It's a Wonderful Wall

The kids and I snuck down to watch Mike and his crew start working on the walls right after breakfast this morning.

While down there, Mike went over a couple minor changes (I hope) to make it easier to build - such as straightening a wall instead of including a slight jag in the wall and moving the opening under the stairs to the side room instead of off the hallway. He also verified we wanted to do a single door centered in the room with windows on either side about a foot from the door on either side (yes, in case you were wondering).

Then we watch Mike and his buddy Darryl (I believe...) mark off the floor for the load bearing walls.

Mike says it usually takes them 5-6 weeks to frame all the way up to the roof - but it might take a little longer with Thanksgiving and Christmas being a part of those weeks.

The crew started placing boards along the top of the walls.

We headed back to let them get some real work done without worrying about kids being underfoot. Kids (eh, hem - NIKKI!) + Powertools = No Good!

After lunch and school, I quickly went down to see the progress - and WOW!

We have WALLS!!

Ok, so they are still framing them up - but they are there!

We are also having blocks laid for part of the wall so we won't have as much expense when we brick up the house later. Yup - we're going brick - hopefully with some stone accents too.

Then Tom came home early so we grabbed the kids and leisurely walked down to see what they completed today.

Nikki inspecting the HVAC pipes. They are in the chalk-line walls, so we'll have to see if that's intentional or not. If not, who knows what will happen. Here's hoping it's intentional.

My cuties!

Such a good looking bunch. :)

Tom pointed out the marks the hinge in the forms left behind. Never noticed it before. Pretty cool.

View from the back storage room.

View of same storage room and future bedroom.

Silly girl!

Our mostly finished wall.

The center door seems to be off a little from the opening in the cement slab, so we'll talk to Mike on Sunday to see what's happening there. I thought the cement opening was center, but maybe it isn't. I didn't have a tape measure, so we'll see.

View from the retaining wall.

View from above.

Bye house - see you next week when more wall stuff happens.