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3/9/2026: Floor Joists and MUD GALORE

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Hi All!

We had another very busy but productive week but the weather did not cooperate. We got a bunch of snow mid week which messed up my plans for finishing up the backfill and turning everything into a horribly sloppy muddy mess. I am very done with the mud! It is everywhere, caked onto all of my work pants, my socks, inside my boots, covering all of my kids shoes and boots, covering my front porch and making its way into the house as well. So much MUD!  But in spite of all the mud the work must go on.

I had the brilliant idea to place the first garage beam on Monday. I figured it would take an hour or maybe two tops. For some unknown reason, I did not take the time to measure the gap for the beam now that the walls are poured BEFORE trying to place the beam. In the end, it looks like I lost about 2″ on my pre planned gap which made me do the one thing I really wanted to avoid.. drilling new holes in the 1/2″ steel. Once we had the beam up in place, it became apparent the holes weren’t going to line up. So I got the drill out and drilled some new holes which was a huge pain. I was standing precariously on the beam and getting pressure on the drill was tough! But we got it done and got the beam placed. In the end it probably took over 5 hours. 

The second beam on Tuesday was much more smooth. Having learned the lesson, we measured BEFORE placing the beam and drilled the new holes down on the ground. That was much easier and the placement was very smooth. We knew just how to pick the beam up with the excavator and it only took an hour like it should have 🙂

On Wednesday we had to do what is hopefully our last bit of trenching. I ran a conduit out to our chicken palace so that we can run utilities to the coop. We had a bit of a miracle there while doing that. I thought I had bought PLENTY of pipe, but no joke without cutting a single pipe, I had EXACTLY the length I needed. I might have liked an extra 1/4″ for that last connection but I think it was enough for a good bond.  I  can’t believe how lucky I got there. Had it been too short it would cause an hour delay running to town to get a couple of pvc fittings. Glad that worked out. 

Soon after finishing that run the snow storm arrived. And we got up to about 6″. The most snow we have gotten at one time this entire year. We are very grateful for the moisture but it sure made a lot of mud! In spite of all the snow and mud I still managed to get the first LVL ledger board placed and hung all of the brackets for the floor joists. If you ever have a bunch of hangers to hang, make sure you get a pneumatic palm nailer. It was an awesome tool to have and made all of the difference. 

On Friday we still had snow on the ground and all the mud, so we weren’t able to finish backfilling like I wanted to.  Instead we got to run all the floor joists for the main floor which was actually a lot of fun! It was a nice break from all the earth work.  Only pain point was the fact that my stem wall was a little high so I had to notch down the sill plate for every joist.  That was a little obnoxious but between Friday and Saturday we got all of those floor joists in. When we were done I was able to put down a piece of subfloor and stand in front of the kitchen window. And what a fun view!

We are so excited for the new space we are creating!  After finishing up the floor joists I got to sit up on one of the steel beams for a few hours after dark and “shoot” a bunch of nails into my steel beams to hold up my floor structure. It’s a bit tedious and after a couple hours I only had one of the beams 2/3rds of the way done. I have many more hours to spend on those beams.

One more week done, one million more to go 🙂 

Until next week 

Mark 

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