First we cut a hole in the roof. Our working, perfectly intact, homeowner-liable roof.

Don’t let the smiles fool you. This is TO THIS DAY still one of the most stressful projects we’ve taken on to date in our home. That’s a hole TO THE SKY in our brand new living room, where rain comes from six months out of the year practically non-stop!

After installing the outside of the stove piping a few days prior, we had stopped up the hole until we could get the actual stove in and install the stove pipe connecting the exterior piping to the actual stove. Each piece had to be essentially glued into place with a heat resistant stove sealant, and the alignment (offset because of our rafters) was a extremely tricky to get level and straight looking, given we were working with standard lengths of piping. After custom cutting a couple pieces and positioning the 400lb stove on the platform, we slid some a slate slab under each foot and sealed it into place.

As excited as we were for the ambiance and heating practicality, starting it up for the first time was pretty nerve wracking. Fortunately everything went according to plan - the flames kicked up at the press of a button thanks to the automatic igniter, the chemical coating burned off (we left the house for this but watched through the windows for any sign of our incompetence burning the house down) and we officially had a barely installed wood-burning heat source with all the latest bells and whistles.

It took us about a year and a half to pick this project back up, what with one thing and another. The forty bajillion other projects we started in the meantime had something to do with it, perhaps. We picked up more stone, stapled mortar paper over the wood platform, and nailed on the most aggressively sharp mesh I have ever had the displeasure of working with.

This was when I began to realize that most of the value in good gloves and boots lies in knowing when to wear them.

Finally we could get to placing the remainder of the stones. We chose the corners first, and worked our way in from there. We learned that Jess is much better at creating an “organic” pattern than I am, but even so, we wound up cutting quite a few to fill oddly shaped gaps we couldn’t avoid.

At last we were ready for the final hurdle. It already looked so much better and “more finished” at this point that I almost didn’t want to mortar the stones at all, since it was our first time grouting anything of any kind. At this point I had discovered that my home renovation learning curve was less of a slope and more of a vertical cliff face.

HOWEVER,

To our GREAT surprise (I cannot stress the magnitude of this shock) I discovered a hidden grouting talent. Not only did I succeed in getting the mortar into the places it should have gone, but I avoided putting it in places it shouldn’t have been and I did it all with a speed that perplexed us both.

Boy did I need that win. It still keeps me going sometimes, I’m somewhat embarrassed to say.

Now we just had to wait for it to cure. You best believe I was asking Jess if it had dried enough to light our first fire of the season every hour on the hour for the next few days.

AT LONG LAST!

The stone was rinsed, the mortar had properly cured, and we started up our push-button wood stove in all it’s fiery, luxuriously convenient glory. Zip took her place - yep, that chair was pretty much exclusively for her - in front of the fire, and didn’t budge for practically six months. She spoke for us all.