So, back to work! We spent Friday saw cutting the concrete. We did a few lines in the garage to help prevent future cracking, then we did the main house in 4 foot squares. It turned out quite nicely! I'm continually amazed at my husband's never ending knowledge of all sorts of various machinery! We spent the afternoon picking up loads and loads of the styrofoam blocks so we can start on the walls tomorrow and Monday (since it's a holiday). We'll see how much we can get done. The first layer is always the hardest, but this time we also have to cut out the doors and windows. So we shall see how it goes, and I'll be back to update you all next week! Enjoy your holiday weekend! Next year the party's at our house!! : )

My amazing husband running the concrete saw!

The garage cut into 10' X 12' sections.

The main floor. It was getting dark by the time I remembered to take a picture! But you can see the squares. I LOVE my floor!

Unloading blocks off the trailer. It's always a little scary to drive with them on there. Just one giant accident waiting to happen!

Feasting on icy cold watermelon at the end of a long day! Yummy!

Okay, Dan and I met with the bank inspector this morning, and I think we pretty much got everything worked out. He was just concerned about a few areas, and since we are owner/builders, he just wanted to make sure we know what we're doing. We don't, but I think we have him fooled!!!! : ) Hopefully, the funds will go through soon and we'll be back on track!

And the adventures continue. . . . . . . .

Today, the bank guy emailed me to tell me that the concrete inspection (which we need to get our first draw from the bank) was 'inadequate due to unevenness and quality of the concrete.' WHAT?!?!?!?!?! What does that even mean? So I called the bank guy and asked him what that means exactly, and he said the report states that there are waves in the concrete. HUH? Again, I'm completely confused! Does he mean in the color or in the actual concrete? It may not be perfectly level, but I can assure you, there are no 'waves' in it! I told him we intend to buff it and polish it later after all the interior work on the house was done. Dan sent an email asking for exact specifications on what needs to be fixed. So now we will wait to see what they have to say. And in the meantime, we are out of money, so we can't really move forward until this is resolved. . . . . . . .Please send us lots of prayers for patience! I am so SICK of red tape and bureaucracy I can hardly stand it!!!!

Extra pics!

There were too many pics to fit in one post, so here's some more from the concrete:

The site of the dreaded cave-in (right against the wall)! It wasn't too bad, considering! And by some miracle and/or blessing, it didn't damage the plumbing!

Thankfully it didn't make too much of a mess. We scooped out the extra concrete (nice job Jonas!) and used it elsewhere.

Jordanne and Nathaniel 'concrete surfing'! Dan needed more weight on the tool, so he had them stand on it!

All done! Isn't it beautiful????

The floor is done!!!

Hooray! Hooray! We finally have a real floor!! I have been looking at the basement for so long, it's really weird not to see it there anymore! Just a small hole for the stairs is left.
Okay, we started at 6:00am on Friday morning. We used the pump truck this time which really helped a LOT! We had several great helpers again which makes all the difference! Sincerest thanks to Bill, Mike, Steve, Jonas, and Connor! The pour went pretty smoothly overall. We had one little cave-in in the polydeck over the basement. A small piece of the styrofoam broke (about 6 inches or so) on one of the edges and some of the concrete fell through. But they patched it pretty quickly and it went great after that. I'm still completely amazed that we poured all that concrete on top of STYROFOAM!!! But it held and it looks great! Dan and Mike spent the day finishing it and making it look all pretty and smooth. The color doesn't show up so well yet, but Dan assures me it will after a month or so. It really looks terrific and we are so excited to have this fairly big hurdle behind us! Now it's on to the walls! We're hoping to have them up in the next week or two. The last of the blocks should be in by the end of the week. We won't quite have the roof on by the end of May, but we'll be close!!!

The pump truck! The concrete truck pours the concrete into a chute in the back of the pump truck, then it goes through a hose and you can direct it right where you want it! A little extra money but worth EVERY PENNY!!

The first concrete going over the basement!

The rest of the concrete (after the cave-in!).

Lots of helpers working hard!

Dan leveling out our shower.

Garage

Okay, moving on. . . . . .we poured the concrete for the garage on Thursday morning. We didn't use the pump truck since it was a fairly small area, so it was a lot of work! It went pretty well thanks to lots of help from some friends! Thanks so much to Bill, Jake, Lilo, Connor, Chloe and Keegan!! Dan spent most of the day making it smooth and keeping it wet, but it was a pretty good practice for the rest of the house!

Leveling out the concrete. Yes, that's me in the pink. :)

Bill guiding the concrete chute.

Smoothing out the concrete.

