11/2-4/04 I went up to the property for 3 days: Tuesday through Thursday.

The roads were bare and wet over the pass but it was snowing lightly. I arrived at the property at 12:30. There was about two inches of snow on the ground but I was able to drive up to the trailer anyway. The weather was supposed to be clear for a few days so I didn't worry about getting snowed in up there.

After moving in and having lunch, I sanded the Grid D3 PSL, the short logs behind it, and the window frame between D3 and E3. Then I planed, scraped, gouged and sanded two logs on each side of the E3 corner. Working on long straight logs with no obstructions goes a lot faster. I should make a lot more progress now that all those tight spots around the windows are done. I brought all my cans of varnish into the trailer. I decided to store them in the trailer so that they will be warm when I use them. If they are cold, the varnish is a lot thicker and it is harder to apply.

On Wednesday I planed, scraped, gouged, and sanded all the rest of the logs on the wall between D3 and E3, and all but the bottom log on the Grid E wall between the window and the corner. Bert and Ernie came by for a visit, and I fed a flock of jays several times. I think this was a different flock from the usual ones. These all had scruffy looking faces. They were either different birds, or the usual birds got their faces into something that messed them up.

Before I went in for the night, I cleaned up all the chips, and vacuumed the walls and floor to be ready to varnish in the morning.

On Thursday morning, I varnished all the prepared logs and the window frame. Using warm varnish made quite a difference. It was nice and thin so it went on easily. The whole southwest wall now has at least one coat of varnish on and it looks great. I had to stand there for a while and admire it. It looks just like I imagined and hoped it would.

After cleaning out my brush, I went into the woods and worked on the water pipe. I cleaned out some more of the creek bed with the post hole digger, and then unrolled the rest of the coil of pipe, about 20 or 30 feet, into the creek bed. I left one half turn of the coil in place standing up so that when I sweat the next coil on, I will be working on top of the coil rather than on the bottom. It was beautiful working in the woods. Most of the leaves have fallen and there was a thin carpet of snow on the ground. The jays found me in the woods so I had to feed them periodically. I had lunch and left for home at 1:30.