Stone and Steel

It's starting to look more like an almost-finished project. The green steel roof is going on quickly. That should be done in another day or so. And stone mason Gene Carner and his helper Alanare zipping along on the cultured stone. You can see their nice chimney work in the roofing photo. In other photos, they're working on the face of our 50-foot porch (which is a cobblestone-brick pattern of stamped concrete on top). The other photo is of Don, upstairs, admiring what they've done on the chimney thus far. This cultured stone is fabulous. Unless you were in the business, I don't think you could tell it wasn't the "real thing." Needless to say, it's much more economical and goes up a lot faster.

What we're leaving

For 30 years, Shooters Supply has been the daily gathering spot for a many a good man. Like a neighborhood tavern, it draws a congenial bunch of faithfuls who help themselves to the coffee and conversation while purveying the day's newest merchandise in the candy case. Shooters Supply has sold about 30,000 guns in its three decades in Yakima. Don and his gunsmiths have worked on at least twice that many. His customers now include second and third generation descendants of his original customers. For some of these folks, Shooters Supply is the only gunshop they've ever frequented. It's the one where they could always get friendly, helpful and absolute honest answers (whether they liked them or not) to their questions about firearms, reloading, repairs and...oh yes...politics, especially Second Amendment issues.

My husband started Shooters Supply in 1977. His original intent was to have a small firearms repair business, without much retail. But the retail side naturally grew, and by 1984 he'd outgrown the small shop on 11th and Tieton, and moved just two blocks west to the corner of Queen and Tieton.

I never spent much time there until this past fall, when I've been standing in for bookkeeper Christina, who's on vacation in Scotland for three weeks. Now that I'm there every day for a few hours in this winding-down time (he'll close the shop for good in about two months), I'm reminded of how important Shooters Supply is to so many people. Not only is it the only place in Central Washington providing full-service gunsmithing by truly knowledgeable and skilled craftsmen. It's also a place that has played a tremendous role in the lives of many regular customers over the years.

Phil Lamb, one of the regulars, has coined the term "Post Shooters Supply Stress Disorder" (PSSD) for what a lot of people will go through when Don closes the doors in November. Every day there are folks who wander in and say they "just heard." Their reaction is almost panic. "Where will we go? You can't leave! What will we do? Who'll fix my guns?" We don't have any answers for them. And who knows where the daily patrons will find a new gathering spot with a coffee pot?

They are a good bunch of people, these regulars. Retired teachers. Dentists. Attorneys, CPAs, financial advisors, medical technicians, farmers, entrepreneurs, Scout leaders and World War II vets. They enjoy each other's company and they appreciate and admire guns as mechanical works of art.

Leaving them will be difficult. We hope a lot of them will visit us at Shorthorse.

Leaving Shooters Supply itself will be difficult too. This is, after all, Don's legacy. This, and Sun Valley Shooting Park, which he also started and developed into what it is today. He, of course, would deny that and share the credit with a few other hard-working members of the Central Washington Range Conservancy. But if it hadn't been for Don Manning's time, sweat and leadership, the range certainly wouldn't be the showpiece it is today.

And then there's Manning Dog Training, my own unanticipated success. I didn't go to college to become a dog behaviorist. It just sort of happened. It, too, evolved and grew, taking on a life of its own. Last January, after 15 years of teaching people how to live more harmoniously with their dogs, I sold the business to my long-time manager, Jane Bumgardner. Unlike Shooters Supply, Manning Dog Training will continue on it path without as much as a speed bump. With Jane's guidance, it will be around a long time. Manning Dog Training is a gathering spot too, like Shooters Supply. Some are there nearly every day with their dogs, attending a variety of classes and activities. Manning Dog Training has changed a lot of people's lives. We've helped some marriages, saved family relationships (of dogs AND people) and launched many an unsuspecting dog owner into new hobbies that have totally redirected their lives. Example: first-time dog owners who just want to teach the new puppy to stop play-biting. They become lifelong students, get their dogs into obedience or agility competition, and end up buying motorhomes to travel to weekend dog trials for the next 15 years!

