Looking Back on Week 2

 Just like "back east" (as is said here) the climate seems to know the meaning of Labor Day weekend.  It's been immensely cooler and even a bit moist.  This morning 
Jennifer took 
this from her stairmaster:

Not nearly as tired this weekend – even though the physical work was just as hard and there was less opportunity for sleep given our desire to see various of the Dem. Conv. speeches!

As the week ended I still felt a little down about the rate of progress, even as I know that the nature of construction ALWAYS is that things take way longer than you expect them to.
But looking through the pictures and remembering where things were at the end of week 1 is reminding me that a whole lot got done this week. It’s just that a big part of the work accomplished this week was NOT done by us. Rather the basement slab was poured.

Several times during the course of this week Sebastian and I had to move out of the way of Fred – concrete subcontractor– and his workers so that they could finish up placing
the gravel, the vapor barrier, and then the concrete slab.


One good thing about these activities is that they served to entertain our guests – Jennifer’s sister Lydia and her three sons – who understandably found the flinging of sand, gravel & concrete a lot more interesting than the placement of block after block would have been.
Here Willie, Spencer & Teddy concentrate on gravel placement & initial slab smoothing:
 



In honor of the visit, and the end of summer (Oy, please not yet) Jennifer took the week off. She started out by borrowing our neighbor’s “flail” – a tractor attachment – so that she could clear various of our paths of blackberrys, brambles, nettles and poison oak and render them pleasantly passable again. In fact, she cleared a blackberry picking walk that she and the boys took, harvesting enough of our weed fruit for Lydia to make a fabulous crisp. I think that only about ½ of what was picked actually made it back to the house:
 
On Wednesday, because the basement slab was being poured, Sebastian & I worked on placing gutters and a silly little shelter over the doorway of the mobile home, instead of working on the house at all. (The spots of rain we’ve gotten here and there demonstrated that without these we were going to be VERY muddy in the mobile because the roof run off pretty much entered the door and windows directly.)

Here’s what that’s looking like today. It’s not that we didn’t get blocks laid. We did.
Monday and Tuesday were more about getting the hang of it. Thursday and Friday things moved a little more quickly.

And blocks isn't  all of what's goin' on,  either. Sebastian has been good at bending rebar and getting it into place. Most of that is horizontal, and visible in this picture if you look closely. 
Probably harder to make out on the web are the vertical cages at the inside corners
which make threading the corner blocks a bit of a chore.  THey will support a lot of weight when we get up into the 
higher reaches of the house. 

OK.   That's it for me at the end of week 2!  In case anybody is actually reading this, and is intersted in the goal of this experience at the gulag,  on FLickr I posted some pics of a model that I built a while ago.  The topographical setting is yet to be added, but the building model is there.  I think you can go there by clicking this:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/61764597@N00/2792962069/


Remember to send an e mail now and then,  cuz I miss yous.

Looking back on week 1

TIRED. Taking a break SUnday:
First week of actually building was as first weeks are. Bog bog bog. Slow at first is always how it is, and I knew it, but felt disappointed each evening none-the-less.

The helper I’ve found – Sebastian – seems perfect for the job, and was a great help in taking over the task of laying the all important first course of blocks. This turned out to be outside of Fred’s – the concrete subcontractor– skills, so it was unclear whether I needed to find a mason to do this. Instead, Sebastian and I tackled it Mon -Weds.

Tuesday we had delivery of “Clementine.” By Thursday she was lifting and moving whole pallets of blocks and one ton of rebar, in one fell lift. The blue thing on the back is a pretty heavy duty chipper – as we have
some pretty heavy duty brush piles.

I have been wanting Fred to get the slab poured (last thing that he will need to do for me for a while) and each day there seems to be something else in the way.

For example, delivery of the gravel that fills in under the slab– which was kind of interesting.
No more dump trucks and shovels. Now the thing is conveyor belt sprays the gravel all over. Real labor saver. Some woman must have thought of it!

