We went to Vegas to take the log home building class, and be sure that we wanted to take on such an endeavor.

 (If you’re just stumbling onto this post and site, this is a chronological story about my 2 kids, husband and I building our mortgage free log home with our own hands. I suggest you start from the beginning so you know what’s going on, or read “What is Cottonwood Creek?”  It’ll summarize this whole blog for you.  We receive new readers from around the world every single day…welcome!)

Once we got home from Vegas and the Log Home building class, we needed to sell the land we owned next door to our (old) house, in order to pay for the logs, and to pay for a tractor and other necessary supplies to get started building with.  I’m a city girl.  I’m new to the country.  I can’t believe I just said that I have to buy logs and a tractor.   (Who AM I??)

I put a sign in the front of the property next door to our house, and placed an ad on Craiglist.

I left the rest to God. If He indeed wanted this to happen, He’d bring us a buyer. 

Our (old) house has an empty lot on both sides. One belongs to us, and one belongs to my mother-in-law. She was wanting us to sell her’s, too, but said that there was no hurry to do so.

The day after I placed the ad and put up the sign, the first call we received bought our lot. The next day we sold Dixie’s...with no sign or ad!! God sold those lots right off the bat. Other lots on our street have taken weeks to months to sell. We fully expected it to take that long.

With cash in hand, now it was time to locate logs.  Without logs, you can’t build a log home.

This was not a simple process.  Steve called many loggers in the Texas area.  He called and called.  He left messages.  No one called back.   We waited and waited.  WEEKS.   Still, no one called back.

Was this a wall God had put up?   Did we get it wrong?  Did we misunderstand?  Maybe we just thought that God had guided us to this point, but we were wrong…

Weeks after the phone calls, I asked Steve who he called and who I should try to get a hold of.   He named the primary one he wanted…B&N Logging.  I looked up the number, asked the Lord to please intercede and make this happen…IF we were supposed to build.   Then I called.  On the first ring, he answered!

I quickly handed the phone to Steve; he was shocked!   They chatted.  Steve explained what we were wanting to do.  Apparently, loggers don’t want to deal with log home builders.   They work with the local mills, not individuals.  This is why no one called us back when Steve left messages.  But…after speaking to Steve, this one was willing to listen….at least temporarily.    Steve arranged to have us meet with him in person 2 days later.

We loaded up at 7am and off we went….5 hours away to meet with a logger.  Not quite the same as going to Home Depot for building supplies!   This was a whole different animal.   Totally different game.  Extremely daunting and exciting all the same time.

We got into town, and headed into the woods.  Tall pines everywhere. It smelled so good!   We got to the spot, and saw the logging going on.   A farmer had requested that his land be cleared of trees for his cattle.   So, this logger was clearing the man’s land.

Billy, the logger, had one log laying there, ready for us to look at…to see if it was the kind we needed, or we wouldn’t be able to work together.   The log was perfect!   The logger was surprised…and relieved.  He had thought we needed much straighter ones.   We needed 80 40-foot logs, with a diameter of somewhere around 12-18 inches….just for our house (other log homes of other designs would need different measurements to suit their own needs).

He continued to show us around the woods, pointing to one tree and another, seeing if they’d be potentially usable in our home project.   The woods were full of them!    What a relief!!!

He said no problem.   Even better…. he told us that Steve had called both him and his son-in-law (also has a logging business) and left messages on their voicemail.  Billy said that he and his son-in-law were eating dinner together one night, listening to their voicemails of Steve’s on speaker…and laughing, and deleted his messages..not wanting to deal with him.  Then, when I prayed and asked God to please let this one answer the phone, and he did on the first ring, Billy confessed that he heard his phone ring, was planning to ignore it, but felt a strong nudge inside to answer it.  GOD!   In fact…he was so impressed with the pictures and lessons we showed him from Log Home Builder’s Association, that he said he wants to build one, too.

We would receive our logs within a couple weeks!!!!    (Holy cow.  Is this really happening???    Logs?)  So far, it seems this is God’s plan!

Done.   We are just waiting for them to be delivered.  Can’t believe this is actually happening.  LOGS?  DELIVERED???

My head is still spinning….

next is “New Wheels“.  You can’t do anything in the country without a tractor.  But for a city girl…?

Or, click on “What do Vegas and logs have in common?”  to see this log home building process from the very beginning.   Or, click on “What is Cottonwood Creek’ to see what this whole blog is about.