We bought some acreage a couple years ago. My wife wanted a nice cabin so she could have some comforts of home. Yes she is a city girl. Myself and my buddy started building the new cabin on weekends only. It is set on blocks due to the amount of rock in the soil. We laid out the blocks and my wife thought it was looking small. 20'X60'. I agreed to make it 24'X60". We set the 8" timbers, floor joists, and put a 1-1/8" tongue and groove sub-floor down. I wanted 10' ceilings for mounts and to make the place look spacious. We framed out the walls and roof. We wrapped everything with radiant barrier OSB for dry in. We put the wrap-around porch up, and then the metal roof. I put a mechanical room on the backside of the house for my electrical, water heater, and condenser for the A/C. We cut out the OSB where the windows were to be installed and put those in. I had removed over 1,000 ft. of EMT conduit on a demo job so the cabin was hard piped to keep critters out of my wiring. I also had to trench out 250' conduit for power and to bring the water to the new cabin. After 2 months of electrical, we started installing the drywall. I hate drywall. We did the A/C in metal, insulated duct before dry walling the ceilings. We tiled the showers and bathroom floors where we went a little whimsical. Got that all in and started the floors. I found a guy in Louisiana to custom mill my floors from century old yellow pine (3.50/sq.ft). We got that down. Found an outlet for pine doors in Houston for $150/door pre-hung. We completed the PEX and the sewer under the house and made the final connections. I installed the PEX in PVC slip pipe. I had a septic guy come put in our aerobic system for $7200. We found some pre-made solid wood raw cabinets that went from $120-$200 each. That saved me a ton of time and not much expense. Somewhere along the way we decided to put up a bead board ceiling. The plywood stuff looked cheap. Went with real bead boards. OUCH! that was not a fast process but it came out great. We built several of the pieces for the cabin, queen size bunk beds for the 2 bunk rooms, 2 bars, stairs, mud room bench and storage, book case, night stands. Was going to go with granite but found some great looking Formica. That saved me tons. We did have the family Christmas last year and it was close to being done. Now I have small jobs and get to work at the pace I want to work at. This was 2 years of weekends and we think it turned out pretty good. We bargained shopped for everything and bought when the prices were right. We are into this for $65,000(+) or (-) a few hundred. If I never finish it now (and why would I), I get to use the excuse we have some work to do on the cabin this next weekend. My wife has now decided the country is so much better, nicer, and quieter than the city. God I love her.
Living the Texas dream
Living the Texas dream
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