We have a roof over our heads (almost)!

First off Happy Thanksgiving to everyone checking out this blog. We in the Pocius family have a lot to be thankful for this year especially all of our family and friends.

So as you can see above we are very close to having a roof on the house. This was a short week, but the crew did a great job getting a lot done. As the roof is getting put on, the classic bungalow lines are really starting to show.

We were also able to get up to the second floor for the first time now that the temporary steps have been put in. John was so excited to see what his new room was going to look like he giggled almost the whole way up to look. Looks like a bunch of lumber but the first picture is a view from the top of the stairs into the master bedroom. The second one is of Johns previously mentioned room. He already decided to go with a Star Wars theme room. Like father like son...

I talked to our site supervisor, Jim. The crew is going to be really busy next week. Finish putting the trusses on the roof, lay all the shingles, and possibly get the windows put in. I hope they all get enough Turkey this weekend. They are relly hoping to get the house "sealed up" before the cold and sleet of St.Louis winter hits.

11.20.2008 Update

This is Amanda hijacking Adam's blog... I drove by before a lunch meeting today and snapped some pics. Now you can see how our back yard is shaping up (without that huge retaining wall). They're making great progress on the second floor as well. You can really start to see how the front will look.

Hope you like 'em as much as I do! that is, enough to take over my husband's blog...

A preview of what's to come???

The fine guys at Jeff Day & Associates were kind enough to send us the above Google sketchup of what our house will potentially look like when it is complete. Architectural Project Manager, Kyle Jones, of Jeff Day & Associates, produced the rendering of our home and we are very happy with how it looks. The fellas might have more sketches in the future and we will post them when we get them.

It is nice to have an architect that is almost as excited about the project as we are! I just hope my grass looks that green next spring!

We have walls!

Amanda went to look at the house today at lunch, and much to her surprise, nearly the entire first floor was complete. Here is a view from the outside. Jason with Sage decided to get the exterior walls made off site. This keeps them away from the elements (which we have had a lot of recently) and reduces waste. It also goes up a lot faster than if the carpenters had to do it at the site.

This is a shot of what will be our living room fireplace.

This is a shot looking into our kitchen and breakfast nook.

Here is John loving the new digs...

I think you all get the idea. Word is we are on pace for getting the second floor installed in the next day or so followed by the walls on the upper floor. If you love shots of lumber, check back frequently.

No more retaining wall!

Just a quick update...

The kids and I went out yesterday to look at the progress. We saw the huge pile of dirt had been cut in half...what we did not see anymore is the retaining wall in the back!

The top photo shows how the grading is going to what will be the entrance to the garage.

The bottom photo does not show much, which is good. Last week there would have been a 5' high retaining wall in the picture.

Deciding to fill that area in, is going to give us a much more usable backyard. It returns the land to its original grade so it will blend in a bit better with the neighboring houses. We are also going to use most of the dirt we excavated for our foundation which means less a dump truck needs to haul away.

Up next (hopefully) walls!

November 10, 2008

We've made some great progress in the last week!

Starting with the top picture, workers raised the height of the manhole cover for a drainage pipe in the backyard. Sounds terrible, we know - but this will dramatically improve the usability of our backyard. We can now have a level yard, instead of having a large retaining wall in the back. The other option: a moat. I'm sure the kids would've loved that.

As you'll see in the second picture, workers poured the basement and finished the base plumbing. You can see the rough-in for the toilet - we're not finishing the basement right away, but we have plans for when we do.

And in the third picture... Hooray! Our first floor! Now just imagine it with a whole house around it... Or just keep coming back to the blog and we'll show you. Eventually.

Stay tuned... next week, we should have walls, and the backyard should be filled in.

Laying the Foundation - Literally

On October 30, 2008, the cranes started placing our basement walls. The top picture is the "finished" basement, and the bottom picture shows a section of how the walls are "placed" - unlike traditional poured basements.

The system we chose to use is Superior Walls ( www.superiorwalls.com ). This is a system that consists of insulated pre-fab concrete slabs. At least, that's the layman's version of the product. I'm sure their reps have a better way of saying it. The product comes with a continuous layer of insulation that's bonded directly to the concrete - thus creating an instant R Value, and reducing the amount of energy lost through the basement walls.

One thing you'll notice about the pictures above: how clean the site is so far. Pre-fab means less waste overall, and no on-site soil contamination.

And the added bonus: The wall system is pre-studded and ready for drywall, just as soon as we're ready to finish the basement. So we'll save money down the line because we won't have to pay for lumber, and we'll be saving natural resources as well... Of course, we might want to finish the rest of the house first...

Plans for our Bungalow

Before we get too much further, we should probably tell you about the project. Our vision was a bungalow. We wanted something very traditional, Craftsman, and quintessentially American. Really, the perfect family home. And if the origins of the bungalow include the Sears catalog, we figured it was a good starting point.
We looked online for examples of modern bungalow floorplans and found one that loosely fit our desires. We took our ideas to our architect Jeff Day, and after he worked his magic, our vision was officially on paper.
The above picture is the front elevation. We don't want to share too much - after all, Jeff did copyright the plan! But the basics include:

• 2,500 square feet of living space
• Attached 2-car rear garage (so it doesn't spoil the front elevation)
• Breakfast nook in the kitchen, along with a center island
• Center split staircase
• Three bedrooms
• Three full baths - one on the main level off of the study/guest room, one jack-and-jill bath between the kids' rooms, and one master bath (including a 6x9 shower)
• Upstairs laundry

Sounds pretty inefficent, right? WRONG! We can do all of this, and STILL go for LEED Silver certification. It is absolutely a traditional house with modern conveniences, and it will be built with efficiency in mind.

If you like the look of our elevation and have specific questions about sharing the floorplan, we suggest you visit our architect's website: www.jeffdayllc.com . He's really great to work with and really embraces his projects.

Our First Entry!

Hello! Welcome to our blog! We are building an environmentally friendly bungalow in St. Louis. This has been quite a journey for us, and we only broke ground two weeks ago... We thought it might be fun to share the journey from here, on, with anyone that's interested.

Above is a picture of our vacant lot, prior to the ground breaking. We've had the land for about 6 months, and we've used all 6 months for the planning of the home. We are working with Sage Builders ( http://www.sagestl.com/ ), and our goal is an efficient family-friendly home. So far, we can't say enough about how great Sage has been to work with. When we started the process, we knew little about building green; we now can credit most of our knowledge to the team at Sage.

Considering this is our first post, I think we've said enough so far! Stay tuned for more info on the ground-breaking, plastic soil, and the setting of the Superior Wall Systems foundation...

Best,

Adam & Amanda