Working on a big canvas: 40 acres on Lookout Mountain, Alabama.


Purchase and Location

I bought this property in 2005 and named it Richmond Woods for my father who taught me about nature and respect for the wild. It's located in Alabama near the Alabama/Georgia state line. The small nearby village of Mentone, AL has been a mountain retreat for 150 years for people escaping the summer heat of Birmingham and Atlanta. My companion, Carolyn, has helped me every step of the way.

A Cottage in the Woods
When you were little, did someone read fairy tales to you? Invariably, there was mention of a cottage in the woods. Our plan is to build such a place: handmade, no architect plans, buying local materials or using salvaged materials. The purpose of this blog is to document our progress.

Monday, December 7, 2009

Our Tent is Gone!!!

We have long had ready the ceiling beadboard sheets that Carolyn primed and painted. The goal this weekend was to finish the insulation and install the ceiling, assisted by our neighbor Rod.

Below: first couple of sheets. Every sheet had to be trimmed down length to fit the inside dimension. We also have ceiling electrical outlets in all four corners.

Below: Russ putting up insulation, Rod cutting the next sheet. This was definitely a three-person job. They prepared the sheets but they were fairly thin so when it was time to nail (and they were sagging), Carolyn pressed sheet to rafter with a long level. Glad we didn't try it without help!

Below: One whole side done on Saturday. On Sunday, we finished the rest. Carolyn began the big cleanup project inside. Just lots of sweeping and putting things away.


Meanwhile, outside Russ and Rod put up the boards that will trim out the screen porch. We got them/stained them several weeks ago and wanted to put them up to avoid warping because we won't get to the screen til late this spring, we think.

With the ceiling and cleaning done inside, we suddenly realized that it would be possible to move the futon and camp bed inside the house, out of the tent and take the tent down. In came the futon... we moved it to the future living room area and took the silly picture to right.

Then, for the first time in five years, we took down the tent (there have been several tents)! Russ decided to leave up the tarp to protect wood, the painting area and so forth from the elements.

As the sun sank spectacularly in the west, we headed for home, tired, hungry, cold, covered with insulation and with sore feet, as usual.

Monday, November 23, 2009

Last Weekend Before Thanksgiving

Exciting news: we went to look at flooring and discuss the sequence of projects with Daniel Millican who supplied our siding. We chose 5" red oak planks. Russ is going to do an oil and wax finish. It should be beautiful! That floor has to go in before we do the hearth and wood burning stove, we found. So we will pick up 19 bundles of flooring on December 5th.

After a restful night at the Settlement at Monk's Cove (Carolyn's new favorite place) and a hearty breakfast, it was back to work on a rainy but not too cold Sunday. Fortunately, we were inside with lights and heaters on.

Carolyn started insulating around the windows. Wall is 2 x 6" studs so the windows will have to be built out on the inside to look good with our planned wall and trim (we are doing wavy board around the windows inside!) We are talking about pine plank wainscotting and chair rail, then dry wall above, painted an earthy sage green. And we have ivory beadboard ceiling we are about to put up. Won't that look good?


Meanwhile, Russ began installing the drop down stairs. We have a great shortage of storage space at Richmond Woods and a nice little attic space in this small cottage: 8 x 24' So it's plenty of room to put quite a few things away once we get the stairs in!

Above: Russ scoping it out from all angles. Below: He put up some support wood strips, set in the steps and temporarily screwed in on one side. Then lowered them part way to check the diagonals (to make sure they were square in the opening) and added shims til squareness achieved.


Finally he adjusted the length of the stair (had to cut off two steps) and put on the feet. It's very sturdy. Here's Carolyn, starting to put things away.

It was nice on this gloomy day (it actually was grayer than shown in this photo) to have on lights and heaters in the cabin, powered by Russ's large generator.

Friday, November 20, 2009

First Coat

Russ went up Nov 14-15 to put on the Olympic toner. It was a nice, sunny weekend. We had chosen "honey" for the shade. Decided to not go too dark. He masked all the windows and was assisted in the staining by our neighbor Rod. They just used an ordinary garden sprayer and it worked fine.

Below, left: pale bleached wood and initial application of honey stain. Below, right: finished wall




More work in progress pictures below. The honey stain looks good in the setting sun:

The finished job with the paper off the windows below:

Blog Archive