PROGRESS!!!

It started like this:

I've been working on work, and sitting looking out my bedroom window wishing to be working out in my office which isn't there yet.

So my dear boss-ish Tim made the comment: Sometimes you just have to start on it.
It made sense. And it was time to see progress. So this weekend, progress has been seen.

First off, we accepted that digging 11 holes in the hard Georgia clay was going to be a huge strain, so we went to Home Depot where we made friends with two really nice, helpful guys "Orlando" and "Jose" (this may or may not be their real names) They came and dug the holes for us and used the word "loco" quite a few times. I think they meant me. Orlando and Jose were great help! We appreciate them very much!! By Saturday at 4:00 we had 11 holes dug!!

This a picture Bill and James standing in for Jose and Orlando, since well, they left right after they finished.
In the meantime, while Jose and Orlando were digging holes, James and I went to Lowes to get
300 lbs of gravel, 25 48 inches #4 rebar, 60 cinder blocks and 1200 lbs. of cement mix. Lowes has a truck rental so we rented the truck, got everything to the house and unloaded! Go Team!

This morning, Lucy, my devoted assistant, partner in crime and our building site supervisor, was out checking out the site. Evidently, she was checking things out before we got to work.

So, I moved the cinder blocks up to the building site. That was fun. Sort of an applied strength training workout - especially since is was up hill. But I got it done (and Bill helped some too!)

Then after lots of trying to figure things out like how in the world to level the cinder blocks in the holes, we gave in and called our friend Seumas. Seumas is the voice of all reason. He's also build a good number of structures. We love Seumas. He said this is the reason he thought using cinder blocks wasn't the best idea. He said using plywood forms made better sense. But after using plywood forms, we'd have that wood left over, and I don't want to have waste from this project, if we can help it. So Seumas and Bill and I figured out how to use a laser level (Bill's newest toy), and gravel and marks on the hoe to get the bases of the holes level and then the blocks leveled. It was a pretty fancy system, and I'm glad we did it!! I definitely learned something about this from them. More on that later.

So we got the first one sunk, I climbed up to see what the view would be from my new office.

It's high, but I LOVE IT!!! IT IS PROGRESS!!

We sank a few more, Bill went in, James came out. Lucy continued her supervisory role.

By the end of the day Lucy was exhausted from all that responsibility of making sure we got everything done right. She inspected every hole, and made sure we were all on the level.

And at the end of the day today, we had 9 footing piers sunk and leveled. We'll fill them with cement after providing additional stabilizing rebar. That will probably be next week...

But hey... IT'S PROGRESS!

And thank heaven's for Aleve... my muscles are so sore!!

But I feel great!!

Thanks to everyone: Bill, James, Seumas, Orlando and Jose, and of course, for her wonderful supervisory work and constant attention to detail - Lucy!