Off to the Woods

This weekend we are heading out to our cabin the middle of nowhere Pennsylvania for the first time this year, which is always a bit of a nervous time, as who knows when the cabin may eventually fall down the mountain.  I've realized I've only discussed the cabin tangentially on the blog here, so I figured I would give a bit of a background.

What the cabin looked like the first time I visited, back in 2008

John's Grandpop built the cabin about 40 years ago, and he grew up going out to the cabin for family vacations.  The owners of the adjoining 160 acres use the cabin during hunting season as well, and we have free range of their property when we go out, so it is a good relationship.  Family members stopped going out there regularly about 15 years ago or so, and the neighbors only went out a couple of times a year, so the cabin slowly was going downhill (both literally and physically).  While Grandpop did a good job building the cabin, he was a minister, not a carpenter, and it was built slowly out of scraps over time, so it was not in the best shape when John and I started going out regularly about 5 or 6 years ago.  After Grandpop passed away, Grandmom gave the cabin to John, since he was trying to fix it up.  We've been slowly trying to get it back in shape, and it's doing much better these days.

A few of the specifics - it is situated on a very small mountain, and we have about 4.5 acres of land, which is pretty secluded.  The cabin has electricity, but no running water (stay tuned for massive improvements in that department this year), and is about 20' x 20', with a loft over half of the first floor.  I've also realized I haven't been great about documenting everything, so I don't have any good pictures of what the inside looked like before we got started, but trust me, it was a little scary.  Because it's at the bottom of a hill which requires 4wd, and no one in the family had a 4wd vehicle until Hubby, everything that came and left the cabin had to be hauled by hand up and down a very steep hill (including all water).  Needless to say, not a lot has left the cabin in the past 40 years, so it was a bit full, both of stuff and wildlife.  Regular trips to both the cabin and the dump have been taking care of that, so it's much better these days.  Over the next few days I will get you all caught up to where we are now!