PHASE FOUR Week 28 - Tile Trouble

Week of December 8th - The drywall was finished and floor tiling begun. All went well until my husband noticed that spacers were not used and the tile in the master bathroom looked terrible. The squares weren't lined up and the spaces between the tiles vary in width from thick to thin! The guys were trying to match it up with the walls, which have discovered are out of square, in some places by an inch or more. Luckily we caught it in time, spent two hours Thursday night pulling it off, scraping off mud, and scraping and smoothing the floor. We had planned on putting up Xmas tree lights and decorations on our two-week old tree - we've been so busy with this house that we haven't had the time or the inclination - but such is life when you contract out your own home. We DO like our crew, but have found that we need to be there several times a day to make sure things are done our way and to make sure they have everything they need***We have decided on the colors for our walls and will be painting the drywall ourselves this weekend. One of the guys, Joe, is going to help, a relief to me as I was worried about standing on scaffolds in the master bedroom and bath (18 foot walls!). We chose cheerful earth tones, "Meadow" green for the mud room, Alabaster (very cheerful yellow-beige) for the guest bedroom, a very pretty color whose name I've forgotten (sort of a Cinnamon-clay color) for the office and guest bathroom, and Seafoam (a gorgeous green) for the master bedroom and bath. We looked at hundreds of colors, purchased 7 samples, painted them on scrap drywall, then took them out to the house to see how they looked with the logs and tile. Luckily Norman and I have almost identical taste and agreed 100% on the colors.

PHASE FOUR Week 27 Landscaping & Drywall

Week of Dec 1st - ***Our landscaping was finished last week and our lawn is covered with straw. Our river rock was also delivered and looks nice underneath the deck. I spent almost an entire day raking the front yard prior to planting the seed due to all the leaves that had fallen. It snowed two days after we planted and I took a pretty picture of the house covered in snow, but accidentally deleted it! Anyway, the snow is mostly gone now, leaving very soggy, messy yard. ****Most of our dry wall has now been put up and the "mudding" will begin today. I've learned that it takes three coats of "mud" and that we will need to keep our kerosene heater running 24-7 so the mud will dry properly. (As we speak it is 19 degrees outside.) ****We've ordered our tile and next week the flooring should begin. Our cabinet maker came out this week for final measurements and said the cabinets should be ready in about three weeks.

PHASE FOUR Weeks 25 & 26 - Color Our House Honey

Weeks of November 19th & 24th - The weather is turning colder and rainy, which has delayed the exterior rail staining and landscaping, but the interior logs have been sanded and cleaned. Since the days seem to be growing shorter and colder rapidly, we are now using a powerful diesel heater supplied by our crew, and lights we purchased. Our crew wanted us to see if we could get more power into the house and we could for $500-$600 more, so we had to decline. The main issue is that everyone has to stop working a bit early and that power tools don't work as well. *****Norman and I spent the last two weekends cleaning the guest bedroom side of the house and caulking the entire house. For those of you who don't know, cracks in logs are normal, but I'm not too crazy about them and we filled in most of them, especially the bigger cracks. ***Our crew is staining the interior of the house this week and it looks great. We are applying one coat of stain and two coats of acrylic topcoat, so it should have a beautiful satin finish.. The ceilings and trim will be a natural pine color, a nice contrast, and will also have two coats.***Our landscaping rocks for under the prow deck have been delivered and should be laid out today. I was a bit disappointed in the color (a bit too reddish for my taste), but they will blend in alright.

