The forms are off!

The walls of the foundation look beautiful. We were happy to be able to visit with our oldest son, Blaine, his girlfriend, Kristin, and her mom, Toni, at the farm a couple of days after Christmas. It was beautiful and sunny (and muddy) - a perfect day for a tour.

Here's a people pic :-)

Our guests

I'll take you on the same path as before - clockwise from the parking area (which is the photo above) and ending again at the front door.

view of Southwest corner 

South side (cropped to show sunspace)

Southeast corner

view from East

view of Northeast corner

view from the North (the garage)

And the grand finale: the front door!

The front door from directly West

There may not be much to see in the next group of photos - but maybe. I think the tubing for the radiant heating in the lower level slab will need to go in before the flat work there. So that could be exciting ;-)

Now it has walls

I am doing a little catch up today. We have visited the farm twice since my last post - and celebrated Christmas with the boys and visited with family. I'm sharing photos from our first visit to the farm in this post. I think it was on Dec. 21.

Here we are. Brent is the master of timed self portraits :-)

Just to keep things consistent I have been starting the photos from near the spot where we envision a parking area for visitors. So here it is…

view from parking area

Close-up of entry area (and the view to the South from our kitchen-to-be) 

As before, I continue around our home-to-be in sort of a counter clock-wise direction. Hopefully we can all see how the thing takes shape as I photograph from approximately the same location each time.

view from Southwest corner

 Here's a close-up of the 2 story mass wall that still has forms because it needed a second pour.

Pretty tall :-) 

Continuing around…

Southeast corner

View from East

View of Northeast corner

North (basically, the garage door)

The view of the front door from directly West is pretty neat - even though it won't be the way the entrance will be approached when all is done. But it makes for a dramatic picture and this view should be a nice one for appreciating the progress.

View of front door from West (it's that inside corner)

The forms are in

Brent took a trip to the farm today. A winter storm came through with a lot less precipitation than forecast, so the foundation crew will pour tomorrow. The forms are in, though, and we wanted to make sure we had photos.

Here are just a few:

The front door (it will be in the corner)

View of the Southwest corner

View of the South side (Mass wall is in center)

View of the East side

I'm hoping next post will be the foundation without the forms. Something to note, though, is the Mass Wall. It will actually have another level that will be poured later. I'm thinking it will happen at the same time they pour the pillars under the garage slab and summer kitchen slab. Interestingly, the slabs are poured last.

I am thrilled that it is starting to look like something!

While we wait...

Trying to build the foundation of a home in this weather takes patience. Or perhaps, building a home is an exercise in patience regardless of the time of year. In either case, our challenge is to wait.

While we wait, we shop and try to envision without re-inventing or re-thinking. I have been pouring over Craig's List looking for building materials, lights, etc. And Brent, being the more productive (showing me up!), built this…

South view of model

Northwest corner of model

This is a 1:30 scale model of our new home. Yes, he is talented and can find ways to make things out of material bound for the landfill better than anybody I know. He scaled the plans and used a laser cutter over a weekend to build this. It is really fun to peek in the windows.

The large tan area on the north side of the model is the garage. He actually has walls and trusses for it, but hasn't had time to assemble those yet.

We love the look of the house. And it's been fun putting it near a window to see how far into the house rays of sun will shine. Those mass walls in the sunspace should be able to warm up most of the day and then slowly release that warmth for us all night.

The model has displaced my Christmas cactus in the center of our dining room table. It's a much better display and conversation starter.

More to come soon!