Much of our house sits unused and looks as tho no one has even moved in yet. Part of this is due to the fact that Brian & I are starting off in our marriage w/ not a lot of material possessions to our names (something I like as I consider myself a bit of a minimalist at heart) and it takes more money than we’re willing to part with at the current moment to fully furnish a house this big. The other part is due to the fact that neither of us have wanted to take the time to decorate when there’s so much to explore and only so many warm weather days. During some of my downtime at work I created a project folder that I’m calling ‘Surviving the Darkness’ and plan on using the long winter nights to make our house more of a home.

First on my list was a project that’s becoming much needed as our little Bucket Cat grows – a more adult cat size appropriate cat scratch. Having never tackled any sort of project like this, I had to do quite a bit of research before tackling this project. How the heck was I to know what a mitre box was when the only reason I even own a saw is to cut down my Christmas tree come December? 

My first challenge, after picking a design and researching all the materials and knowledge needed to was finding a fence post in Anchorage. Since there aren’t really many farms in Alaska there aren’t many tractor supply stores either. After visiting 1 rebuild supply store, 1 feed and farm store, 2 Lowe’s & 3 Home Depot’s I finally found what I was looking for. 

Once home w/ all my goodies I set to work in the garage while Brian worked on his truck in there as well. It took most of the entire day, but when it was all said and done, I think I did alright. I think my Grandpap Walter, who maintained a very popular wood shop in his basement, might even be a little proud of me if he were here to see this today.