My 2 Story Colonial in West Virginia

[FarmerChad]

Well.. I finally decided to start posting pics and progress as we go along. My dream since childhood was to build my own home. After about a year of serious searching, my wife and I found this lot. Believe it or not, it measures 100 foot wide, 180 foot long. And yep, all the lush landscaping came with it.  



As much as I like trees and mother nature, some of the wilderness had to go. Considerding the "jungle" took up most of the lot. We spent most of our summer evenings dealing with milkweed, briars, and varieties of trees I have never seen the likes of.



Im glad to say the briars and razor sharp weeds lost the battle. Not without a fight though. The briars left a few scars on my arms and legs.
Ahh.. the trusty jeep, parked in the front yard. Recently she was outfitted with the finest Class 3 Reese hitch that Advance Auto Parts had.


More fire. I think we had a total of about 5 fires in order to elimanate the overgrowth. My beautiful wife throwing stuff into the fire. Without her support this project would probably still be on the backburner.



At some point the septic folks came and did my perk test. Come to find out my lot drains like a sieve. Sorry no pictures of drilling or holes. I thought that would be kind of "obsessed". Did get my approval from the DEP, and did I mention that we don't even have to fool with the building inspectors? We happen to be located about 3 miles from the city limits. The county doesn't have any inspectors. Not that I won't build to code or anything, but at least I don't have to wait on the inspector man to show up.

Next course of action was to bridge the gap. Literally. Across the front of the lot is a culvert/ditch. About 3 feet deep. A call to my friendly gravel/concrete dealer netted me a bargain on a product called "rail mill". A by product of steel production. I ordered 20 tons, and it took every bit of it.



A more recent photo shows the dimensions a little more cleary.



Some time went by before the next big event. Renting a bulldozer. Now let me say, I have never ran a dozer, nor did I think at any point in my life I would need to run a dozer. I will say this. RENT ONE. If nothing else you will have a blast scaring your neighbors
The Cat D3 in all her evening glory.



Now the weather is turning cold, and dark settles in at 5 pm. So work is limited to the weekends. Hopefully, an excavator will be coming around the first part of December.

I will keep you posted on the progress.

Chad

[glenn-k]

Big yellow toys are fun.  Looking forward to watching your progress,  Chad.  Thanks for the pictures.

[FarmerChad]

Yes, big yellar toys are fun. Can't wait to wreak havoc with the excavator. As an update, I have very little to report. Well nothing to report. Just waiting on the excavator. In the interim though I have started a storage building project, tired of toteing those tools all over gods green earth.

[glenn-k]

Before you get carried away with the excavator, be sure you lay things out accurately and check depths - widths - square etc as you go -- it's easy to overdig when you are having fun.  One of my customers cost himself quite a bit in extra labor and concrete because he had too much fun before he checked to see where and how deep he was. :-/

[FarmerChad]

Good point, and already planned for. I have set up batterboards and plan to use a laser level to help with the depth issue, along with grade pens. I gonna guess that the sides will need to be stepped approx. 4 times and the front and back 3 times. I guess we will just have to wait to see.

[glenn-k]

That's what we did -- changed from continuous straight to stepped - he needed 1% slope but got about 2 feet below that.  We just stepped it and will extend the walls.  We have a good engineer and he will change anything we need as long as it pencils out.  

[FarmerChad]

I found some more photos to share. The dozer made quick work of the roots.



The lot is starting to look a bit different now. Thankful that the mud is drying out.







Batter boards in place and strung together. I throughly marked the boards in case the string becomes broken.. or eaten by the wildlife. I also thought that marking the dimensions of the footer and the distance from the road would be a good idea.



The beginnings of my storage building/workshop in the background.





The shop will be "nestled" below a friendly cedar tree. Sounds all so homely.. eh?



The front of the shop. Being "on call" with my job took a serious toll on my weekend plans. I hoped to have the entire floor framed up up but that didn't happen. Just as I would get started, The ol' pager started singing its familiar tune.



Another shot. The shop won't be too big. Only 10 foot by 10 foot. The floor will be framed with 2x8's. I have plans to install 4 more p.t. posts.



There is logic to the 10x10 shop size. I just happen to have a framed up shell of a previous green house. It never made it to full green house state. Anyhow, the footprint is 10x10, 7 foot tall walls, and I think 5/12 pitch roof.  I put studs and rafters on 2 ft centers. My plan is to disassemble the structure, add extra studs, and rafters, transport to the worksite, and reassemble on my nice new platform. Install plywood on the sides and roof, a bundle of arch. shingles, and voila.. instance building. Im sure it won't go that smooth. Like, a drenching rainstorm. Or a small blizzard.   Somehow, "suprised", I won't be.

