Community Site Visit!

Today everyone got to tour the site! There were lots of questions, lots of awwwweeee, and I think it was helpful for many of us. Those that wanted to, got to go up on the second floor of both west buildings and climb up to the third floor of the northwest building. From up there people said there were amazing views of Mt. Hood (unfortunately, I didn't make it up there). Richard was able to catch a couple shots before our camera died.

Raising the Wall - Nov. 17th

While at our meeting on the 17th, they raised an 85-foot section of wall all at once. It was quite a site to see!

During the site walk, we saw them framing the second floor walls and the floor. The exterior sheathing was already attached. Then they used wall jacks and a number of people to raise the wall. There was one guy running between everyone I'm guessing telling them to speed up/slow down so that the wall would be raised equally along the entire length so as to avoid the entire wall snapping in two.

It was a successful raising and by the end of the meeting I got to snap a completed shot.

November 10th

Within a week, the framing for the first floor was nearly complete. The southwest building was receiving the second floor joists. The northwest building had the plywood sheathing on the first floor, the joist above completed, and the plywood for the 2nd floor flooring was being put in place. Also, they were installing the required railings for the workers to be able to work up there.
I got to go up onto the second floor and look out. Even from just the second story, the view was amazing! I can't wait to see what the 4th floor of the townhouses will see!
Meanwhile, the footings for the walkways were dug out, the footings for the upper portion of the east building were ready to start, and they were working on the dig-out of the rest of the basement.

November beginnings - Nov. 3rd

We led out the start of November on a good foot - just starting the framing on the first two buildings. There was a slightly slower start than originally predicted, but once they got going, it went quite quickly. They had all the lumber for the first two building delivered to the site at the start of the framing.
While the guys (yet to see any girls on the crew) where framing the first floor on the west, the excavator started work in the middle of the site. They finished the infiltration area that will be located under out grassy play area. This will be the destination place of all our stormwater for the site and is sized to handle up to the 100-year-floods. Once this was completed, they began digging the footings for the upper part of the east building.

October Work

During the month of October, work was focused primarily on getting the slabs for the two west building put in place. They started with pouring the stem walls. Then the radon system was put into place. After the radon system was laid, they backfilled, and prepared the soil for the toppings. First the vapor barrier was installed along with the under slab insulation. Then the rebar for the slabs and the radiant tubing for the hydronic radiant slab system was put into place. Finally, they were able to pour. We were blessed with a relatively dry and nice day to get some smooth slabs put into place that will be the finish floors on the ground level! It was a pretty impressive pour and made such a difference.
Meanwhile, on the east side of the site, the basement got fully dug out, and the footings for the basement began being formed.

It's been awhile...

So it's been awhile since my last post. So many exciting things have been happening, but I haven't made the time to post. Many of you have commented on my lack of blogging. I am finally getting back to it. In the last month I've been just swamped. The community is going through our unit polling process, I took another licensing exam, and there's been all the normal construction type stuff to manage. On top of that, Terri was out of town for a couple weeks in there, and I've been completely slammed at work.

So not to make all these excuses, but the blogging has taken a back burner for awhile. I'm finally going to spend some time tonight posting some beautiful pictures of our soon-to-be new home!

Hope you enjoy!