Folklore and Footprint

I've been thinking about how the cabin we are building is right next door to the cabin that my grandpa built in 1960. RIGHT next door.  The lots are only 50 feet wide on the lake so your neighbors are close...good for us on the southern border (my parents).  Jury is out on the other side (but please note, that's where the drunk, couch-befouling stranger originated).

Anyway, there are lots of family legends about the construction of Grandpa's cabin more than 50 years ago like:

• The land was a swamp when they bought it.  Grandma spent a summer with her sons (my Dad being one of them) clearing out the small trees and brush with a machete while my Grandpa worked in a GM shop.  She proudly recalls she was never more physically fit than she was at the end of that summer.  Following the clearing, trucks and trucks and trucks of fill dirt were brought in to make the ground higher than the water table. 
• The "plans" for Grandpa's cabin came from a great uncle's visit to a Boy Scout camp where he drew a building he saw there by hand.  I imagine a few nights over cups of coffee as my Grandpa and a few great uncles (the young men of that generation in the 60s) stayed up sketching things out, dreaming, arguing, and planning, and then promptly getting started based on what they had drawn themselves with pen and ruler.  
• The water used to mix the concrete to pour the slab foundation by hand came from a hole they dug in the ground. 
• While Grandpa was at work and kids at school in the middle a week, the half-built cabin was hit by a tornado.  Finding it leaning and twisted, grandpa winched and jacked it back to center the best he could and propped it up from the inside with plywood and continued building.  For at least 40 years the center support wall was very obviously crooked, at least until my Dad bought the place, moved in, and fixed it. 
• The exterior was wrapped in burlap instead of siding for several years.  Apparently, another great uncle worked for a carpet dealership where delivered carpets came in big rolls covered with a water resistant burlap that got thrown away.  My grandpa asked for the burlap to be saved for the cabin -- as weather proofing and insulation. From what I understand, the names of the carpet companies were printed in huge letters all over the house.  Thinking about that story makes me happy that wanting to do things 2nd hand and "green" runs in the family (though certainly "frugal" would have been used instead of the term "green" back then).
• Grandpa's cabin had an outhouse until at least the late 70s...and the outhouse had 2 seats in it (no reports of 2 people actually using it at the same time)

These old stories, always continually reworked into various lakeside conversations, have never meant more to me than now - as we think and plan for our own build.  Here is a picture of Grandpa's cabin in 1962:

To my family reading this, my apologies...sort of...if I got any of the stories wrong.  However,  I do think there is some value and interest in what I think the story is...a sort of 50-year-long game of "telephone".

Thinking about my Grandpa's build makes me more sure that we can do it too.  We have actual blue prints, and plan to have professionals do the foundation.   We have time... my Grandpa built his cabin when he was working full time all year with young kids.  We have young kids, but my husband has summers off and both our fathers are retired (and are basically our building "ringers"), so there is likely to be more hands around for longer than back then. We have the Internet to use for research and advice.  The surrounding infrastructure is better than it was back then .... Grandpa had to haul his materials from far away towns with no interstate and on at least 20 miles of dirt road....including spring wash outs that made the byways completely impassable.

So, I will take a moment and say thanks to my Grandpa for showing me that it can be done, in less desirable conditions with the same amount of tenacity and will, spurred on by similar visions of kids and grand kids enjoying the fruits of our labor.  Thinking about all of this makes me remember him, in the twilight of his years, his calm smile looking back at me and my cousins being drug around the lake on skis or tubes or home-made surfboards for as long as we had gas in the boat.  I never thought of it before, but I think he might have been thinking about all the work and dreaming and planning -- of taking a swamp and turning it into his definition of paradise -- resulting in moments of joy and indelible memories with his grand kids.

Progress
Early this past week, my husband and I spent a few hours talking about the "footprint" of our place.  The key questions is ... "do we have to take down the massive trees in order to build?"  The cottonwood trees, as I have said, are huge.  The main trunks are the size of a dining room table, and branches 3 and 4 sections up are the size of large trees themselves.

Not only will they be very expensive to have them removed (no way could we do that ourselves), they are so impressive and majestic, it just seems a shame to do it.  When on the lake, the silhouettes of these trees against twilight skies guide us home because they are the tallest of any around them.  They have been used recently as perches for bald eagles, who drop half-eaten fish at their bases (one almost hit my husband once and he thought for a second that he was in a fish fight). On the other hand, the trees have been the source anxiety for my hearing-sensitive-music-teacher-husband who often claims "the trees are screaming at me!".  Yes, the trees are so huge and sprawling that the blowing leaves can be deafening on the many windy lake days. 

