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My First Time(s)

Do you remember when you got the bug for log home living? When you decided that a log home would be the home of your dreams?

There are two occasions that stick in my mind that I thought I'd share. The first was when I was around 13 and we were visiting my dad's college roommate. About 20 miles east of Payson, AZ, in the White Mountains, is a small community called Kohl's Ranch, built in a valley along Tonto Creek. All sounds very westerny, doesn't it? Anyhow, this community is mostly made up of cabins, and it was here I first experienced a log home. We were invited to dinner at a neighbor's house, so we walked up the dirt road and beheld a beautiful home, the logs in a Swedish Cope cut (if I recall correctly) and stained in an appropriate brown. The outside was magnificent, but it was the inside that really threw you for a loop. White. Everything inside was white, from the walls and leather couches, to the lush carpet. All completely white. Now, as a 13 year old kid who'd been playing the creek all day and had just walked 200 yards up a dirt road (the whole neighborhood was unpaved) I could tell you even I knew not to touch a thing. I have no idea what the residents of this particular cabin were thinking when they decided on white as their only interior color of choice. The cleaning must have been very time consuming or very expensive. Probably both.

The second time, I was probably closer to 19, and delivering pizzas in Flagstaff, AZ. This particular delivery was to the northwest of town, with an amazing view of the San Fransisco Peaks. Again, it was to a log home, but on a much smaller scale that the aforementioned one. The gentleman who answered the door invited me in (it was quite cold outside) and told me to warm myself by the wood stove while he got the money. Cozy was the perfect way to describe this cabin; it appeared to be at most a one-bedroom with a loft similar to a recent featured article on Loghome.com, but not near as big. The wood stove was in the corner of a small living room, with an overstuffed couch and chair, facing an old, beat up piano. The kitchen area was under the loft, with a small table under a window, and a ladder (not stairs, a ladder) that led up to the loft. I completely fell in love then. The log walls combined with the complete comfort of the place just sang "home" to me.

I guess it's true...you always remember your first time ;-)

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Comment by Shad on July 27, 2008 at 9:18pm: Great post Dianne - and thanks for including a link in your bio to your current home your building. I'm going to post it here: ( http://www.schraderlanding.blogspot.com) and hope you don't mind, so that everyone who visits this post can check out the wonderful pictures!

Comment by Dianne on July 27, 2008 at 10:18am: 1974...New England Log Homes had a model just down the street from our apartment. We passed it on a daily basis and stopped by many times just to dream. Yes, we loved it, but weren't sure about living in one on a daily basis. Plus, we were still years away from being able to afford a home. In the next few years we visited many of their model homes, we were campers and we'd check with them about dealers in the areas we happened to be visiting while camping.

Fast forward to 1977 and our purchase of 2 acres of land in a rural community (a half hour commute to both our jobs), knowing some day we would build a home there. By 1979 we had a budget to build, and the log home idea was still there, but we checked out other options as well. It quickly became apparent that we wanted unique and nothing else except the log home was going to satisfy us. We sat down with them and seriously crunched the numbers. Knowing in advance that some of the interior work would have to wait, it still appealed to us. We were seriously in love with the logs, wood interior walls, the cathedral ceiling and loft. And also felt that we had done our homework by visiting all the models over the years. We were very comfortable with our choice.

Both sets of parents thought we were crazy and tried to talk us out of it! But, we both knew what we wanted and with such a united front from us, we won all 4 of them over! We lived in that log home for 29 years, and loved it more each day. And I might add that we had our budget...and on the day we moved in our budget was only $40.00 short (yes 40...!)

We are currently building our second log home. My husband's job (of 34 years) was no longer secure due to downsizing, outsourcing and off-shoring! For the last 5 years he had worried on a daily basis if he would show up to work in the morning to find himself "laid-off". That is no way to live...and we were close enough to retirement...and he wanted to leave on "his terms". But, in order to do this we'd need the equity from the log home. I spent weeks crying and wouldn't consider living in anything other than a log home. We spent 14 months trying to sell the home during the time the housing market was seriously depressed.

Happy ending here...we are retired and currently building our second log home. It's smaller, but we have 10.55 acres instead of 2 acres. There's only the two of us so smaller is very okay (and actually it's only about 100 sq foot smaller but then we added a walk out basement and will finish a large room down there and it's going to be bigger...go figure...LOL...). We are having lots of fun building, our work crew is wonderful, we are happy with all our choices so far. We hope to move in within 2-3 months.

Just an interesting note here: In 1981 Log Cabin Syrup did a "Give-Away Sweepstakes" and needed to use the outside of a log home for pictures in the ads for newspapers and flyers. Our home was chosen from about 10 others that their reps had visited. There was no monetary gain from that, just a nice feeling that they liked what our home looked like.

