Time for another break

I spent the last week out at the site actually carpenter-ing; it was a nice change from the winter dirt-work. Now that we are all done with the posts and anything involving digging the work is progressing relatively rapidly, although still slow considering it is cold and dark most of the day, and no one objects to heading back to the plywood shack when twilight time comes around. The sun used to travel high enough to give four or five honest hours of direct sunshine, but now every day has the daily arc of the sun edging closer to the horizon. Also the near ridges of the Chugach have recently been hosting frequent snow squalls which have blocked all but the faintest direct light. Our lucky month of clear (but still cold) weather has passed on to more typical early winter weather.
Although it is snowing in Anchorage quite a bit, the Matanuska valley seems to generally have much less precipitation. Often we have enjoyed clear sunny weather at the Bench while Anchorage saw a few inches of snow. I don't mind the snow anymore, the platform for the Yurt is up and nearly completed; the rate of progress as we get higher off the ground is much more rapid and enjoyable. Caleb came up for Thanksgiving and was joined by Adam and Vern Ahonen on Saturday the 29th. Together we insulated the floor with blue board and put on most of the plywood floor, and also moved all of the remaining materials under the platform and stapled a bunch of tarps around the posts. It is starting to look like a structure, one with a huge amount of storage, which will be useful. We have room for a toll shed, snowmachine parking, wood storage, stuff storage, artic entryway for the trapdoor....but that all is far off in the future. Walking on the new floor is novelty enough after crawling around on the joists for three days.
It won't be long now until the whole thing is ready for the Yurt itself. Everything related to building is making sense finally, and my brain now seems to be tuned into the building wavelength so the rest of the floor and finishing up the insulation should only take a day or two working alone. I won't give an estimate on the date for the Yurt raising because my timeline for progress has been off by about 100% so far, and I'm working in Anchorage here and there; Betsy started her training for the marine observer job as well. Soon, though. It will be nice to move out of the shack and into the new home, hopefully it will be an early Christmas present.
I again have no pictures to add right now, but they are out there; more up-to-date ones will follow soon.

Bill