My students (four-legged) number 6-8,000 over the past 15 years. Between Don's business and mine, we seem to know at least half the people in Yakima. He's the "gun guy." He IS Shooters Supply. I'm the "dog lady," or Don Manning's wife, or Manning Dog Training.

Now we're moving to a small town where basically no one knows us. We're just new faces in town. They don't know he fixes guns. They don't know I work with dogs. Yet. We kind of want to keep it that way for a while, so we can actually enjoy retirement. As soon as word of his talent gets out, Don will be as busy as he wants to be. I plan to just volunteer my services with the local community.

We're finishing a 30-year chapter of our lives when we leave Shooters Supply, Sun Valley Shooting Park, Manning Dog Training, and all the people associated with them. It's time to start writing the new book, titled Shorthorse.

Premature furnishing

I couldn't resist. I've been picturing these old snowshoe chairs here for a long time, so thought I'd give them a try. Sure enough, they fit just fine. Of course they'll look better with real walls behind them....

Windows arrive!

The windows arrived a couple weeks ago. Thirty-three of them. Our Yakima house has eleven. Yikes.

Well, we wanted lots of natural light...as much as we could get into a two-story house without having a glass ceiling. (We DO have two functional skylights! They are there under the pretense of providing much-needed ventilation for this very tightly built home...but I'm delighted with the idea of being able to look up and see stars at night!!)

We chose Milgard windows. Clad in dark green fiberglass on the outside, and wood on the inside.

Good thing we were there when the truck arrived. Those 33 windows were heavy, and Larry (the builder) has a very bad back. So Don got to help unload them.

Now, if I can just get him to wash them, too...

The biggest adventure of our lives

Last night I mentioned to Don that building this house was probably the biggest adventure of my life.

He said he definitely felt the same way.

Between the two of us, we've led very full and satisfying lives. We've had the opportunity to see and do a lot of exciting and unusual things. We've both been pretty blessed.

That said, neither of us can think of any experience that tops this one. The project has consumed our thoughts (and money!) for more than four years; before we even bought the property, we were planning the house.

As we both head into retirement in Montana, I'm proud knowing that both Don and I have contributed significantly to our country, economy, and social passions over the past 30 years. Now, we're channeling a lot of that energy toward our OWN destination: Shorthorse.

A close-up look at our SIPS roof

This is Lizzie, our pit bull, posing atop one of the few scraps remaining from the construction of our roof, which is made of SIPS panels like the rest of the house. You're looking at a piece of dense styrofoam sandwiched between two pieces of 5/8" OSB. The roof panels are two inches thicker than the walls, providing extremely good insulation.

For more details about our SIPS-constructed house, read the earlier post titled SIPS: A Foam House.

Kayaking for old fogies

By most hardcore kayakers' standards, my L.L. Bean boat's a scow. It's made of thick plastic, it weighs a lot, and it would just about take a tidal wave to tip it over. But it's perfect for me. With four hip replacements under my belt, I frankly never thought I'd be able to get in or out of a kayak. But this one's wide enough and stable enough for me to get in and out safely, albeit with GREAT care. The biggest risk for me is slipping and dislocating.

Because the boat's too heavy and bulky for me to pick up and carry, I drag it down from our property, across two sets of railroad tracks, two access roads, and down to our launch spot. Once I'm in the kayak and pushing away from the rocky shore, my boat glides through the looking-glass and becomes part of the 360-degree picture.

You see and hear incredible things from out on the water. Bald eagles, deer, heron, ducks, geese. Once in a while, an otter. Lots of jumping fish. You become part of their world, sitting in a kayak that puts you IN the still water, not just ON it. It's a privileged place to be.

Last August I found myself surrounded by a huge school of fish. They looked to be maybe 10 to 12 inches long and were close to the surface. Everywhere. It's like I couldn't paddle without touching them. There were thousands in a stretch of river about 600 yards long. Although we have Northern Pike, some bass and some trout, I think these were probably just perch.