Comment by Shad on July 24, 2008 at 4:45pm: Awesome Ted - that's a great story. And so is yours Lynn!

Comment by Lynn Peterson on July 24, 2008 at 11:09am: My husband and I were up north looking for a military supply store that he had wanted to check out. I saw a For Sale sign at the end of a driveway that had a Log home. I always like the look of them. I asked him if we could please stop at the realtors office because it was down the street. He said OK reluctantly. We did and she brought us down to the house immediately. When she opened the door I fell in love. The house was a little out of our price range. I thought about it all the time and started reading log home magazines and putting up pictures everywhere my husband looked. We went up that way again and sure enough the price had been reduced. We looked again, made an offer and the rest is history. Of course I didn't realize that the condition of the house was less than perfect. It was 30 years old, had never been stained and the roof was leaking. The first thing we did was put on a metal roof, pressure washed the mold off, stained it and started doing landscaping on some of the 5 acres. 4 years later, we love it even more and will probably never leave, unless it's to another log. Living in a log home is so warm and comfortable. Our friends are all impressed by it. To us it's just home!

Comment by Sara Brown on July 21, 2008 at 2:38pm: I've said it before and I'll say it again: East Rosebud Lake, Montana. I've been spending summers there since I was seven and I swear I fall more in love with it every year. Snow-capped mountains, white-water fly fishing, the occasional moose spotting, brews and burgers at the local Grizzly Bar—what's not to love?

Comment by Carol Afshar on July 21, 2008 at 11:45am: My husband and I spent months looking for our retirement home. One weekend we must have seen 20 different places, with no luck. As we sat in our real estate agent's office, very tired and discouraged, with the knowledge that we had to drive back to LA the next morning, our agent said, "well there is one home, not the style you are looking for and a bit larger, but if you want to just do a drive by???? The rest is history - we fell in love with a log house and can't wait to move in full time.

Comment by Michael McCarthy on July 21, 2008 at 10:18am: Easy one: Blackwater Falls State Park, West Virginia (near Canaan Valley, White Grass), winter 1988...and many winters thereafter. This best-kept-secret park is a cross-country skiing gem, and it boasts a bunch of small, modest cabins dotting the forest. The cabins were built during the Depression by the Civilian Conservation Corps (a work program launched by Roosevelt...same program that also helped build many of the structures and trails throughout scores of national parks).

I love Blackwater's cabins with the enormous hearths. Park rangers stack firewood on your front porch every morning...and after breakfast, you step out your front door, squint against impossibly blue skies, strap on your skis and hit a trail 20 yards from your front door. It's paradise----and the cabin has a great deal to do with it...

Comment by Rob Romine on July 21, 2008 at 10:09am: Growing up in South Carolina, I lived about an hour from the beach. I loved the sand and surf, and couldn't wait to get back on the weekends. However, my family lived in West Virginia, and every summer we would visit. My grandparents and my aunt each lived in log homes, and the two weeks we usually spend in WV were always filled with adventures of hiding in the loft, climbing the outside corners, and using the low storage area behind the upstairs closets as our "fort". I loved visiting and spending time with my cousins.

At sixteen my family moved to WV, and it was time to build a place of our own. Of course we built a log home, and I was even more hooked. I was able to help with the entire process of planning, construction, and move in and told my family that I would be in the business the rest of my life.

Sixteen years later, and I still love everything about log home living. I love the smell of the wood, I love helping new couples see their dream unfold, and I love getting to visit homes all over the country and see all the unique and different ways they are finished.

The way I see it, I get to experience a first time every time I visit a happy customers new log home.

Comment by Alexis Dyke on July 21, 2008 at 10:09am: I guess we all remember our first time. I visited a neighborhood craft show. The home that hosted it was a log home. The owner had everything just perfect. A fire in the fireplace,a beautiful Christmas Tree and hand made quilts used as wall hangings. I left thinking that there is no home like a log home. My husband felt the same. He had often visited a hand peeled log home as a child. We discussed our log home impressions at length, not imagining we could ever own one. That discussion occured 25 years ago this Christmas. Through the years we have visited log home booths at the home shows and have rented log homes for vacations. Finally, our three children grown, tuitions paid, we purchased our land. Six weeks later we signed for our log home. It was completed November of 2007. We love our home and still can't believe it is ours, but we still remember our first time some 25 years ago. Alexis and Wayne

Comment by Donna Peak on July 21, 2008 at 10:07am: Ah Shad. First times are memorable, aren't they? The thing I find surprising is that although log homes are all made of, well, logs, the diverse architectural design features, finishing techniques and furnishings that people incorporate make each home so unique, you can have a "first time" again and again and again. The thrill never dies.