PHASE FOUR: Weeks 22, 23 & 24 - Interior Work

Weeks of October 27th, Nov 3rd & Nov 10th - Wow, hard to believe that three weeks have gone by. Norman has been ill for most of that time, probably with the flu, missing two weeks of work. He did rev up enough to play a gig for the TPAC (Tennessee Psychological Association) annual convention in Nashville on November 7th. Our friend Eva, who has a beautiful voice, played with him and they sounded great despite the fact that he was a bit flaky what with the heavy cough & decongestant meds! We had hopes of doing all of our interior staining, but have ditched that idea along with our goal of moving in by Christmas. Here's why: Although we are not "old," we have both past age 50 a good while back and don't bounce back the way we once did! We have put so much pressure on ourselves to do much of the work ourselves and to get it done quickly that it is probably a factor in Norman's getting sick, and neither of us had been sleeping well. We have done very well so far in staying on budget, but we have decided that spending a bit extra for labor and finishing is well worth it. Both of us feel good about this decision, are sleeping better, and are now back to being excited rather than stressed about our home. It may be January or February before we move in, but that's OK. I read somewhere that it takes the average log home "owner-builder" 11 months to complete a log home, and it will take us 6-8 months, so we are still ahead of the game!
Here are highlights for the past three weeks:
****All of our fixed windows are now installed.
****While I was finishing up our tongue and groove sealing on our prow deck, I got attacked by hordes of ladybugs! No kidding, there were thousands of them flocking around and on me and in the stain, to the point where I had to move everything inside. I'm told this is an annual event around here!
****The exterior staining is done except for the deck railings and spindles and looks great! We had a moment of panic this weekend when it snowed and we saw white streaks and spots all over our stain! A call to our stain company put our minds at ease, though, after they explained it is something called the "blushing effect" that will go away as the weather warms up. It appeared because it actually takes up to three weeks for the stain to "cure" and very cold weather can cause temporary spots.
****We have decided to stain the interior logs a light honey, leaving the ceiling and trim work natural pine. After seeing the ceilings up and the vast expanses of light pine everywhere, it began to bother us that our floors and cabinets are also very light (natural hickory) in color and we decided we needed a contrast. The light honey color complements the exterior dark honey and is really just a shade or two darker than the natural pine color. (If anyone is interested, go to the Permachink website and look up the color.) .
****Gutters are installed - a brown color that looks good with the colors of the roof and stonework.
****Front and mudroom doors (mahogany) are trimmed out and delivered. They will be stained a "chestnut brown" shade which goes with the gutters, roof and stonework (and the knots in the logs!) Norman and I will be staining them this weekend (Nov 22nd).
****We went ahead and finished our attic after all (except for heat and air) and love it! We had some leftover log siding, so put that in the gable sides and put tongue and groove in the ceiling. The attic floor and ceiling are both insulated with R-30 so we can bring a small heater or AC unit upstairs if we need to, but it should stay fairly cool in the summer and warm in the winter. We then had 4' knee walls built with very cute doors (sort of cross-buck style) made for the openings which will give us storage space on two sides 6' deep and about 18' long. We will probably floor it with carpet (later). Norman is going to use this as his music room, so he is thrilled about that! It will be about 13' x 18' or about 250 square feet!
****We got a great bid/offer by our "mountain man," Ronnie, to do a lot of clearing and landscaping in the woods around our home, so took him up on it and it looks great! It is now much more open and improves our view of rock outcroppings to the East and Jump Off Ridge to the South. As far as the landscaping around our house to the tree line, Charles Thomas' crew began "dressing up" the land (final backfilling and leveling) and seed sowing this week (November 17th). A couple of weeks ago he and our electrician set up our permanent electric meter on a post about 60' from the house, as Norman didn't want it stuck on the front of the house. We are going to paint it and landscape around it (disguise it as a bird feeder or something - ha!)
****All of our tongue & groove ceilings are done and look amazing. Our insulation is done. We really went all out with the insulation, putting R-30 in all ceilings, R-19 in almost all of our walls and closets, and R13 in the gabled areas with siding (because R-19 wouldn't fit). We have noticed, as has our crew, how much warmer it is in the house, even in cold weather, because of this, and how very quiet! I was startled to hear that very few people in this are use R-30, using R-19 instead. We would have actually preferred R-38, but our cathedral ceilings are not built to accommodate that (a design change we would probably have made if we had known better!).
Projections/Next Projects: The guys (Sam Thornley and his crew of two, brother Joe and friend Skip) are currently preparing the great room and master bedroom/bathroom side of the house for staining and sealing, sanding and cleaning the logs. We are doing the other side of the house ourselves to save money (and because we don't have to climb scaffolds to do it!). They are also doing a bit of trim work. Following that, they will be doing more trim work, laying tile, hanging drywall, hanging and trimming out our doors (after Norman and I stain and seal them), then laying our wood floors. After the floors go down our cabinets and granite will be installed, then our electrican/plumber/HVAC guys will connect everything for the final inspection. We think we will be done with all before the end of the year (S).

PHASE FOUR Weeks 20 & 21 - Interior Work

Weeks of October 13th & 20th -

***Last week & weekend Norman and I FINALLY finished applying our log preservative and pesticide treatment and our subs finished the interior log siding in the great room. ***This week our subs are working on insulation, trim for the windows, and caulking of the exterior logs so that staining can begin next week. We are also putting some good flooring in our attic (not OSB board) and insulating the attic rafters as well as the floor as we will probably want to finish it at off at some point. We have 570 s/f of attic space, so there is room for plenty of storage plus a small room (maybe an exercise room).

***We met with our landscaping consultant who has taken soil samples and come up with a beginning plan for us. This guy is pretty cool, by the way, with "decades" of experience in plant biology. He is a naturalist who also into wholistic healing and big on organic farming. Want to bet that he also subscribes to Mother Earth Magazine (as do we)? He has tested our soil, which is about as hard as concrete right now and contains various toxins, and will grown almost nothing until we rework it. We are to have it turned 4-6 inches, mixing it with granulated gypsum. Gypsum, we have learned, will encapsulate all of our toxins and provide several needed nutrients for our soil such as calcium and carbon. Next we are to plan oat seeds and Austrian winter peas over the whole site and to cover all with straw. Once the oats and peas are about 1" tall, we spread a fertilizer called Greensand over it with one of those handheld spreaders.

