Have crane will build

A much better week, albeit not without it's challenges. Monday was spent finalising the preparations for lifting the posts and beams into place on Tuesday and, as we had left several little jobs over from the previous week, it was a long day. We arrived bright and early on Tuesday morning to clear the overnight snow off the timbers and sub-flooring and were still doing some last minute tasks when the crane arrived, which came on time. It was another long day lifting the heavy timbers up onto the top floor and putting the posts and beams in place. It took longer than expected as things didn't all go our way.

The weather was mixed and on Wednesday we worked through light snow falling most of the morning but, it soon disappeared and in the afternoons of most days we were stripping off the layers to stop from overheating. Thursday we lost both Kyle and Matt, the former to two months carpentry training and the latter to a long weekend with his girl friend. That left us short of manpower at the end of the week and consequently things slowed down.

It was quite a big crane unit, more than capable of doing the work we required of it. First, the posts were all lifted into place and then there was a short pause, while they were secured, before we were ready to lift the beams.

The first beam to be lifted. We started over the garage and worked our way southwards from there.

Dexter guiding the beam into place over the second bedroom.

The garage nearly done.

By the end of the day all the posts and beams were in place and there was a different feel to the place. Despite the ominous looking clouds it didn't snow or rain.

Wednesday and Thursday were spent cutting rafters to size and man handling them into place. By close of play Thursday we had done most of the room above the garage. There are two more to place over the shed dormer on the right of the picture and two more to place .....

.... to the right of the ladder, where the room joins on to the main cabin.

We were going to make a start on the main cabin on Friday but we were overtaken by events and due to lack of manpower it was decided that the best value from the day could be gained from driving down to Kalispell in Montana to pick up the windows. This turned out to be eventful. As we started to load the windows onto the trailer we discovered that the two small windows for the prow were the wrong shape and were not accepted. Owen will be resolving the differences with the company and re-ordering the correct shape and size next week. At the border on the way back there was a delay because the paperwork wasn't in order and Owen had to go down on Saturday to sort it out.

Each step brings it closer to appearing like a house and I am looking forward to a hard week ahead getting the remainder of the rafters in place. I hope we will also put the valley pieces in and mount some of the windows on the ground floor. The weather is forecast to be wet and mild and it may present us with an opportunity to lay some concrete in the garage. We'll see.

I continue to see and help John Sheppard, the homeless man, whose seemingly endless optimism and cheerfulness in the face of adversity is nothing short of inspirational. On Saturday I bought him some food, took him for lunch (turning a blind eye while he helped himself to a pocket full of salt and pepper sachets) and took him home. His cat and dog are both thriving and are a great boost to his morale.

There are others here however, as I have hinted before, who have much more than John but who are, in other ways, less fortunate and live with troubled souls and whose hearts beat a lonely rhythm through long, sleepless nights.  Most struggle with debt or addictions and often both, which are but the symptoms of deeper problems. Others stoically bear the pain of past sins. And there is one, who often fears that one day his sins will catch up with him and that when they do - the pain will be unbearable.