Check it out:  

Then we hit a pretty major overlook on my part – the underslab plumbing needed to be placed, tested and inspected. I have been thinking of a plumber as something I won’t need for a while, but lo and behold there’s the small matter of the house’s drain pipes that run down into the basement floor and out. OOOOps. Fortunately all the rest of the plans are in place, in terms of where the pipes will come down, so after hectic run to town for supplies etc we managed to get the pipes laid into the gravel at the proper inclines.


You glue them all up and cap them off, with one ten foot pipe sticking up. This gets filled with water and then you watch to see whether you have any leaks. If no leaks – building inspector comes.

That’s what we hope happens Monday, so that after some more sub-slab details, the basement slab can finally be poured, perhaps Tuesday.

Maybe tonight I'll post some photos of house model,  to show what the ultimate plan is.  Right now, I need to take the lead from my non-human companions:  

Some ask: What are we looking at?

>On Thursday we had the first of a three day heat wave that I hope is breaking as I write.   It was the first day I needed to move blocks and by my calculation I garden  hauled almost 3000 lbs of them, with the help of my trusty garden cart.  Can't wait for arrival of our tractor!    It was HOT AND DUSTY.  


Here's a little clarification using pictures from the last coupla days progress.  
Hoping  this will make the pictures you've already seen more understandable:  

The "foundation" of our house (this is pretty standard) is an outline of the house poured in concrete called "footings."  These are thicker heavier channels of concrete that lay under the basement slab (floor) .  THey are so that the heavy perimeter walls are sufficiently supported.  THis is the case in many houses you've seen,   just that you generally are looking at it after the concrete slab was poured on.  Here you are seeing these "footings."   

 THe squares inside are the same kind of thing,  but they are to support some steel columns that will come down to support upper construction (to allow some wide openings on the first floor).  Next week the interstices that you see in this picture will be filled with more gravel and then a 3 -4 " slab of concrete will be poured over top,   so that most  of the concrete you see here will be underneath, and invisible.


We are building the house using "insulating concrete forms."   The ones we are using are manufactured very near here and are made from wood chips rather than styrofoam,  like many.  THey are a little heavier, and  sturdier.   If you're really interested,  check out: http://www.faswall.com/product.html They fit together pretty precisely,  with a pattern that requires attention to the orientation of the blocks -- up and down, front to back, etc.  THey have cut outs that create a web of concrete when they are filled  -- with a horizontal as well as vertical elements.   THey create a tight building with breathable walls...  

The (oversimplified) idea basically is that you stack them up to the exact shape and size that you want,  and then fill the cavities inside with rebar and  concrete. Floors hang inside,  roof on top and internal walls all framed conventionally,  within this envelope.   The inside and outside of the blocks can be plastered  or stucco'd or you can attach any of the conventional finishes....    Soon I'll share some pics of a model and maybe plans,  if you're interested.   In the meantime,  above is a pic of a load of blocks.  



Fred-- my concrete guy-- is laying the all important first course of blocks for me,   because it has to be mortared and laid to near perfection so that subsequent courses fall into place square and plumb without a lot of shimming and adjustment.   It's been a little slow getting a rhythm.  I need him to finish up and am having some of the standard frustrations one has with busy construction folks.... Oh well, soon it'll be just me.

First,  all the corners had to be prepared,  placed and cemented into place.  (Placement of  just the corners such that they will be square, level, and in the right place  is a little tricky,  but I think we got pretty close.    That stage looks like this.  


THen the blocks in between get put into place.  That looks more like this (Sorry.... not a very good image but stick with me.)   

On Friday I stacked a second course just to assess whether the work was sufficiently exact,  and what I got was this:  

In actuality the procedure for stacking the courses is different - with the all important corners requiring attention first- so this was just an experiment,  but it gives you a pretty good sense of what is to come.  

