Business, new builders — and a young boy — benefit from workshop

PALMER — Little by little, a family cabin building business is making wishes come true.

About 25 people gathered at Friesen’s Custom Cabins for a beginner’s workshop earlier this month to watch and listen to owner Jay Friesen and his employees go through the process of building a cabin using a kit sold by the business.

“If you can build a Lego set, you can probably build one of these,” said project manager Travis Huggett.

Though the plans are designed by Friesen’s son (also named Travis) to be simple enough for one inexperienced builder to build the cabin on his or her own — the boards in the kit are even labeled and color-coded — several workshop participants said they would recommend it to others.

“It’s very informative, at least for someone like me who doesn’t have much experience,” said Palmer resident Jamison Peters about halfway through the daylong workshop.

Peters said he plans to start building a cabin in the Mat-Su in a couple weeks, and rent it out as a getaway for others until he and his family can afford to have it just to themselves.

Loretta and Grant Arnold, on the other hand, said they’re planning to build a permanent home for themselves and their infant child.

After living in a double-wide “fixer-upper” on their property outside of Palmer for a while, Loretta said they’re ready to “rip that thing up” and start anew by building a cabin on their own (complete with experiments in gardening, she said).

“It’s a good way to not get into a $350,000 mortgage,” Grant said.

Friesen’s kits range in price from around $20,000 to more than $100,000, depending on the type of materials used and the size of the floor plan. Cabin kits start at 640 square feet and go up to more than 3,500 square feet.

Palmer parents Davin and Melissa Carlson are also looking forward to building a home for themselves and their small children, and not having to rent a place.

Though he’d done some remodeling in the past, Davin said he was grateful the Friesen kits are made for people who haven’t attempted to build an entire house before. As a self-proclaimed perfectionist, he especially appreciated the designs’ flexibility.

“If you don’t do it perfectly (at first), you can fix it,” he said.

Plus, help is just a phone call away, Melissa pointed out.

“It seems like they’ll let you call them when you’re in a panic,” she said.

That kind of customer service is what Friesen said he hopes will continue to bring people back and keep the business thriving.

One of the reasons for hosting workshops — though this is the first Friesen’s has hosted in a few years, he said — is to be able to fund charitable projects, too. Friesen said he and his employees recently raised a 900-square-foot outbuilding for a church on Farm Loop Road to account for Sunday school overflow, as well as homes and offices for people who couldn’t afford it (though the business also has flexible payment plans).

“We try to do a little bit when we can,” Friesen said.

But the latest project on the docket — and the one built at the workshop — was particularly unique.

Friesen’s recently received a call from the Alaska and Washington area Make-A-Wish Foundation with a request from a nine-year-old Eagle River patient for a Nerf-themed clubhouse.

Details regarding the boy’s condition were not shared with the Frontiersman, but Friesen said in a press release that he was glad to support the project.

“We are a community-minded company that has invested in and supported worthy projects throughout the years. In presenting to our staff, we were all unanimous and energized with an invite to participate in granting (the boy) his wish for a Nerf Gun haven.”

For more information about Friesen’s Custom Cabins, call 746-2082 or visit www.friesenscustomcabins.com.

Contact reporter Caitlin Skvorc at 352-2266 or caitlin.skvorc@frontiersman.com.