Did I mention we have rocks?

Future rock garden

Two of these rocks will remain here (the one I'm sitting on and the one directly behind it). They are to the right side of the porch view so won't be too in-your-face. I'm going to mound up soil and fill in with hostas and flowering ground cover. The rock to the left has already been moved to a more pleasing spot and it too will get flower treatment. It's sunnier in its spot though so I'll be able to do lilies and other sun flowers.

Standing in the footer trench

Chris is in one footer trench, taking the picture of me in the other. Everything is dug out now and the cement guys are coming Friday to pour the footers.

Excavation dirt

Look at that sandy soil! We mainly have forest loam but the dirt in the foundation site has been surprisingly sandy with a hard clay base. Some big rocks as noted above but mainly Adirondack clinkers of a couple feet diameter. We're building the house where an old barn foundation stood. We kind of assumed that whoever built the barn there did so for a reason. Good drainage. Firm soil (the barn foundation hadn't really shifted at all).

For those interested, we disassembled the barn foundation and saved the rocks for use in future projects.  As we were doing the disassembly is when we decided it was a barn not a house - we've found lots of equipment related metal bits and some cool old bottles. Need to do some dating of the finds once we have time to get into the research.

We took our plans to Curtis Lumber to get the materials estimate. They're backed up with the prime summer building season (who says housing starts are down?) so we may have a materials delay. But we still need to install the radiant floor tubing before pouring the slab so we have some time yet. And it won't hurt anything if the slab sits for a little while before the framing starts. Although since the cement is going to be our finished floor we'll likely need to do something to keep it safe and clean. Huh, have to give that some thought.

Digging the Foundation

We've gone from this:

The site in summer 2011

 to this:

The site in summer of 2012

Chris was doing a great job of clearing and digging the site but after encountering boulders like this one, he decided it was time to bring in the big equipment.

Now that's a big rock

Our neighbors T&S had recently built their house and recommended their excavation team. Skip and his son came out and got started right away. So far they've come up with three additional boulders twice the size of this one (plus many smaller rocks). I've got one heck of a rock garden in my future.

Digging stumps, picking rock, and finding sinks

One big stump

Now that the trees are down we're starting to clean the building site. Lots of rocks to be scavenged for future projects like rock walls, the woodstove wall, and flagstone patios. Also lots of really big stumps that need to be pulled and moved. We've pushing them off the hill and letting them roll as far as possible. Of course they inevitably catch on each other and bunch up - but I'm liking the look. The rain is washing the dirt from the roots and they're starting to look like those cool stump fences that people pay insane amounts of money for. So we're getting them for free!

Future woodstove wall

Speaking of free, we scavenged two porcelain bathroom sinks from a bath remodel. They're in excellent shape but the folks who had them are changing the style so didn't want them anymore. We'll use one in the downstairs bath and the other in the laundry room. The big bathroom sink we got from the Habitat for Humanity Restore ($5!) will go upstairs after all. Chris is already planning the bath vanity for it - we've got some interesting ideas on how to make it attractive and functional. Always an awesome goal.

And a chipping we will go

Friends traded labor for firewood and cut down all the trees on the build site. Some were big enough to turn into lumber so he left those for us. Otherwise he got to keep anything he cut. This was an enormous help as he got it done in about two weeks versus the months it took us to partially clear the lot last summer.

He also did a great job of stacking the tops so that we could easily chip them. We rented a big chipper for 24 hours and got all the limbs cleared.

Wonky wood going into the rented chipper

We've officially got a building permit and a 911 address so we can start talking to the power company. Hoping hard that we've budgeted enough for the power run. We know it won't be cheap since we're so far off the road, but are firmly convinced it will be worth it to be isolated in the woods.
So now we're ready to start the excavation!

The site is starting look like a house will fit on it

Ta Da!

And we have construction drawings! Much information is contained on these gems - septic plan, plumbing layout, energy info, and so on, and so on. Chris heads to town this week to start the permitting process. Woo-hoo!

And the clearing goes on...

We're back to clearing trees from the home site. Cut, cut, cut; chip, chip, chip. 

Chris did the cutting 

I did the chipping. 

Funny how Chris is in short sleeves and I look like it's still winter. 

Ethan came out and did the perk test and deep hole test - we passed and he should have the plans completed in the next couple weeks.

The APA confirmed their non-jurisdictional decision so we do not need to go through the agency with our building plans. That will simplify the process as we'll only need to get the plans approved once at the town offices. 

Shed

We decided to build a small storage shed (temporary it should be noted) to store future home "stuff" away from the current home so that it would be easier to stage for sale. Tractor Supply had a nice Spring sale and we picked up a steel-framed "garage in a box" for a reasonable price. Our good friends L&M came up to help us put it together.

Yes, they're reading directions

This is what happens when an accountant and an engineer assemble something

Why is the shortest person holding up the frame?

The frame went up fairly easily and we decided to stop for dinner. Grilled burgers over the fire pit and enjoyed the rest of the evening just chatting. Tomorrow we'll put up the cover and tie everything down in case of high winds.