A Hole in the Ground for Money

Our driveway after the 2.5-inch rain storm.

In the Valley, the summer storm season has been nothing short of amazing.  I've lost count of the number of times I've heard about rains in excess of a half inch, and then there was the microburst a few weeks ago that knocked down trees from 5 miles away in Luray all the way to the hollow.

The tree damage reminded me of the derecho we had in the DC area in August 2012, except that this time the trees all pointed in the north-to-south direction, whereas they pointed west-to-east the other time. And I have a feeling that we won't be so lucky that Port City makes a special beer to observe the occasion of this storm!

We've had trouble with our driveway at Hawksbill Cabin ever since we bought the place.  As can be seen from the accompanying picture, the previous owners had problems too, and went to great lengths to try and repair past damage and prevent further damage.

After the repairs - this time.

It's a decently sloped grade, enough so that we bought all wheel drive cars to ensure we can make it up the hill in the winter.  That's the problem - once water gets out of the various culverts and other storm water features we have, it gets on this slope and speeds up, carving out gulleys.  There's a ton of gravel down the road that was once part of our driveway!

Still, after our last repair, it held up for three or four years.  We thought we had solved the problem.  Until this year, when we had a 2.5-inch rainstorm around here.  After that, it was gulley-city.

The storm sent us on an all-hands search for someone who could repair the driveway this time.  Our friend Mickey, who did such a great job on the previous repair, had retired, so we needed a new person.

We found a local fellow who came out one Sunday to have a look at the situation.  Pretty quickly he was back with us for the estimate and a plan for a new gravel variety - and he said he would bring out some heavy construction vehicles to pack down the gravel after it was placed.

It all looks great and it is pleasant to drive on.  We have had a couple of storms since the repair and I think it is holding up well.  We'll just have to wait and see for the next big one though, I guess.

Nature Will Get Us All in the End

Over on "Abandoned Berlin" - one of the blogs I follow, which you can find in the right hand column - there's a post today about a villa that was destroyed in WW2. It's located in Steglitz, a district that was Southwest from where I lived in Tempelhof.  Fairly suburban, but the structure and decoration of the house looks beautiful.  

It was destroyed in allied bombing one night in 1944, and in the style of that blog, the writer was able to gather quite a bit of interesting information about why it is still a shell.  That reminds me of one of the houses on Vernon Street NW, where I lived in DC for a few years...in any case, a link to the post is at the end of this one.

Which brings me to the topic of today's post.  It's been quite a hard winter, and before the snow that started last night, we had some high winds out at Hawksbill Cabin.  It's taken its toll on the pool cabana, shown in the photo here.  

While it's not war damage, there are a few small projects we're going to need to get underway - and to me, that is a welcome sign of spring.   

Here's the link to that post about the villa in Berlin:  http://tinyurl.com/jwylemf

Mary's Chairs Project

The chairs - before.

A couple of springs ago, one of our neighbors put out some nice wooden chairs during "big trash day."  Mary spotted them and thought they would be worth the effort to recycle.  She even went and knocked on the neighbor's door to make sure that they were okay with that.

I should mention that Alexandria sends around a notice about big trash day about six months in advance.  There are folks who scavenge the night before, checking out the various piles of discards for something of value.  It's quite competitive, and for some reason our neighborhood gets a lot of traffic.

In the group house I lived in when I first moved to the DC area, my room mates had made a big score on big trash day over in the Westover neighborhood, near East Falls Church Metro.

They'd found an original, marked, Heywood Wakefield coffee table - but for some reason, when the house broke up, no one took it.  Now it sits in the living room at Hawksbill Cabin.

So the fact that Mary was able to score these chairs is really saying something.

The chairs - after.

The project lay idle for a couple of years, but she decided last spring to pull the chairs out of their storage area and check out what needed to be done.  It was a straightforward job of stripping of the old finish, which was peeling away, and was the reason they were tossed in the first place.

She also sanded them down and tightened the screws.  Then she painted them a flat white to match our other porch furniture, and there they sit.

Of course, with the hurricane on, none of us are going out there to check them out.  But I do fancy lighting up a stogie out there sometime this fall.

Door Chore

During my furlough, I had resolved to take care of a few small maintenance projects around Hawksbill Cabin - as if, because I'm so handy, all that I really needed was the time - one that I am really good at though, is painting.  So I've begun to get some much needed touch ups done.