BUT, good news is (for all but my husband's hearing), we think we can build and save the trees.  Our late-night planning included a full scale drawing of the property (1/4 inch = 1 foot) with the location of the trees in mind.   While we still  have to find out exactly how far off the property line we need to be and the specifics about where the septic has to go in relation to everything, based on what we know and what we can reasonably estimate, here is our "footprint" plan (the visual is greatly aided by our kid's craft paper and markers):

The footprint plan...Circles are the trees

The garage is optional in the short term and the subject of hot debate, but the prevailing wisdom is we should spend our time and limited funds on things that will result in a finished house and a new mortgage as quickly as possible.  A spacious garage is definitely a must for the future, so we are trying to plan for it now by making space on the lot and modifying the floor plan.

The goal for this week is to talk to someone at the township about building codes and get the ball rolling on quotes for the foundation.

Thanks for reading.
Sarah

Inspiration and Research

For a Christmas present to each other, my husband and I commissioned my uncle, David Lackey, to do an oil painting of the sunset picture of our kids Ella and Danny.  He just finished it this week and though I haven't seen it in person yet, I am in love. 

                                                      http://davidelackey.blogspot.com/

I can't wait to find a prominent location in the cabin-to-be for this treasure.  It is sure to grow more special as the years pass and my kids get bigger. And of course, it is made even more special because my Uncle painted it -- and he like my Dad (and I and my cousins and now my kids) share a tapestry of youthful memories of time spent on the lake in countless sunsets like this one over the last 53 years.  The painting has now become the inspiration and anchor of my daydreams about how we might decorate -- wall color, furniture, general theme...but though that's fun to think about, we are a long way off for sure.....

In the interest of helping would-be other DIY-ers with bloated ambition like ours build a house when they have no idea how, here are some things we learned this week:

1. A land survey for a lot only 50 feet wide and 180 feet deep can take 2 days and cost $3,000. I have no point of reference but, that seems like a lot of time and money to find 4 corners of a really small piece of land. Of course, we are getting other quotes.
2. We need a 450 sq foot drainage field for our septic tank.
3. Septic size requirements are based on number of bedrooms for a house plan. We can have a smaller one because our house is technically 2 bedrooms, even though there is a loft, which we intend to have people sleep in.
4. I am sure to know WAY more about what happens to our bodily fluids than I ever wanted to at the end of this project
5. You don't have to have a well and septic in place before you build.... you just have to have a well and septic permit, with clearly defined locations of the well and septic
6. Well and septic permits are good for one year and cost about $200 each in our county.
7. People are awesome! We have only just begun to tell folks about this build and already many have offered assistance including:
1. 2 potential contractors (might be good for the foundation work and ongoing advice)
2. Architecture advice
3. Manual labor (so many have offered to "swing a hammer")
4. Tents and lawn space for volunteer builders
5. General encouragement for the build AND the blog about the build

Progress:
On Saturday we went up to the lake to take stock and begin to clean out Buddy.  Truth be told, there isn't much of value in the old guy, but the aim is to keep anything we might need in the future.  So, the first thing we did was clear out some space in the attic of the shed on the property.  Then we put the futon and a few other pieces of furniture up there, and then we boxed up some mementos and the  kitchen stuff....there's nothing nice, but it would be silly to get rid of it now only to go to Goodwill later and buy it all again. It was chilly, but probably the last real day we could hope to get into the trailer before spring.

Here is the inside of the trailer in mid-packing.  You can see the whole 10-ft width of the Buddy in this shot.  Right under the mirror is where the infamous drunken stranger couch once sat. 

Buddy has 2 small  bedrooms, the back bedroom (with the mold and leek) is an okay size.  Our son and I spent many hot summer nights in that room when he was a few months old while my husband slept on the futon. The 2nd bedroom (with the unexplained septic smell), is about 5ft by 6ft.  Sounds small, but it was actually our daughter's 1st bedroom of her own because when she was born we all shared a bedroom in our tiny apartment in Brooklyn.  Our kids are only 3 and 5 now, but looking at this picture reminds me of their baby-hood.

