And so it began. (Spawn House)

So going back exactly 8 months ago to late evening, July 18, 2014. The new update to Minecraft had just dropped for iOS and I was terribly excited. Since I’ve never been a PC player (and have no real interest in starting), this was going to be my first time experiencing infinite worlds, Enderman, biomes, wolves and several other things Kidzilla and Beastie liked to tell me about during their visits.

I updated MCPE on my phone, created a new infinite world, and pushed the button…

…and the image in the header appeared before me. Immediately I noticed how different everything looked from my last world. Grass everywhere. A deep river type thing stretching lazily in front of me to who even knows where. A dense copse of trees ahead, some of which looked very different from what I’d previously seen. If I squinted I could even see a mushroom off to the right. They’d been nearly nonexistent in my previous game. Best of all was looking ahead to that tree line and knowing behind it stretched a huge world waiting to be explored. (Interestingly though, I haven’t made too much of a foray westward as yet. Most of my explorations since have been to the North).

It being Survival mode though, I wanted to make a shelter before sundown. Like you do. So I made a 90 turn and started exploring the nearby landscape for a place to dig in and roost.

Spawn House has gotten a bit more… developed since.

That’s the same spot, roughly the same angle too. My, how the neighborhood has changed.

Lets go inside. Up the hill and around a bit:

What looks like a chimney off the left actually has a ladder going all the way up to the top of the tower. We’ll get up there in a sec.

I should probably furnish up here at some point. Anyway now to go up a very long ladder…

It got way more fun being up here once I tinkered with my options.txt file. The view from up here as a result is pretty amazing.

I’ll probably have explain why there is a burnt out field of flaming netherrack covered in lava in another post. Anyway, enough ogling the scenery, lets look around in the basement(s)!

This is the first room I carved out in the house. Because punching rocks.

Fun fact – I’ve set those dark oak stairs on fire a couple times by mistake. I didn’t know then that even if there’s a solid barrier of cobblestone containing lava, it can still set surrounding wood on fire. Oops. Actually I’ve burned down the entire spawn house at least once during construction that way, which is why that chimney isn’t actually a chimney.

Got a lava pit you don’t know what to do with? build a window and make it part of the decor!

I don’t even know what the kids did down here, the level is kinda trashed, hence the sign apologizing for the mess. I think they were trying to set up super secure beds or something.

If I’m mining out a space under a house in Survival I tend to leave behind these cobblestone warrens of platforms and stairs.

Despite many warnings not to do so, this was the point where I got tired of carefully mining out levels and just went on ore hunts by mining down in checkerboard patterns. I only died a few times…

You can just see the platform through the doorway, but we’ll go out there another day.

So there you are, my first house in this world. Go big and go home, right?