The backfill and excavation is complete around the foundation and things are starting to dry out. We now really get a feeling for the lay of the land walking all the way around the house - without sinking up to our knees in mud!
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The excavator got it’s workout today playing in the mud. You can see from the movie in the gallery that the driver had to use the bucket to help pull himself along through the muck - pretty cool to watch actually - almost like an inchworm. What was once above ground has now been buried and stuffed with gravel. Now we’re starting to get an idea of how the house will look above ground.
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And on the 9th day of April, the workers came and removed the foundation forms and left a great wall…
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The excitement builds (no pun intended) seeing the foundation progress! Since this whole process is new to us, it’s like a science lesson without attending class! The forms seem to click together like lego. It’s hard to imagine that they’ll hold enough cement to support the walls of an entire house!
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We’ve made another breakthrough - finally siding, trim and shingle colors that seem to work together. Another decision we never knew would be so difficult! Anyone who has ever had to chosen the color of an entire house based on a 3 inch sample knows what we’re talking about. We have logged more miles in the car in the past few weeks just trying to track down a Grenadier Green house than we normally log in half a year (ok, well maybe not quite that many)! We (mostly Valerie) just couldn’t choose one of the 16 brown colors without seeing the green first. As suspected, we both decided that the green was just too dark, so we settled on Brownstone - you guessed it - one of the browns.
With the siding color under our belt, we figure that the shingles should be a snap - well… Bill wants his hot tub eventually so he let Valerie choose the shingles she likes - gee thanks Billy! The whole task was really more like a process of elimination - what was left after we discarded what we didn’t like - more browns! GAH! And the final decision - Oakwood.
Technical specs for anyone interested:
Mitten Sentry siding, 4″ horizontal
CertainTeed XT25AR shingles
Who would ever have guessed that choosing a tub would turn into weeks of toturous indecision? One would think that tub vendors would realize that tubs are a hard thing to sit in when they are mounted perpendicular to the floor 20 feet above ground. The other thing that one would expect a vendor to realize is that by the time you have decided what model to order, what length and width it needs to be, whether to include water jets or air jets… you’ve forgotten all about what color you wanted to order - gah! White was not what we wanted - but it is what has been ordered - I wonder if it’s too late to change that to bone…
More about Bain Ultra and their thermo massage tubs…
It’s so funny. All along we have had this debate about how large this house should be. Valerie has maintained that it should be at least 4000 square feet of finished space. Bill has contended that, “THAT’S JUST HUGE!!!” Tonight, we drive up to the lot at sunset to find that the footings for the foundation have been poured - yes, very exciting! But it was hillarious… Bill kept saying, “it seems so small!” It’s funny how nearly 4000 square feet of space looks so tiny when you’re just looking at the foundation.
As I sit here writing, we’re still arguing about how the basement will take shape. Bill’s main concern is that his kite workshop seems to be filled in with dirt at the moment - and heaven knows, that just WON’T do! We’re both excited to see what the next few days will bring. We’re confident that the whole process will make more sense as we see it progress…
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Today we got a chance to get some aerial photos of our new lot and the surrounding area. My friend Scott and I took these pictures with my kite aerial photography remote control rig and Scott’s kite. I plan on taking photos throughout the building process…
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–Bill
Awakened by…. chainsaws???? Could they be at our lot? Noooooo…. oh yes!
Amazing! We stopped by the lot on the way to work only to find wide open space where the septic will go and where the house will stand! Man, this crew does not waste any time. Apparently they were here yesterday afternoon getting started on the job while the ink was still drying on the contract! How exciting! We have a real feeling now where the driveway will go and where the septic is stuated. It seems impossible that the space they have cleared for the house will soon be full of cement, timbers, windows, doors and a roof!
Today, Wednesday, March 23, 2005 we have finally signed the contract with the development company to build our new home! The experience left us with many simultaneous emotions - excited, nervous, scared, anxious - and definitely tired!
