Hearth Under Construction

   I am making a hearth stone out of this mountain. I had to split and saw and chisel it down to 68" x 20" x 3". It is currently resting in place after many laborious hours of grunting and cursing, with just a small amount of adjusting to do before we set it, which will happen Tuesday.

Cause For Celebration

  The chimney is finished! The last corner stone put in place yesterday and the empty joints filled with mortar. Just a final and thorough cleaning needed to complete the job. It feels great to stand back and look at that monolithic structure in its final state.

Boothbay Shoe Covers

  These aren't Fitzburg Slippers or Phippsburg Slippers. They are just good ol' fashioned plastic grocery bags, to try and keep my kicks dry while I cut up some stone. It looks like I should be wearing them all over my body.

The Den Hearthstone

That Heritage Valley stone sure looks great when it's honed.

Hearth

  One side is completed and the hearth-stone in place. Heading down this morning to install the other one.

North Haven Farm Wall

 
  Some shots of about one-third of the wall we build last summer on North Haven, which was 1000 feet long when it was finished.

Fitzburg Slippers

  "Stan the Lobster Man" does carpentry for Boothbay Home Builders off-season. He's a real character and Damon and I have a good time joking around with him while we're working. Well, Stan came up to me the other morning and says, "Hey! I see you got your Fitzburg slippers on."
  "What's that?" I asked.
  "Fitzburg slippers. That's when you take your old boots when they start gettin' all cracked and beat and you cut the tops off so they'll be more comfortable. Fitzburg slippers."
  I guess I got me some Fitzburg slippers, and cheap.

Some Shots Without the Staging

Joachim and Boaz

   Dan and Paul got their pillars in place Saturday and they are quite impressive. They worked their butts off to get them in place and I am actually really impressed that they managed to get them in at all. Every so often I would walk outside and see the two of the prying with bars and blocking and hoisting and I felt grateful to not be involved. Seriously, they had to slip these nine-foot monstrosities in between a concrete slab and a porch roof with three inches to spare. It was amazing.
  Now, walking in the front door of this house is like a religious experience. It's like entering the front door of King Solomon's Temple, which was flanked by two similar pillars named Joachim and Boaz. In Jewish mysticism, the Tree of Life was also flanked by the two same pillars. They are kind of like Yin and Yang, representing the positive and negative, respectively; or more accurately, "mercy" and "severity". Quite impressive.