Don has yet to try the kayak. He's afraid he might like it too much. One thing's pretty safe to say: by the time we start having regular guests at Shorthorse, we'll probably have a second kayak available for you...that is, if Don isn't using it!

Plagues of August: Smoke and Yellowjackets

According to environmental experts, every August for a long time to come will be a season of smoke in the western states. We're getting a taste of it in the Clark Fork River Valley.

Last Thursday when we arrived at Shorthorse, we were greeted not by a spectacular view, but by an eery haze that all but obscured the mountains around us. It was like wearing a pair of dusty glasses, only you couldn't wipe the haze away. The air smelled like a campfire. When the smoke smell first hit us up around Sandpoint, it was almost pleasant...pungent and fresh, and reminiscent of many good times around fire rings with friends. But as we drove east into a thickening air, that nice smell began to slightly sting nostrils and eyes.

The majority of smoke was rolling west from the "Chippy Creek Fire." This wilderness fire has consumed about 90,000+ acres of timber, brush and clearcut in remote mountain areas about 40 miles from us. Meanwhile, about 28 other fires were burning around the state, including a scary blow-up in Frenchtown, on the north side of the freeway at Missoula. Highway 93, our common route to Missoula, was closed because of that fire, called the "Black Cat." A bunch of really fancy horse farms had to be evacuated.

The ground at Shorthorse was tinder-dry. Everything crackled underfoot. The temperature's been in the high 80s and 90s for many weeks, with virtually no rain. The smoke-laden air was perfectly still. There was silence around us...no tractors, no chain saws, no recreational shooting. Even if there weren't Stage II fire restrictions on such activities, people around here wouldn't take chances like that anyway. Not now.

We live with the threat, and yet we fortress ourselves as best we can against a fire. We're clearing, thinning, pruning and mowing when we can, to establish a defensible area within 200 feet of the structures. It will take a while, but we're working on it. The fire departments actually maintain a list of people who have "done the work," and in a triage situation they will respond to the properties on the list FIRST.

We also have separate circuit breakers at the house, the barn, and the pumphouse...so that, in the event of a structure fire, we can still power the pump and garden hoses from a remote location.

Our SIPS construction is much more fire resistant than most building materials. That should help minimize damage.

Don is considering getting some of that flexible "K-Line" irrigation hose...something that can be towed around by the tractor to where it's needed.

And we also feel that being down on the river at the bottom of the hill probably offers more protection against wildfire than being up on top in the wide, flat valley floor.

Fire is a risk we live with. Don used to be a wildlands firefighter in his "younger" days, so he knows its power and has good knowledge of how to deal with it. Me...I just get hysterical. Good thing he's around!

And then there are the yellowjackets......

Name That Room

Foyer. Parlor. Den. Study. Library. Music room. I think of big old two-story homes when I hear those terms. Homes built strong. Homes offering security, stability and organization. I grew up in such a home, and have always had a fondness for those big houses where every room has its specific function. Don grew up in a big two-story home too.

Today's modern houses generally contain family rooms, bonus rooms, great rooms, media rooms, and home offices. They imply openness, oneness, togetherness. Less segregation of activities.

But here we have two independent adults who, although happily married for nearly 25 years, enjoy their privacy and their separate activities. And we liked the houses of our youth. It's not surprising, then, that we designed a home where each room is quite separate and has its own function.

The kitchen is a kitchen. The living room is a living room. Bathrooms and bedrooms are what they are. But beyond that, we need to name some rooms and STICK with the names.

There's "Don's room" just off the living room. It's Don's because he'll have his desk, computer, trophies, and books in there. But "Don's Room" isn't a very descriptive name...plus it sounds like a room that's maybe off-limits to me! So we've tossed around "The

Study" and "The Library," both a bit pretentious but much more accurate. "Don's Office" isn't bad, but sounds sort of cold for what will be a very attractive and masculine room. Someone suggested we call it "Dave's Room," since I always envisioned an extra sleeper bed in there where friends like Dave Oliver could crash if they ever stayed too late playing music or enjoying adult beverages. Personally, I like "The Library," because it brings to mind a floor-to-ceiling wall of books and a comfortable wingback chair...both of which will be in this room.

