Come see the place!

The date might change, BUT YOU ARE INVITED!

 Come tour Double Oak!

October 18, Saturday, 3:00-5:00

Come and go. No program.

Walk the paths (prepare for poison ivy) and write on the walls of our house.

(Your words might be a poem or inspirational quotation, a joke, a blessing, a Bible verse.

What words should be buried for all time in the walls of our house?
In the quiet will they whisper to us?)

Light refreshments.

Contact us for directions: SusanMarkLandis@gmail.com

Hope to see you!

(Have words but can't come? Send them!)

OSB on the roof and walls (or, I'm rotten at headlines)

These are the days progress is fast. As one person commented when the roof is on and the outside walls are up, it looks 90% done but there is yet 90% to do.

 

OSB board, Zip Board, on the west side. You can see a tree Dennis is trying to save, even though it is scraggly and perhaps cuts off our access to wireless internet. Opinions?

This shot is inside the house toward the west end where the main living space is: dining by the large window on your right, north, and sofa and chairs at the end. The shorter window to your left is over the kitchen sink. The heating/cooling consultant thinks we might have too many windows, but we love sun and the view.

Here is what we'll see while doing the dishes. This west slope will likely be terraced. You can see prairie grass.

Dennis climbed the scaffolding to look out the tower window. The east slope will be wheel chair accessible to the lower level.


The crew nailing OSB on the roof. The final layer will be steel.

This shot is from the northwest: garage on the left, living area on the right, tower in the middle, sand everywhere.

The crew put room dividers on the main floor so we could get a feel for spaces. We discovered the mudroom/laundry room was the most spacious in the house. Dennis made some changes and my office space benefitted. (SML photo and all that follow, but you can easily tell the inferior quality.)

I have trouble believing that the closet on your left is deep enough for a hanger. Most of the rooms seem teeny.































Dennis borrowed the skid steer from the crew to clear a 5' path on each side of the driveway. Why is it called a skid steer? Because of the tracks, one basically steers by skidding this way and that. Note the cage for possible roll overs.

You can't tell, but Dennis has a huge grin on his face: a man and his new toy.

The spirit, not the letter

The days it didn't rain this week, the crew set roof trusses.

"Setting trusses while obeying the spirit of OSHA if not the letter" Dennis

View from the northeast. Notice the sand!

Walk out, walk in

 (9.6.2014) The big excavating equipment came back end of this week to fill in around the house and rough in the basement walkout. Dennis commented that the drivers handled the equipment like toys.

Main floor walls are up. Now that the house is easier to access,

Dennis enjoys standing at the windows and looking out.

water proofing the foundation walls

 

 View from the south with walk out, accessible basement for guests

(the not visible, east slope is gentle)

Dennis has been collecting rocks for landscaping. Here is his prize.

Reclaimed barn wood

(9.5.2014) One of our goals is to be environmentally sensitive as we build. We've found that researching and finding alternative sources is more time consuming and difficult than we imagined. Case in point: I want to reuse old wood, wide boards, for flooring. We possibly need over 2000 square feet of installed wood.

 

We had thought we'd find several people locally who take down barns and maintain inventory of that size. Instead, we found only one person, who has been in business for about a year. His warehouse is in Lafayette, IN, more than a two hour drive. But we have time, so Wednesday we made a day of the trip. Here are snapshots (meaning that Susan took them) of Aaron's wood at Wabash Lumber (http://www.wabashlumber.com/).

 

This is the side of Aaron's office, made of scraps. He said it attracts more attention than pieces he put together more intentionally. Much of his wood is sold to crafts folks who make items from it, or to people who use it as siding for an accent wall.

A pile of various kinds of scrap wood

Barn rafters such as we hope to use. The unexpected problem? They need time in a kiln to dry the wood and kill any insects, nails taken out, milled to correct size. This process may take 2-3 months and we need 50% more wood to begin with than we need to finish. ouch, ouch, ouch

Possible decorative beams. Ideas where to use them? We have one from Wayne county, a family from Oak Grove, but we'd need to add other beams.

We had lunch at the local Indian buffet, Sharma Kitchen. Some of the entries I'd not had often before, including one with goat meat (on bone).

Fresh naan and hot chicken and onions were brought to the table--a delicious touch.

But the great news here in Goshen is that the local Indian restaurant opened today!

