Category: RIVER HOUSE (Page 7 of 16)

Daphne is working on a landscaping plan for the house. One of the big questions is whether we should have any lawn area for entertaining. At our current house, we have a front lawn that is large enough to host a 20 person brunch. It would be nice to be able to do that at the new house as well.

To answer this question, we tried to figure out how large a sit down brunch we could host only using the deck and not having any lawn. The exercise started by drawing out the layout of the deck and then trying to fit in chairs and food tables.

The deck is 677 square feet. Some of that will be covered by a breezeway, but we can put the food tables under the breezeway. Here is a diagram of the deck with a possible layout of chairs. Dots are 1 foot apart.

The answer is we can fit around 24 chairs plus food tables. But more importantly, this means that we do not need a large lawn area to hold parties.

The Concord Natural Resources Commission does not allow “turf lawns” in the protected zones under their jurisdiction. We could probably get away with a small lawn in the same place where there was a lawn before construction started, but we are not going to bother. We may still put some grassy areas on the front (road) side of the house but that area is outside the 100′ buffer zone, so it is not subject to the restrictions that apply to the protected zones.

By the way, I may have been a little pessimistic in the labeling of the diagram. The view to the Northeast is better than just an OK view and probably should be considered to be a “Nice View”. And the view to the east overlooking the river could be classified as a “Great View” (better than just nice). I marked where the heat exchangers are located since they may make noise when running, but we do not know yet.

Its the weekend and normally we would be out pulling more invasives. But the air quality is very bad because of Canadian wildfires. So no outdoor activities for a while.

We did make a quick visit to the house, however, to check on the progress. At this point, all the windows have been installed except for the south side of the game room. Here is a view of the back (river) side of the house with all the windows in place. (The french door onto the porch is still on order, and no screens have been installed on the porch.)

Work also continues on the garage. At this point they have back filled the foundation and soon they will pour the slab and frame the garage itself. The main garage footprint is exactly the same as before the demolition. However, we added a “shed”, which will be a step up from the garage and from the deck and will be used to store outdoor tables and chairs and/or our trash barrels and/or a bicycle or two.

I actually have a decent, brief construction video of the garage foundation being filled.

Here is a recent view of the river from ground level, if you have forgotten what it looks like.

When we got to the house this morning, we discovered that it now had a door and that door was locked. There was a lock box, but I did not know the code.

We first searched the construction trailer for clues, but no luck. But then I turned on my phone (it is usually on airplane mode) so I could send a text to the builder, only to discover that he did send a text to me the day before. So now I can access my house.

No new interior pictures this weekend. Nothing has really changed. We did, however, get a chance to inspect the proposed luxury vinyl tile (LVT) flooring that we have selected. The flooring looks very nice and matches the hardwood that will be in the bedroom wing and upstairs. The LVT, however, has a more textured surface than a smooth finished hardwood. This will make it much less slippery (especially for a dog should we get one), but it will make it trap dirt easier.

Next week’s site meeting is on Monday instead of Wednesday, because on Wednesday Daphne and the architect will go look at cabinets.

Meanwhile, Daphne is doing landscape design. I will probably write a story page about that process.

Here is a picture of the house. You can now see that we have windows on both floors on the side and front, except for the second floor front bedroom. They are leaving that window until last because that’s how they get supplies onto the second floor.

The windows on the first floor are recent. Here is the east wall of the living room.

And here is the dining room plus the kitchen windows.

There was a snag in ordering. The two french doors (one for the deck and one for the porch) will take 5-6 more weeks to arrive. Until then, they will block the deck french door opening with plywood to avoid rain getting in.

Pretty soon now, the builder will install temporary doors with locks. Yes, we will start locking the house next month so we can start to store tools and things inside. For the actual doors, the pantry door should show up in approximately 5 weeks. I am not sure about the front door.

Meanwhile, the garage foundation is now insulated. Later this week they will back fill the outside and fill up the interior with dirt.