This pic shows the  kitchen.  Notice the pictures glued to the cabinets.  The lake is about 50 feet out those front windows. 

I'd say it Buddy is 80% ready to be torn down, and, despite the slight nostalgia,  I am in a hurry to do it...to mark the "real" start of this project.  But, Andy (always pragmatic), says we should wait until April and Buddy can live out his last winter months as storage.  Fine, though I admit I have dreams of driving up there with a sledge hammer.

And finally ....because I like to plan things out, here-goes:

• Jan-March = PLANNING
• Clean out Buddy
• Get a land survey
• Determine the "footprint" and location of said footprint.
• Finalize floor plan and questions like "do we put on a garage while we are at it"
• Get quotes for the foundation work (at this point, we think this is one part of the project that we will not do ourselves, but we shall see once we find out how much it costs).
• Start obsessing about 2nd hand kitchen cabinets, doors, fixtures, wood burning stove, lumber, etc. 
• March = Permits
• Well and Septic permits (first)
• Building permits (second)
• April = Tear Down and Land Work
• Tear Down Buddy - first week of April (Andy's spring break)
• Decide if we have to get rid of any trees (note-- there are about 5 HUGE cottonwood trees on the property.  I mean 2-people-can't-wrap-our-arms-around-huge)
• May = Break Ground and Foundation
• June = Put up the shell of the house
• Thinking of having a "barn raising" party
• 4th of July - Goal date to have the cabin "weathered in"
• July-TBD - Interior work
• Some time next spring = New Well and Septic
• Next June = Project Completion
• Next July = Secure new, more reasonable mortgage and spend a week lakeside on my hammock with a cocktail in my hand

So, please feel free to hold us to this schedule.  A plan written down is about 60xs more likely to actually happen than one that isn't.  Which is another reason for this blog...to hold ourselves accountable to our plan, and to make our plan public so it is harder to decide it is okay to fail.


Thanks for reading.  Any advice is welcome.
Sarah

The Story of Buddy

We are building a cottage!  This blog is intended to chronicle that process.  Mostly for me, and my kids, but also for anyone else who might be interested.

The story:
About 5-ish years ago my husband, Andy and I bought some lake property in Michigan right next door to my parents' house.  We were living in NYC  (Greenpoint, Brooklyn) at the time, pregnant with our first, and given the high cost of living in NYC, our jobs as a nonprofit worker and a teacher, and lack of rich relatives with any promise of inheritance, we had no hope of owning anything worth while anywhere close to where we lived. So, in 2007 when the piece of property came on the market, we had a little savings and a desire to "own something", so we bought it.  Sounds great if I stopped there.

However, this was 2007.  Yes, a year before the housing bubble popped.  Oh yeah, and the property doesn't have a house on it, but rather a run-down circa 1960 single-wide trailer -- brand name "Buddy". And because Buddy was not a "real" house, it also came with one of those legendary predatory-bank a really bad mortgages with super high 8.9% interest and a 15 year balloon.  But, my parents just happen to live next door in a house that they bought from my Grandmother -- a house that my Grandfather (now passed) built himself, so along with the sale came many childhood memories of turtle hunting, sailing, campfires, boat rides.  Mix my memories with my Dad's childhood memories of the exact same spot on the exact same lake and the potential for my future children's future memories on the exact same lake and yes, you could say the property had a lot of emotional attachment - nearly to the point of being "sacred ground" to me and my kids.

Picture of the lake - this past summer:

Picture of Buddy the trailer (I love this pic because both of my kids are in diapers and because this is pretty much how they dressed that entire summer):

We were thrilled.  For the first few years, we loved the trailer (which we quickly started to simply call Buddy).  It was a major diversion from city life -- somewhere between camping and a hotel with a quaint/sleezy mix.  The well went out our first summer there and we couldn't afford to fix it, but we delighted in our no-cost solution of stringing a long hose from my parent's outdoor spout.  Soon after that, we started getting mild electric shocks in the shower and realized the hot water heater was on the fritz.  So, happily, we started showering next door when absolutely necessary and bathing the kids in the lake and only using the hose water ingeniously snaked through a hole in the floor so we had a working toilet and then split off from there to another hose that allowed us to wash our hands at the sink in the bathroom.  Sure, there was no water to the kitchen (and no stove for that matter anyway), but we were still in love in a kinda of "vintage", "kitchy", "New-Yorker Hipster wanna be" way. We burned oil lamps at night and drank boxed red wine while Ella, our then infant daughter slept.  We laid and listened to heavy rains on the thin trailer roof.  We glued pictures of us enjoying the lake to the kitchen cabinets. We sat up at lakeside campfires until wee hours with family and friends and guitars and bug spray and canned beer and the baby monitor crackling on the ground next to us.  I would say it was about 2 summers of bliss before things started to go downhill with our relationship to Buddy. 

