Fair Warning

Monday and Tuesday were relatively quiet days for a change. Two big loads of framing wood arrived, but no work was done. After the walkway incident, it was good to have a bit of a break. Wednesday the framing crew was out in force and our Architect was there to give them the big idea. We met with him briefly. After a few questions we learned that they planned to tear down the kitchen wall two days later and with some prodding, made our Architect realize (and confirm our suspicions) we needed to pack up everything on that wall. One wonders what would have happened Friday morning if we hadn’t had that conversation, because no one seems to consider that there’s a living kitchen on the other side of that wall.

Since Colleen and I have volleyball Wednesday nights, that left one night to clear out half our cabinets and move enough furniture to put the fridge on the other side of the room. Colleen and I didn’t exactly demand that they give us another day, but we made it pretty clear that one night was not really enough time and we would appreciate it if they could delay for a day or two. Fortunately, the next morning I talked to our Architect again and he said they had come up with a few more things they could do to stall the wall removal and give us one last weekend without a hole in our house. Whew . . .


Colleen and I did actually get a lot done last night, but we were very happy we didn’t have to finish completely. As of this morning at 9am, the wall was just barely there. The siding and outside layer of plywood was off and Tyvec was up to keep out the weather. It’s very weird to be able to see daylight seeping through your electrical sockets.

Floored

It got a little lost in the drama with the walkway, but the concrete slab was also poured on Thursday. Getting all concrete form supports out and making this big flat space makes the room look much bigger. I’m excited.

It's My (walk)Way, or the Highway

There was another run in with the concrete guy this morning (the previous one almost costing us a tree) concerning the walk way. I’ll try to keep this brief, but some quick background is necessary. The original plans had a walkway that was quickly sketched in by the architect more or less as a placeholder. The problem with that plan was that the walkway went directly through the azalea bushes. A few days ago, the PM asked what we wanted the walkway to look like. I drew it on a digital copy of the plans and sent it to him. He then spray painted it on the grass and he, the concrete guy, and I, all had a talk about it.

Last night I got home at 11:30pm to find that the forms for the concrete had not been laid as per my instructions, or the way of the original plans, but in a kind of weird pattern that made the whole thing look like it was leaning slowly to the right. I have deduced that the head concrete guy left, his assistant decided that he didn’t want to dig out the extra dirt that would have been required to actually run a straight line, and so we got this weird hybrid thing. So I got up at 6:30 this morning to have a little chat with the concrete guy. He was very irritated when I told him it was not satisfactory because the concrete truck was due at 7:00 am. He proceeded to say that Colleen’s dad had approved the new lay out and as such, we would be held responsible for any costs incurred due to the delay. I compared that excuse to a certain animal’s fecal matter. He quickly switched to another excuse and then another. Eventually I told him that if it was going to cost someone more money, he needed to call the PM and talk about who was going to pay.

After a short phone call with the PM, the concrete guy immediately said, “I have an idea.” This was progress. His idea actually required more work than my original plan. I tried to explain several times what I wanted it to look like only to have him suggest something else. Later I realized that most of the problem with fixing it was that all of their tools for laying out forms were back at the shop, so they could only use what they could scavenge from the original formation.

In the end, they were able to create something similar to, but not exactly like what I wanted. It only took them about 20 minutes to make the changes (about as long as I argued with them about it), and it was all done before the concrete truck was ready to pour (largely because it took the driver 20 minutes to successfully back into the driveway.) The walkway is also a little lighter gray than Colleen and I were hoping for, but we’re satisfied with it. On the up side, the stone pattern is really neat looking (pictured below), and I’m glad I got up at 6:30 to fight for my sidewalk.

One Down . . . er, Up

We have a wall! We're hoping there will be more, and perhaps a roof at some point, but we'll start with a wall. The excavation/concrete team was out on Monday adding additional rebar to the footer to form what would ultimately become both the retaining wall and the rear wall of the addition. They later put up the "forms" (big metal sheets) into which they could pour the concrete to make said wall.

It was around Tuesday that I noticed that they were putting up forms around both the left and right wall in addition to the rear wall. After some questionting, it turns out that we are going to have some pretty serious portions of our side walls be concrete. I don't really know if that's any better or worse than 2x6's and insulation. If anyone does know, feel free to comment.

Some additional excitement came early Wednesday morning when we awoke to them uprooting a tree in the yard. I won't go into detail, but let's just say that Colleen's mom 'had a bad experience' during the original addition with certain plants being bulldozed so now she's particularly on edge about that sort of thing. Apparently they were not willing to pay the extra $800 for the concrete pump to get the concrete high enough to pour into the forms and so they were going to blaze a trail into the backyard for the truck. Fortunately, Colleen's dad was able to talk with the excavator and they mutually agreed on a path that would spare one of the more favorite trees. Crisis averted.

Once that was all figured out, they poured the concrete and all was well. Our new wall is currently drying out (it's such a wonderful, quiet activity at 7am). Rumor has it we'll have a floor on Monday or Tuesday.