We have this fabulous door at the entry to HC - it has an elaborate, heavy duty hinge assembly on dutch panels.  An additional layer of wood planks was installed on the interior part, so it's double thick.  No bear is getting in while we are away, and I think the door would survive a tree falling on it...knock on wood that that doesn't happen.

The door faces south, so it gets the sun year round, and lately, I've begun to notice that the paint was fading.  Worse yet, apparently, somewhere along the way, someone had used spray paint for touch ups, and now the traces of two finishes were beginning to show, a glossy finish from the spray paint and something more of a matte on the undercoat. 

Off to Lowes for a gallon of exterior latex in color Merlot. This is the same color we've used on the hand rail that surrounds the brick terrace.  I've got a picture here of Tessie supervising me painting those.

There are also some color panels on the addition (I hope to get these taken care of during the fall). Although the front door needed painting, these are the real motivator for the project...the frames for these was painted in an oil-based black enamel, which is peeling.  That is what I am really trying to get to, but I thought I would start with the red paint first, and do the detail after.

Finally, there is a mistake that I made a few years ago, that needed to be corrected, and now finally has been.  I painted the doors on the barn with an idea of tying the outbuilding thematically to the house.  Unfortunately, the paint I chose was in the color "terra cotta"...which gave a distinctly Harley Davidson appearance - there used to be a Harley in there, but not any more these days.  Here's a link to a blog post back when I painted them the first time.  http://hawksbillcabin.blogspot.com/2008/06/catching-up-on-few-small-projects.html

All good now though.  Those doors are the color of a fine wine!

A Small Annual Maintenance Matter

In the spring clean up department, a few weeks back we had the drive regraded, and while he was at it, Mickey put in new gravel.   The paths and driveway look fantastic for a couple of weeks after this...

Unfortunately at the first big rain, we find a new gulley on the downhill side of the drive, and we can begin to observe as our gravel begins the journey first out into the road and eventually over into Beaver Run.  I am quite sure that I have gravel as far down the Shenandoah as Front Royal by now.

I used to look at this as one of the small projects...but now I recognize that it is at minimum an annual task -  unless we spring for getting the drive way paved.

Trees Before and After

We had to get a bunch of tree work done this year - in fact, these tasks have held up getting the pool opened.  And taking care of it has led to the realization that we probably have five or six more pines to take down, unfortunately.  I've got some photos to post of all of this, starting with the apple tree.

The apple tree is poised for a bumper crop this year.  Unfortunately the stress of the snow last winter left this old tree in poor shape, and we noticed that the second of the tree's originally three trunks had split.  So that's gone now, but the remaining trunk seems healthy and strong.  Once again, I forgot to save the wood for our artist friend Lisa.  You wouldn't believe all the golf ball sized green apples all over the yard!

The second, and more problematic tree, was the big pine.  This one had a pronounced lean that showed up after the winter, and I knew there was trouble when the hawks (check the label "Hawks" on this post) didn't return to nest here this year - they are nearby, I see them flying through the woods from time to time. 

So we also took this one down, and a couple of others that were sickly.  Now we've got a big open space in the front yard, and the sky is opened up overhead.  The pool will be cleaner this year as a result, and probably warmer.

Down Comes the Big Pine

Since we bought the Hawksbill Cabin in September 2007, we've enjoyed the big pine tree that dominates the hill in the front yard.  The neighborhood is known as Hawksbill Pines, after all, and this just might be the eponymous tree...although I doubt it.  It's really a marvel.  But unfortunately, it's going to have to come down this year.

After the snows this winter, we've noticed there is a pronounced lean in the main trunk.  While it's subtle enough that you might not notice it as a casual visitor, I can definitely see it, and I am growing a little more concerned each time I take a look at it.

For the last two springs, a family of hawks (I've had trouble identifying the species - either Coopers or Sharp-shinned hawks, and at the moment I'm going with Coopers) have nested here, raising four hatchlings each year.  They didn't nest here this year, but moved to the woods in the back of the house.  I haven't found the tree, but hear the "near the nest" call and see the male flying over from time to time.   Their voluntary relocation opened up some options.  (Click on the "Hawks" tag on this post for more on their nesting activities.)