*****Charles Thomas, who did all of our excavation, is going to give us a price to do all of this, along with completing the ditch for our underground electric , closing it up, and setting up our electric meter about 60 feet from the house. (If we put the meter on the house it will be an eyesore we can't disguise, so a friend suggested we move it a few feet away from the house. This will also be much nicer for the meter reader, as he won't have to get as close to our barking doggies.) In addition to owning and using heavy machinery, Charles owns a local nursery and was filled with good ideas on inexpensive landscaping. He also helped us decide where to locate our final parking area/driveway, suggesting that we add another turnaround. It will be on the left side of the house as you drive up then a walkway (probably of flagstone) will lead from the driveway to the house. Since we will end up with two attached turnarounds on our driveway, I guess we should rename our home CRAZY EIGHT BLUFF DRIVE!?

***We have also hired back our "mountain man," Ronnie, to haul off our most recent huge pile of construction debris, to chop up and haul off various and assorted branches and wood debris, to help us with the staining next week, and to put plastic (moisture vapor) under the house. Ronnie don't read or write and I had to pay him soon as he filled his truck with the first load so he would have enough gas to haul our stuff off. We hear his wife takes his pay as soon as he gets home every day and they go out to eat with it.

***We are putting up temporary doors this week so we can get the house secured. One of our subs has some old ones he is letting us use. The front and mud room doors we will have are being framed and won't be ready for at least three more weeks.*** We have contracted with an alarm company that will do the preliminary wiring in the next few days before the interior is completely finished. ***DECISION ABOUT DOOR KNOBS HAVE FINALLY BEEN MADE (That was agonizing, thanks Mother, Dad & Marti, for your advice - we have gone with oil rubbed bronze exterior knobs & handsets, and antique nickel interior knobs, which should complement our brushed nicked bathroom & kitchen fixtures.

****As I write it is a rainy Friday. We have to get our T & G cathedral ceiling sealed so that's our weekend project. We WILL, however, be taking at least a few hours off for the UT game, watching it at the home of our friends Bethany & Tim. Go VOLS!

PHASE THREE: Weeks 17, 18, & 19 - Rough In

Weeks of Sept. 22, 29 & October 6 - (Click on the photos and you can see more detail. We are very happy with the way our roof, siding, and fireplace have turned out.) I can't believe I have let three weeks go by without updating this blog! Things have been very intense, with lots of final decisions agonized over and made (such as electrical fixtures, lighting and appliances). Would you believe I spent two days and went to 3-4 places looking for bathroom fans, then ended up back at the first place to buy them? We THOUGHT we were prepared, but the pace has become so fast that our heads are spinning (call me Linda Blair!). OK, here are the highlights:

****Our electrical, plumbing, and HVAC has been "roughed in," our shingles & final roofing is done, our fireplace has been completed, and some of the interior log siding has been put up. Our fixed windows are also in (except for one apparently measured wrong), but I don't have a picture showing them yet). At times we had as many as 10 subs, including their employees, on the site! Luckily they all know each other and are on good terms, so they didn't seem too perturbed when they had to step over and around each other**** Our fireplace guys are a change, as our original subs were several weeks behind. The good news is that they completed the fireplace and stone veneer in less than three weeks and saved us well over $4,000 in the process! We did have some communication problems as none of them speak English (all hispanics), but we were able to communicate through their boss (the owner of A1 Building Supply, Carl Mount, a great guy!)****We passed our county framing and rough-in inspection, albeit with a few comments about some of the plumbing (nothing that didn't meet code, but our inspector wants above and beyond code at times).***After getting one estimate for over $700 to haul away our four piles of construction debris, we hooked up with a local mountain guy who did it for about $300. Poor Ronnie can't read or write, but he worked hard for us and did a good job. He also does lots of miscellaneous chores others don't seem interested in at the rate of (get this) $12 (cash) an hour! We are going to use him to help us stain our home, a chore we have decided to do ourselves to save money and because we are convinced we will do a better job than anyone else (OK, except for that bid of well over $9,000 that we couldn't afford!). ****We still spend every weekend policing the joint (cleaning up, for those of you younger than mud). Last weekend we began to prepare to apply our Shell Guard (combo pest and wood rot treatment containing borax). Norman took off work today and will take off tomorrow because it is taking us longer than expected. Hopefully, by this weekend we will be ready to begin staining our logs.