The surveyor came this morning to double check placements. The garage placement is fine. However, the roof over the front stoop is so close to the setback line that the gutter may extend over the line. We are going to talk to the building inspector about this.

We also had a visit from the consultant who handles the lightning rods. He looked over the house and will make recommendations soon. It turns out that there was a recent barn fire caused by lightning which has resulted in a large increase in demand for the lightning rod consultant.

Soon they will run the radon exhaust tube into the attic. Normally they would run it out through the roof, but we would like to avoid another hole in the roof if it is not necessary, so we will leave the tube in the attic and measure the radon levels later in the build process. We do not expect any radon problems.

In other news, we have decided to expand the utility room in the basement to fit all the planned equipment. The walls have not been placed yet, since the basement slab has not been poured yet, but we have changed the plans. You can see the new dimensions of the utility room in this picture. The stairs make the the image confusing. The stairs do not go into the utility room; they come from above the utility room and terminate next to the utility room.

Unfortunately, this change counts — Days since we moved a wall: 1.

So, what is coming up? Well, here is an approximate list.

• The window installation will finish up this week.
• The garage will be back filled this week.
• The garage stab will be poured next week, followed by framing.
• Next week they start installing attic insulation.
• The basement slab will be poured in another month, after that they can install the stairs from the first floor into the basement.

August will be a busy month. We will start interior installation of heating ducts, plumbing, electrical wiring and internet cables. It turns out that they can all work at the same time, so it will get busy inside the house.

They have done the initial installation of around one-half of the windows. Here is view from my usual angle where you can see six windows already in place, although they are not sealed yet.

Here is a picture of the family room with one of the casement windows opened. In the family room, 4 out of 5 of these panes will open.

I have two construction videos for you this week. The first one shows them pouring the garage foundation.

The second construction video shows some of the window installation from the front of the house.

I did not take a picture of the garage foundation without the forms. Maybe on another site visit.

I did a quick visit to the site today and noticed that the beautiful view of the river was a little clouded this afternoon. Can you tell why?

For this week and next, they will be installing the windows. The windows currently have protective film on them which degrades the view a little. This is the East wall of the guest room.

There is a structural engineer that is used by the architect to design the supports and make sure that the house will not fall down. Once the house is framed, the structural engineer comes by to inspect the work to make sure that it matches his design and code. In our case, he will come by twice, once to inspect the roof, which needs to be done before roof insulation is added (which happens real soon now), and once to inspect the rest of the house (I think after the basement slab is poured).

Today was the roof inspection. Good news, we passed. Here is the relevant section of his letter.

I just got back from spending over 4 hours on a walkthrough. During this session, we reviewed the locations of all the lights, light switches, exterior cameras and Ethernet switches. We also indicated everywhere that the builders needs to add blocking to the walls to allow us to mount towel bars, floating shelves, mirrors, and anything heavy that needs to be attached to one or another wall. It was a long session, but we got through everything.

Here is a picture I took from the blocking discussion in the kitchen. Aside from seeing Daphne, the architect and the head of the carpenter crew, do you see anything else interesting?

If you need a hint, its WINDOWS. Yes, all the windows have gotten delivered and the crew has started the two week long process of installing them. Every room in the house now has windows (and french doors) leaving against their walls waiting to be installed. Right now they are preparing the frame around each window. Future updates should include pictures of the mounted windows.

Speaking of updates, here is the garage foundation. Last week they poured the base and just today (while we were there), they poured the foundation walls. There is no basement or crawlspace under the garage. These walls will go up about a foot above ground level and the interior will be filled with gravel on which they will pour the garage floor.

During the walkthrough, the architect found another framing mistake, can you see it in the picture below?

Its turns out that this corner in the center of the picture should be concave instead of convex, so we ended up shrinking the bedroom and expanding the hall closet. This image from the plan shows where the wall was supposed to go, and the mistake is in red. Oh well, this should be easy to fix.