There will be a big relief associated with the event.  This tree drops needles and those little cones into the pool all summer long.  I had no idea how much litter a pine tree continuously throughs off, and that's especially true of this one.

We are taking down two of its downhill neighbors, which have always looked a little sickly, and one more up the hill closer to the house and pool.  It's just time for these to go, and unfortunately for the big one, with the lean, we can't afford the risks of it falling at anytime, especially later in the summer during the heavy rains.

Chris said this will open up the view.  That's certainly true and we'll have a clear look over to Beaver Run hollow. 

I'm thinking about replacing these with four to six apple trees, which won't grow as tall.  It'll be nice to have a little orchard there, and since I think we could lose the old tree soon, it's time to think ahead.

As far as pines go, we'll still have 10 or so of the large, 70- to 90-footers left, and there are a couple of 30-foot sapplings around that will grow into place.  We've got more in the acre of woods behind and to the east, which is where I think the hawks have settled.  So the neighborhood can keep the name - Mary and I will stand by it.

Getting that wood pile organized

I got a late start last weekend and had a lot of social and business appointments in Page County, so I didn't have the time I wanted to clean up the new wood pile in the back.  This pile of logs is from one of the three trees we lost during the winter - we lost one of the three trunks of the apple in front, took down one of the old dog woods that was close to the power line, and took down this pine which was leaning and close to the house.

So I had it cut up into sections so I could move it, but the team left some of the logs too big to move with my wheel barrow.  So for now I piled everything up in one place while I get some better equipment.  I've got to get it moved soon though because it is too close to the house...at a minimum it will attract black rat snakes...but it's easy to imagine something venomous taking up residence there, too - a copperhead or a timber rattler...or both.

In the past I've kept these logs so my friend Chris could use them for firewood over in GWNF...but he doesn't camp often enough to use it all.  So this time, I plan to use these logs to line the path out into our wooded back lots.  They can return to the earth in the forest, and while they are doing so we'll have a route to follow out into our woods.  I will keep the smaller logs for him though.

Here is the stump of the dogwood we took down.  A couple of years ago we took two down in the front - I don't like it, but sometimes these older trees are just dangerous and are threatening to come down on their own.  I took this because of the oxidation happening already, and the sap running here - I remember that from the last one.  I have an artist friend who may come and take this stump away...I do plan to feature her work in a post soon.

Where'd my driveway go?

As the snow began to melt a few weeks ago, I started noticing all the gray patches that were piled up near our driveway at the Hawksbill Cabin.  Then I started to recognize the gray stuff as the new gravel that we had put down last fall.  I have to admit that got under my skin a little bit - but also I realized that there wasn't much to be done about it, except to try and recover some of it.

So over the weekend, that was the main chore Mary and I tackled - trying to gather as much stray gravel as we could from the snow banks around, and replacing it on the bare spots - or worse, where various trucks and cars had spun in holes that fill with water and freeze overnight.

I guess I managed to salvage about 10 wheelbarrows full.  It's a pity, some of it is pretty much lost forever.  Something to remember for the next El Nino winter - don't patch the driveway that year! 

Chores are Waiting

I've got chores waiting for me out at the Hawksbill Cabin and I am really looking forward to them.  I even sent a note to my buddy Chris - he may come out and join me.

The main thing that I need to take care of is to clean up this log pile.  A few weeks back, we had Ricky Dinges come out and take down the damaged trunk of the apple tree in the front yard, and a gnarly old dogwood (that we hated to see go).  While he was there, we noticed this old pine that was close to an oak, and since we had this situation a couple of years ago - the pine fell - we decided the pine had to come down. 

Ricky took it down for us two weeks ago, and I told him to leave the logs cut to camp wood length and I would take care of it.  So this weekend, I'll be moving it to a pile behind the shed...where I still have quite a bit of this wood left.  Chris wants to use it during weekend camping trips and he's taken about a third of what I had...I guess he isn't camping as much as he needs to.

Here is a view of the roof with all the snow melted off finally - but with the big snow banks behind the house still there.  These are in the shade of the house all day long - it's going to take a couple of weeks for this to melt!

Losing Part of the Apple Tree

Just last month I was starting to think of some Spring chores, including getting our apple tree pruned - http://hawksbillcabin.blogspot.com/2010/01/february-pruning.html ...