Then there's "Jan's room" upstairs. Same situation...it'll be my office and hideaway. But calling it "Jan's Room" sounds like Don and I sleep in separate bedrooms, and such is not the case. It's not a "Bonus Room," as it's called on the house plans. That's a ridiculous term. It's more like "The Garrett," a room of creativity and serenity. My friend Heidi had such a room built in her new house a few years back. She called it her "PMS Room." Same concept, I guess.

Finally, there's the dining room. At least, it would be a dining room to most people. But to us it's a southwestern cantina, with adobe walls, arched doorways, a kiva fireplace, and a dark, old-fashioned bar and back-bar. The floor is distressed wood. Throughout all our years of planning, we've called it "The Monti's Room." Monti's is a favorite restaurant of ours in Tempe, Arizona. We've visited it for years when we've gone to Phoenix for All Guard Highpower Rifle Team tryouts, or in more recent years for the All Guard Team Reunions. Monti's design and decor is old adobe, and we've always liked the atmosphere.

But no one other than our All Guard Rifle Team cronies will know what "The Monti's Room" is supposed to be. There's "Rosa's Cantina," but that's not very original. We thought about calling it "The Elkhorn," which is the name of the bar in San Antonio where Gus broke the bartender's nose ("Lonesome Dove" again....) But "Elkhorn" is an awkward word. We could call it "The Buckhorn," since we have an antler shed that Dave Oliver picked up when we were walking a 20-acre parcel in Heron one day when we were still shopping for land. Finding the shed was supposed to be a sign of good luck, so it was significant. Yet "Buckhorn" is sort of trite. I have a feeling it'll remain "The Monti's Room" to us, and to all our guests it'll simply be "The Bar."

Larry Schuster, Builder Extraordinaire

"Who's the best custom builder around here?" we had asked the locals, and Larry Schuster's name always came up first. We'd almost bought one of his houses a couple years earlier, and it was easy to see the quality craftsmanship in it. So we contacted him back in the fall of '05, and he agreed to build our house when we were ready. He normally does one house a year.

At the time he was finishing up a huge, multi-million-dollar log home in Noxon, which is about 20 miles north of us.

I just found out today that the home in Noxon will be featured in the November 2007 issue of "Log Home Living" magazine. Maybe there will be a picture of Larry. He'll be the one that looks like an old-time mountain man.

He's highly thought of throughout the building community up here. Today I had a powwow with Tom Wagler, our Mennonite cabinetmaker, and he told me they don't come any better than Larry. "He's a perfectionist," Tom related. "It may take him a little longer to complete the project because of that, but you can be absolutely certain that it's done right."

What I Like About Our Food Store

There is one "supermarket" in our local town: Harvest Foods. Here's what I like about it:

1. All the signs are in English.

2. The prices aren't any higher than Yakima.

3. You can go to the store in your grubbiest work clothes, ball cap, and no makeup, and nobody cares because most folks look that way.

4. You ALWAYS see someone you know or at least recognize.

5. All the signs are in English...woops, I said that already.

"Behind Door #1..."

Things are shaping up on the inside. The fireplace and kiva structures are in place, as well as the chimney they share. Of course, nothing is as simple to build as it is to envision, especially if the architectural plans just don't work. Larry's had to modify a lot of things as he goes along, as illustrated in the photo above. This is part of a wall between the master bath and dressing room. The beam sort of "got in the way."

What Body of Water Is That?

The body of water in the photos above and at the top of this blog is Noxon Rapids Reservoir, one of several impoundments of the Clark Fork River on its way to Lake Pend Oreille and on to the Columbia.

