Flatwork

The ground is prepped and ready to have forms set and cement poured. We decided it was time to get it done as the carpenter should be here to start the porch work next week. The mason spent a majority of the afternoon taking out this cement and prepping the area by removing debris.


Tomorrow morning they will put up the forms so a sidewalk goes from the front sidewalk, around the side of the stairs and porch, and down the side of the house to the back stairs of the deck. The majority of this sidewalk is going to be in the dogs run, but it will be a necessary walkway for the functionality of the lot. They will be pouring the cement tomorrow afternoon. I hope I am around so I get the chance to watch them work this out. It takes talent to lay cement quickly and efficiently. I was not there when they poured the floor in the basement (still bummed about that) so this will pacify my need to get a closer look at the process.

I have learned of a new universal concept of contractors - leaving refuse on the job site with reckless abandon. I am not saying I am frustrated with it, because I know its legit, but its unreal how quick things pile up. I am going to spend a good amount of time working on cleaning up the property this weekend. With the long weekend and nobody working on the interior, it should give me three solid days to get things cleaned up. I am going to focus on getting all of the big stuff up so when we are done with the mechanical in two weeks we can get a good solid professional cleaning for the inspection and then the spray foam insulation. It shouldn't be too bad to get this cleaned up, and will be a great chance to go over the location of things one more time before we make them permanent by closing the walls.

Ed The GC, Eddie the Electrician and myself walked the house today going over the electrical layout. WOW. Talk about a ton of process thinking and focusing on how you will actually use space to make sure all of the switches and outlets are in the right place. Its quite challenging to thinking about habits and patterns that will occur in the new house. I am pretty excited to see this come to fruition as I think we corrected a lot of the layout needed tweaking. This is going to be a lot of work getting through it, but in the end we are going to have a lighting scheme that makes a lot of sense and is simple and straightforward.

Two weeks. We should be talking about insulation in two weeks. We will be putting in decks next week. There is a good chance that siding will start mid to late week as well. The house should be closed and sealed by the end of the month. I have a pretty good idea about where we are going to be in a month and its going to be interesting to see if it all works out the way I think.