Monday is a big day for the build because construction starts on the concrete foundation. It is about two months later than I would have liked but at least it is moving ahead. We also got a schedule for the entire project plan and, as expected given the timing of the foundation start, the finish date will be sometime next year in mid to late August. This is much later than we were hoping for since we wanted to be in Vermont during the summer getting things ready for the winter given that we’ve never lived day-to-day through a Vermont winter before. There was a lot of log splitting that was planned and that will all be somewhat rushed now or moved far ahead. I was starting to formulate plans on taking the chainsaw along with me during our trips up over the next year and chopping up as much of the wood that was set aside as possible to start the seasoning process. The neighbor has a tractor and log splitter which I might be able to borrow to move the bucks and piles around as well as use the tractor’s PTO to drive the log splitter.

In a week, I am taking my oldest kid up to college at Champlain in Burlington so I’ll be able to see the week’s progress on Saturday night or Sunday morning before driving the long march back to PA. I am hoping that we don’t have any major hitches over the next year because I’d love to start making up ground on this schedule in case we hit heavy snows or supply issues due to COVID-19 throughout the year. I don’t suspect the latter will happen because we are focusing so much on local resources. The supply lines for lumber in the midwest and western regions are stressed right now because our idiot president opened things up too early and now building materials are getting scarce and expensive in large parts of the country.

So the layout and slab work starts on Monday, the process will get rolling and the slab pours will happen around September 17th. Once those are all done – a process that will take about two weeks – we move on to framing. That phase will be very interesting and the house will start getting a real form and shape at that point. When Thanksgiving rolls around, we should have the house framed and roof framed and dried in, and the windows and doors installed. By the end of December, we should have much of the insulation done and readying for a preliminary blower test. January and February see the sheet rock and soundproofing take place and the plan rolls on from there.

So things are going to start happening and I am hoping we have a nice clean runway to completion with no surprises. After the nonsense 2020 had thrown at us so far, I think we’ve all earned it.