5-30-08 Framing

Today is Saturday, and none of the crews are working. Here's a look at what they got done yesterday. This is the front porch loking west. The sheathing is all on for the bottom floor and all the columns are in.

This shows the header for the columns. I was surprised that it was that big, but I guess it has to be to support the roof

Again looking west, this time into one of the living room windows. This is actually the living room and the dining room combined. There's a header on the right in the picture that outlines the space that will lead into the kitchen. There won't be a door there, just a big opening.

Now on the west side of the house looking east. The columns and the huge header over them make it look like a Spanish hacienda. While I was there this morning I set up a sprinkler to water the big oak tree that I'm trying to save. The tree guy advised me to do this to keep it from being too stressed out if the weather was dry. We had a big rain last weekend, but nothing since.

More framing

I spoke to the nice lady who lives next door to the Avery Street house today about a piano related issue, and she asked me, "Have you seen your house lately?" Well, DUH! Here are today's pictures. I just got back from there and Matt and I were walking through the rooms downstairs. I don't know if he really recognized the place, but he traipsed right up the steps (after I took a picture of him on them) like he knew where he was going. The area where the house is going up is so completely different from what he knew that I'm sure he didn't realize that that's where he grew up.

Anyway, today was more framing on the downstairs, starting on the wall underlayment (don't know if that's a word), and installation of the columns. There are 16 of those. The ceilings downstairs will be 10 feet, and I love how high they look. the builder talked us out of putting a transom window above each of the regular windows, but I wish now I had insisted. He said it would be unnessary and a big added expense so I gave in, but I would have loved that extra light and the way it would have looked. Oh well...













The east wall. The kitchen door is the last opening. Two windows open into the dining room.






The west porch columns going up.



One window. Ceilings are 10'.




This magnolia tree is growing over the treehouse area. The blooms always make me feel really southern and they always remind me of the Lansing family in Raleigh.







These ferns are "garden escapes" from a pot of fern I had growing near the old fountain. this is looking down from the house site to the bottom of the stairs, and the ferns are covering that hill. The stobs you can just barely see are from the azalea "trees" that I cut back just a few weeks ago.

Beginning the framing

This was the scene this morning at about 10:30 am when I got by to look at the house. It's really hard to believe that just yesterday morning I was watching them pour wet concrete into the frames. In this shot the outline of the house is done and all the rooms are also outlined with wood that is anchored to the concrete.










Then tonight I went by again, and lo and behold here's what you can see
from the bottom of the stairs (and the street).

And here's a picture taken from up in the tree house. I didn't have much time because I was coming from a graduation party for a friend of ours and had to get to choir practice, but I took just a few minutes to walk through the "rooms". It was fun, and exciting, and looking at plans on a piece of paper sure can be different from what happens in the real world. For one, I thought our closets would be huge because of the way they looked on the drawings, but after seeing them in real life they look really small. I hope that's just a perception thing because I was looking forward to more closet space. The laundry room also looks very small

Pouring the slab

Today they poured the slab for the house and the porch, and it was an incredible sight. All of the concrete was pumped in by an enormous overhead boom pump. The boom went from the road all the way over the garage and the big cherry tree that's beside it. One man was up at the site operating the boom with a wireless remote control while the concrete workers moved it about to place the wet concrete where they wanted it.

I've just come from there (it's now 6:00 pm) and I was walking around on the solid slab -- didn't even have time to run Matt down there to put his paw print into it! Tomorrow they will start framing, and we will finally be able to see what's happening from the street level. Up until this point you could tell that something was going on, but from the street you could not see what it was.

Here are the pictures.

The Tree House

Here are two shots of the tree house. This is also the tree that we're trying to protect on the west side of the property. This tree house was there when I bought the house years ago. It's a kind of strange structure and not really useful at all except that now it offers me a platform to use for taking pictures of the house.

The edge of the house will be 12 feet from the tree. I'm trying to get the contractor to help protect this tree by keeping vehicles off of the root area which reaches out at least as far as the canopy of branches. Obviously, from the size of this "protective tape" that he put around the base of the tree he doesn't understand that.

And here's one just for fun that has nothing to do with the new house.

Joe made bread and butter pickles this afternoon, and here's a picture of us with the spoils. I helped just a little, but it was mostly his project.

Rebar and reinforcements ready for pour

Here's today's picture from up in the treehouse. I guess I need to take a picture OF the treehouse so you'll know or remember what I'm writing about. This is just about ready to have the slab poured. the plumbing is all in, and reinforcements are there. All of this has to be inspected, and the pour will occur on Tuesday.

This is taken from the top of the stairway leading up from the garage looking straight across what will be the front porch. The big tree on the other side is the one we're trying so hard to keep the contractors from killing. You can see part of the treehouse just in front of it. I'll get a better picture later.

Foundation and plumbing

This is the driveway up to the house site on top of the hill. The red dirt is the actual driveway, the lighter stuff is the sand that's going into the foundation.



Here's the foundation with the sand inside (Matt's doghouse in the background). Plumbing is going in under the sand.





A picture from up in the tree.













One of the plumbers working in the sand.

Excavation work

The trenching work for the foundatin.
Just a couple of the bottles that have been unearthed. Joe plans to run them through the dishwasher and display them as artifacts (although they're probably just Worchestershire Sauce and pepper bottles).

A view of the trenching work from up in the treehouse. I like this picture and this view, so I'll try to continue getting them from here for a while. The dark earth at the other end of the picture is where the stump grinder did its work to remove the last of the stump from the big tree that crushed the house. He was here today (Sunday, May 11, '08) because the trench up there runs right through where the stump was, and they're trying to get this phase done so we can get it inspected tomorrow. We'll see.