Today features light drizzle, and the same was predicted for the rest of the week. This means that filling in the trench has been delayed until Monday (unless the forecast for Friday changes). Meanwhile, I did go around to the north side of the garage to see where all the conduits come up, as shown below.

Meanwhile, the electricians have moved into the basement where they are installing the main panels. Here is a picture of them working in the area just above all the conduits.

There was also some work on the outside stairs down from the deck, although that work is not finished yet. As soon as it is finished, they will add the fireproofing coating to the deck framing.

At our Wednesday meeting we had the tile installer come by to measure the bathrooms so we know how much tile to order. We (meaning Daphne) picked the color we will use for the lattice work under the deck and under the porch. Friday we go to the showroom where we will select our counter top and given them a deposit before they raise their prices by 15% on October 1st.

Siding has been delayed a week so it will not start next week, but rather the week after. Meanwhile, the HVAC installers are still putting in ducts. I suspect they will be working for another week or two. The duct work has caused us to relocate some of the ducts in the basement reducing the ceiling height in a section near the basement door by a foot (it will still be over seven feet).

As you have seen in earlier posts, we have conduits running from the basement (utility room) to the street and the garage. These are buried 4 feet under ground and then covered in concrete and then dirt (and eventually asphalt driveway and paving stones). The purpose of the concrete is to provide some measure of EMF shielding between the wires and any humans walking across the driveway and front walk.

Today the concrete is bring poured over the conduits and the builder sent me this action shot.

And this after the fact shot.

Once again, we returned to the backyard to pull invasives. I am pleased to announce that we are almost done for the year. Perhaps an hour or two more and then we will have pulled everything we can until more sprout next spring.

Here is a view, looking North, of the backyard post invasive removal. There is only one buckthorn remaining (can you find it?). It was too big and inconveniently placed to remove so we just girdled it and it should die in a year or two.

As far as construction goes, there is steady progress on deck framing and on duct work for the heating system. The most visible changes were in the trench where they are putting conduits between the road (telephone pole), garage and basement. Here are some pictures showing the progress. First looking at the front of the garage, then from the side.

And here is the current conduit ends in the basement.

I can not read all of the labels on the conduits, but here are the ones I can read:

• spare
• alarm to garage
• spare to street
• spare to garage
• fiber to street
• cable to street
• cat 6 to garage
• switch to garage
• power to garage
• water meter

I was hoping to have a good construction video showing the conduit work, but the electricians are camera shy as you can tell by the end of the video (I have another day and a half of that same view).

This will be a longish post, so I apologize in advance.

We had not been to the house for over a week and when we got there for our Wednesday meeting, the driveway and yard in front of the garage was all torn up. This was expected, since they are laying conduits between the road, the house and the garage.

Here is the view from the street. The ladder is leaning on the utility pole. Power and internet cables will be buried after coming off the pole.

And here is the view from the front yard.

They will continue adding conduits for a few more days, and then next week, after an inspection, they will bury the conduits in concrete and backfill the sand. But for now, there is no easy access into the garage or even onto the deck from the front.

Speaking of the deck, last week they worked on framing of the deck. Here is a side view of the deck. Notice that the corner is not square, because if it was square then we would be over the 50 foot wetlands setback. Also, the stairs are not in place yet.

This past week, the construction camera was positioned to show the work on the deck. Here is the work (I removed most of the boring parts).

Now that the deck framing is in place, you can see that the passage to the basement door goes under the deck without a lot of headroom. Daphne is used for scale.

Now that you have watched the video, go back and look at what happens just after the 1:00 mark. You should see them finally mount the french door from the living room onto the deck (and a little later, in the background, the french door onto the porch).

Here is the view of the living room french door. Its clouded because there is still a protective film on the door.

And here is the french door in the game room that leads out to the porch.

If you scroll up and look at the deck side-view picture, you may (but probably not) notice something missing in the foreground. (Go ahead and look, I will wait).

Its turns out that we had a rain storm over the weekend and without gutters, we got a lot of water undercutting the concrete pad that was poured for the heat exchangers. The crew had to remove the pad, build a packed gravel foundation, and then they will re-pour the pad next week. Here is a brief construction video of the work.

That takes us to the interior of the house. This past week has all been about putting in the duct work.

As part of placing the ducts, the installers had to make some small changes, mostly to work around the joists and in one case the plumbing. Here is a layout of the first floor showing the changes that we had to approve (in red and yellow).

For example, we would review changes like this (which is from the east wall of game room).

Or adjustments like this, which is the corner of the game room. On the other side of that wall (to the left) we also adjusted the vent, but in the case we moved it from being closer to the bathroom, to actually being in the wall facing the hall.

The air return vent in the front hall (outline shown below), which was planned on being under a shelf, was increased in size. Because of that we made a more drastic change. Instead of having a floor vent under a floating shelf, we decided to actually have a cabinet that goes down to the floor and to have the vent come out in the front of the cabinet (so that it turns 90 degrees inside an otherwise empty cabinet.

With this proposed change, we then noticed a cosmetic problem. The laundry room door opening (left side in the picture) and the closet door opening did not align, which would be more apparent with a cabinet. So we decided to shrink the closet door to align the openings. Does this quality as “moving a wall”? You decide.