SUB OBSERVATIONS: Overall, we have been pleased with our subcontractors. However, we have unfortunately learned to believe the home building books when they say you really can't completely trust anyone and must be there to closely supervise. Here's today's example: We have a crew who is doing most of post-rough-in work such as insulation, drywall, ceiling and floor installation, etc. We really like these guys, but have been disappointed in the quality of some of their work. Today, for example, they began to install some batts installation. I noticed that while about 70% of it was done correctly, some of it was cut wrong and literally crammed-in, made-to-fit. I knew how it was supposed to be installed because I had read about it over and over again. I had to confront them and it upset me (a lot more than it did them, I think). I simply told them that I needed for them to redo it, that insulation really can't be compressed and needs to be cut to fit. The just looked at me and nodded. (Later when I checked, they had redone it, but some of it was still a bit tight. It wasn't something I couldn't live with,. so I let it go.) ON THE UPSIDE OF THIS, later that day we received a pleasant surprise from these same guys. We had had some concrete delivered for a small concrete pad for our prow steps. There was some concrete left over, so our subs and the concrete delivery guy decided to pour concrete into the holes we had dug over the weekend for our new gate. (We had posts sitting in the holes). They not only poured the cornet, they leveled the posts, saving us some time and effort. I don't know if our guys felt guilty and/or embarrassed over the insulation criticism or were just being nice (and they ARE NICE GUYS), but this just goes to show that to err is human and ... to then throw in a nice surprise for the boss makes it a whole lot better! (S)

P.P.S. We have fleas! Our neighbor's dog, a daily visitor actually named Peehead, has left his mark!

Week 16 - 0 to 100MPH again

Week of 9/15/08 Things are finally beginning to flow once again! The past week we have gone from having one to three crews (10 guys) working on the site.

*Our pictures depict the start of our fireplace and our house with stone veneer and completed decks and porches.

* Our new bid for the fireplace came in at well over $4,000 less than our old bid and they are doing a beautiful job. We have made friends with the owner of A-1 Building, Carl, who is personally supervising the fireplace construction and was even at the site all day last Saturday! Norman discovered his place accidentally as no one had told us about him and he doesn't advertise. He sells mainly to contractors, but is giving us the same prices! Carl is fascinated by our fireplace as it is new to him (you can't buy Acucraft fireplaces in TN). He also loves coming to the bluff and seeing how the house is going - says there are no comparable views except in Gatlinburg. Carl also gave us a great deal on the manufactured stone siding, which we decided to extend all the way around the house (forget that latticework on the prow side - stone will be zero maintenance!) Thanks to Carl, we are now back in great shape budget-wise.

*Other accomplishments: Our decks & porches, including handrails and spindles, are all done, our tubs and showers are framed in, and our interior log siding has begun. The plumbing is almost complete and the HVAC guy has done a walk-through with us and the plumber to decide on where our vents & returns will go. Our window trim has been redone and looks good. We have made arrangements to have all of our site trash hauled off next weekend.

*Norman and I once again spend much of the weekend doing clean-up. Actually, I picked up and raked up debris, and he sanded all of our interior log walls. We had made a decision to extend the interior walls from the great room area into the kitchen/dining area and are very happy with this.

Weeks 14 & 15 GLITCHES

Weeks of 9/1/08 & 9/8/08 - Highlights:

****Almost nothing was done the week of Labor Day weekend as our subs weren't ready. We did meet with Steve Feeley, a landscaping consultant, who is going to give us some good, basic start-up ideas. We also put in about 15 hours picking up trash and wood scraps. The weekend after Labor Day weekend we spent most of the weekend sanding our interior logs in preparation for cleaning and sealing them ourselves. We decided not to stain them because they are just too gorgeous the way they are!

****This past week (9/8/08) our main interior and finishing sub, Sam Thornley and his crew (buddy Skip & brother Joe), did get our stairs and spindles installed as well as a small 5x4 deck for our mud room. They also put up most of our interior log siding in the great room. It all looks good. I never thought I would get excited about round wooden spindles, but they are so much prettier than the "ripped" ones simply nailed to the railing (and, of course, about 3X more expensive!).

****We purchased all of our staining supplies and finally decided on a beautiful dark honey color.

****We are going to be cleaning and applying Shell-Guard RTU (insecticide guaranteed for life)to our logs inside and out and staining the interior of our home with a clear coat adding UV protection to it - because finances are getting tighter and the bids for those jobs are higher than we think they should be.

****The posts holding up our porches and decks are not set and bolted in concrete per code, and have to be fixed before we can pass the rough-in inspection (J.R. Neal dry-in crew).

****The building crew headed by J.R. Neal also failed to drill all of the holes needed for electrical wire.

****After some initial resistance, Battle Creek agreed to make good on the above, but we don't know yet when, as the crew works out of KY and will have to come back to TN to fix things. (Will find out on 9/14/08).

****Finishing nails were not used on our trim so we will have to figure out how to cover up large nail heads when we stain.

****The trim for the fixed windows that we thought we got such a good deal on were done backwards, the window sill on the outside. Also, when our window guy came out to measure for our fixed windows, he refused to do so, saying he would guarantee they would leak. One estimate for replacing and correcting the trim is $600 labor, not including materials. We will discuss this with J.R. Neal when he returns to correct the other above errors, but don't have any confidence that he knows how to do the sills correctly (maybe we'll get a refund, at least?!)

****Our fireplace guys, who told us two weeks ago that they were running 2-3 weeks behind, now tell us that it will be about 3 more weeks. We are getting another bid next week from some folks who can start next week if we accept their bid.

