November 11 - 17, 2007

• The plumbing inspection passed this week.
• We will go for our heating, ventilation, and air conditioning inspection this week.
• That inspection should pass and we will call in for our framing inspection.
• Insulation should happen the Monday after Thanksgiving.
• The city attorney stopped by on Saturday to take a tour of our house.
  
  
  Our front porch railing is all but done. We tore out the awful back porch steps and will have new ones this week and also railings for that too.
  
  Our house sits up really high.
  
  
  The sidewalk has it's forms done and inspected and is ready to be put in this coming week. Our downspout connectors are now fully connected and will run under the sidewalk.
  
  
  It may not be a big deal for some, but our house is now hooked up to the grid. Our sump pump is no longer connected to a house 75 feet away with an extension cord which is constantly being cut. This had required constant monitoring every time it rained.
  
  We now have operable outlets on every floor which means we can connect to our own house for our tools and most importantly, our radio.

The landscaping can go forward at any time.

October 21 - November 11, 2007
We have passed our electrical inspection and the plumbing and heating inspections just have one small item each before they pass. This week, those issues will get taken care of and we can go for a structural inspection.

The landscapers have started and the house is ready for the inspections to pass so we can start to insulate and then drywall.

GREEN GREEN GREEN
As part of our green build, we have been using our lumber in a very efficient manner. We have followed the Building Science Corporation advanced framing techniques. Below shows what is typically done in residential construction.

To put in an outlet for the refrigerator, our electrician put in a massive amount of wood to hold up a receptacle box.
See the picture below to see how could have done the same task with less wood and less time.

Here is our fix. Besides wasting less wood, we now have more room in the wall for insulation.