Actually, the seeds of our animosity probably started the 2nd summer, when our daughter was 9 months old, kicked off by the now infamous "stranger peeing our our couch incident".  Encouraged by the broken front door on the 4th of July, a benevolent yet very drunk stranger wandered in after the fireworks and merriment to sleep it off on our couch.  We woke up to find him there, still drunk and stewing in his urine.  That situation was resolved by us emptying his wallet of $80, getting a new couch, and putting a chain on the door (though it is still technically broken). It was funny, yes, but probably the beginning of the end of our use of the words "quaint" and "upscale camping" and "retro fun" to describe the trailer and the beginning of the phrase "luxury storage" for camping clothes and bric-a-brac overflow from next door.

Next came the mice.  Despite our attempts to winterize the place at the end of the summer, we returned in the spring to find every soft spot had been used as a nest for the rodents, evidenced by mice poo everywhere -- on blankets, pillows, in Ella's crib, in drawers, counter tops.  It was everywhere, and we threw out all we could and spent a week scrubbing everything that wasn't nailed down, but I have to admit that after the mice, I have been slightly skeezed out with Buddy ever since. 

The next series of experiences included a septic tank smell wafting into the small bedroom periodically, a leek and suspected mold problem in the back bedroom, and the discovery of rotting, crumbly walls in just about every corner. The last nights we spent there (though we visit often) were 2 summers ago, but we had pretty much vacated the 2 bedrooms to uninhabitable storage and put our bed in the kitchen and the kids beds in the living room.

I should probably mention that about 2.5 years ago we moved back to Michigan, and now live about 25 miles south of the lake.

About a year ago we started to get really clear about the financial situation that comes with the property. While financially we could go ahead and keep paying the monthly mortgage, we were deeply "under water" on the place by $60k optimistically. The mortgage situation meant that we were pretty much paying only interest and not touching our principal at all ... and we had a 15 year "balloon" payment to worry about.

So, we started looking for a solution and after much council (including talking to a real estate lawyer) came to 4 options:

1. Sell it (short sale, and not likely given how underwater we are)
2. Walk away (attractive in some ways, but really a last resort option for us for lots of reasons)
3. Get a construction loan (complications here because we would have to hire a builder and we would need a down payment of 20% of the cost of the build PLUS what we owed, and that total couldn't be more than the property would be worth in the end).
4. Build a house ourselves, finance it ourselves, and then find a bank to refinance the property when we finished (yes, we made exhaustive attempts to refinance the trailer in its current state to no luck)

Option 4 seems to be our best bet as it keeps our credit intact, lets us keep the property we love, and increases the value without taking out additional loans. 

So, we spent the last year saving,  dreaming, pillow-talking, researching, buying blueprints, going round and round about our options and solutions and second and third guessing our decision.  The final trigger-pulling step was negotiating with our current lender to let us remove the trailer and we just got that letter today.   

So, here we are, and here is the cabin that we intend to build.

I guess I should say that by we I mean the "royal we", which will have to include our Dads and Uncles and Moms and family and friends (ahem) - many of whom have offered to help.  Andy and I certainly have no idea how to build a house, but we think we can do it with your help and history and collective expertise.  We hope to have fun and learn a lot along the way, but we are sure to make mistakes and create drama. 

The cabin plan is small, cute, just enough. 2 bedrooms - one for us and one for guests (and we hope there will be many)-- with a sleeping loft for kids. We will source the best deals for construction materials and make every effort to purchase things like cabinets and appliances and furniture and doors and anything else 2nd hand.

I plan to record everything here.  From tearing down the trailer to getting permits to breaking ground to selecting siding colors and wall paint. I welcome any advice and feedback you might have along the way (if anyone but me actually reads this).  

Thanks for reading. 

Sarah