The joys of washing dishes

You know it's been a tough week when you're excited about washing the dishes. The plumbers were out yesterday morning to permanently fix the broken pipe, restoring water to the entire house. We're still getting some startling pops and sprays from the faucets as the air works its way back out of the pipes, but we're very happy to have life back to normal.

Moving forward, our project manager asked us to choose our new walkway pattern and color this morning, so Bruce and I put our heads together over IM and both liked this the best (if only all decisions were so easy!):

Paula Abdul & Peter Griffin

After two days of construction on the addition, I've learned that there are good days, and bad days, and days where you just fight to keep your head above water. Its those latter kind of days that remind me of the wisdom of Peter Griffin and Paula Abdul: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33Xnosq1ei4&feature=related

As you may recall from yesterday, our place was without water for the night, but Colleen's parents did have water. Today, the plumber came out (step forward) and said he'd have to break through the footer they just laid yesterday to fix the broken pipe (step back) and then he left without actually doing any work (step back). The county tax assessor also came out. He said that he could lower our tax assessment (see previous entry: Money II) (step forward). Later in the day, the cap on the broken pipe ceased to hold (step back) which was then later recapped (step forward). So we pretty much ended the day the same place we started, only with slightly lower taxes and the looming problem of having to jackhammer open and the repour part of the footer.

Good luck getting Paula and Peter out of your head.

Construction Day 1

This morning Colleen and I were awoken to the sound of silt fence being hammered in. Before we had even rubbed the sleep from our eyes, the earth movers were already doing their thing (i.e. moving earth). The previous blog had a couple of quick shots of what had been done by 8:30am.

They did hit some snags as the day wore on. Not long before we headed to work, we heard someone say "We've already got a problem." The power line runs into the house in a place that needed to be covered by new construction. This had already been discussed two weeks ago when we had everyone out at the house for meeting. We were a little annoyed THEN that this was a surprise to our both our architect and project manager, who have been to the house many times over the course of the process. Apparently this discovery was not taken by anyone to be an action item when there were two weeks to remedy the problem, and they were forced to get an electrician out to the house on the fly to reroute the lines in order to continue.

In the meantime, the water line running into our side of the house was found to be far closer to the surface than expected, not made of copper which would show up on a metal detector, and hiding inside a corrugated plastic drainpipe. This was of course discovered when a shovel was driven into what appeared to be an innocent drainpipe and water began pouring out of it. The water had to be shut off to the entire property until they could get the pipe capped late in the day (try as they might, they couldn't get ahold of their plumber to fix it immediately). Colleen's parents' side now has water, but the goal of the addition was to be at plus one bathroom, and for tonight we are at minus two. This is supposed to get fixed tomorrow, but we've been given no promises.

Despite the problems they managed to get a huge hole dug in the backyard and poured all the footers. Not bad for day 1.

Here you can see the rebar being laid in prep for the footers. That guy is kinda short, but the hole is still impressively deep.

If you look closely in this picture you can see that the concrete truck at the house across the street at the same time as the concrete truck in our yard. Two loads of concrete have gone in so far!

Here is the finished product for Day 1. If you look closely, you can see the rebar along the back wall where the retaining wall will go.

They're heeeeeere. . .

Views from our windows this morning. More pictures to come after work today.

(FYI: Komcast never called me back).

If at first you succeed. . .

. . . try, try again.

Given our two week deadline from the excavator, we've been trying to take care of a few loose ends so the digging will cause as little disruption to our life as possible. To that end, I called our cable provider about a week and a half ago. [I don't want to mention their name, so for the purpose of this blog, I'll just call them Komcast.] Komcast gave us a pretty quick appointment (only two business days later), but a 'window' of 8am to 8pm. Fortunately, Colleen's dad is on his summer schedule so he was able to hang out until 4:30 when they showed up. The original intent was for Komcast to run a cable from a different pole in a different corner of the yard so as not to cross directly underneath the future addtion. When they came out, they said that wasn't possible and instead ran a very long trail all the way around the yard so they could avoid the digging area. They guy didn't bother to bury the cable saying that it would be fine to drive over and when the construction was done Komcast could come back out and run it into the addtion. Cool deal, good experience, all is well, check that off the to-do list.

Four days later while no one was home (makes you wonder why they give you a window at all), they came back out and buried the new line, but not where it was laid. They burried it directly over the old line. For those of you keeping score at home, that's two lines in the wrong place, zero lines in the right place: Komcastic! I called them back immediately and was promised a prompt return phone call. I'll let you know how that goes.



In a completely unrelated story, here is a picture of my grill. I spent two hours cleaning it today and wanted to make sure someone got to admire it.

Missed Utility

Apparently the lines that I thought were from Miss Utility a few weeks ago were actually our architect laying out where the silt fence should go. That does answer a lot of unexplained questions about the lines that were there. So, again, I present the picture of the lines (this time with cute little flags).