None of the other changes were problematic for us. We did move the vent near my computer a few inches closer to my desk, which hopefully will not be a problem for my rolling chair. And we made the vent in the master bedroom wider, so we had to quickly measure the bedside tables to make sure everything still fit.

I will also leave you with this picture. This is the attic area above the second floor front bedroom and family room. This space will be filled with air handling units soon.

For the rest of this week and first half of next week, they will be working on the trench and conduits. I have moved the construction camera to pick up the action.

Once the trench is filled in, and we can access the garage again, we will store the siding in the garage and the week after next the siding will be installed, starting in the back (river side). I will move the construction camera again in a week and a half to catch that action.

Inside, duct work continues and once the conduits are done, electrical work will start.

Days since we moved a wall: 57, unless you count shrinking the closet door opening, then 0.

Another Saturday, another invasive pulling session. But you do not want to hear about that, you want to know what’s going on with the house. Well, in the previous post I had a picture of the garage and basement floors. Here is a video of the pouring of the garage floor.

A few days later they they started work on the framing for the deck. Here is a picture of the current state of the deck. The concrete pad will be for the heat exchangers.

The camera was not well positioned to capture the deck action, but I have a short cropped movie of some of the work.

Since there is not much else to show you, I thought I would add this picture of the front of the house.

The camera has been repositioned for a better angle on the deck framing. I also expect the french doors to be installed early next week and I assume duct work will continue. We are still a couple of weeks away from the siding installation.

I just came back from our Wednesday update meeting. Things continue to move forward. In fact, the builder thinks we are ahead of his original schedule, but we are not celebrating just yet.

The biggest change since last weekend is that we now have a floor in the garage and in the basement. The following two pictures show the garage floor and the basement floor. The lines, which were just cut, are for expansion to reduce the likelihood of cracks, although some are still expected.

Also this week, the landscape company put the gravel in the area which will be covered by deck. They will start framing the deck soon, and then put down plywood so we can walk on the deck. The final deck surface will not be added until near the end of the build process (to prevent damage). You can also see that they added a small pad behind the garage for the heat exchangers.

Inside the house, plumbing is mostly done except for a few drains, and hooking up to the (not yet built) septic system. This picture is the master bathroom’s shower with controls and pipes for the shower head and the separate wand.

Speaking of plumbing, look at what appeared in the foundation a few days ago. This is the only exterior faucet that needs to go through the foundation. The other three will all go though the siding. This faucet is next to the basement door and is where we will wash our feet when we come in from the river. Its also what we need to water the plants in the backyard.

Meanwhile, on the second floor. work continues on the ducts for heating/cooling. Here is ceiling of the family room next to the stairs. You can see the ductwork and a ceiling vent (this one is an air return).

The french doors come in on Thursday and should be installed by the weekend. Next week or maybe the week after, they will dig the trenches and put in the pipes between the utility room and the garage and the street. In a few weeks the siding will start and I hope to catch that on the construction camera.

Next Tuesday they will be pouring the basement and garage floor. I hope to catch the garage floor work on the construction camera, if I am lucky. Meanwhile, on Friday they covered the Styrofoam layer with a layer of plastic. Here is what the garage looks like, pre-pour.

Meanwhile, here is this weeks construction camera video. Mostly you see them dig a trench for the gas line and then fill the trench in. At the very start you see them cut a hole or two in the foundation, and in the middle of the video they work on supports for the deck (against the house).

During our weekly Wednesday meeting, I took some progress pictures and I will go through some of the work done so far this week.

The gas line is being installed. We will have 3 propane tanks on the far side of the garage. Then the gas line will run to the generator and then on to the house, where it will be run inside to the gas range (in the kitchen). The first picture is the connection to the propane tanks and the second shows the run underground.

The final window is now finally in place on the South wall of the game room. We are still waiting for the french doors (which come on September 2nd) and the real exterior doors for the house and garage. All the other windows have been sealed up (second picture).

They are laying down the insulation that goes under the concrete floors in the basement and the garage. First shot is the basement. Second is the garage in progress. Concrete will then be poured over these layers, in a week or two.

Most of the plumbing lines are now in place inside the house. The plumber mentioned that he will miss eating lunch on the porch since he is just about finished up for now. First picture is the plumbing runs in the basement. Second picture shows plumbing to the master bathroom tub (which you saw in a recent post). Third picture is the plumbing to the master bathroom sinks.

The last post showed them drilling the opening the foundation for the make-up air vent. Here is the outcome (the vent is not attached yet). We are thinking of using the block for a seat somewhere.

Meanwhile, the HVAC team has been running the ducts, starting on the second floor. Here is work being done on the duct over the family room.

Finally I leave you with this picture of the construction worker’s charging station. I assume this does not quite meet electrical code.

Today we decided that there will be two steps at the front stoop. One step from the walkway onto a large Blue Mist granite slab, and one step up from that slab into the house. There will be an extra step going from the walkway onto the deck because we want a slight slope to funnel water away from the house, down either side (which means under the deck in this case). We also decided not to put an extra awning over the game room South wall windows since it seems pretty shaded without the awning.

Our media consultant was in the hospital with a burst appendix, but he should be back in time to consult with the electrician who starts work any day now. A whole bunch of additional work is scheduled for the next month, mostly inside. Stay tuned for more updates.