The Punch List

I got to use my first EVER Dirty Dancing analogy yesterday. It was perhaps one of the highlights of my day! Ross had this two page list of things that need to be done. It included things like truss clips, tie downs, A34 clips on the somethingerother. He led a group of us around gesturing to this and rambling something off in construction gibberish. We all nodded, and it often included snippets of "I can show you that later" or "you'll figure it out".

In the middle of one of these "I'll show you that later", I asked Ross if he'd ever seen Dirty Dancing. He said yes (Thank God or I might have fallen over.)

Me: "You know that part where he's teaching her the dance for the Sheldrake, and he says 'I'll show you that later, we'll do that later', and then they get to the hotel for the night of the performance, and she hasn't learned all those things?"

Ross: "Yeah?"

Me: "I'm in the hotel Ross."

And I WAS in the hotel...the hotel of A34 clips, porch clips and truss clips (although he was drawing me pictures, I was just CONFUSED!) We did do a good chunk of the manual labor part of the list: ripping out and replacing sheeting, putting in shear walls, adding studs and rails for cabinets and such. About the third time I trucked back up the stairs where Ross and the truss boys were rolling out trusses on Robin's house, Ross pretty much told me to finish what we knew how to do and then go build interior walls.

I've never been so happy to hammer in my life! :)

So here are the updates:

Tina's house was plumbed for water! (Duh..what else would it be plumbed for, right?) Josh, Bernie and Robert put house wrap on and installed windows. WINDOWS PEOPLE! :) Zhan's house was sheeted and had half the roofing on. Jerica, Selina, Julie and Carrie were putting up shear walls in the garage, and Anna and Brandy were sheeting the storage room. Zhan and his daughter cut out the doorways with a sawzall, put up porch sheeting, and worked on adding studs and braces. Shaun (Robert's brother), Nathan and Nathan's volunteer ripped out sheeting (ok...honestly, this was mostly Shaun busting it out from the inside with a sledge hammer much like the old kool-aid man commercials...it was both amazing and terrifying to watch) and then Brandy and Anna ripped nails out. I put some cabinet bracing thingees in with much help (I suck at "toenailing" boards in, and measuring. I'm not sure why I decided I was up for this task!) Ashlee's house had the trusses finished and she and her dad and brother were bird blocking it. Ross and the boys were rolling trusses on Robins. We have Garrett and Amanda's 1295 package delivered, and the other 2 should be coming soon. Ross ordered all the other houses on the main drag's packages to be cut!

It is truly amazing how much has gotten done. I learn something new every week (This week: AVOID THE PUNCH LIST), and I feel exhausted and full of pride when I leave. Brandy and Jody have been coming out to help, my mom has been manning the childcare front. It truly takes a village! :)



Tina's First Window!!! (And housewrap!)



Robin's Trusses

 I took lots of pictures...I'm going to post quite a few to get you up to speed! :)

This is Zhan. He's teaching me to listen closer and slow down when I talk! It's a good lesson for me! :)

Tina's house, Zhan's house, and half of Robin's house (which had trusses by the end of the day)!

PLUMBING!

Anna Helping with windows! :)

Josh housewrapping

Robert nailing something (I have no idea)

Josh, Shaun, Anna and Jody :)

That's all I have for today! :) After taking 20 minutes to upload pictures,  I think I may start an album, and then people can just check the most recent ones each week! :)

Until next week!

HB



It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood...

Man it was GORGEOUS on Saturday! I actually had TOO MANY clothes on! :) I'm not going to bore you with what I did all day (you could just check my last five blogs...that's what I did!), but we are moving right along!

Tina's house has it's roof...I mean the actual ROOF on it! :) Plumbing and I think windows are coming in this week. Zhan's house will be sheeted and roofed this week. Robin and Ashlee's houses will get the trusses delivered. Nathan and Robert's houses are almost done with the second stories! Then we'll do the interior second floor walls on that one, and then trusses will be delivered.

And THAT, my friends, is six houses almost done with framing! HALF WAY THERE! :) YAHOO!!! :) I know those six houses are far from finished...but it's so fun to see how much progress we make. Ross said we'll be putting house wrap on Tina and Zhan's soon, and then siding. My educated guess is we'll start the 1295's next (but I don't actually know). I really enjoy being out there...although my ten hour day almost killed me Saturday! I've been thinking a ten hour day is better than having to go out two days in a row, but my shoulder may be disagreeing with me! :)

My favorite part is driving the kids up there. After the comment about how our house still looks like nothing (although we DID get slab on Thursday!), Clarissa starts shrieking about the Roof on Tina's house, the "triangles" on Zhan's house, and the framing on the other houses. Friday we drove past Ross on our way in to see the houses, and Clarissa said "Is that your boss?! Do you do everything he says?" :) I said "I try." And she said "I try to do everything you say, too, mommy. But sometimes it doesn't work out well". :)

Next weekend will be a little more low-key. Next week is spring break, and Ahren will want to go out during the week (because he can!) :) So we will probably only do a few hours on Saturday, and spend the weekend with the kids.

It is such a blessing. I love getting to know my neighbors more, learning more, getting stronger. It's hard work, the scheduling is a nightmare, and my body hates me the next morning. BUT, it is SO worth it.

So until next time,
HB

(I've been slacking in the pictures department. I'll get lots of pictures this week and post it to an album and link it. So fun!)

