Progressing Toward The Goal

This past weekend was very productive. I have one room in the Cottage that is fully functional and it is the bathroom. I was able to get the "repaired" composting toilet in place and all the vent pipe went in without a hitch. I still need to get some supports for the stack but it is stable for now. And the thing works. I did not realize the fan it runs 24/7 which is a bit of a bummer, not that it is loud but in this small of environment and with no door it is noticeable. Not sure what I am going to do about it, but it does make great white noise for sleeping. I will keep updating as the unit matures, still pretty curious in how it will work once I am able to use it on a regular basis.

Not really exciting photos but I did get in the shower door as well. Pretty excited about that since it fit perfect. It was one of those Craiglist gems. Paid next to nothing for a brand new but 10 year old shower door. Box was completely sealed and was never opened, they had it in their garage collecting dust. It fit just perfect and it will work great, the water heater after re-calibrating is working as expected and so I am pretty happy with the set up. I am not taking a lot of showers here at this point but that's okay, its time will come. Can't use a bunch of water anyway, we are having the driest December on record since the late 1800's. Go Figure, I need rain we don't get any for a month in DECEMBER.

I am taking the Christmas holiday off from working on the Cottage and will start back up over the New Year 3 day weekend, the next on the punch list is either Window trim or "The Ladder".

Ah Hot Water....Again

Okay I have a confession. I can procrastinate on certain things in my life if they don't really bug me. I can ignore them for quite a while if necessary. So my hot water was not working and I chose to ignore it. I have lived a long time on a sailboat that did not have a hot water system and I just learned to work around that little inconvenience. But I made the mistake of posting on the blog yesterday that I was without hot water. I would like to thank Ethan who woke me up from my stupor and well guess what. It took me all of 7 minutes to fix the problem once I got home. Precision-Temp did a great job in customer service to address my issue sending me clear and specific directions on how to re-calibrate my hot water heater that had forgotten who it was.

I really don't care that I had the issue in the first place. What I do care about is that it was able to be resolved quickly, both via email and a call that I initiated that was unnecessary. As the email really did answer the question. Hot water is working fine now and I ordered a Cold Weather kit and should be good down to 20 below. May it never get that cold in Oregon.

Still Lot's To Do

I started last weekend with a list of 5 things that must get done, by the time the weekend was over it had grown to 26. It is funny how I knew I had a lot of things that were nagging at me but I am really at a point that I should  just set the tape measure down and step away from the table saw. But that is not going to happen at least through the next three weekends. Good thing is I should get a bunch done. On the hot list is getting Hot Water working again. I killed my hot water heater, well at least I injured it. I have not had hot water working for about three weeks now. I really don't need it at this point as I am still in the house (next door) but it needs to get fixed. Cold weather killed it, dang. Lot's to learn about the "house" stuff, I have been living on boats way to long...

Here is what is on the top of the agenda:

The Kitchen cabinets are an issue and eventually a stove. I have yet to get my mind around how I am going to get these cabinets done. I have come to one conclusion, I am the one who is going to be doing it as I will not hire it out. So I have to get a plan committed to in my mind and then figure out how I am going to build it. I have a picture I found on the web, so I have an idea how I want it to look but nary a clue how to build it. Should be fun.

Actually before I do the anything with the kitchen I am working on the bathroom. I need to put the floor down. I fixed the damaged composting toilet last weekend so it is ready to go. Once the floor is in then I have to drill out the vent pipe path, all the work on the metal roof is done so I just need to pop the final hole and I am good to go.

Guess where all my crap has been collecting. My fancy little R2D2 Vacuum is going to have to go somewhere...Probably the loft at this point. This should actually be a pretty simple process get the Biolet toilet in place. Hope the thing works, there is way to much research and investment to see it come to failure once I start using it. Stay tuned I will give a full debrief, the good, the bad and the ugly after a couple of months of use.

I have some significant wire management issues still to deal with. This is a lot of detail work that I just need to address. On my list this is like #56, #65. Not really top of the list stuff but it needs to be addressed. All the windows needed to be interior trimmed out, the door needs interior trim. I still need to trim the upstairs window. I really want a curtain on the door window and am scared to death about picking out some fabric that makes the first "lady friend" who shows up barf right on my front step due to my poor choice of fabric. Things that keep me up at night, too funny really isn't it.

Oh yea on the list is a Ladder, shelves, closet doors, bathroom door. Yikes this post is starting to make my head hurt. Hopefully once we get into the new year I can have some of this stuff knocked out.

New Life Change - Mini House Living....Almost

It has been almost three weeks since my last post. Long time for me, but I have been busy. I Spent a week on the East Coast last week for work, packing my weekends with work to address the little issues that are coming up. I took the week of Thanksgiving off and got 90% of the floor done. I still need to finish the bathroom but the floor came out stunning.

 The Greenhouse became the work area for the pieces that did not fit. The space actually worked great, one of the goals is to get the greenhouse working and get some salad stuff growing.

 After several days of work I realized I need to back off the Coffee. Yikes.

 I laid down flooring foam on the plywood and that really seemed to help in laying out the floor boards. There is no squeak in any of the boards. I used a flooring gun where I could. The biggest pain is that I am no spring chicken any more and I bet my average was I got up twice for each board I put down. I needed a hammer that I could not reach, or needed more nails, or I had to cut a board - oh about 4 times, or none of the boards next to me would fit right, it just never ended. I think my next cottage will have vinyl floors.

 The closed cell foam insulation has been awesome. I have a hard time believing that it is 28 degrees outside and 60 inside and I have had the heat on low low all night. It is really air tight in the cottage as well, the picture above is the Dehumidifier to get the moisture out of the air. I generally am running around 70% and it is something that I will have to monitor. I never installed any of the three fans I have but am ready to do so if need be. We will see.

 I have my kitchen pretty much set up but don't have any way to cook anything. I had a discussion with the local govt. and they were concerned that I was "living" here and you can not have 2 residences on one property in Dundee, OR. Now I did not get into any discussion that there are 9 other RV's or Trailers in the neighborhood that ALL have kitchens. I just have chosen not to install any of that gear. I have a room in my brothers house and use his facilities for the most part and certainly do all my cooking/eating within the house. We will see how this plays out, don't think I will push the issue as I don't have to, knowing soon as things dry out the cottage will move. I still have a fair amount of work to do to tighten up the cottage and get it dialed in but don't plan on having dinner over at my house anytime soon.

 I abandoned my plans for a table runner that I can slide the table back and forth on. I used movable table brackets for a boat so that I can move the table to two different locations. There was just not enough room for it. I have come to the realization that there is a whole different perspective from what I thought about this space to the way it really it is when you are living in it. I will address this more in a later post but let's just say my views are significantly changing my layout plans.

 I was even able to do a little decorating and put up a Timbers Army scarf (I am going to have to buy another one to wear to games). I am big soccer guy and have followed the Portland Timbers since I was in high school in the 70's (RCTID).

 One of my design goals was to be able to take advantage of some off the shelf components for drawers and shelving so I when I built my closet and refrigerator room they were designed to be able to fit in these cabinets (Thanks IKEA). I knew my limitations on my skills and cabinetry is not anything I am skilled enough to do without taking a bunch of time. Which is why the kitchen cabinets are not done. These are functional and will work fine for what I need.

I was even able to get some clothes in the cottage. My project is becoming a home.