****We are installing a gate as people coming down our country road think our driveway is now the main road.

****We are still in fairly good spirits, but are realizing that almost everyone in this business is fallible (except for Freddie, our world-famous log home salesman, who is simply a wonderful guy) and that we really must be more on the ball in terms of inspecting people's work.

Weeks 12 & 13 - Dry In

Week of 8/18/08 and 8/25/08 - The dry-in went amazing fast and the J.R Neal construction crew and Battle Creek construction manager, Lee Cardin, were very friendly and professional. We treated the crew to brownies, fruit and other goodies each week and they went out of their way to patiently answer our questions. We did experiences some "glitches," however: 1) We learned during the dry-in period that our log home company does not frame out those windows or the doorways for the front and mudroom doors that we are buying ourselves. My husband had to make a trip to the window company to find out the specifics. The dry-in crew graciously agreed to handle this, for a fee of $25 per window which sounded reasonable to us; 2) We realized that our bathroom windows were too high and needed to be cut lower, our error. We had an emergency conference call with Battle Creek on the increased size of the windows. Once again, the dry-in crew & the construction manager came to the rescue. This time we used the barter system: three cases of beer and two chain saw blades! 3) Our fireplace foundation was finally capped off after a consult with our fireplace guys and our fireplace insert was ordered and received. However, we could not, at first, figure out how to easily get a two-pallet fireplace insert weighing a total of 950+250 lbs inside the house. (This was not something our dry-in crew was excited about handling.) My SMART hubby finally came up with a plan: He offered Collins' Building Supply, who is to deliver our wood floors, $100 to stop by our house, pick up the pallets, and use their truck's lift to lift it onto the porch. He will then use a pallet lifter he is borrowing from a local veggie merchant to scoop it up, into the house and (hopefully) onto the fireplace foundation; 4) We have water leaks. It rained ferociously for 2-3 days on the 25th & 26th and water leaked through the valleys where the middle roof and two lower-pitched roofs meat. The log home company said it was normal for that much rain, that the roofing felt couldn't hold it. We consulted with our roofer (who has 40 years' experience, but was in Alabama) & he told us that the felt was probably not laid correctly. He also said it was a bad idea for him to go ahead and lay down flashing and shingles until the fireplace was completed. (Our fireplace roof goes through the middle of the house.) Another friend said the same thing. Norman and I spent hours sucking up water with a wet-dry vac; 5) The fifth glitch is related to the fireplace. When we called our fireplace subs to let them know that we would be ready for them the first week of September (which is what we had been telling them for at least 6 weeks), they told us that they would be tied up on another job for at least 2-3 more weeks. This was rather upsetting, as due to the aforementioned leaks, we can not have any interior work done (such as dry-wall, electric, HVAC or plumbing) until the fireplace is done and the roof is shingled. I was told that they would try to find a mason to get things started for us and that they would call us back soon; 6) Trash: We didn't realize how exhausting picking up trash and stacking waste lumber would be. We have spent the entire last three weekends doing this and have the aches and pains to show for it. We are going to have to spend a few hundred dollars to have it all hauled off, but it will be well worth it. NOW FOR SOME GOOD NEWS: 1) My husband realized that I had allowed nearly $5,000 for flooring the attic with tongue and groove (dummy that I am - who knew that OSB would work fine?), so we will be using OSB and he will be flooring it himself with his handy dandy staple gun; 2)We have so much lumber and OSB board left that we should easily be able to floor our attic with it; 3) We may also be able to "panel" our hallways with extra tongue and groove, which will be very pretty; 4) We negotiated a better deal for stone veneer for our house by using a local building supply company to furnish the materials and labor, saving us several hundred dollars; 5) Despite all of the glitches, we are thrilled with the way our home is evolving, are quite proud of the fact that we designed it ourselves and; 6) We are actually under budget, which means we can include a few nice extras, such as great room ceiling beams. The dry-in crew, who has built over 300 log homes, said it was one of the prettiest homes they had ever built. Our construction manager, Lee Cardin, said he thought it was the pretties home ever built by Battle Creek Log Homes. Maybe they were both just sucking up, but we loved it, oh yes, we did. To celebrate, we chipped in for another two cases of beer and pizza and waxed sentimental about how people's paths cross and they enjoy each other for such brief moments. (That's my husband, the shrink, waxing, in case you wondered. He is really such a sweet, sweet man!) Have a good Labor Day weekend. Go VOLS and OBAMA and enjoy the following pictures of the dry-in!

Week 11 - Dry-In Begins

Week of 8/11/08 - Things have gotten incredibly busy all at once, so I haven't posted much lately. Not only have the logs arrived, but we have been dealing with computer crashes, out of town guests, and last minute decisions such as changing the size of our pantry and bathroom windows (ouch, design changes are costly and stressful)! The builders started the dry-in at 10AM Monday morning and since then worked from dawn to dusk, literally until 8PM or so at night. I have taken over 40 pictures starting with log delivery to where we are today, with the roof in the center section of the house framed in. Once the dry-in has been completed (end of this month) I'll post a link for anyone interested in seeing the entire process. Meanwhile, here is a view of the house taken from the end of the bluff.