Dennis is checking other places for wood, perhaps including used gym floors, which would be perfect for the gathering room.

Walls, a door opening, a floor

(August 30, 2014) It's beginning to look like a house! By the end of Friday, the basement walls were up, the trusses laid for the main floor and the plywood hammered on. Every seen a power hammer? Work goes amazingly fast using one of those!

 

South basement wall nearly ready to go up

 

Basement, from the east, apartment end, through the gathering room, Dennis' office, guest room and bath, to storage

Walk out basement from the south east. The land isn't shoved correctly yet. Likely we can't landscape until spring. I have vowed to plant some bulbs anyway. One must have crocus and daffodils to watch to see if spring will actually arrive!

(Susan)

Framing time and house

(August 22, 2014) Our builder gave us a time frame this week. The goal is to finish the house by the end of November. Three understandable qualifications: he can't control the weather, timing of subcontractors and our changes of mind. I'm guessing we'll move in on the coldest, snowiest day of 2015. I promise cocoa to anyone who helps!

Dennis meets with the builder Thursday mornings. Yesterday guys were smoothing the basement floor, after the plumbing was done, for laying concrete. Tools included skid steer, shovel, rake and hands. Both the plumbers and these cement folks commented that sand is much nicer to work with than clay. Glad to oblige. Anything to make the job easier.

When the first floor wall studs go up, we'll invite you to come write on them. Contribute a poem or prayer or joke or drawing or anything that should be foundational to a house that provides welcome shelter to family and friends. If you aren't local, we'll do the writing for you. Maybe we can have another gathering! Dennis has cleared lots of paths that you can walk. Some have huge cottonwoods across them, but some are more accessible. He has cleared out the yellow jacket nest near one that unpleasantly surprised him. Let us know if you wonder where the paths begin.

Eight truckloads of cement

Dennis' photos speak for themselves . . .at least until he has more to say about them. You'll see a cement pumper.

 

 

 

 Dennis calls this "dancing with cement."

Laying our foundation in the sand

Yesterday the forms went up and today (7-29-2014) the cement trucks are coming. Dennis says three are currently lined up and five more are on the way.

 

Not only are we building in the sand, but it looks like we are building fewer than the typical four walled structure. The other sides are where the basement is open to the outside (a walk out) so it is more useable to other people and groups. There will be walls.

 

Foot by foot

 

These are footers for the house. Not much else to say other than another step, hooray!

 

 

Yes, the house matters greatly, but we are there because of the land. Butterfly weed a week ago:

 



Digging the basement

 You did hope for daily updates, didn't you? After months of nothing happening, the fast changes during excavation are a sigh of relief and broad grin exciting. The sad part is seeing the changes to the pristine land. However, Dennis did explain to me that we are piling the sand from the basement in a pit where sand was removed who-knows-how-many decades ago, so we are actually restoring the land.

  Here is an view of the almost complete excavation. The walk out part of the basement will be done later. If you have ideas about how to accomplish that so people downstairs don't feel like they are sitting in a dishpan, we'd love your ideas. Because we are building on sand, some of the process is different and the hole is larger to ward off slides. You'll note that we have brilliant excavators--they left themselves a way out (Unlike the steam shovel hero of our youth).

 
 

Get out your magnifying glass to see the amazing technology here. See the tripod in front of the truck, above? It is sending out a beam at exactly the correct height for the basement when received by the sensor on the bulldozer. Below you can see better the receiver. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To pack down the garage floor, they filled the dump truck and drove back and forth a bunch of times. (Sorry, I can't be more exact than the information I've been given.)

This is the west wall of the basement as outlined by the orange sticks. Pouring begins on Monday. (Yes, we've heard the admonition about building a house on the sand many times. But way down there is plenty of rock. WAAAAAAAAY down.)

Here is the pile of top soil, such as it is, that is being saved for backfill. Going to need enrichment if we are to grow much, although we do hope to mostly plant natives. I have a few favorites I perhaps will work in on the sly.

 



 Turns out the wheels aren't actually taller than Dennis is. What a relief!

 

Friday we leave for a long weekend in the mountains of PA with Dennis' cousins. This information matters to you because that assures you won't get more photos until Tuesday. Sorry that I can't get the photo outlines to size, leaving lots of white space. Go dig in the dirt this weekend . . .It is great fun!