Update on the Log Cabin Project

We've been working most evenings at the log cabin, hauling off trash and old wood. Larry has spent a few daytime hours there too and we're making progress. We finished removing the porch on Thursday night. Now it was time to start on the tumble-down kitchen addition. This is what it looked like before we started last night:

We made one last check to be sure we'd removed everything we might want before pulling it down.

This globe was on the kitchen light. It's nothing special but we can use it for the one that fell off the porch ceiling fan last fall. No sense tossing it out if it can be used. That was the last thing of any use left in the kitchen, so it was time to pull it down.

We hooked a chain around what seemed a good place and pulled. Boards came tumbling--time to pick up sticks. Can you see the dust flying? I wonder how many homes we might have disturbed?

We hitched the truck to the one 2x4 that seemed to be holding up what was left of the kitchen...

and pulled.

Down it came, in a rush of dirt and debris. Unfortunately, the 5-gallon bucket got squashed. There went our impromptu step. Being short requires a step pretty often and the bucket was handy!

Now we have the job of cleaning up ahead of us. We hauled off two loads of wood for burning, and kept the kitchen door and some tongue-and-groove wood that was on the kitchen walls. It's really nice wood and I think we can clean it up to re-use for another project. I also kept the bottom panel of the screen door, a nice piece of beveled wood that is perfect for a signboard.

As the kitchen came down, so did part of the chimney to the cabin. Larry was pulling this stone off the tin when something popped out of the hole in the stone:

This is Larry's reaction to the unexpected occupant:

The snake slithered out of sight under the tin, so I expect we'll run into each other again in the coming days. Won't that be fun? Since it was a black snake we did not kill it--they're good to keep around to control rodents. I'm not sure the man who owns the property feels that way about snakes though! And Larry isn't nearly as calm about them as I am, probably because he was raised in an area rife with copperheads and rattlers, and I was not.

We'll continue work on cleaning up the mess we made this week and probably into next week. Then the real work begins--taking off the tin roof and taking down the logs.