PHASE TWO, Week 10 - Log Time

See Norman above posing with some of OUR milled logs at log home company. See log miller guy below stacking our milled logs. Countown time is here! Our logs are due to be delivered later this week.

THINGS WE HAVE DONE RIGHT SO FAR

1. PREPARATION: Spent over two years designing our home, learning about the construction business, and learning how to be an owner builder (well over 1,000 hours), and started continuing dialogues with resources who are knowledgeable and supportive. Our log home company said they had NEVER had anyone ask as many questions as we did, and that they are going to publish them and their answers for future customers! Made preliminary decisions about what we wanted and priced all items down to the door knobs.
2. CONTRACTING: Learned about the bidding process & going rates and picked good contractors (quality over cost). We got to know them, treated them well, and understood that the reason they don't always show up on time is because other people want last minute changes or additions just like we did! (We needed and got a fireplace foundation built, french drains added, and the interior of the foundation leveled up without prior notice...course we also offered to pay cash!) Also, we complemented our subs and their employees a lot and were sure to tell bosses when they did something especially good or showed initiative.
3. FINANCES: Allowed enough of a reserve in our construction loan - and some personal cash - to cover potential overruns, staying on budget (so far). Set up via excel spreadsheets accounting methods to track every dime alloted and spent, showing at all times how much of a reserve is left.
4. SUPERVISION/SITE WORK: Been at the site every single day that contrators are there, sometimes up to three times a day, ready to answer questions, make decisons, run out for building supplies that were left off lists or otherwise ommitted, and more.
5. BOUGHT MATERIALS DIRECTLY AT A DISCOUNT: Always asked for owner-builder discounts (and almost always got them). Paid for most of the materials directly ourselves with either start-up funds, 0% charge cards, or by charging them to accounts we opened up at local building supply places. (Our subs who included materials in their bids were very greatful that we offered to do this, especially as the construction business is very slow right now and finances are tight.)
6. REMEMBERED TO LAUGH & STARTED A BLOG: (Well, OK, we haven't perfected the laughter part yet, but are trying, as building your own home is extremely stressful even on the best of marriages, and ours is in that category). At the end of the day we try to take time to relax together and to reflect on how very lucky we are. We also enjoy tracking our progress via our blog and weekly emails to family & friends.
7. OTHER RESOURCES: This is a magical place. Many of our new friends here have had experience in building their own home, two as owner-builders, one who had a GC, and one (a master carpenter) who is building his house himself from the ground up. All have been an enormous wealth of information about local contractors, prices, and suppliers. We've made it a point to meet our neighbors in the area where we are building, and they have also been very encouraging and supportive. This is a very small town and we've discovered that most of them knew who we were and had checked out our site before we even met them - fine with us! Some are still showing up on the site to introduce themselves and give us their opinions (S).

Week Nine - Still Finishing Phase One

Week of 7/28/08 - OK, so we're still here, no mortgage inspection or draws yet and no log home package. Rain, subs stuck on other jobs, subs who accidentally buried the cable for our temporary electric cable connection then had to dig it up with a backhoe, a last minute decision to install french drains around the foundation, and the time it took for us to waterproof our foundation ourselves held us up. We had to dig out one side of the house (30 feet long, 2 feet deep) that was back filled in error, and also had to move about three tons of leftover block that was in our way. (Norman really did figure out that it was close to 3 tons!) Two days were spent waterproofing (including two two-hour trips to the only supply house in Altamont that had the waterproofing we wanted for a total of 12-14 backbreaking sweaty hours between the two of us in 93+ weather. We had to do the waterproofing ourselves since our sub didn't have time right now. That's OK, though, as we saved some money and are very proud of the job we did. As of today, we have completed everything except for back filling the foundation and covering up the septic tank, and confirming that our temporary electrica has passed inspection. Our septic inspection passed just fine; he knew all of us, loved the site and had enjoyed his lunch there several times, and signed off even though he actually didn't even walk over to the septic tank or look at the field lines! (I will give no names here to protect the guilty!) Our first mortgage inspection is set for next Monday (the same day the back filling, etc., will be done, but the mortgage co. said that was OK). Three folks from the log home company came to the site to check things out & we made some good plans. The logs will be delivered next week and the dry-in will take 2-3 weeks. Norman & I are excited over our choices of tubs and showers (biscuit rules) and faucets. We are getting a $250 rebate from the log home company as well as free upgrades on our door knobs and hinges as a "thank you" so that is nice. We don't have all of the figures in yet, but it looks like Phase One will come in a bit under budget. We are in a good mood and looking forward to seeing our logs!

