STAY TUNED! BECAUSE OF HEAVY RAIN, WE MAY HAVE TO CANCEL THE EVENT BELOW. WE WILL UPDATE HERE AND ON THE MIP & LOG-RAISING FACEBOOK PAGES.

You’re invited! We, along with Katahdin Cedar Log Homes, are hosting a Log-Raising at “Solitude” this coming Saturday, June 4th, 2016 from 10 am to 2 pm. This is a totally free event! Have lunch on us and watch the logs go up! Bring rain gear, sunscreen, bug repellent and your favorite lawn chair. 

Solitude is 6 Lakeside Drive of the Reserve, so follow the dirt road in the Reserve until you see a green gate for 6 Lakeside Drive. You will need a code to get into the electronic gate. Please email me for the code, along with your name and the number of people attending. RSVPs are extremely helpful so we plan for lunch properly. 

Directions from Dallas–click here. 

Directions from Houston: click here.

Directions from San Antonio/Austin: click here.

Directions from Stephenville, TX: click here. 

For those of you wondering where my posts about prayer techniques are, they will resume in the fall when I begin Year Two of Heartpaths. But, for now, I’m going to crank up the blog with posts about our cabin-building experience at the Reserve because we are finally in the active phase of building! As I write this, the concrete trucks are madly pouring concrete to avoid the near-constant deluge of rain we are getting. Sometimes I wonder if I’ve moved to Seattle!

To boot we are in the Texas warm season. Typically, Texas is very dry–to the point of not even knowing that you are sweating! (Dehydration can result quickly because of this.) Right now it feels like we’re living in a sauna. There really is a difference between dry and humid heat!

So, what does styrofoam have to do with a log cabin? Only its foundation, that’s all.

While visiting log suppliers, we found a foundation-building system that we decided just had to come to Solitude. We intend to have a 4 foot concrete crawl space under our cabin and usually, concrete blocks are used to do this. While this is inexpensive, there are issues. When putting together concrete blocks, there are a lot of seams that could, one day, weaken the total cabin.

Enter ICF foundations. What is ICF?

Insulated Concrete Forms. Go here for a good description about them and the advantages of using them. I will not bore you with recounting it here.

Solitude’s ICFs in place and ready for concrete

What is great about ICFs is that they go together like a jigsaw puzzle, rebar can be added for extra foundation strength, and the styrofoam adds more insulation. Once in place, concrete is poured into the center of them to form the crawl space walls. It is cost-effective because it combines several foundation-building steps into one. The initial cost is slightly higher than conventional foundation construction, but the economist of the house (aka the hubby) felt it was cheaper in the long run and a better system.

Questions? Post a question/comment below!

Friday’s Post: Maizie returns!

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