The Farm (1 Viewer)

[jynx]

Yeah, I saw this on here

(Borrowed from @pistonpete )

And I think it would be super cool to do something like this over the door. If I could talk @beno out of the front-clip from the raisin I might try something like this with one from an 80 of course that 40 clip is pretty bitchin' hangin' up there

 

[bluehawk]

That's cool for sure

 

[sk8salomon]

Wow, looking great! Love that metal barn.

 

[jynx]

Thanks guys. Our builder says he is tired of waiting on his first mason and has another guy lined up. If all goes to plan they will be laying block tomorrow (10.6.15), at this point I will believe it when I see it. Of course the only bad part is that we will be headed out to SCC on Thursday so will just see where things are at the end of the week, that is if they actually get started.

 

[jynx]

So I should have put money on when the mason would start, cause I could have cleaned up. Tuesday came and went and no start, as did the next 5 days. Finally on Saturday we got a picture of a mixer sitting on site. So Sunday we ran out after we got in from SCC and low and behold.....

Corners!! 3 to be exact. So that was promising, but they didn't show back up until after lunch on Monday, but we were promised they were here til they were done. So Erin has been checking on them over the last few days and as of today they are making steady progress. Head guy said they should finish the block by Friday and should finish up the brick Tuesday or Wednesday next week. I hope they are right.

Looks like they have left the front open to do the piers and then they should button up the front and the porch.

So according to our GC the framers should start week after next if all goes well. Even though we are moving, I remain skeptical, bit optimistic at this point.

 

[jynx]

And Erin has been out there mowing and doing some grading. She seems to be getting pretty handy with her new toy (which I have still yet to even sit on.....)

That freshly graded spot above is where our burn pile from last spring was. (I couldn't find a good picture of it)

And she started grading off where Hannah's swingset will be.

Saturday I will be doing more trim work on the barn while she works more on cleaning up the place.

 

[bluehawk]

Looking good man. Like the old MF, sweet ride. Can't wait to see more

 

[jynx]

Thanks man, the old MF ain't the prettiest, but has been gone thru front to back, twice actually, and runs like a top. Ain't too worried about the looks, but I do need to get some new gauges for it and clean up the wiring a little. Will have to tell you the long version over a sometime.

 

[bluehawk]

A cold one and a story would be awesome. Looking forward to it.

 

[Elbert]

looks like progress is in the works. We had a MF135 diesel for 20 years..or so, normal maintenance, bought a battery about every two years since I never could get my Dad to crank the thing and run it in the winter and he like to buy car batteries for it Once we got over that learning curve and got a real battery things went smooth. I like the MF's... Seems like guys in the house-building trades continue to live up to their old tricks...start 20 jobs and finish none on time...show up a day here and and a day there. Good luck on the house schedule..

 

[jynx]

Yeah, took a while to get them here, but they seem to be doing a good job and as far as we can tell have been making steady progress. They ran out of water a little before noon today so it doesn't look like near as much progress today.

Erin sent me today's progress pictures.

Mostly looks like they ran out the front wall, leaving that little gap to get in and out of and then stacked block inside for the piers. Guessing piers and wrap-around porch tomorrow. We shall see.

 

[bluehawk]

Seems like all masons are slow to start and take forever to finish. At least your seeing some progress

 

[jynx]

The masons came out and worked for about 4 hours today while we were there. I worked on finishing up trimming in the back corners of the barn, Erin spent most of the day grading out where the swingset will be and the masons finished the safe room and another line of piers. 3 lines of piers to go and then finish up the front walls and foundation will be done. Framing package is to be delivered next week and the framers are set to start a week from Monday.

Will throw a few more up later, but here is the house as we left it.

Front wall is just a little tall....

Erin is 4'10" tall... good thing E is getting good at grading with her little green tractor cause we gonna be doin' a good bit before it's over.

 

[jynx]

Well, the barn is finally closed in on all 4 corners. With it cooling off I wanted to make sure that it was sealed up so no little furry friends try to take up residence inside for the winter. I still have a few misc. pieces of trim to get on before I will call it finished, but most would have a hard time telling.

I need to spend a day just picking up scraps and cleaning up around the barn, but overall I am pleased and rather proud that we did this all on our own, with help from friends and family.

Never seem to be enough hours in the day and the little stuff just takes time to get the way I want it, but we are getting there.

And on a side note, we are almost exactly one year from the day the truck delivered the building package. Looking back the truck rolled in on November 3 of last year, we broke ground on November 8 and we are closed in completely on October 18, 2015.

 

[jynx]

Latest Drone Flight vid. Be warned, Erin had to "tie" the camera and it was windy, so this one may require a motion sicknes pill.

Bump to 1:00 for take-off

 

[jynx]

Brick!!

They finished up the block this morning and started on the brick work. The block you see below will be grade eventually.

Should finish up the brick this week. Hoping the framing will arrive as promised and the framers show up on Monday. GC wants to pour the garage floor on Friday so things seem to be moving in the right direction.

 

[jynx]

Couple more. Erin waterproofed the exposed block this morning, the termite guy showed up after lunch and they delivered some framing and 3 loads of stone today. Erin is going to do another fly over this afternoon.

Framing starts on Monday!

I have also decided that building a house SUCKS!! I now understand why they say if a marriage can survive building a house it can survive anything. And it isn't even us. Erin has all her Sh!t together, but we got subs and vendors with their hands out and a banker who has rules to follow, so just trying to figure out how to keep everyone paid and things moving is wearing on me....

Anyway, drone video and more pics to come.

 

[jynx]

Today's Video (make sure you bump it to HD quality if you want to)

 

[Elbert]

what style of foundation is that referred to? vs a solid continuous slab type? I understand the cement slab "style" and what I've heard is a crawl-space type style...but not sure I'm expressing that correctly. Are the floor joists..etc run across those coloumns of cinder blocks there in the center of the space...I assume so. Just wondering how things progress.

 

[jynx]

@Elbert That is what is commonly referred to as a crawl-space. That means there is a space to crawl around under the finished floor above. This is what my builder keeps calling a dropped floor system. I'm not sure if that is the technical term, but basically a series of beams (triple 2x10s in our case) will run front to back sitting on those piers in the middle. Then a series of 2x10 floor joists will span across the beams from end to end. Then that will get decking and they will start up with the walls. The box in the middle that looks out of place is constructed of concrete filled block that is a little over 3' tall, when the beams are added it will be right around 4' clear from the bottom to the top and will have some additional anchoring and reinforcing and will be our storm shelter. It is located under the stairwell that will go up to the bonus room, which I intend to reinforce as well. With some of the weather that we have around here, momma insisted on having a safe place for those "just in case" moments.