We can only assume there used to be rapids in this stretch before the dams. Now it's deep and and usually as glassy as it is in the photo. It makes for perfect lake kayaking, one of my new passions. On the weekends there are a few waterskiers and jet skis, and numerous fishing boats. There are a few private docks farther upriver from us, and a public boat launch in Trout Creek which is about 8 miles downstream.

At no time, however, could you consider it "crowded," and most of the time it's totally serene.

Best of all, it's just a 5-minute from our house to the point where we took these pictures. This is where I launch my kayak, and it's also where our dogs wade and swim.

Our Wild Neighbors

Oh yes, we have wildlife living with us at Shorthorse.

Deer, mostly whitetail but we've spotted a couple mulies too. The deer are ALWAYS there.

Elk. We had a herd living in our yard last winter. We expect that to change when the place is fully occupied, but they'll still be close by.

Bears. Larry, our builder, saw a small black bear amble down the driveway last month when the crew was sitting in the garage eating lunch!

Geese. Lots and lots of local geese.

Turkeys. These comics are pretty plentiful.

Exit of the Yakima Club

Four years ago, three Yakima couples accidentally came together with a common quest: to find retirement property in Sanders County, Montana.

We were basically acquainted with each other beforehand, but it was a surprise to find out we had a common goal.

Don and I had already chosen Thompson Falls as our destination. Lee and Charlotte were next. Lee's a truck driver, and for years he'd enjoyed a regular route through Thompson Falls. He'd fallen in love with the area, and Charlotte was thrilled with the prospect of moving there. Mike and Sue had connections in the Thompson Falls area, and they recognized it as a real gem for anyone who hunts, fishes, and enjoys small-town conservative life.

Somehow we all connected with each other and formed "The Montana Club." We'd get together for dinners or barbecues at each other's homes. We'd share our property-search progress reports, along with tips we'd picked up about the area.

Lee and Charlotte were the first to actually buy property...20 view acres on which they'd build a log home. Within a couple months, we'd bought our 41 acres, about 5 miles down the road from them! And about 18 months later, Mike and Sue found their parcel, 50 view acres with an existing house and barn.

Lee and Charlotte sold their Yakima home just last week, and will be renting a house in Thompson Falls until their log home is built next year. Mike and Sue will be permanently relocating to Thompson Falls within the next couple years. They want to do some remodeling first, plus they're both still employed in Yakima and own a big house here. Don and I, of course, plan to be gone from Yakima by mid-October of this year.

When all six of us get moved, we'll still rotate house to house for dinners. A wonderful friendship has formed between us. But we'll have to change the name of the group from "The Montana Club" to "The Yakima Club."

The Train

If you're looking for property in the beautiful Clark Fork River Valley, you'll be hard-pressed to find it without BIG POWER LINES running near or through it, ROAD NOISE from Highway 200, or the TRAINS (up to 22 per day).

Highway noise was unacceptable to us. We really didn't want power lines either, if we could avoid them. But we liked the lonesome, intermittent sound of a train winding its way through a serene river valley.

At Shorthorse, there is NO highway noise. Nor are there any overhead power lines within sight. But our house is about 200 yards from the railroad tracks. The house sits up on a bench; the tracks are down below, with a thick screen of pines, firs and tamaracks hiding them from view. The trees also temper the sound, which isn't unpleasant to us anyway. Beyond the tracks is the Clark Fork River. The opposite bank of the river is mountainside. This topography lends itself to long echoes. You get to hear every train whistle twice: once in real time and a shadow of it a second later when it bounces off the mountainside.

Our first night there, in the 5th wheel, we lay awake waiting and listening for the far-off approach of a train. We were aware of only two that night. Since then, we don't even hear them anymore!

We like the trains. When we're awake, we enjoy the low, powerful, rumbling of these occasional visitors passing through. Each train has its own personality, defined by the whistle, the engineer who stylizes his whistle blows, the speed of the train, and the cargo it's carrying.