Tomorrow  (Monday the 18th of August)  I have a helper coming.  If things work out,  I'll hope to have him here through as much of the construction as possible.  Keep your fingers crossed for me,  and keep some e mails or comments coming.  Don't have to be about building,  just say hi, will ya!  xxB

Tuesday Aug 12: Footings poured

 





On Tuesday the footings for our building were poured, at last.

Footings are part of the foundation.  THey are the concrete pads that will accept the walls of the building.  Once they are all set,  a slab gets poured above and inbetween -- which will be the floor of the basement.   Before the concrete arrived,  things looked like a web of lumber with rebar placed inside, as required to reinforce the building.

Here are a couple of shots of what the thing has been looking like,  before this final phase.  


Because our rd/driveway is so steep in places,  the cement trucks could not be loaded very high, because the cement can simply pour out the back of that spinning cylinder that you've seen on the highway.   Thus it took three trucks.  


THey are big and heavy and little scarey
when they pull in here,  but all was well under control.

Fred,  the guy I've hired to handle the concrete -- including to help me when it comes time to do "the pour" of the walls (more later) is really a terrific person to have found.   Apart from that he's  great at what we  hired him to do,  he seems to know absolutely everything about the flora and fauna around here. 

ANyhow,  at the end of the day yesterday things looked more like this:  

Next week I'll be on my own here -- with the helper that I arranged for yesterday, so we'll see how we can move this baby up after that!   
If none of you come and visit, guess who'll be the only one enjoying our makeshift terrace: 

 Will keep you posted,  so check in and be heard from.

Up to today

OK.  This post follows the one from a few days ago,  and should bring this up to today, so that future posts can be short and sweet.  If you want a chronology,  read the post prior to this, then this, and you've got what's here, in terms of history!  


Shortly after we were FINALLY able to close on the land (having won permission to build a house on it)  we decided to put in a vegetable garden -- despite not yet having running water -- as a kind of exercise in making our claim.  An effort it was....

But it served the desired purpose....   
Later,  when the dryness of our summers here set in, we had to do some creative thinking about how to get up here with enough water to keep everybody alive... if not happy.
 The driveway up to here at this point was just in its initial stages of being cleared,  so getting that little contraption up the rd filled with water
was more of an issue than you might think.  

Just to give you sense,  here's a "then" of the dogwood that ends our driveway:  

This is a slightly more recent view of the same area : 

 I won't bore you with all the details of getting the driveway and electricity and water and septic field in.  Suffice it to say there's a fair amount of work in getting all those systems set up.   Once we did get settled here, the next priority was  keeping the house building moving.  So, we got to work on digging the foundation hole right where we want it:   
 Again,  it's all a lot more work than a few photos make it look like...  In any case,  this too is accomplished now:

 


  And you can stand inside what will be  our basement in the future.

But I'm getting a little ahead of myself.  I did want to tell about the first week or two of living here in our mobile.  They were downright funny.  In preparation for the hard work to come, and despite having sworn years ago that I would never move myself again,  (but that was in the days of moving from one 5th floor walkup to another...) J and I moved ourselves with a big truck and our own two hands.  It was two weekends of pretty much hell,  but we got through it in good humor and spirits.   What followed were some of the most interesting trashy weeks of my life,  with our stuff scattered about the place,  and bulldozers and tree chomping machines showing up early in themorning to work on the site.  I particularly like this photo,  which happened at about 6:30 one morning.  J on her stairmaster,  outside the mobile home,  interrupted by our need to decide which trees the excavator should take down....  Moving trash still not taken away to the dump.... what a sight: 
Notice some of the marvelous cabinetry strewn about -- it's stuff I removed from the mobile.... lovely!

