Glamping

Campsite now on the Peninsula

Half glamor, half camping.   Well that at least was the plan.  Three days off (and the weekend) at the house.  Chasing down the contractor, making sure progress was made and enjoying the property.

I organized a "Porta-potty" so at least now we have a toilet on the property.  The well water is very clear if a little cold and we have a fridge in the "Map room" next to the garage and two grills.  We arrived on Wednesday morning and had to move the tent because the cats were practically hyperventilating in the sun.  Putting the tent in the shade, under the trees on the peninsula was a brilliant idea.  The tent remains cool all day.  As you can see from the picture we brought down the umbrella and the grills and had quite a little set up. The contractor was collecting the wood floor boards so obviously wouldn't be at the house today.

Once we got settled , swam in the pond,  cooled down and I did a little bit of gardening....then the thunderstorms started.   Wow, thunderstorms are noisy in a tent.  Rain pounding on canvas,  massive thunder and lightning.  The cats hid...the adults put on a brave face.   Thursday it rained all day and the night was more thunderstorms and Friday the most overcast, humid hideousness.  Couldn't leave the tent and couldn't stay in the tent.  

Now, our tent is a big tent but in this weather no tent is big enough for two adults and two cats (who have worked out if you scratch at the zipper on the door you can get out into the exciting wild...actually all they do is eat grass and vomit!)

Thankfully, Brian the contractor came with the floorboards for patching the floor and did a fair amount of work on the floors.  The plumber came too and put in more of the main, cast iron waste line and vents.     Really felt that there were people working on the house for the first time in a long time.   It distracted us from the weather a bit.

New powder room floor

 

Dining room floor now complete and totally flat and with terra cotta tile 

Board wall around stair and recreation of the enclosed stair
There will be a door on the first step.

View out of the restored door.
You can see the stair door leaning against the new tongue and grove, hand planed, plank wall  

We were all ready to go home on saturday morning.  There is nothing glamorous about camping through three thunderstorms and 100% humidity.  Then Saturday morning was the most wonderful morning.  The humidity was gone and the sun woke us up.  We cooked breakfast on the grill.  Coffee and the cats started enjoying the camping.

Breakfast on Saturday morning.

Booh decides he likes camping - when there is no thunder

This is typical of the cats camping Booh is lying in the sun...
... Cole constantly looking for trouble

Having seen a bit of progress, I was determined to work out a detailed schedule of what we still had to do on the house and what was a reasonable amount of time to complete the work.   Now, Daniel thinks I'm mad and probably the contractor will think I'm a patronizing bastard but this is the closest I've got to a schedule in the last 3 months.   With Daniel's help I mapped out the scope of work and put it to a calendar of weeks.   Even optimistically there is no way the house can be completed before October.    

That's a lot of time to spend in a tent with Daniel and two cats!!!!

My over-controling schedule for the construction work