Week Eight - Finishing Phase One

Phase One - Last Week: 7/21/08 - A bit of rock and new requirements for our electrical transformer have slowed things down a bit, but our buddies Bob & Brian hope to be done in a day or so. The ditch for our underground electric is 4 feet deep and 750 feet long. Over 1,000 feet of telephone wire was delivered last week by AT&T, one of the few items we didn't have to pay for! Lee Pettis of Duck River Electric has been wonderful to us. He came out 3-4 times before we started construction to help us stake our underground electric, then has been back several times since to help subs with the trench and transformer requirements. Gib, our block man, was injured on another job last week, but promises to show up tomorrow AM. He will finish the house foundation then the fireplace foundation. It was kind of cool to see our septic tank installed today - looks sort of like a concrete casket. It is called a "lowboy" as it sits higher up in the ground than a regular tank (go figure). That makes about as much sense as PVC pipe having male and female parts on their ends. One part, the receiver, is the female part. The male part screws in to the female part. Do you know how embarrassing it was for me to go to Builder's Supply & tell the parts guy that I needed male and female parts for my pipes? (S) How much do you want to bet that a man came up with that one! P.S. IT IS NOW FRIDAY & WE ARE NOW BEHIND 3 DAYS BECAUSE OF RAIN AND SUBS NOT SHOWING UP. I AM LEARNING TO GO WITH THE FLOW. ENJOY THE PIC I JUST ADDED OF MY HUSBAND (IN THE PINK) HARD AT WORK WITH OUR FOUNDATION SUBS.

Week Seven - Electric & Septic

Phase One - Week of 7/14/08 - This morning Norman & I were on our way out to the property to see if one of our subs, Charles Thomas (owner of Charles E. Thomas Construction), had shown up. He was in our driveway. He let us know that he was ready to start our underground electrical work and septic system. Charles is quite a character: a man of few words, he rarely answers his phone, doesn't worry about signed contracts, and gets around to sending clients a bill a couple of weeks after the job is done (or so we've heard). He has an excellent reputation here, though, of high quality work and integrity & quietly goes about the community doing various good deeds and giving generously to charity whenever asked. We like him a lot. I cancelled my plans to take our sick cat, India, to the vet, and began to coordinate all of today's needed events: Phone calls to and from Duck River Electric to answer various questions & request a site visit today, phone calls to neighbors to let them know the digging will begin, and phone calls to suppliers to order and deliver materials. Oh, and then there are the trips back and forth from the site to convey information since cell phones don't work well there and phone calls from my husband about a deal he just heard of on cultivated stone. Once again, we've moved from 0 to 100 mph! Hang in there, kitty cat!

Week Six - Fireplace Blues

Phase One - Week of 7/7/08 - The good news is that our foundation is 99% complete and looking good. The bad news is that we assumed that our fireplace foundation was included in the foundation bid, but guess what...? You guessed it. Boy, did we mess up, to the tune of over $2,000! Luckily for us, the contractor finishing up our block work is going to make time to do our fireplace next week. (Stop laughing, Tim.) The rest of this phase is going slowly, e.g., the underground electric and septic work. Our contractor for those items was supposed to be there towards the end of this week, but no show and no call back yet. It looks like these delays will set back the log delivery date to somewhere between the 21st to the end of this month. Oh, well, I'm sure things will soon be zipping right along...(Tim, if you are reading this, stop laughing.) Tim, by the way, is one of our friends who recently built his own home. He had a GC but it still took him 16 months to finish up. MOUNTAIN TIME?

Week Five - We Passed Our First Inspection!

Phase One - Week of 6/30/08 - Here is a picture of "our guys," Carl & Uncle Dick, putting in our footers. They didn't know I was going to show up to take pictures, otherwise I am sure they would have kept their shirts on. I told Norman it was OK, that their pecs were almost as good as his, so it wasn't overly offensive. The Building Inspector came out yesterday to inspect the foundation after the re bar was put in. We weren't too worried as our foundation contractor has NEVER failed an inspection yet, according to the two guys doing the actual work. This week work on the foundation will continue with the concrete for the footers being poured, then the block work begins. Our block work guy, Gib, came out today to take final measurements for block. Our driveway and waterline guy, Terry, was also out. He moved one of our spigots to a more convenient location (our builder said it was in the way of the log trucks, what did we know). He also worked on the driveway, smoothing it out and dumping several loads of gravel. He should be through sometime tomorrow. I was there most of the day basically cutting roots that were in the driveway and raking up sticks and twigs. I also talked to our closest neighbor, John, about his dog Peehead (yes, his real name). Our construction guys love Peehead, who likes to follow them around and help them dig holes, but they were worried he would get into their fresh concrete. P.S. I WANT TO SEE SOME CONSTRUCTION FEMALES (SIGH). OH, WELL. MAYBE WOMEN ARE JUST MEANT TO BE BOSSES LIKE ME...

Week Four - Batter Board & Tree Cutting

Phase One - Week of 6/23/08 - We ran out to the property yesterday and today and have evidence that our foundation guys have been there. Our Porto potty is finally getting some use and soft drink cans & other trash are littering the brow! The stakes in the ground are now hooked to lots of string and boards surrounding where the house will be and we can see the elevation of the prowl area (looks about 7 feet high, but is actually about 5.) We are having hot tub visions. Our builder, Sammy, came out and told us we had to cut down over 20 more trees so that the logging trucks can get it. We also don't have enough room for the entire packet to be delivered at once, so he is going to talk to our log home company about making an extra trip. We really like Sam, by the way. He is very responsive, easy to work with, a perfectionist, and a great builder (we've seen his homes & spoken with the owners). He is also going to do most of our subcontracting.

