The last four trips to the cabin were as follows:

1. Clean up, organize, and move all the tools/supplies that were completely cluttering the first floor. Applied a final coat of joint compound on the downstairs walls.
2. Sanded all the walls and ceiling. Applied a “slap brush” texture to the ceiling.
3. Painted the ceiling and walls of the main room.
4. Installed oak hardwood flooring in the main room.

Saturday I put four coats of water-based polyeurethane on the loft siding. I used an Earlex HVLP sprayer I bought on sale about five years ago but hadn’t used until now. The sprayer worked great and it took about 25 minutes to spray a finish coat. Because I used water based poly, drying time between coats was only two hours.

While waiting for the finish to dry between coats I started on a porch ceiling using T&G aspen siding I had left over from the loft. While not strictly necessary, I had the extra wood and it does dress it up a bit. I got all the planks cut to size and about a third of it installed.

Sunday I installed flooring in the loft. I used a cork floating flooring I got for $2 a square foot. The dark color is called “Sable Gibralter” and provides a nice contrast to the lighter siding but does tend to show my dusty footprints.

Upon leaving on Sunday, I-40 was closed due to a fire seven miles SE of Heber so I had take an alternate route home which took me farther north through the towns of Tabiona, Hanna, and Francis. It was only 22 miles farther but the route contained a lot of steep grades and tight curves and because the big trucks had to detour also, I spent a lot of time going under 20mph. The trip home took an hour and 50 minutes.

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I’ve finished installing the aspen siding in the loft. It took a bit longer than expected. Next I’ll add some finish and trim.

Saturday I installed trim in the loft. I used cedar for the trim and the color matched the aspen siding very well. The windows took the longest but turned out well.

This week I mostly worked on the siding in the loft. I’m about 80% finished.

I also installed two more aluminum rails on the roof for solar panels. Originally I planned on installing two large 300W+ panels using the two rails but have since decided to use four somewhat smaller 200W+ panels, therefore the extra set of rails are required.

Minutia:

I found a new replacement Ford tailgate shell locally for $250. It’s already primed and I’m going to try painting it myself.

There’s a rabbit living in the pile of scrap wood by the cabin. He made an appearance on Saturday.