Day 19 - Crazy Weather

The first picture above was taken right after lunch and we can see Brian installing the cross-bracing and we can also see that it was bright and sunny as it had been all morning. Then around 2 o'clock a big black cloud rolled in and by quitting time, 4:30 (see second picture), it was snowing!
We got a good start on laying down the floor after spending the first part of the day installing insulation around the perimeter, backing along the west wall, levelling the interior joists, and installing the cross-braces. We should be able to glue and nail down the remaining sheets tomorrow, and depending on the amount of snow that accumulates overnight, we could start marking out all the walls onto the floor in the afternoon. The materials for the walls will be delivered tomorrow morning...

Day 18 - Starting the floor

Today we got all the floor joists in place and secured down (this picture was taken at lunchtime). It was nice having Brian helping me today as we got a lot done. Tomorrow we should get most of the plywood down and I will be ordering the material to build the walls! Things seem to be moving along now...

NB: the reason the pictures are sometimes warped as is the one above is that they are made up of 5 or 6 different images and I stitched them together on the computer.

Day 17 - The Swimming Pool

The 2 x 10's for the floor were delivered along with the plywood, but first I had to pump out around three inches of water that covered the entire crawlspace!
Tomorrow, I will have someone helping me so we should get the floor in pretty quick. Hopefully he will be able to continue helping throughout the framing process. I hope have the framing done, including all the walls, by the middle of March because that is when the trusses are scheduled to be delivered.

Day 16 - Pouring the skim coat

The skim coat was poured into the crawl space on Friday without any problems. The guys who did it did a good job and had obviously done this before. Just as they finished it started to rain and hail. Luckily it didn't effect the concrete much, but as it it merely the crawl space it wouldn't have really mattered anyway.

Monday morning I will start framing in the floor, and I won't have to wear my rubber boots anymore! (And I'm not even a poet...)

Day 15 - Pumping water

After a frustrating morning of trying to pump out all the rain water that has collected over the past few days, I finally was able to put in the remaining 'pony wall' and lay down the poly in preparation for the concrete skim coat which will be poured tomorrow. We've got a crew of concrete finishers who will come in the morning and pour both the skim coat in the crawl space and the slab in the garage. But, of course, it will depend on the weather. Meanwhile, I will be and have been helping out my dad who came home from his holidays to find out both his guys quit on him while he was away! He's been desperate in finding skilled labour with no criminal records. One of his latest jobs is moving furniture in the RCMP building (to allow the carpet layers to lay carpet) and has had five different guys rejected due to past criminal offenses!
So next week I get to finally start framing in the floor. We should see lots of progress from here on in...

Day 13 - Welcome back

After two beautiful weeks in the sun, I'm welcomed back to the job site with a full day of rain. And unfortunately the concrete did not get poured while I was away due to the soft, wet ground it was to be poured on. I am going to have to pump the water out and compact the ground before the skim coat gets poured, but this has to be done when it's not raining. This will probably set me back a few days as it's still raining pretty hard outside. I did however get the bottom plates bolted to the foundation so I'm into the wood! Sorry, no picture today as it was raining pretty hard all day and besides, it pretty much looks the same as it did when I left.