It turns out that the weight of the snow on some of those branches caused one of the main trunk branches to break and fall, luckily only hitting the house with a glancing blow and no damage.  So we had Ricky Dinges come up and cut the fallen tree out of there.

While he was there, we had him cut down a very gnarly old Dogwood in the back, that was trying to wrap itself up in the power lines.  It's sad to lose a 50 year-old tree like that, but there was a real danger there so we thought i was a good idea. 

While we were talking about his work and paying him, we took a closer look at this pine tree next to one of the white oaks.  Two years ago, the pine in a similar pairing fell during Spring thaw - so we've decided to have Ricky and his crew back in to take this tree down before it falls on its own. 

Looks like I am going to have another bunch of camp logs for Chris -

Chimney Chore

Weather and work deadlines kept us away from the Hawksbill Cabin for a longer interval than usual, and Mary and I needed to get out there to check in and see how things had fared during the snowpocalypse. Mary had made arrangements for the driveway to be plowed – twice, and she’d had our roofer Alan come out and shovel the snow off of the roof after the first big snow this month. Between the big December and January snows Alan had come up to install ice breakers and to upgrade the flashing at the base of the chimney, so this visit was also the first time we’d be able to check out his work on this small project.

The back of the house is partially below grade, so the above ground portion of that wall is between six and seven feet high. The snow that I shoveled off the roof in December lay back there in the shade, forming what ski resorts would call a respectable base of between two and three feet. In these approach photos, you can see that with the additional snow and from Alan’s shoveling, the snow was as deep as five feet behind the house, nearly blocking the clerestory windows.

We’ve had leaking on the chimney wall during heavy summer rains and also after the December snow began to melt. So my goal was to go up, shovel some snow from the roof, and then clear the chimney cap – where there was about two feet of snow remaining. I worked on this for about an hour – a wet and icy standing seam metal roof is slippery, so be warned, sports fans – and finally had the area cleared well enough to take a look at the new flashing job.

This is a technical solution to our leak problem, and it is often used for stone chimneys. The uneven surface doesn’t allow for a standard flashing installation to be effective, so you cut into the stone, inserting the edge of the flashing inside of the chimney. There is a mechanical attachment of the flashing to the base of the chimney, and then the overlap extends to the surface of the roof.

We talked to a couple of architect friends about the problem, including a couple of historic preservation specialists, before we settled on this approach. Fortunately, Alan was familiar with the method and was able to execute it for us. While there was no trace of the old leaking inside the house this time, I cleared the chimney cap off for good measure. Seems to be working so far.

Gutter Job

During the recent snow and melt, our gutters at the Hawksbill Cabin took a beating. They were torn away from the house due to the sheer amount of snow, coupled with a one-inch rain fall. As of this weekend, there was still snow on the roof – shown here in a photo from Sunday morning – but if the warming trend holds another day or so, all of the snow will finally be off the roof. Then who knows until the big piles in the shade behind the house melt away.

In addition to having Alan come out for a little bit of roof work – he’ll be doing a specialized flashing repair and installing “icebreakers” to prevent future damage to the gutters – we had our gutter guy, Craig Comer from Luray with Precision Seamless Gutters, in case Page Valley readers are interested – he’s always been responsive and has done a great job for us.

In addition to reattaching the gutters where they had torn away, we reopened the downspout at the center of the back of the house. I don’t like the placement of this one or how it drains to a little pipe under the house, seen in this photo as white piping in the stairwell. But we learned this is essential drainage for the roof’s large flat spaces – the run to the ends is too far for a heavy rain.


The downspout at the end of the stone portion of the house had to be reattached after the storms, and the gutter on this end was angled more to send water its way. Because this side of the house is somewhat sheltered by trees, there never seems to be much drainage here, although it may just head the other way to the central downspout.

Now just to get the chimney work and icebreakers in place, and hopefully that’ll do ‘er.

Floors and Doors

We still have a long list of home improvement projects at the Hawksbill Cabin, and we get to them as we can. It's basically a function of money - the two labels about big projects and small projects will show that we've taken on quite a lot of them, including some that were very expensive, over the two years so far - but also, Jesse, our general contractor, stays very busy in the Valley so we have to wait until we come up in his queue.

