As of Day 35

Day 29... we have a floor

 ... and a ceiling for the basement!

Day 32... first floor is framed!

 Trusses for the roof!

 View from the back door, through the foyer, towards the front door.

 Day 33... prepping for the second floor... from the front door.

 Prepping for the second floor... great room.

 Day 34... second floor... from the front door.

 Second floor... great room.

 Day 35... exterior walls for the second floor!

Today should be Day 36, but we started with heavy rains, so hopefully they can get some things done up there this afternoon.  We're chugging right along!

Week in review

Day 24... forms come down to reveal REAL LIVE WALLS! :)  This is the view looking at the side of the house towards the garage.

 This is the opposite side of the house into the basement.

 Our bunker located under the front porch.  We're having it cemented in with access from the basement to use in case we have tornadoes... or you know... zombies. ;)  There were far too many times I was under the stairs with the girls... on a slab.  With the rock that we have under ground around this bad boy... we're not going anywhere. :)

 Day 25... the waterproofing is completed.  This is looking towards the front of the house at the front porch.

 Garage side.

 Back.

 Opposite side of garage into the basement.

 Day 27... last Friday.  LUMBER!

 Dirt has been back filled into the garage and around the perimeter of the house.

Today would have been Day 28, however, RAIN... and rain is coming our way again tomorrow.  Hopefully framing will begin Wednesday! :)

Day 22

We're officially on day 22 of construction.  This of course only takes into account actual construction days... not rain days, most Saturdays, and all Sundays.  The rock predicament really put us behind, so the crew has been amazing and has worked several Saturdays.  They are awesome.  Here is where we've been the last couple of weeks:

Day 14... prepping for footers.

 Day 19... footers are complete and now they are moving onto the basement walls... predominately concrete.

 This is the spare bedroom downstairs.  Sexy huh?

We were up there last night to assess the situation, and it looks like the concrete walls will be poured today.  I believe the plan is to start framing Friday or next Monday.  CAN'T WAIT!

The good... the bad... and the ugly.

I'll start with the good.  We love our team of workers so far.  Curtis (the general contractor) is really wonderful and doesn't seem to mind the constant calls and questions from Bryan... or the random visits from the girls and me.  Robert our excavator is top notch.  He's been frustrated with the rock situation (which happens to be the bad in the title), but works until late in the evening for us and has even come in on Saturday.  We're very lucky.  

We were off to a good start with the ground breaking.  The girls and I would venture up to the property for picnic lunches to watch Robert push dirt around. 

 And during the evenings we'd venture back up with Bryan and let the girls play in the dirt.

Then our problems started.  Blacksburg is very rocky.  I mean we do live in the mountains, but the land here really stinks.  We knew we had rock, we just didn't know HOW much of it we actually had.  Turns out... a lot, and it's VERY EXPENSIVE.  Oy.  Robert is working his little heart out for us though.  He continues to break more and more everyday and has been using it as filler for underneath the driveway.

 There's Robert.  Hi Robert!

 Found this good luck charm laying in the "driveway."  It will for sure hang in the new house.

 And here my friends is the ugly.  A broken hammer... I told you the rock sucked my butt.  It broke Saturday evening.  Sunday was a no work day.  Monday was a holiday.  Tuesday and Wednesday it was too muddy and rainy.  Finally today Robert was back up there waiting for the repair men to bring a new bit to put in the end of the hammer.  As I typed that I looked outside... it's raining.  Ugh.  This week we were supposed to have footers poured.  Looks like that may be next week's goal.  I hope. :-/