We Built This Six-Sided Oak Cabin For Just $120

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All told, it took us about two months to fell and peel all the logs for our cabin, with lots of time out for chores in the garden and visits to the swimmin' hole.

THE DESIGN UNFOLDS

By midsummer, our cabin's design had begun to take shape in my mind, although I hadn't yet put anything on paper. Two things were certain: [1] 1 wanted to build a multisided structure . . . something a little more aesthetic than the standard Abe Lincoln log cabin. [2] The dwelling would have to be constructed from the relatively small logs that my recently acquired mule-Jude-could maneuver without much difficulty. This meant timbers no more than 12' to 15' long and 12" in diameter.

With these factors in mind, I ultimately decided to build a cabin in the shape of a hexagon, with 13-foot-long sides. (What I had done, in fact, was re-invent the Navajo Indian counterpart to the white man's log cabin: the hogan. The only difference is, the traditional hogan has a roof of dirt or adobe, while my cabin's roof is made of particle board.)

With my design fixed, I set about trying to skid all the felled and peeled oak logs we'd need to the construction site . . . and quickly found that Jude knew as much about skidding logs as I did: that is to say, nothing. On our first outings, the mule skidded me (through poison ivy) about as much as she skidded the logs . . . but we eventually got our signals straightened out and managed to position the big timbers right where I wanted them, alongside the construction site.

At the site, Cheryl and I stacked the logs in perpendicular layers-about ten logs to the rowto dry. Afterwards, we confidently sent out invitations for a cabin-building party to be held Labor Day weekend (which was only a couple weeks off).

FOUNDATION TIME

A few days after we sent out the invitations, Tom-a husky neighbor-showed up to help me with the cabin's foundation ... which he and I constructed from the stone that grows so abundantly here (especially in gardens).

What we did was cement large, flat rocks together to form seven piers: one for each point of the hexagon, and one pier in the center. Since our logs were 13' long-and since the timbers, once notched and stacked, would overlap 6" at each endwe set the piers 12' apart. (Note: We sunk the bottom of each column 12" under the ground-below the frost level for our area-and checked the piers' height with a string level.) The fact that the six outer piers were all equidistant from the center one (and from neighboring supports) made the hexagonal foundation very easy to lay out.

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