To quote myself, “Every time I make one of these I imagine I’m building a trapper’s tilt deep in the wilderness,” and that’s exactly what I eventually did, although calling my backyard a wilderness is stretching things! I have made plenty of “log cabin” garden beds (see “‘Log cabin’ garden beds” in Backwoods Home Magazine Issue #159, May/June 2016). So instead, my wife and I built ourselves a straw bale cottage, and have lived there happily ever since. I’m not a large or strong man, and I don’t own heavy equipment for moving massive logs. It was heavy, bruising, and dangerous work. We had three adults and two teenagers working we used pry bars, come-alongs, and a winch to move massive logs and roll them up ramps to place them on the walls, where they were laboriously notched and fitted by someone perched up there with a chainsaw. But when I was 16, I’d spent two weeks working on a log cabin high in the Colorado Rockies, and I vividly remember the experience. After all, we had forest land with plenty of timber. When my wife and I started homesteading in the late 90s, I naturally thought of building a log cabin first. It recalls our pioneer ancestors and beckons us to return to the land, to a simpler life, and persists as one of our best living traditions. I believe there is something unique about this simple, elemental form that calls to the spirit of all Americans. For as long as I can remember, I’ve always wanted a rustic log cabin deep in the forest.
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