DAY 24- 2nd Entry

While the carpenters didn't seem to accomplish much today, the concrete contractors did manage to build the forms for 3 of the 4 (or more) retaining walls. The first 2 pictures of walls, are change orders, that is not included in the original contract, so more money.
There was a lot of debate about whether this wall should be at 90 degrees or at at angle. The decision was to keep it square at 90 degrees. A stairway will eventually be built up to the upper level and a path.

Wall to the Right of the Lower Garage

This picture is of the wall to the left of the man cave on the lower level.

 

And the pony wall, which WAS included in the contract (the picture is the same as the above, so I am now lost).  Concrete pouring is scheduled to occur next Wednesday.

And the work on the upper garage sub floor continues-

More Monday..... 

DAY 24- NOT MUCH PROGRESS

I tease Craig, our contractor, about when he is going to do some actual "work". He has been great about organizing and getting the subs there on time and being sure that everything flows smoothly, but up until yesterday, he didn't do actual construction work.
Because of the lack of building going on in this small community, all the other contractors primarily do their own "sub" work. The concrete subs, are actually general contractors, who would have like to do the whole job, but they actually are doing just the concrete (very nicely I might add).
So Craig's plan is to help Tom with the carpentry. I believe Tom is also a contractor from down the hill, but needs work, so he is being a carpenter.
Tom has been here most of the week, but up until today, although Craig wears his tool belt, we hadn't actually seen him (Craig) do carpentry work.  However, today Philip caught him with a hammer in his hand. Mind you, the first picture was supposed to be of Craig doing work, but as you can see, he is supervising.
Sorry about the fuzziness- things were just moving SOOO fast, it blurred.

Craig "Just About" Working

Craig Actually Working and Tom Supervising

Until Monday......

Day 22-23- Upper and Lower Garage Prep

With the back fill completed and lumber delivered, the carpenter guys started building the sub frame for the upper garage's concrete slab. There will be a 3 " concrete slab poured over the wood, somewhat suspended.

The concrete guys also started work on the lower garage slab, in preparation for pouring the the 4 " slab (to support a "lift") next week. The wing walls also will be built and hopefully poured next week as well. They are to hold in the dirt from slipping down the slope.

I headed back to the Bay Area home for final preparations for the big wedding in October.

DAY 21- Foundation Cured, and Backfill Done

After a busy weekend with the setting of the alarm, I hoped to sleep in today, to no avail. Clunking started at 0730 outside as Greg, the excavator started pushing around dirt to do the backfill. Soon Craig knocked on the door asking the cars be moved out of the way.
The big truck was here to dump gravel into the backfill space where the french drain would be going.

Dumping Gravel

Once that was done, the guys removed the snap ties from the concrete and filled the holes, while Greg moved dirt around the lot, filling the gaps and smoothing the soil out.

Backfilled and smoothed

Meanwhile, sister and I went to water aerobics for our exercise (no pictures)
When Danny arrived, he worked on creating the upper driveway so the upper garage framing could begin tomorrow. Several truckloads of dirt were carried away today. The guys worked late, not leaving until after 5 PM.

Upper driveway

It was a struggle, but I managed to complete this posting with my new Apple MacPro. Since I flunked iPhone, this has been a challenge and VERY different and non-intuitive. 

CALLING IT DAY 20- The Footings/Foundations are Completed

By last Friday, the footings and foundations were poured with concrete and the forms removed.

Contractor Craig Supervising

These are all new words to me, but I am learning as we go along. Concrete will still need to be poured for the garage floors, and for the multitude of "retaining walls" and curbs, that are "work orders" to the original contract- meaning more  $$$$.
The walls must cure for at least a week before any "backfill" of dirt is done. That is filling up the holes beside the foundation where space was left to be able to build and remove the forms.

Rebar inside the walls

The Beautiful Wall- still wet

Curing and the yard cleaned up

The man cave/work room is on the lower left, with a 1/2 bath, and a staircase up to the upper garage and storage room, which will be over the man cave. The lower garage is on the right and is 25 X30 feet. The upper garage is the entire upper area and is 25X40 (minus a bit for the storage area), and the entrance to my 10X30 storage room. The garage floor will have concrete poured over a wood subfloor.

Engineer husband kind of laughs at me, because these building words are new words and concepts to me. So I can tell him about his health  and medicine in words he doesn't know either. We share knowledge of the computer world, as we have been brought together over time from our original occupations (nurse and civil engineer) to computer project managers/analysts. 

Out in the garden in the evening, this buck sat posing for husband to take his picture. He was a very big buck and beautiful, and is probably waiting for the garden to be installed so he can have his pick of delicious flowers that we think he (deer) won't want. 

And of course, we need to have pictures of our babies- looking out at the world where they cannot go.

The BIG Pour and More

Although I was not present for "the Big Pour", that is pouring concrete into the big foundation walls, nor do I yet have pictures, I can report that the inspector approved the forms for filling, it took 2 loads of concrete to do the fill, and the forms have been removed and the big walls look really nice, if concrete walls can look nice. Craig, our contractor, was insistent that any walls we would be able to see, be "pretty", and hence, the plywood for forms, as mentioned before. I will add pictures as soon as I receive them.
I did manage to transfer the pictures off my mobile phone to my computer, so here is the turkey that sister mentioned in her blog.

This turkey is terrorizing the town, with Betty avoiding walking in our neighborhood for fear of it, and the neighbor lady said the turkey bit her. We saw the turkey in the road while we were driving, and it was in the road and close by. The turkey chased us when we drove away. We are thinking that perhaps there are baby turkeys around, and this is a protective parent (see the other turkey in the background).
More tomorrow when I have Pour Pictures. Then "curing" for 1-2 weeks.
Next week we are hoping to have four trees trimmed, but the tree people are very busy, and very non-committal, so that chore may have to wait.

Week 4- Lost Track of the Day

We arrived back at the Mountain House, opened the doors and smelled smoke-like a burning forest fire. After wandering around outside and determining that it didn't seem to be nearby, we closed up the doors and retired to bed. Upon awakening in the morning, I opened the doors, then quickly closed them again, as it was still smoky outside. There was a forest fire still burning, but it was quite far away to be smelling the smoke. When husband woke up and looked out the window, he SAW smoke coming up from just over the deck at our house. He hurried down stairs and discovered that there was a smoldering area where a tree trunk had been removed several years ago, and the hole filled up with the ground up tree stump. It had also been treated for termites. So it appeared that this smoldering fire which was like a peat fire, had started by spontaneous combustion. He pulled out the garden hose and quickly extinguished the fire.

We were very lucky it was a still night and no wind was blowing, or we may have been rebuilding the house as well as the garage. Husband is digging up the remnants and filling it with dirt (the brown area back by the post).
The forms are almost completed, with the inspector coming on Tuesday and more concrete pouring on Wednesday, the forms removed on Thursday, then quiet for at least a week.

Man cave to the left, lower garage to the right and upper garage at the back of the picture. The upper garage will have concrete poured over a suspended wood floor.

The plywood forms are used so there is a smoother wall where the wall is visible on the final garage.

Meanwhile, providing the tree trimmer "makes it here", the trees (in the background) will be trimmed of dead branches and shaped as many trees which interferred with their growth are now gone.
I couldn't pass up this picture of my Bentley boy stretched out on the blanket. The sable brown cat sleeps on the dark blanket and the platinum cats sleeps on the white blanket, presumably for camoufalge. He is such a relaxed cat.

 Off to the Labor Day BBQ....