Framing- our future house takes shape

Framing was very exciting because we could start to see the outline of the future home!!  It took about one and a half weeks to finish the framing. (which was quite quick!!)

After the framing comes the roof and windows.  Things are moving along great!

Foundation Continued

The footers are finished, so next the foundation walls were poured for the rear part of the basement. First- Mold/Forms were put up to pour the concrete and they were removed a day later.

after the forms were removed:

Next- Waterproofing!  The black is the waterproofing material painted on the walls, also added- french drains.

After waterproofing was completed was time to backfill (Seth's part!) Seth used a skid steer to complete that part of the grading.

 our future front porch...

Seth testing out his parking spot in the garage with the skid steer.

Ready for concrete pads to be poured next and the framing begins!

Pouring of the Foundation

Finally after 2 weeks of waiting- we lucked out on a few days of good weather to begin pouring concrete. First step is pouring the "footers" for the foundation.

 The boundaries are first marked out with string and stakes

Then, the frames were placed and concrete was poured!

Next step... basement poured walls!

Finished the basement dig!

Alright we finally finished digging the basement and only a few more days until we will have the concrete foundation started, we just need a few days without rain!

oh wait... ICE STORM??

Then the following week- snow!??

More Site Prep

Continuing to work on the basement dig- making progress slowly but surely! We used the help of a laser to help achieve the correct grading

 Above is the laser eye we used.

We also had the power connected for the temporary pole during building.

It will be fun trying to disguise this beauty in our front yard with some creative landscaping. 

The Basement Digging Begins!

Finally, after about 6 months of preparation in grading, house plans, bank loan acquiring we are almost ready to begin official construction with the Reed Brothers as our builder!  We close in about 1 week from today (February 9th) on our construction loan.  Seth has already started digging the basement.  

We met with the builders and a grader they commonly use to determine the best spot for the house to be place and staked out the edges.  Seth began digging to allow for the 10 foot poured basement walls. I (Katie) helped dig with the "mini-x" as well!

Here you can see the gravel that we have use to make the driveway so far. Still have several more loads to go.

Next step after the basement dig- pouring concrete the "footers" for the foundation. 

More Utility Prep

We are continuing to work on getting our water line in place all the way to the house site. It is quite a long distance- around 650 feet all the way to the house!  We are tapering the size of the pipe to smaller sizes as we get closer to the future house site to keep the water pressure high.  We have also installed a few frost proof spigots along the way for future landscaping and water troughs! Seth also rented a riding trencher to dig the deeper (36 inch) trench needed for the underground power line.