Summary:

• Monday-Tuesday –> Utah
• Wednesday
  • ICF John came back
  • Installed bracing and scaffold
• Thursday – Pour Day
  • 6″ of morning snow!
  • 4th and final Pour and Pump Truck
• Friday
  • Truss arrival
  • Truss Sorting
• Saturday
  • Truss installation done by Team Family 
  • Truss Recap

Hey All!

It was a crazy week! I can’t believe how much progress we made.  It’s fun to see just how much happens each week as I write these letters and reflect on the week.

This week we had our last concrete pour day scheduled for Thursday. I did text John the weekend before letting him know that the weather forecast looked absolutely awful for that day.  He thought about it but decided to go forward. I thought that was a bit crazy but oh well 🙂 We went for it. John showed up Wednesday morning and he got the ICF bracing installed and ready to go. 

It started raining that night which was annoying because with all the bracing there is no way to put down the plastic. So everything just got really wet. And if that wasn’t bad enough… Wednesday night to Thursday it snowed. And it kept snowing until about 10a.m. and dropped about 6″ (the most we have had all year in one snowfall).

The pump truck and concrete was scheduled for 1p.m. By the time that rolled around and the trucks were onsite most of the snow was gone. The sun even came out and it was a pretty good window for the pour even though it was still a bit chilly.  I’d say the whole day was a success. And the ICF portion of the project is now complete! Woohooo!

The next day on Friday, our trusses arrived!  And man is that a lot of wood! The truck wasn’t going to fit down our driveway so we did something we should have done at the beginning of the project. We knocked the brick pillar over and widened the entry to our driveway. Better late than never I guess?

Anyhow by doing that we were able to have the trusses dropped right in our driveway.  The unload was really cool, the driver just tipped up the bed of the truck a little and the trusses just rolled off the back as he drove away.  As fate would have it .. all the trusses we wanted to start with were at the bottom of the pile. So Mark came over and helped me sling around the trusses and make a few piles of them.

Then yesterday, we started running the trusses! It became a family project! Karianne, Sam, Andrew and I all worked together to make it happen. I think Sam and Andrew got a little tuckered out from all of the work. Andrew has been talking about how tired his legs are today 🙂  So instead of being smart and renting a crane, we decided to run the trusses with the excavator. The excavator could lift them above the wall but then Karianne and I would walk them down the wall on the scaffold to the final location. Meanwhile one of the boys would push a makeshift platform I attached to our rolling scaffold. That would hold up the middle of the truss as we walked along. Tipping the truss up was a huge pain and was hard! Karianne stuck with it all day though, I couldn’t believe how much hard work she did.  It was awesome.  Just imagine going up and down the scaffold, up and down the stairs, up and down the excavator all day. It was tiring 🙂  Anyhow, we got the section above the garage all done.  I think it has been one of my favorite parts of the project so far. It was fun to see the trusses going up and fully defining our envelope. There was a lot of change all in one day.  

I am not entirely sure how we will run the other trusses as the remaining trusses will be lifted parallel to a wall that they need to be perpendicular to. It’s going to be quite the challenge and there is a good chance we will need to call in reinforcements. That’s a problem for another day though 🙂  Such an awesome week! Until next time

Mark

Videos:

Steel Lintel Recap: https://photos.app.goo.gl/ZLaDTUcGjR3Tnbx6A

Steel Lintel 2: https://photos.app.goo.gl/FV12jMgvhUix1Pn4A

Wet Subfloor 😦 Ready for Pour:  https://photos.app.goo.gl/Czbz4vXfirQKLeVk9

Pump Operation and Truck Arrival:  https://photos.app.goo.gl/nHgwxvAHzDHBDFrH9

Knocking the wall to make sure its filled:  https://photos.app.goo.gl/PEjw6CPAwBzcQByXA

Pour Done and embedded truss brackets recap:  https://photos.app.goo.gl/xWixvPNgFhzCHd6u5