Framing Update

Betsy and I went to check up on things yesterday. THIS is what we saw and as you can see things are progressing nicely with the framing. The mason is building piers to support the front and back porches and we are getting ready to bid those jobs out. The first of the mechanical trades, our plumber will be starting some of his work shortly.

If anyone is interested in what's been used to frame the house so far, there's a list HERE. On that list you'll see a number of items Referred to as TJI and LVL. These are engineered lumber components for a for a Weyerhaeuser product, iLevel. The rest of the stuff is pretty self explanatory.

On a seperate, but not totally unrelated note, blog reader asked me about the pine trees that are on the property. In March 2002 we put 5 of the parcel's seven acres into a forest stewardship program which notes "2 rows of indigo bush were planted at a 5'x10' spacing along the western and southern property lines. The rest of the field was planted with loblolly pine at a 8'x10' spacing with the rows running in a north Isouth orientation."

Since then I've been tending to the 2,200 pine trees seedlings which are now 15 to 20 or more feet tall.

After 8 years, on average, each acre of my pines sequesters about four tons of carbon monoxide per acre per year.

Never let it be said I'm not doing my fair share to save the planet.

We was framed

So far, the weather hasn't been especially cooperative. After the foundation walls were poured it took a while for Dale to get the rat slab done. It seemed like every time he was getting ready to pour concrete it poured rain and the foundation held the water like a swimming pool. Since Dale couldn't get the slab done, Luke and his framers couldn't start doing their thing in earnest. But rather than let time slide by the framers began to make wall panels which would be placed as soon as they could do the the first floor decking ...which was contingent on having the slab below it poured. To make a long story short, Dale got the slab done on December 17th and the framers were then able to get the entire first floor decking in just before it snowed, a lot, late on the 18th. By December 28th the entire first floor was framed and materials for the second floor were on there way.

If all goes along as scheduled the entire shell will be done by the end of February.