[jwv]

Hey FarmerChad, whereabouts in the wild and wonderful are ye?

Judy
From So Ohio (originally)

[FarmerChad]

Hey Judy,

You know about our "wild and wonderful" secret? You really are from around this here hollar, aint ya?   I live in Barboursville. About 20 minutes from Huntington.

[Sassy]

FarmerChad, have you ever heard of Canal Winchester?  Or Lockburn (sp) AFB?  My dad was stationed there from the time I was a few months until I was 5 y/o.  We lived out in the country on 5 acres.   Had 100 chickens that only I could gather the eggs from, they'd even let me hold them while I swung on my swing!  I remember it was always green, we had a nice big garden, lots of strawberries, corn & veggies, even rhubarb.  We had a couple sheep - the mama sheep had twins - we had to bottle feed them.  It seems like my dad built a long rock wall from the rocks he took out of the garden area.  

There were lots of lightening & thunder storms - even slept through a tornado that took the roof off of the house next door!    We also had a lot of snow.  I have lots of good memories of Ohio  

[jwv]

Sassy, I've heard and even been to both those places. Canal Winchester was a school trip as I recall. Lockbourne was the AFB and is now Rickenbacker Int'l Airport and is basically a suburb of Columbus.  

FarmerChad-born and raised in West Portsmouth OH-Huntington was the center of the universe growing up 'cause that's where our TV came from (in the days before cable)-went to nursing school in Gallipolis, where one summer we floated in the Ohio on inner tubes.  Whatever possessed me? My best friend from those times lives in Charleston, just a hoot and a holler from you.

Did you have any good 'maters this year?-the taste of those would almost get me to move back.

Judy
Proud to be a Hillbilly

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[Sassy]

Judy, I don't remember much about the rest of the state, just my little neck of the woods - interesting to hear how things have changed - like the AFB.  IIRC, weren't there "lightening bugs" in Ohio?  Or did I used to see them when I visited relatives in Nebraska & Minnisota?  they were so fascinating to watch   .

[FarmerChad]

Ahhh... maters, the essence of a summer sandwich. This year my mind was elsewhere. Something about locating a piece of land to build our house on. Ive been thru Rickenbaker. Near there is a farm. Owned by the Renick Family I believe. They have a giant cornstalk, as tall as a powerpoll along side the road. Lightning bugs? Oh yes, and a canning jar with holes in the top.

[FarmerChad]

Saturday, managed to install the floor joists. After that, I dissambled the greenhouse, taking more time then I thought it should have. Then a trip to Lowes to pickup some plywood and studs.



Sunday, this morning. The salvaged greenhouse all loaded and ready for her final destination. Bit of a wide load.



The plywood secured down. A good feeling, to actually see something happening.





One of the walls from the greenhouse being diassembled. The original studs were on 2 foot centers. The structure only supported sheet plastic. I decided to take apart the walls, and add a few extra studs. The task itself was pretty straight forward. A hammer and crowbar (where there was resistance) made quick work of the task.



The first wall up, facing the front.



All walls up and secured. As you can tell, dark has settled in.



Finally, something thats starting to look like something.



The roof has to be rebuilt completly. Thats ok though. I want to leave room for a loft for storage. Hopefully that will come together next weekend.

[FarmerChad]

I didn't get too much done this weekend on the workshop/storage building. Thats due to my perpetual (sp) need to change/redesign/etc. I spent a few nights last week considering my options. I finally made a decision, and have so far stuck with it. I decided for one, that a simple 10 x 10 box wouldn't do. That wouldn't nearly due justice to the house. Ya know, that house that is still only on paper, well none the less, I added a few features. The biggest change to the shop is the size. I decided to go vertical. The building will be 1 1/2 stories. The 1st story is still 10x10. The 2nd story.. or .5 story.. well whichever.. will be 10x16. The extra 6 feet will hang over the front, creating a covered porch. Originally, the door was on the side, I cut out a new one in the front. Might leave the side door, dunno yet. I figure by the time its done, I will have built a small cottage like structure. More on the second floor, Im planning on a knee wall that is 3 foot tall, leading to an 8/12 or 12/12 pitch roof. So.. what I did get done was cutting out and moving some studs for that new front entrance. Installed the double top plate, and then fanagled with the beginnings of the 2nd floor.



I would like too add that, in my mind this was a simple task, yeah... uh huh. I installed a few cleats here and there. Then secured one 2x8x10 to the front of the building. I placed the two 16 foot 2x8's on there appropriate sides. I nailed as needed. I then, using a scrap piece of 2x4, pushed the entire rim forward. Very slowly, going back and forth between the left and right sides. At one point the entire unit was starting to teater, but all is good for now. As can be seen, I need to install some 12 foot pt post for the overhang. Hopefully this will happen next weekend.