Within about another week we had rented a "pod" which will serve as storage and tool shed for some time,  and I have put up a little patio of paving stones, so that we can enjoy our temporary spot.  Here's a shot of that in progress (see the start of a little terrace in front of mobile home!):
 So the next step, and final one that I will document on this post,  was the arrival of the building blocks that I will use for the house's entire shell.  Getting them up the road was a job for the same driver that brought the mobile home,  and when they arrived and were perched there on the side of the foundation hole,  it was a bit of a stomach chruner for me:   In fact, next thing it was my job to get them off this truck (2 loads 30 pallets each) and stacked up as I need them around the site,  using a "rough terrain forklift" that we rented and I learned to operate,   lets just say, on the job: 
 Again,  it seems simple enough,  but given that there is not one spit of level ground on this site that we love so much,  it's actually a challenge that requires use of all the nifty things that a machine like this can do.  And some concentration, too:   I am always happy when learning a new skill    and this was no exception.
As of today, (Monday the 11th of August) we await an inspection needed before we can pour the footings, hopefully tomorrow.   Shortly after that my work will change to that of laborer -- and I'll be laying those blocks and seeing whether I can beat the rains, at least to a first floor. 

In February,  before it was clear we would ever own this spot,  we moved some "furniture"up  and had a ceremonial first seated meal:


Today,  we've made a funky temporary home that most of you would find comfortable and entertaining, if not charming:   We have a guestroom with double bed and half bath of its own.  We've had two visits already!
So get over here and check it out.  We love visits.  If you can't come in person, come to this site and share your moral support!


More - but much shorter-- soon!  xxxB

Getting started.

OK friends. We have been promising a blog and managing only minimal picture posts on our Flickr page: http://www.flickr.com/photos/61764597@N00/sets/72157605008928950/

This will not repeat all of those early images, and I'm really not sure if I'll be able to keep both things up, but I am trying, after many false starts, to "blog" the construction of the house on the land we call Spyhop. A first false start on this blog was on another site that I found very difficult to navigate. http://bdohrn.blog.noodle5.com/about/

At that link there is a silly little piece, written mostly when we returned from Mexico to get the news that we had finally succeeded in getting permission to build on this land. Check it out if you want to read a little about the whale watch trip to Mexico. Idea was to artfully link to why we gave this land the name "Spyhop," but it didn't happen to come together because like everyone today, I have a limited attention span, I guess.

In any case, I'm going to use some words and a lot of pictures and hope that it will be interesting enough so that some of you will look and give us some moral support through what is about to be a very demanding project....

Like I said, there are more earlier pics on Flickr.

After over a year of hiking up ( about 400 ft of vertical climb from the start of our driveway) – a good workout) to our preferred building spot, almost immediately after we were able to close on the land we started working on clearing a driveway and getting a better sense of the building site, in high hopes of being able to build this summer.

We had a visit from Susan Allee, and some perfect whether to go with it!
As many of you know, I had been working on a set of plans for a house on this site, hoping all along that it would amount to more than an exercise, but protesting that it would have been a great learning experience, if indeed it DID become only an exercise. So once the land came through, it was time to get an engineer into those plans, so that they could be submitted for a building permit. Permit application day was pretty exciting.




We also enlist ed help from Lydia Marshall & Robert Drucker -- primo architects and cousins of Jennifer's, to evaluate our plans, and particularly how to place the house on our site.



In the meantime, while all that was going on, we were also "house shopping" for something we could live in on the land. Originally we were thinking we'd build something that would eventually serve as my shop, but in the short term might work as a kind of studio apt for us. But as things developed it became clear that while we had good vision for where the house should go, our confidence on how another building should be sited fell apart . I n addition, it just seemed like too much to have to build a prelim. building before getting started on the house.... so it came to be that we purchased a 1975 "Homette." I kid you not!



Getting it up the driveway and ultimately to our spot on the hill was adventurous, to say the least. But we made it.















So, there's more to show and tell, including the tale of learning to operate the forklift, but that'll have to wait until tomorrow. This is the start. From here, it'll be short and pictureful, and I'm hoping some of you will write back now and again. Maybe you can do this through the blog, but you know, there's the old fashioned e mail thing too =; -)


For now I'll leave you with the view from the window in this funky mobile home study!