The area immediately below our home is officially known as "Childs Siding." Sometimes when we hear trains idling, switching, and hissing down there, we're drawn like little kids to jog down the hill and get a close-up look. It's better than a Lionel train set!

Maybe when we get settled, I'll bake cinnamon rolls on a dark winter morning and race down the hill to give them to the engineers sitting down there in their locomotives, waiting for a train to pass from the opposite direction.

A House for Dog Kids

Our dogs share our lives, and thus our house. When we designed the Shorthorse lodge, we wanted it to be dog-friendly and unfussy. We also wanted easy maintenance and tough. I didn't want us heartbroken and cussing the dogs the first time we got toenail scratches on brand new doors or floors.

So here are some of the features we incorporated to make it a "dog house."

1. Ceramic tile floors in high-traffic areas. The tile is a slate-type gray, with matte finish and semi-rough surface for paw traction. Dogs love lying on cool tile floors on a hot day.

2. Cultured stone up to the window sills in the living room. Wouldn't show scuffs, claws, and dog goobers. The window sills would be stone (toenail-proof). We anticipate the dogs will be standing on them a lot, barking at the wildlife in the yard.

3. A "dog-proof room" that also serves as the laundry and mud room. We can shut them in there if we really have to on some rare occasion. Vinyl floors, easy-care cabinets, storage for dog food bins, and...a four-foot steel groming tub, complete with ladder and sprayer! The tub will also serve as a utility tub for washing horse blankets or whatever.

4. Two doggy doors in the breezeway; one accesses the laundry room, one accesses the back yard (which will be fenced with 5' chain link).

5. Hardwood flooring in two rooms, but it will be casual, almost pre-distressed.

6. A built-in dog bed nook in the living room. That was the architect's idea. Our dogs prefer to be on our bed, couch, or floor next to us, but maybe we can make this built-in thing work once in a while.

7. Front porch and back patio made of stamped concrete instead of wood or Trex. Again, scratch-proof and chew-proof.

8. Furniture that is "pre-distressed" and rustic.

9. Rustic doors, sort of Shaker style, that won't look ruined if they get scratched.

10. A three-stop elevator to help our elderly dogs get up and down the stairs (okay, so it's for us when we're lazy or lame...but the old dogs will use it too, as soon as they learn how to push the buttons).

Top photo of four dogs: our kids Grasel, Atlas, Lizzie, and Kosmo. Lizzie is a year-old pit bull. The other three are Greater Swiss Mountain Dogs. Kosmo is about 10 years old. Grasel and Atlas are littermates, 11 years old in this photo. We lost our little girl Grasel in May 2007, about two months after this photo was taken. Her ashes are waiting to be freed at Shorthorse, when we finally get moved later this year.

The Weather and Climate

"Montana? Sure hope you like wind and lots of snow!!"

We hear this a lot from our skeptical friends in Yakima when we tell them our plans to move. Then we have to explain the following: Sanders County is known as the "Banana Belt" of Montana. It's in the extreme northwestern corner of the state. As Jake Spoon would say, "You can smell Canadee from there." Sanders County is a large piece of real estate encompassing the WETTEST area of the state (Heron, on the west end of the county) and the DRYEST area (Hot Springs, on the east end). It also has the HOTTEST average temperature (our town, Thompson Falls, in the middle) Snow can be light, moderate or heavy, depending on the the annual whims of nature. But every summer we have quite a few days of 100+ heat. The saving grace is that it cools off so much at night. Typically a midsummer morning can start at 45 degrees and zoom to 102 by 3 p.m.

The real secret, however, is the LACK OF WIND. We might get some pleasant, playful gusts in the early evening, but basically there is NO APPRECIABLE WIND in Sanders County. 3 to 5 mph is a high average! The next question our skeptical friends will ask is, "Just how familiar are you with the area?" They think we've been sold a bill of goods, weatherwise, by the local Chamber of Commerce. It's nice to be able to say, "We've owned the property for four years."

What's Taking So Long?

