You'll be floored by these improvements!

The last weekend in April brought Ernest, CJ, Lewis and myself to Rambler's Roost, the first to be able to drive into the cabin in 2009. There was still some snow on the road in and in the main yard, but nothing a little 4x4 effort couldn't overcome!

Our purpose in this early spring trip was to install a natural slate tile floor in the main kitchen area, replacing the carpet from in front of and under the cookstove with a safer material. So, the width of the kitchen and five feet from the end wall is now a beautiful natural slate tile floor, transitioned to the carpet by a strip of oak trim.

Fair warning for those that got comfortable with carpet in the kitchen...this floor is going to be cold on bare feet! But the danger of an ember falling from the wood cookstove is eliminated by the entire area being covered in slate. This will mean some additional care in cleaning too, but well worth it.

We arrived Friday evening and worked until 10:00 p.m., prepping the area by removing the carpet, stripping the old linoleum to bare wood underlayment, applying the backerboard and oak trim piece.

Saturday we got our layout, measured and cut tile to fit and laid in thin set mortar. While waiting for that to cure, we had plenty of time for general cabin cleaning, wood chopping and stacking, cleaning the electric stove top (that was about two hours of intensive scrubbing) and window cleaning.

Sunday morning we applied the grout, which required many buckets of fresh, clean water from the river. Lewis had gone home Saturday evening so the bucket duty fell to Ernest as CJ and I sponged the grout and cleaned the tile. Everything turned out as planned and looks great!

Ernest returned last weekend and put a couple of coats of sealer on the grout and tile before replacing the stoves. A small glitch in the cookstove pipe prevented completion of that project so Terry and I will go up Friday this week and finish that, along with cleaning the oven of the electric stove.

So all is in order for another busy season of cabin trips for our family. We have new neighbors upstream so be sure and introduce yourselves if you find them enjoying their new summer home.

Mel and Terry