Whoa! Where did this come from?

Whoa!  Where did this come from?

Drove by at the end of the day and could hardly believe it - we have walls!

Just as I was getting ready to leave, Mark and the kids showed up.

The Sub-Floor is Done

The Sub-Floor is Done

We're making progress, but we get another dusting of snow.  It's looking good though and the framers are scheduled for next week.

And we have a Foundation

And we have a Foundation

Seems like we are picking pace again.  The concrete foundation has been poured and the weeping tile is place.  The forms have been removed and we can now clearly see the makings of a house.

The foundation walls are braced to prevent the weight of the backfil from pushing them in.

A bobcat brings some of the excavated soil to fill in the future garage.

It's been a VERY productive day.  By the end of they, we have the makings of our sub-floor.



Concrete Forms are Set in Place

Concrete Forms are Set in Place

 

The forms were dropped off this morning and installed by end of day.  We can see the framework of our house starting to take place!

What a Difference a Day Makes!

What a Difference a Day Makes!

Seem like we're back on track - the footings are in.

The footings are in and we're getting ready for our foundation.

Mother Nature Slows us Down

Mother Nature Slows us Down

An unexpected snow fall leaves us with the makings of a swimming pool.

Looks like we're adding the cost of a water pump to the budget.

Excavation Day!

Excavation Day!

Wow.  We've made a lot of progress in just a few days.  Today is Wednesday February 6th, and on our first visit of the day, the digging was well underway.

They excavation had started already, and a sewer crew was already below ground to inspect the sewer system.  The big unknown is whether or not the utilities will be sufficient.  Given that we are building in an area that constructed in the 1950s, there is a good likelihood that the utilities will need to be upgraded and if this is the case we could easily add several thousand to our build.

A sewer crew is working below ground cleaning the sewers and taking video of their findings.  A regional inspection in the afternoon confirmed what we were hoping for .... we do NOT need to dig up the road and upgrade the sewers.

Unfortunately, I forgot my camera for the second visit of the day.  The crew had made significant progress and much of the hole for the new foundation had been dug.  We're expecting a big snow storm this evening, and with any luck - it will pass us by.  We're all set to pour our footings tomorrow.  Just in case, the ground has been covered with hay so the ground can keep warm.

Demo - Day 2

Demo Day 2

Tuesday February 5th

We drove by the lot on our way to school this morning.  Presumably, they got started about 7:30am.  Considering where they had left off on Monday, they had made quite a bit of progress already.   This is what we saw about 8:30 am:

By lunchtime, there was almost nothing left:

And by end of day, there was nothing left:

You can tell by the red stakes, that the surveyor was able to come by and pin the lot, which means that tomorrow we can start excavation.

Demo Day is Here

Demo Day is Here

-Monday February 4th, 2013


Wow.  We've been waiting for this day for so long, it is hard to believe that it has arrived (and gone). 

The alarm clocks started sounding off at 6:15 am.  We needed to be on site by 7:30.  The goal was to leave our house at 7:00 am to be sure that we did not miss anything.

I was up late, the night before, making sure that all the batteries were charged and the recording devices were prepped and ready to go.  I was amazed at how smoothly the morning went.  We were dressed and ready to go by 7:05 am, although it was a bit of a hustle at the end to make sure that everything made it out the door and into my truck.

We arrived at the site about 7:20 when my husband looked at Sienna and asks her if she was dressed warm enough.  She tells him, "this is what Mommy told me to wear".  He looks at me and asks, "is she dressed warm enough?".  I am shocked to see that my child has no winter coat on.  How did we miss that?

Fortunately, she was wearing many layers of clothing, but still not enough for the -10C weather.  He drops us off and rushes home to get her winter coat. 

The plan was to get a family picture of us with our construction hats on ... sadly that picture will have to wait for a later day but I at least grabbed a picture of the kids.

We set up our observation area across the street and waited for the action to begin. 

Mark returned to the site just seconds after the first "crunch" tore into the roof of the old house.

The biggest challenge for us was the FREEZING COLD.  Our new neighbour popped by with a handful of hot paws (hand warmers!).  My toes were beyond frozen (it's been a long time since I've had to dress for extreme temperatures!).    We got the hot paws activated and into the children's gloves and into my boots!  I was the only one who was not prepared with below-zero graded footwear.  When Mark returned with Sienna's coat, he brought a few sleeping bags back with him, so we were able to stay warm.  It was only a few minutes later that we abandoned our chairs and hustled into the tailgate of my truck. 