Today we met with the A/V guy who is handling the internet, cameras, sound system, doorbells and TV setup. We ended up repositioning two of the exterior cameras and adding a third, which will face the backyard and the river (for wildlife viewing). We also added a third doorbell chime for better coverage.

We also met with the electrician (who was part of the walkthrough) and the HVAC installer. The HVAC installer was doing his first visit to the house and will start to order the equipment. The next steps for the interior are a structural inspection, then attic insulation. Then the duct work can start. This is followed by the plumbing and then the electrical work, and finally the security wiring (e.g. smoke detectors).

The garage will be framed in two weeks. Then the house will be sided. I think the builder is holding off siding the house so he can side the garage at the same time. By the end of the summer, most of the work should move inside (until next year).

First the news. Daphne and I went paddleboarding on the Sudbury River. I was able to remain standing the whole trip. Daphne switched to kayak mode for a stretch and when she switched back, she fell into the river (she was able to climb back on – nothing damaged except her pride). It was approximately 2.5 miles round trip and it took us around 90 minutes. It was somewhat windy so we paddled into the wind at the start, which took us to Fairhaven Bay, where we saw an eagle and an eagle nest, although not together.

Meanwhile, visiting the site allowed me to fetch the construction camera recording from Saturday’s roofing work. The roofing of the main house is now finished. Here is the video.

This Saturday we sent to the site in the early morning to do our weekly pulling of invasives. To our surprise, we found a crew working on putting shingles on the roof. It looks like they started on Friday and will finish today. Here is a picture showing the roofing in progress.

On Wednesday they poured the foundation for the garage. The will add the garage basement walls this coming week. There is not really a basement under the garage, at least no space that will be accessible. I guess I will see what it looks like next week. Anyway, here is what it looks like now.

Inside the house, I noticed that they have finally placed the last interior wall. Specifically, the slanted wall between the master bathroom and the game room. Here is a picture from the porch. A few things to notice – they have a sunken area in the floor for the master shower (just behind the new wall). And if you look at the ceiling you will see a paper plate marking the location of one of the lights (more on that below).

Next Tuesday we will visit the site to do the electrical walk through evaluating (and adjusting) the locations for all switches and lights (and maybe plugs). They have already started to mark the locations for lights and switches. You can see one of the lights in the picture above. Here is Joel’s computer corner in the living room where you can see switches marked.

I have a short construction video of the pouring of the garage foundation.

I also have video of the roofing work from Friday but I am holding that back for another post. I do not normally record any video on Saturday or Sunday, but when I saw them working this morning I turned on Saturday recording. Tomorrow I will grab that footage and put together a video showing the roofing work.

Earlier this week they put in the framing for the supports for the garage foundation. The concrete will be poured tomorrow. The larger square is the original footprint of the garage. We then added an extension (called the “shed”) on the side towards the house, where we will store things like the tables and chairs for parties on the deck.

They have also finished the framing of the porch. The exterior openings will be large screens. There will be windows and a door between the game room and the porch. The area under the porch will be left open, and is where we will store the boats.

Here is the latest view of the waterfront. The water is way down, and people in our neighborhood community are complaining that the Conantum common dock is no longer useful for getting their boats into the river.

Here is an updated schedule.

• Roof trim is complete
• Roofing starts on July 9
• Windows will be installed the weeks of July 14 and July 21
• The basement slab will be poured as soon as the windows are done
• The siding will be installed starting the week of Aug 4
• Garage footing will be poured on July 10
• Garage foundation will be poured during the week of July 14
• Garage framing will be starts two days after the foundation is poured

On July 14th we do the electrical walkthrough, where we evaluate the placement of all lights, plugs, switches, Ethernet ports, and telephone ports. On July 21st we do the blocking walkthrough, where we identify the location for everything that gets attached to the walls, like coat racks, towel racks, toilet paper holders, floating shelves, etc. Basically anything where we need to add supports in the walls (so the screws go into real wood and not just plaster).