Kevin and I just spent another weekend at Waycross, trying to help get some cabins finished. They are building them to be able to house more campers for one of the busiest weeks of the summer, so they need to be done by July. We were able to get a lot accomplished, but there's still a lot to do. Hopefully another crew can put in a weekend (or two) between now and then--they're going to be awesome when they're finished!
When we got there Friday evening, there were two additional guests waiting for us in the retreat house:
A bat
A toad
The toad was taken outside, but we lost track of the bat. An attempt was made to open all of the doors and get it to fly out, but it swooped through more of the house than we anticipated (and, to be honest, most of us dropped to the ground, screaming), so we lost sight of where it ended up. :)
This was where the cabins were as we started work on Saturday morning (there are two of them):
Roofing begins
We had 2 people on the ground and 2 people on the roof for each side. The ground people pre-drilled the holes, and the roof people received the sheet metal and screwed it in place.
Roofing ends
We got a pretty good rhythm going and were able to complete both cabin roofs by lunchtime!
After lunch, Kevin, Adie, Will, and I moved onto the fascia (the vertical sheet metal on the front and back of the cabin):
Will (up on the ladder) hung the sheets and measured the next sheets for us.
Kevin was the Saw Man!
Cutting the metal was pretty nasty--there were sparks flying, and my ears were ringing through dinner (we should have had ear plugs). But again, we came up with a good system and finished the front and back of one cabin Saturday between lunch and dinner. It was mentally exhausting because we had to remember the heights of each side, draw the angle, etc. And the sheet metal had one side with a flange and one side without, so we always had to make sure we were orienting it in the correct way. There were 2 times I drew out the cuts for Kevin to make, he cut them, and we handed them to Will, only to find I'd drawn them totally opposite of what they should have been.
We also found that cutting on the back side of the sheet metal was better than the front side (less bumpy), but that meant adding another dimension of difficulty for us on the ground because we had to flip them in our minds. The back of the cabin drops off pretty far, so I switched to ladder-holding duty for Will, and Adie and Kevin knocked out measuring and cutting the back side very quickly. By the end of the day, my brain and body were totally wiped!
Speaking of being wiped out:
Beautiful Baby (and blond?) Gordon
Ben and Gordon came out for dinner and evening fun, and then they all headed back home. Gordon's giggles were the sweetest!
Sunday we all dragged ourselves to breakfast and then dragged ourselves to get back to work. It took us a while, but eventually we hit a good groove. Kevin and I ended up helping Zella (Adie's mom) put in the frames in the wall that will eventually support the screen walls. (The plus signs below.) She and another worker had done the ones on the right side of the door on Saturday, and she and Kevin and I did the ones on the left side of the door on Sunday.
Slowly getting there!
The majority of lumber has been milled from Waycross trees, so it was all very heavy and dense. I 'tapped' my shin with one of the posts and have a pretty good bruise today!
Others in our group framed one of the cabin's decks, built staircases for both decks, laid the decks themselves, and put up soffit on one of the cabins.
Thanks so much to Sharon, Jim, and Scott for watching Lewis for us for the weekend. :) We really appreciate it.
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