The cold ate away at the life on my camcorder and camera batteries.  I lost 25% of my camera battery having taken only about 3 pictures.  My 6 hour camcorder battery died after 90 minutes.  I got most of the demo footage filmed.  I'm a very novice film-editor ... I was just happy that I figured out how to speed up the footage.  Here is 90 minutes of filming condensed into 2 1/2 minutes.

We left to run some errands and came back an hour later to this progress.

We returned at the end of day around 3PM to see that they had wrapped for the day.

Tomorrow is the BIG day

Tomorrow is the BIG day

Today was our last day of making sure the house was prepped for demolition because tomorrow it all comes tumbling down!

The digger was dropped off on Friday and is poised and ready to go.  We spent the weekend trying to clear out as much brush as possible.  Whatever is left will hopefully get crushed through the demo and dig.

We had three fairly large stumps in front of the house, and it looks like someone has helped themselves to some firewood, and chopped down the a bit more of our tree stumps.  If they had only waited, we arrived today to carry the remaining chopped trees from the backyard to the front yard.  We've pawned off as much free firewood as we can onto family and friends.  The remaining logs have found their way to the curb and hopefully some passersby will help themselves to some firewood.  We were surprised to see that someone helped themselves to the small lights from the bricked pillars at the end of the driveway.  I'm not quite sure what someone would use those very old lights for, but both were gone when we arrived today.

I have fond memories, as a kid, of watching our family homes being built. My brothers and I would love to climb onto the diggers or backhoes while my dad would take our pictures.  It was fun to see that my kids will also have the same memories.

The demolition is expected to start at 7:30 AM tomorrow. 

Lot Selection

Lot Selection

The blog starts with a picture of what our lot looked like when we bought it in May of 2012.  This is what it looks like on Friday February 1st, 2013:

The brush in front is reflective of trees that have been cut down.  Lesson #1 - Lot Selection - don't buy a lot that has a lot of trees within or around your build envelope.

This was an expensive lesson for us.  Although we loved the look of the lovely treed lot and had no problem envisioning our home being built here, we really did not anticipate some of the issues that the trees would cause.

Before you can even apply for a Construction Permit in the Town of Oakville, you must obtain a Site Alteration Permit.  One of the requirements in order to obtain a Site Alteration Permit is that you must provide an Arbourist Report for review.

cha-ching

It took a little shopping around to find an arbourist that fit our budget.  Once hired, he came out and surveyed our lot.  He measured each and every tree on our property and provided a detailed report regarding three measurements and tree health.  Of particular interest were the 13 trees that were discussed in our report.  It was concluded that 2 trees were directly within our build envelope.  1 tree needed to be removed in order for the installation of the new utilities.  Another tree needed to be removed in order to permit a 2-car driveway.  2 smaller trees needed to be removed in order prevent obstruction of the view of the house.  If any of these trees were protected species, we could have had to revisit our plans and design our home around protected trees.  Fortunately, the only challenge we faced was the limit of 4 trees per year, but since two trees were directly within the footprint of our soon-to-be-built home, we were able to notify the remaining 4 trees within our annual limit.  The next step was to obtain quotes for tree removal. 

cha-ching

We had our first minor heart attack when we started getting quotes for tree removal.  My ever thrifty hubby decided it was time to invest in a chain saw, so he handled the majority of the tree removal, with the exception of one tree which was too large for him to take down.  We were able to find an off-season deal to get one large ash tree removed for a small fortune. 


We'll be a little more savvy if we do this again, making sure that our lot is not going to be too costly to build on.  We will have a better idea of what it will cost for tree removal so we can factor this in to any purchase offers.  In hindsight, we should have been a lot tougher on the Seller after we closed on the house.  He left a lot of junk behind in and around the house, and unfortunately, this is all now being disposed of at our expense.  Next time around, we'll write into any offers that the Seller must remove all junk and debris from the property.  When we closed on this house we were caught up in romantic notions of building our home; we won't make that mistake again.


We did have a few good laughs through this process.  Like the one afternoon when my hubby is busy chopping down trees, and he sees a car pull up.  He assumes it's one of the neighbours stopping to chat and as my husband approaches the car to say hello, he sees a camera at the window and then a flash.  Someone was trying to catch him in the act of perhaps unlawfully chopping down the trees.  Fortunately, we had filed all our required notifications and had not violated any laws.  A later check with the town Arborist confirmed that said photographer had indeed attempted to file a complaint about us.

Welcome to the neighbourhood.