Latest Bungalow Drawings

Diane's Mill Road Bungalow Project

Today we completed the first elevation draft for Diane's (Shawn's Mom's) house, which we're going to be starting to build in the next few months.

We used a *free* program by Google called SKETCHUP, which has a hefty learning curve but is proving to be well worth the effort since the drafts can be printed to scale, exactly as shown.

Last weekend we ironed out most of the details together while visiting Diane at home north of Seattle. What we came up with is a 26'x40' 'neo-bungalow' with a classic front porch and simple but handsome lines. It promises plenty of opportunity for detailed woodworking!

We are now in the process of completing a full set of plans for the county, which we should have by the start of June 2010, and we're aiming to start the site work shortly, with the framing started by August.

Stay tuned for updates!

We're also waiting for a final septic plan to be drawn up by Steve Schneider.

Pictures from Jamie's Birthday & Our Recent Trip to Oregon

the foxhole garden raspberry rescue

We have had something like 6 days in a row of splendid blue skies, hardly even a cloud in the sky. It's been awesome!!! It's made for great working weather. Wed. through Friday we had outdoor yardwork, with the biggest two days being Thursday and Friday...a garden restoration where all of a sudden, after several days work it all seems to be showing! We have been enjoying the transformation of the yard and as a bonus, Jenny has bequeathed us basically two beds of raspberry canes, since she wanted to keep only three beds of five. These are big lusty canes, thick as your thumb and six feet tall before a little spring trim. We cut out all the dead wood in all the beds, removed numerous invasive fennel plants, and were able to bring home over 60 canes, with most of their roots in nice shape, for a little raspberry rescue mission. We cleared out and chose a big garden space, trying to figure out what might be sunniest based on how much moss was growing in the lawn (YIKES!!!!!!), I moved the compost pile over, and shawn spaded it up and I removed and shook out the sod. He planted all of the canes! We also made space running along the driveway for overflow canes. We had the whole weekend to work on our own garden, and be it ever so humble, and be it nearly certainly doomed to failure since it's so shady (you're seeing it on a full sun day before the deciduous trees have come in!! Oh My!!) we still think that the raspberry canes will survive till we can relocate them in our own garden yard someday SOON we hope!! In any case, it felt awesome to be outside, digging and planning and even dreaming about a few things being sown (we are going to plant mostly in garden space friends in town are generously saving for us, but we want to at least plant some greens at home...lettuce, spinach, maybe some mustard...things that don't like hot weather...who knows, maybe they will surprise us! At the very least it will be interesting to take note of the sun's power! I guess this would qualify as looking on the bright side?? hee hee)...Anyway, that was yesterday's work and it took most of the day. We had a date out at the Bo Kong restaurant in Richmond, a vegetarian Chinese restaurant with great food, (lots of amazing mushrooms!!!) and just a fun spot we like to visit every now and again. We shared a tofu and veggie hot pot, one of our favorites, and another dish that was quite unusual, with gluten puffs that were sort of faux shrimpy and chickeny. Kind of weird, but fun anyway! We also had an appetizer made with yuba, served cold with a light sesame oil dressing that was really good. Afterwards we toured a big Asian market for a while before heading back home. Today, Sunday, we spent a bit of time working before taking the afternoon off for a big walk in the warm sun. Shawn did a little planing and I assembled my last hive bodies, two deeps and one western super. Next week it's time to assemble frames for foundation...I think Shawn's going to be involved in this endeavor, too. Great weekend here in the Northwest. It felt crazily indulgent to be planting canes. Hope they will do well!! We also rescued several giant poppies, which fills me with glee. They are some of my favorites!