We had a little too much concrete! We just extended it into the utility closet and my bedroom closet!

All finished!!

Okay, I'm a little behind, since we have been working like crazy to get the slab poured! Here's an update:

We finished all the plumbing, then backfilled everything. We spread gravel over everything and leveled it out, then compacted it with a tamper. You would not BELIEVE how hard it is to get that much gravel/dirt level over such a big area! We tried to get it as close to 5 inches below the floor as possible so we don't have to pour as much concrete. The gravel is cheaper!!

Last weekend we had the guy spray everything with termite spray, then covered the whole thing with plastic. We put styrofoam insulation over the plastic everywhere except the basement to hold in the heat from the radiant tubing. Then we put down this wire stuff that looks like fencing to help hold the concrete together an to attach the radiant tubing to. Then we put all the tubing down and zip-tied it to the wire. We cut out all the doors and put boards on the outside so the concrete would be smooth there. We also had to put MORE rebar in the polydeck over the basement to make sure the beams would be good and strong to hold up the floor. Here are some pics of our work:

Filling in and leveling out the gravel. SO MUCH WORK!!! I really HATE shoveling! : )

Nathaniel running the tamper.

The plastic over the garage--it doesn't need insulation since we're not doing floor heat in there!

You can see the black plastic underneath, then the white foam and the wire on top. Of course, it HAD to be windy the day we did it! Thanks to our nieces and nephew for their help!!

You can see the radiant floor tubing. We will circulate hot water through it and it heats the concrete and thus the floors!

Plumbing

Well, moving right along! We got all the plumbing done in a day and a half, and boy was it tough! We started last Thursday and called the inspection in for Friday. You have to call this recording and leave a message to schedule the inspection. I begged them to come late on Friday, but it's really up to the inspector. We worked until 8pm Thursday night and started again on Friday morning at 6am. There was SO much to do! I had to run into town to get a few final parts, so the girls and I got the parts and picked up lunch. We got back and finished up, and had just started eating when the inspector came! And we passed! Yay!! So all our hard work paid off! Then, after all that, Dan and kiddos drove me to Tucson for a Mother's Day dinner at the Melting Pot! It was a great day, but we were all completely EXHAUSTED by the time it was over! We spent Saturday laying around the house and recovering. : )

Sunday, we filled all the dirt in around the plumbing. I am amazed at how many times we have moved the same dirt around to different places! In, then out, then over here, then back over there, then in again! Dan wants to soak everything really well with water so that all the dirt settles as much as possible. We don't want the foundation settling later because the dirt shifts! I don't think we will be able to pour the slab this weekend like we were aiming for. We are still a little behind from the stupid rebar delay! But we are not too far off track, so we'll keep plugging away at it!!

My good looking plumber!!

Master bathroom.

The kids bathroom and where it goes out to the septic.

Jordanne helping out!

Our little picnic area where we eat lunch and take an occasional break!

Well, we got a little more done on Sunday. Mostly we just filled in the inside of the blocks with dirt and leveled it out. You can see the orange marks where the dirt had to go up to. It was SO windy!! We were pretty worn out by the afternoon and decided to call it a day.

Next, we'll get all the plumbing in, then we will put in 4 inches of AB (or gravel), then the plastic, foam and pipes for the radiant floor heat. After that comes the concrete! We are aiming to pour the main slab in 2 weeks. It's going to take a lot of work to make it, so we'll take any prayers you want to send our way!! We are pretty much on schedule. Still wish we could just fast forward!!

Leveling out all the dirt.

All finished!

Before. . . . .

. . .and after!

Moving right along. . . . .

Well, we got the stemwall mostly poured yesterday. The concrete company was overbooked, so they only sent one truck instead of two. We got 3/4 of the way done, we will just have to add a little more next week sometime.

It was an interesting experience!! We used the pump truck again, but this time we used the big boom truck. There is this gigantic arm with a hose attached that the truck guy can remote control to move around the edge of the house with us. It makes the job a LOT easier, but it was kinda scary too! The concrete came out really fast and moved the blocks around some. We were both so nervous the walls we spent so much time getting straight and level were going to be moved completely!! In one spot, the concrete was really wet so it leaked out under the styrofoam block and just floated it right up! PANIC!! We managed to push it back down and set huge rocks on it to hold it there until the concrete set up a little. But we got it done and it doesn't seem to be off too much. I guess we'll find out for sure when we start on the main walls!! : )

We also put the polydeck forms on for the basement. It looks pretty neat. I still have my doubts about pouring concrete on just styrofoam, but I guess we'll see!

Our little problem spot!!

Nathaniel checking out the polydeck!

All done!

The view from underneath.