I'm sheeting in the rain...

I thought 21 degrees and snow was bad. I lied. Working in the POURING rain is NOT fun! I couldn't keep my fingers dry, went through three pairs of gloves in an hour, had to go to the little hardware store and buy new dry socks on my lunch break AND switch shoes. Anna and I were glaring at each other the entire time, and occasionally our significant others just for good measure, not because we were mad, but we were MISERABLE! Thank goodness after lunch, it drizzled lightly for about an hour, and then the glorious sun appeared!

So as I said last week, these blogs are going to get very boring from a technical standpoint. Guess what we did this week? Yup...you guessed it! Framed and sheeted exterior walls, and then framed interior walls. Daniel, Garrett, Ahren and Josh rolled trusses, and another group put floor joists down in Robert and Nathans houses. We had lots of awesome volunteers this week: it feels SO GREAT to have all your volunteer hours covered by the time you leave on Saturday! We still have 2 1/2 hours to make up this week, but we enjoyed a day off together on Sunday, and it was SO needed! I'm hoping to find a way to work these in once a month!

Some exciting things we learned this week: We are going to be the first group that gets two different types of siding! It will make the houses look more "fancy", and we also have two-tone paint schemes. AND, our garage doors will have windows! SO AWESOME! :) We still haven't picked our door...I'm guessing we'll end up with Ahren's choice.

There was some really sad news: Obama's 2012 budget cuts nation-wide mutual self-help programs. We were encouraged to write letters to our senator about the importance of the program to us individually. Our house and the rest of the Kingston Cedars group will be able to complete, but all the rest doesn't look so good right now. I know what an amazing thing this program is for my family, and it's sad that it looks like it will be discontinued.

So the short recap is this: The 3 1320 plans are moving right along. Tina's house has the roof sheeting on, and looks like a house! (With no doors and windows, of course!) Zhan's house had the trusses rolled out this weekend, so I'm guessing sheeting for the roof will happen this week. Robin's house was the one we were working on. We had all the second story exterior's up, and were starting to frame interiors. I bet that will be done this week easily, and the boys will be rolling trusses on that house next week. Robert and Nathans houses were getting joists so we could put the subfloor down on the second floor. Which means I'm sure we'll be throwing up the exteriors on those next weekend, and I anticipate a few new lumber packages this week as well. The great part is that once we start ONE MORE HOUSE, half the houses will be started. I know this really means nothing, but it SOUNDS accomplished! We've only really been working "full time" since the beginning of March/end of February, and it goes quickly! :)

Your still-slightly-pruny-from-all-that-rain homebuilder,
Heather

Build it, square it, sheet it, lift it. REPEAT

Boy...30 hours a week is a whole additional full time job! Ahren and I were out there for a cumulative 17 hours on Saturday, and then I was out for another 4 hours on Sunday morning. I had to leave because Aubrey's 8th birthday was today, and we had a very important pool party/luau to attend! The childcare definately makes it more challenging, but it's truly tough for everyone. We have someone who works six days a week, people who work funny shifts that span the entire days (like 10 to 7), couples who have to do 20 hours themselves, but one half of the couple is injured/in school/working, etc. We have been SO Blessed in that it's been possible for us to find all day childcare for the kids on Saturdays. This allows us both to go out for 8-10 hours, and then just worry about our other 10 volunteer hours, which if they aren't volunteered we have to do ourselves. I have some amazing, caring, AWESOME neighbors, and they had all their hours all covered, so they gave their and their volunteers time towards our required hours! YAY FOR AWESOME NEIGHBORS! :) So this week, we are all covered (and caught up from last week), and I will breathe easier...for five more days! :)

As far as the technical house stuff, it's going to be VERY boring reading VERY quickly! :) We pretty much do the same thing everyday (which is good, because we have 12 houses to build!) In exciting news, Tina's house got TRUSSES! I mean, you can walk through her house, tell which rooms are which, and it has a ROOF! (Well, it looks like a roof with no actual roof stuff). I pulled into the build site Saturday and Ross was doing the funny "Trying to keep my balance" arm swing. I was none too pleased to realize my husband was in the trusses group (but luckily never saw him on the roof!) Here are some pics:

I framed Nathan's house with Anna, Josh, Selina and Nathan. (I'm thinking I'm forgetting someone, but if I am I'm sorry!) Then after lunch Robert and his brother Shawn and Julie came over and helped us. Sunday morning I did more framing, and the super sweet Brandy came out to help! We saw a deer in the build site, and then put up the tallest wall EVER! Seriously. Look:

It is a bottom floor wall that goes TALL because the stairs go up there! :) We also got to pick out our doors...Ahren and I aren't totally on the same page. We'll see how that goes. And we got the first copy of receipts...it's seriously two inches thick!

As far as the Ben-Judah homestead, Julie (another awesome neighbor) sent me a facebook message Friday to tell me we had slab insulation and rebar, so we were ready for slab to be poured! YAY! :) I didn't get a picture, but you've seen others...it's all the same!

So that's all for this week!

Your Happy Homebuilder,

Heather

Hot off the presses!!!

It took a few days, but I finally found the newspaper article online! YAY! :) This is the version (with multiple pictures) that ran in the March edition of the Kingston Community News...the same text ran in the North Kitsap Herald. Enjoy!

http://www.pnwlocalnews.com/kitsap/kin/news/117188213.html