It was Labor Day Weekend '05, when we gave the architect our rough sketches for the house. Now it's July '07 and we still don't have a finished house. What's taking so long?

It started with the architect.

We decided to hire an architect because we felt the scope of our project called for more than a design engineer. We didn't want to make ANY mistakes, like forgetting closets or leaving insufficient room for doors and drawers to open properly. Plus, we wanted it to be artistically and aesthetically "right."

The guy we hired was referred to us by a couple local folks who basically just "knew of him." I called him in Missoula, talked briefly, and liked what I heard. He sounded confident and said he'd worked with SIPS before. So we arranged for him to come to Shorthorse, see the site, and discuss our project.

He assured us we'd have our first drafts within a month, and final plans in plenty of time to start building in the spring of '06.

It was nearly 4 months before we got the first drafts. Our changes were minor, but the second drafts took even longer. And so it went...for more than a year! Each time we'd tweek any little thing, the next drafts took months. His bills were always on time, however.

By the fall of '06, we'd had enough. Our builder, Larry Schuster, shared our frustration and told us he had enough to go on with the current drafts. So we pulled the plug on the lousy architect.

The next delay was due to the SIPS manufacturer. We'd chosen R-Control, out of Belgrade, MT. A freight truck delivered the panels on schedule...and left. A company rep was supposed to be on hand to advise Larry, since this was his first SIPS project. But no one showed up. So Larry was on his own with a two-man crew, trying to figure out these jigsaw puzzle pieces piled next to the building site. Oh...and this was in the middle of January, by the way!

As Larry and crew got into the project, they discovered the SIPS panels DID NOT FIT. They had been cut the wrong size at the company. So Larry had to acquire a special tool to trim these panels on site. This cutting, trimming and fitting stretched an otherwise week-long building project into months.

The roof panels were among the worst. Our design called for 12 valleys (6 gables), and fitting them with the panels was a real chore. The roof wasn't actually closed up until late June!

Other delays have resulted from the LOUSY ARCHITECT's design. The architect made numerous mistakes, drawing things that just could not be built. Shower heads coming out of beams, for instance. Walls coming down on top of fireplaces. Each time Larry's identified such a dilemma, he's been forced to redesign construction. That takes time...time we thought we'd already paid for.

Add to all this the fact that Larry has a crew of just two other guys (and sometimes just one other), and that every subcontractor up there is booked and overbooked about six months in advance.

And then there's this factor of "Montana time." The folks up here have priorities that come before work. They are, in order: family, church, and hunting. It's hard to argue with priorities like that, but it does slow down the building process.

SIPS: A "Foam" House

We'd heard about a new building system called SIPS (structural insulated panels), and it sounded perfect for the kind of house we wanted. SIPS panels consist of about 5 inches of dense styrofoam sandwiched between two pieces of 5/8" plywood. These panels form the outside walls of a house, as well as its roof. They provide super-tight insulation. They're also extremely fire resistant. Because there is no conventional framing with studs, the walls go up fast (they are precut to size at the SIPS factory, and assemble onsite like a jigsaw puzzle.) The walls are also straight and square, which is a builder's dream. Chases for the electrical wiring are pre-drilled in the foam panels.

While SIPS panels cost considerably more than conventional framing, there would be a cost savings in labor. A SIPS home, typically, could be put up in a week by an experienced crew. We also felt a SIPS home would be perfect for the extreme heat and cold sometimes experienced in our part of Montana. And we liked the idea of not having to hunt for studs on exterior walls every time we wanted to hang a picture!

Don built an experimental pump house on the property in the summer of 2005. He was using a kit assembled for him by Premier Building Products out of Federal Way. The materials had been "bargain priced" because they were factory seconds. The pump house went up easily in less than two days. Talk about SOLID! And when the temperature was 90 degrees outside, it's at least 25 degrees cooler inside! He sided it with natural cedar and stained it the same color our house would be.

We were sold on SIPS. Now all we had to do was find an architect and a builder who could make it happen on a larger scale.