Clever Title Goes Here

For several reasons, I have not been able to post for two weeks.  I had some computer issues, and did not have access to my photo library while my laptop was being repaired.  I was also off on my yearly bike trip with my good friends Geoff and Denis, our twenty second year.  That in itself is blog-worthy, but I'll leave that for another day.

So back to our little project.  Much has happened in the last two weeks.  I'll let the photos do the talking.
 

Second floor deck

The second floor, deck and exterior walls were added and the interior "mirror walls" were finished.  Unlike the first floor, the interior partitions could not be built on the second floor until the roof trusses were done.  This is to accommodate the sheathing that is added to the underside of the trusses to complete the "building envelope".  This term has at least two meanings.  When I referred to the building lot, the building envelope is the part of the lot where you can actually build a structure.  This is usually dictated by local zoning rules.  Within the structure itself, the building envelope refers to the parts of the house that are insulated, in our case, very well insulated. 

This sheathing will eventually extend under the entire ceiling.

So back to the second floor.  There is a layer of sheathing that sits atop the outside wall and extends past the mirror wall roughly four inches.  The roof trusses will sit on this layer, and the building envelope will be completed by the aforementioned sheathing, nailed to the trusses and seams taped with our "super tape".  Insulation is added above the sheathing and between the exterior and mirror walls.  All warm and cozy.  The fact that so much thought and effort is being expended on the insulation is especially comforting, as we had to fire up the wood stove in our rental house for the first time last night.

Rigid foam under basement slab.

There is also activity going on in the basement where our excavation contractor is levelling the gravel and adding four inches of rigid foam insulation.  Additional foam is added on top of the exposed footings to eliminate any thermal bridging.  Once the roof is finished, our basement and garage floors will the poured using one of those cool concrete pumper trucks. 

Back outside to get a few shots of the rooflines.  When we were waiting on the trusses, we would look at the house and think, "it looks kinda small".  Now that the roof trusses are installed and we can see the height of the house, the thing looks HUGE!!  From the road it looks like a castle.  I wonder if there is a decent moat builder in Addison County?

Moat goes here!

They also added the framing for the deck on the south side.  Originally, this extended roughly half way down the south side of the house.  Keeping with our "bigger is always better theme", we had them extend this along the entire side.  Hope passing airplanes don't mistake it for the runway at BTV!!

We were a little worried about being high enough to see the mountains over the tree line.  This shot was taken from one of our bedroom windows.  As you can imagine, we are worried no more.
 
Another change we made was to leave a peaked ceiling in the bedroom above the garage.  The

Front (west) side.

original plan called for a flat ceiling at eight feet.  This space will also have a walk-in closet and our laundry room.  Here are shots of this room looking north and south, toward the main space.  With the area above the garage, the second floor will be about 1,380 finished square feet, compared to 960 on the first floor.

So the roof should be finished next week and the second floor partitions will be completed so we can get a sense of the layout.

Stay tuned, lots more to come...

Facing north.

Yup, stil have a view.