Weekly Update: 8.12.23
Well, it was another eventful week for us. Between heavy storms, torrential rain, and hot days, the weather felt almost like an obstacle course to work around. But -- work around it we did, and we have plenty of progress to show for it.
The week started with a stormy Saturday morning. We went to Bolivar to pick up groceries, and then we did a little cleaning and organizing of the tent for the rest of the day. The sun did come out eventually, but the build site was too muddy to do much of anything. Between the rainy Saturday and a restful Sunday, it was good to get a little break from the bunkhouse project. We all helped Bonnie-Jean watch over Tilde, who was recovering from her surgery. While taking a turn with her in the kennel, Grace caught a picture of the kitty who has been hanging around our place. We don't know if it is a stray or belongs to a neighbor.
We hit the ground running on Monday morning. Our brother Levi organized all the blocks -- sorting the different types and sizes. Grace and I checked our string lines for square again, and we realized they were off. We think one of the batter boards probably got bumped while it was muddy. We hung new string lines and made sure they were square. The next day, Grace and I marked the precise location of each pier on the footings. This was a tedious undertaking -- using a plumb bob and level to get as close as we could. It took us most of a day, but we managed it.
We had planned to start laying block on Tuesday, but the forecast for Wednesday made us wary. We were worried about so much rain on our fresh mortar, so we decided to wait. We were glad we did.
On Wednesday, we had the worst rainstorm we have experienced while living on our property.
The wind wasn't too bad, so we decided to ride it out in the tent. But once the rain started, the sound was deafening. It was so loud, we could hardly talk to one another without shouting. And the rain just kept coming. Through our windows, we watched as water filled our footing holes, in some places completely submerging the footing and dry-stacked block on top (we had set out the first block for each pier). It was unbelievable. We kept an eye on our dry creek bed down the hill, too -- wondering if this rain would be enough to make it flow. And it did. The dry creek became a small river, rushing along the woods to where it dumps in the spring creek.
When it was all over, Jeremiah walked down to see what was left of the sodas we had chilling in the spring water. The sodas in the crates were still there, but everything outside was scattered along the banks. Several of us went down to collect the flavored seltzers, diet colas, and packages of the kids' CapriSun caught in the bramble. We found a spotted fishing spider in one of the soda crates, apparently hanging on for dear life.
The forecast warned of tornado risk Wednesday afternoon, and we were prepared to head down to our storm shelter before the second wave of storms. Thankfully, those storms drifted south and missed us entirely. After such a wild morning, I really wasn't in the mood for round two.
Things were still a muddy mess on Thursday. Most of our footings were completely covered with mud, so we set about cleaning them off. For the deeper holes, this involved shoveling buckets of mud and lifting it out. It was a mess, but we still managed to start on our piers. After all the prep, it felt good to see it coming together.
We worked all day Friday laying block -- Grace, Dad, and Levi doing most of the work with me assisting as I could (I'm ashamed to say the blocks are a bit heavy for me to heft around). We got about halfway done -- but we used way more than half of our mortar. We will have to pick up some more in Bolivar on Saturday.
Aside from making progress on our piers, we got a big wood shipment on Wednesday evening. Menards brought in everything we need for our floor system. It's exciting to see it all sitting there, like solid planks of possibility. I'm so looking forward to finishing up the masonry work this week and starting on the floor.
In the middle of all the foundation work, Bonnie-Jean's German Shepherd pup gave us a scare. Tilde was recovering nicely from her surgery -- we thought. Then, Tuesday evening, the surgery site appeared to be swelling badly. Our vet was already closed, so Bonnie-Jean and Erin took her to the Emergency Veterinary Clinic of SW Missouri in Springfield. Since Tilde had thrown up earlier in the morning, we worried something could be very wrong. The vet told Bonnie-Jean that she thought the surgery had failed, and it would need to be redone. It wasn't an emergency though, so they didn't charge her for anything. They just told Bonnie-Jean to make sure Tilde was resting and not playing with rough and tumble Dagger. Bonnie-Jean brought Tilde home and scheduled an appointment with our vet for Thursday. We dropped her off for another surgery Thursday morning, but it turned out that the only issue was that her stitches were too tight. The vet re-did them and didn't charge Bonnie-Jean anything. He said she was healing nicely, and he cleared Tilde to play with Dagger. That was a relief, as keeping the two apart had not been easy.
With everything going on, it felt like a rather chaotic week. We survived it though, and the outlook for this next week is brighter. Our dad, Samuel, and brother Jeremiah are off for the week, so we have extra help getting things done on the bunkhouse. The weather looks mostly pleasant, so we hope to make a lot of progress and have some fun along the way. No matter what, though, we are trusting God's timing and providence as we do our best to move forward.
