We have a new cabin now. We spent much of 2013 looking around at many different cabins and locations. We ended up three miles away from our one that burned down! This one is much nicer and.....wait for it....has indoor plumbing! Yes my savvy friends, not one but two bathrooms! It also has four bedrooms which will allow us to have guests over. It is truly a genuine log cabin. We have been steadily working on it every chance we get, tearing out carpet, painting and decorating. I have a tremendous amount of bare walls to hang my photos. We ended up keeping the burned land as we now have two wood stoves to gather wood for and the seared wood will burn just fine after knocking off the blackened outer shell.
My husband finally sold his ranch near Miles City Montana. He had been wanting to sell it for years but couldn't get his sister to agree. She is part owner. Finally, she stated she wanted to sell and my hubby jumped at the chance. He has been cleaning out the old ranch house as the new owners are going to strip it to the 2X4's and rebuild. There are some nice antiques there and my hubby has been bringing them home. We will put a few of them at the new cabin to give it a little character.
We have purchased some furniture for the new cabin with the insurance money that my husband received for the one that burned down. I actually found a couple of second hand chairs that really were very unique. I found a stellar rocking chair with a beautiful pattern on the head rest portion. We also found a wonderful chair at a used furniture store that is fairly old fashioned but in great condition. We have a couple of other older chairs that we are going to get recovered and repaired. One is a rocker from the 1800's!
You have to understand a little about this new cabin to get the jest of the type of furniture that we want to decorate with. This cabin was built in 1983 so it really isn't that old. In 1992 it was purchased by a man and his wife who basically wanted to reside there "off the grid" so to speak. This man was not a friend of the US government and he did not believe in paying his taxes so the IRS took ownership of the cabin in 1993. However, no one would go up and get the current squatter out of the cabin so he kept living there. In late 1993, the man had three other men move in with him. His wife had left him so he had lots of room. The four of them started a movement in Montana called "The Montana Freemen". They resided in the cabin until September of 1995 when they moved out and went up to Jordan Montana where the "Freemen 81 Day Standoff" took place. So as you can see, we purchased a little piece of Montana History! I have spent some time researching what went on at our new cabin during those years they were there. There was quite a bit of counterfeiting and had they all stayed there, the Freemen Standoff would have been at our cabin instead of Jordan. They named our cabin "Redemption Township" and the Jordan Montana location was named "Justus Township". It's kinda cool knowing our cabin had a history even though I would never condone or believe what the Freemen preached and lived. We actually purchased the cabin from a retired minister and his wife who resided there for 12 years before they decided they wanted to move into Billings. We actually had gone and looked at it once before we looked around for a while more. However, we were both drawn back to this quirky cabin and just knew that we had to have it. Although my hubby constantly states "there is nothing square in this cabin" as he measures spaces and thinks about what he wants to do with them.
We have quite a few plans for this new cabin. We are hoping to make it a place that we can go if the "you know what" hits the fan some day. My hubby is going to have his ham radio tower there and we are going to try to install solar and wind power as alternative emergency power sources. We are excited about this endeavor and I will keep you well informed of our progress.
We are planning our first and only trip of 2014. My hubby has gotten to know a man from Washington State who knows a great deal about Bigfoot. Now my husband is quite sure that these creatures exist. He believes that he heard one at one time and has had a bucket list desire to go on a hunt. He has been invited to join this man in Washington to do a little hunt and we are very up for this! After all, one can combine two favorite pastimes, Geocaching and Bigfoot hunting! We are only taking one trip due to the fact that we have a lot of important work to do on the cabin and cannot afford to let it sit too long. We want to have wood cut and all the improvements done on the inside by the time Winter rolls around.
Well, that is my update for this year so far. I am sure there will be many other interesting things to report as the rest of the year flies by. I truly hope all of you have a great Summer and a safe one as well. Cheers for now! Freedancer
