.
That's the nature of building in a rain forest area.

The first metal pieces are laid in place.

View from just outside our future deer fence.  We'll have a wonderful private garden outside the bedroom.

For now our main floor will be the 'workshop'.  Jim built sturdy shelving and designed some scaffolding
we will use for the next year while we embellish the space.

 

It's the little things like caulking and sealing cracks that will make this house super solid and insulated. 

The start of the ceiling rib project....a creation from Jim to craft a most unusual ceiling.

Jim cut out 1/4" plywood to create three different sets of ribs.  One from each shape creates the 'wave'.
Each one was carefully sanded and stuffed with insulation.

We knew that working on the ceiling, installing insulation, putting up a vapour barrier, etc. would be challenging without the right scaffolding.  Jim puzzled over it and came up with the design below.
Each 'cube' is on sturdy wheels.  Thick planks join the two cubes together.  We can easily roll it as a unit with me pushing one end of a cube and Jim pushing the other one.  Planks and plywood over the stairwell mean we can walk from scaffold to wall anywhere. Brilliant!

Yes - I can use a drill as well as a camera.  

Can you see the beginning of a wave across the ceiling?  An innovative design
idea by Jim.  Pine boards will run across the joists.  That's another story altogether!

The ceiling shape is the first of many unusual artistic features we
will be creating in our home.

The last pieces of the curved ceiling ribs going in ...after dinner.

We do stop many times a day to admire the view!
Sunset last Friday - taken through our dirty windows but it still was one of the most amazing so far!

Always working!

Fall is in the air as we continue inside work.  Siding and shingle
art will be added to the outside over the coming months.  There
will also be a chimney sticking out once we install the wood burner.

So...that's what we've been up to lately.  This week we will be framing a portion of the lower level to create a temporary studio apartment to live in while we finish the upstairs.  Our electrician, Kane, is coming later in the week to start the electrical.

All in All...we love Sointula and this journey.  We're collaborating well, and finding our friends in Sointula great resources for who to call or where to buy something.  We're beginning to solidify design ideas for the bathroom and kitchen and think about our future garden.  The studio will be great to spend a few months in while we work on the rest.

Until next time...

Jim and Tricia Bowen
250 818-0095
tandjbowen13@gmail.com