Week Three - Stake Out!

Phase One - Week of 6/16/08 - After a two-week delay, our house is finally staked out! We were told that our foundation, Charles, would be out there "this evening," to stake it out, so decided to take a run over to the property at about 4:30PM. No signs of anyone. As we were leaving, we saw a truck coming towards us on the main road with a couple of guys in it who said they were lost and were looking for (our property). We led them to it, showed them where our house needed to be staked, then left. We wondered how they would have known where to stake it if we had not been there, but guess our foundation guy (these were his hirelings) knew things would turn out somehow....Tomorrow these same two guys - Carl & Uncle Dick - are to return to set out the batter boards. On another note, we had to go ahead & shell out the money for our wood floors. They had run out of the #2 grade we had settled on, so we bought a #1 grade for a bit more as the price is going up and up & our supplier already had it in stock & sold it to us for the "old" price.

Week Two - Site Clearing & Gravel Trucks Falling

Phase One - Week of 6/9/08 - The week started out well, with our foundation sub, Charles, doing a beautiful job of completing the site clearing and leveling. However, he informed us that he is still delayed on another job and may not be able to start the foundation this week. He also let us know that the guys installing our water pipe placed it too close to where future field lines are going to be and it needs to be moved about 15 feet, something he can handle and says is easy to do at this point. On another front, we received calls from our roofer and HVAC subs indicating that prices are going up so we need to go ahead and shell out some money now to lock them in. Good thing we just took out another 0% interest charge card! On the bright side, Norman says that if we can charge up to $35,000 we can earn enough "points" on one charge card for me to fly to Puerto Rico with him on a 4-day business trip. (There is always a silver lining to every cloud, right!?) Oh, one more thing. The guys doing our driveway delivered one load of gravel then fell off of the mountain. No kidding. They were returning with a second load of gravel, driving up the mountain, when the engine sounded weird so they pulled over to the shoulder. The shoulder didn't like that and gave way, toppling them ovder and down into a culvert. Luckily, no one was hurt and they hope to be back with a repaired truck next weekend. Pretty good excuse for knocking off early, huh?!

PHASE ONE, Week One - Construction Daze

Phase One - Week of 6/2/08 - I'm dividing our log home construction into five phases, the first being that of our site and foundation work. The site has already been cleared for the most part, but needs some touching up. Next our foundation will need to be staked, our block for the foundation laid, our driveway graveled, our waterlines put in, and our underground temporary electric installed. This involves no less than three separate contractors, Charles, Terry & Gib, and their crews. Our foundation builder has been delayed on another job, but Terry laid approximately 1300 feet of water pipe was laid over the weekend. He also put in two additional hydrants to use for landscaping our entrance and the roadway. Norman helped by doing some digging and running out for parts. He also got a scare when he was trimming around the bluff and realized he was standing on the end of a straight drop!

Closing Day!

After many delays we were finally able to close on our mortgage! We should be able to start construction next week, so stay tuned.

A Dream in the Making

In January of 2005, my husband and I bought a beautiful piece of wooded mountain land in Tennessee with bluff views to the East and South. One of our dreams has been to build a log home with a view. We moved here in late 2006 after putting our home in a nearby large city on the market, thinking it would sell right away. Little did we know that it would take 14 months! Meanwhile, we have been renting a nice house about three miles from our property and spending the time designing and planning our home. We had taken the plunge into self-employment, with Norman being lucky enough to work in the vicinity while I work part-time out of our home.

We also began to clear the bluff area, roadway, arrange with neighbors for electrical easements, and much more. Our land is 7.6 acres with a driveway of over 900 feet, so we are having to bring in water and (underground) electric. We purchased some architectural design software, reviewed hundreds of floor plans, and spent countless hours researching log home companies, log home construction, and how to become owner-builders. We signed with a log home company to provide the logs and a dry-in package, and we will be subcontracting out the remainder.

Our house sold right before Christmas, so we began to accept bids and make decisions on subcontractors. It took over two months to arrange for our mortgage, even though we had already been preapproved, but we are finally ready to close this week IF ALL GOES WELL, and to start construction next week. Lucky for us this is a great time to build as the construction business is very slow and contractors are eager to work.

This blog is being created for family and friends who are interested in watching the process. If anyone else "out there" is working on or has worked on a similar project, we would love to hear from you, too!

I will be posting some pictures of our home as it is constructed. Maybe I can even coerce my husband to make a comment or two. He actually wants us to write a book about the process. Meanwhile, if you are interested at taking a peek at our property, just click on "Pica Web Albums" under Preconstruction Photos on the right to see a slide show.

Pat