There was old linoleum tile in the main hallway of the addition. It was probably the original floor. The immediately previous owners had haphazardly installed a second layer in one area and painted over the tiles for the entire length of the hallway. Replacing the tile with Pergo or a similar floor was the plan.

I should note that we considered using alternative, sustainable materials for this purpose - including bamboo and other products. Their costs were approximately double that of the beech block we chose, which ended up being on sale at Home Depot, and comes with a 15-year warranty. I still chalk the availability and distribution issues up to an emerging market for "green" products, there is a lot of talk and great products and technologies, but the supply chain issues still preclude their widespread adoption.

Also, somewhere along the way the doorway to the master bedroom had been removed, and there were never any doors on the hall closet. We'd gotten by on the bedroom door, and hung curtains over the closet.

We combined the doorway installations with the floor to have a two-day project for Jesse, and last week we finally got them done. In the progress, he hid the phone cord that used to run down this hallway behind the molding and thresholds. Really a job well done, as always.

Saturday Chores

After heading out to the Hawksbill Cabin on Friday night, we got up early so we could run some errands on Saturday. Mary wanted to pick up a few items at the Luray Farmers’ Market, and then we were due for a drive down to the Home Depot in Harrisonburg (the only Home Depot I will ever set foot in again – most courteous and knowledgeable staff I have encountered in one of these stores!).

We made our stop in Luray, but the two vendors we wanted to see weren’t there – there is a fellow that sells Page Valley honey and Mary wanted to get a few jars for hostess gifts, and there is a lady who makes wonderful beeswax hand soap that is scented with lavender that we really enjoy. With these two absent, we browsed the other booths, where Mary found some local jams to substitute for the honey, and from the same vendor, a nice bunch of asparagus which I grilled with corn and NY strips for dinner.

Then it was on to H-burg. I mentioned that Jesse, our general contractor, was out a couple of weeks back – we have a slate of small projects for him, including installing some folding doors on the hallway closet (we currently have curtains hanging there) and a new door on the master bedroom.
The bigger part of this group of projects is laying a new floor in the hallway, about 80 square feet. We were going to put down linoleum tile ourselves, but after shopping the Pergo we decided we liked it better. We’ve chosen a light colored Beech Block pattern, and we went down to Home Depot to buy what we needed. These photos are of the linoleum we were considering.

It turns out that a little more planning is due – there are several kinds of trim packages, including quarter rounds, leveling elements, etc., that need to be purchased at the same time to complete the installation. Because Pergo is a “floating floor” it is not mounted flush to the walls, as you do with linoleum. There is a quarter inch gap between the floors and walls, and this is typically filled with a silicon caulk-like project and covered over with the trim.

So we left without a purchase, just slightly better educated. We will work with Jesse to make the purchasing arrangements for the flooring, and he’s going to go ahead and start on the closet doors within the next couple of weeks.

A Parting Look at the Azaeleas

The azaeleas were at peak last weekend at the cabin. Despite overcast skies, I was able to get a few photos of them, including this one that was taken from the bedroom window. In the distance, across the front yard, you can see the road and the beaver pond in this shot as well.

With rain all day Sunday and forecast for the rest of the week, the flowers aren't going to last long. In fact, the weather was already knocking the blossoms off of these plants that day.

Also of note in these shots are the gleaming new white gravel paths, which we had done a few weeks back. Despite the allergies and rain, spring is such a splendid time of year in Virginia.

First Spring Project 2009

As I was scrolling through the photos on my moto cam I noticed I haven't written yet on our first spring project, which was to redo the gravel walks and parking space. These photos are a few weeks old - Mickey came out and took care of this project the same weekend we did the Mary's Rock hike last month.

That's his truck in the background...I know he made three trips for all the gravel, but I don't know the cubic footage of the gravel we put down.

When I post the azaelea photos from this past weekend, the difference will be clear, especially in the photo below, which was taken about two weeks ago, just as the azaeleas were beginning to bloom.

We also decided to put a path up the side of the house. This little hill is fairly steep, and the dogs started using these steps as a way to get to the backyard. So we decided to put a path in to make it easier for everybody.

The paths had been recently redone before we bought the house, but the small gravel that was used didn't stay in place and was pretty much mashed into the ground after just a year or so. We've chosen a larger sized stone and we put down a really good membrane to protect from weeds growning up in the paths. It made a huge difference around the house.