Hey, If You Happen To See The Most Shaggy Contractor....

 ...that walked out on me, tell him I'm mad and he's not done.  Tell him if he doesn't come back, the law might just be coming to pick him up.

These are pictures of where we stand right now.  In order for the foundation to be finished there needs to be another beam or stem wall poured on top of the perimeter beam.

We haven't seen Tommy in over a month and it has been almost three weeks since we have heard from him.  So...here we sit.  And I get to be reminded of our predicament every time I look out the kitchen window. 


So...If you happen to see  the most shaggy contractor that walked out on me, tell him he is fixn' to be in trouble, tell him he needs to get back here and get finished. Oooohh won't you tell him I'm mad and that's not good for him.

A Concrete Development

 Finally, some concrete.  This part was easy, just fill up the hole.

 

This is the first pour.  In a few days (fingers crossed, again) more forms will be built for the stem wall.  That will be about 26" tall.   I won't go into aggregates, admixtures and slump here but, let me just say that our next pour will have a slump of no more than 5 to 6 (preferably 4 to 5 but, that might be to difficult to move around)  and will have some retardant to slow drying time. 

      I know concrete drying isn't very exciting for most people but, it is thrilling for us.

Rickey trying to figure out why the vibrator quit working.  And, no I have not been playing with it!

Gotta Love Steel

 Finally, the steel is going in!  I don't think were going to get to pour before the end of the month though. 
The plastic is in the footing to help the concrete cure slower, according to the contractor.  I think it's to keep the OSB and Sheetrock (yes, I said Sheetrock) forms dry so that they won't break when the concrete is poured.  I am watching this process and hoping Tommy has done this before.  I think that it will be okay because it will all be back-filled with sand.

Tommy has a good start on the steel.  But, I am betting it will be two more days before we pour.

Expert Inspection

Now we've brought in the expert.  First, she has to search the grounds for anything laying around that she might need to take care of (like lunch that may have missed a worker's mouth).

Then she makes sure that the footings aren't too deep, because she is afraid that she couldn't get out.  

Then she says "Momma that is enough of this!  If you put me in that hole so I can pretend to inspect it...I will wake you up at 3 A.M. every night for the next six months!"

Okay! Okay!  Enough torturing the dog. (Daisy says thank you Sherry.)  

We are slowly getting there.  Footers dug, pier holes dug, forms going up.  Who knows maybe we will pour concrete before next month.

Foundational Education

It is always amazing to me just how much dirt you can get from a small area.  The pile in the background is from scraping the grass off of an area 35'x45' only an inch or two deep.

What I did expect, was for the cats to love playing in the fresh dirt...and they did.

Here we are today. What I didn't expect was to find topsoil 2' down in the entire foundation.  I don't know if it had been trucked in or if the gods were just smiling on us.  If it had all been the clay that we were expecting, this part of the project would have taken much longer.  As it is we are already having to deal with a couple of minor mishaps.

Mishap number 2 (I'll get to 1 in a minute) We did not realize that the water line to the barn was right across the back corner of the house.  So, after some scrambling to turn off  Niagara Falls and some digging to find and re-route the line we are back in business.

Mishap 1 is that the two outside 45' beams are only 35' apart and they needed to be 36' apart to take into account the rock ledge, which in our case will be used for a porch ledge.  But Tommy (our contractor) has a solution; which I will attempt to explain to you in the picture below.

Picture "A" is a cross section of what the the beam was going to look like.  The ledge on the left is where the porch joists would go. The middle is where the metal building would go and the ledge on the right would hold the floor joists for the inside of the house.  Now the beam is going to look like picture "B"; everything will all just shift over 5 1/2". This way we won't lose a foot of interior floor space and wall space.  The ledge that is cantilevered out over the ground will just have to be fortified with extra re-bar.

Re-digging would probably cause more problems and this fix will be fairly simple. (fingers crossed)

We Have Activity!

Finally!!  It has only been a month since we signed the contract, but since we also wrote a check, it made it seem like 7 years.  Anyway, I feel like I can blog again.  I was beginning to get a little depressed, not sleeping, not thinking to clearly.  (No I have not been drinking)   
                                                            Not much to look at yet, if you click on the picture you might be able to see the string line.  It was very interesting to watch Tommy set the perimeter. I have never seen it done like that before.  Click here to to see an explanation of how he did it. 

It just does my heart good to see some equipment in the yard.  I actually slept last night.  That was the first time in almost a month that I slept past 3:00.

The Saw

Ahh...that new saw smell.  Nothing like it.  Thank you Lowe's  

I bought this  Hitachi 12" dual-bevel sliding miter saw yesterday. Just stopped by Lowe's to check on it, and low and behold it was on sale.   That was good. But, they only had the display model left.  That was bad, because, the sales guy didn't want to sell it.   After insisting that he please ask his manager;  I was victorious. (a little over the top but, none the less how I felt) So, for a total of $90 off the retail price of the saw I felt like I could afford to splurge on a great rolling saw table.

My dad has had his Hitachi saw for several years and it has been good so I feel like I have made a good purchase.  I will keep you posted on it's performance.

First Photo of House

Build Site (pink flag center right)

Here is where the story begins...  almost.  The story actually began about 5 years ago when we moved to this place.  It is beautiful here but our house is really a garage that was meant to live in only temporarily while a house was being built. So here we are with a house that is  just an idea.  Partly because we did not now what we wanted or if we were even going to stay here. Partly because funding has been somewhat unpredictable.  Now we are in a position to build, without a mortgage, if we do most of the work ourselves.  So, we've decided to build a metal shell, on the site in the photo above, then finish the inside like a home.   Each little step we take makes me more and more excited.  Like ordering windows and finding somebody to erect the building the way we want it to be done.  It seems that building a metal house on pier and beam is not the norm.

Signing the Contract

Tommy and Rickey

AND HERE WE GO.....the contract is signed and a large check was written.  Our contractor, Tommy, is a very nice man and does not stand on formality (thank goodness) so, a handwritten contract outlining the work to be done is enough.  We all signed and dated it so now comes the trust part.  We trust that Tommy is going to do a good job and he trusts that we are going to keep paying him and not cause undo grief with changes and new ideas.  I will keep you posted with how all that goes.

House Plans

Line Drawing

Here is a simple picture of what our house will look like.  I chose a blue roof because it is different and I like it. I just hope it will look as good as I think it will.

Plan drawn in V-carve

Here is the floor plan that I must have drawn about 15 times.  I think this is going to be very livable for us.  I wanted the kitchen, utility room and our closet to be very close together because it seems like that is were I am always walking back and forth between.