First functioning circuit!

Sara and I continue to plug away on the electric and plumbing. Although it's been very challenging, based on bids we received, we figure we're saving $10k or more by doing it ourselves.

I have the main floor wiring almost complete and about a third of the basement. My parents are coming into town next Tuesday, and in order to get my Dad to help out with the house, I figured I better get the heaters working. He's a bit of a freeze baby after all those winters in Florida, and I'm not sure he'd enjoy working in the house when it's only 30 degrees.

We're installing six electric wall heaters. Our backup heat was a tough decision. Ideally we would have liked to use propane, but we didn't have much luck finding heaters that were economical or easy to install...too much venting or potential health hazards with the ventless ones. The wall heaters, although a bit noisier, heat up a room much faster than baseboards since they use a fan. It was a little frightening lighting up a 30A 240V circuit as my first, but so far no fires or any problems that I can identify.

Maddy hides in the basement among construction detritus while learning a thing or two about plumbing.



Lighting for the dining area (left) and the kitchen (right).



4000 watt wall heater with thermostat for the kitchen/living room.

Deck and porch

Bob Goodman (who was the lead guy building our house) came back from Oregon to work with Sean on our deck and covered porch. These come off the south side of the house, and a few weeks ago we placed three multi-ton boulders as footers for the support posts. Cheaper than concrete!

They have the frame and joists of the deck in, and by tomorrow afternoon we should be enjoying a beer in the sun on the completed deck. After that, they will work on the covered porch, which will be a 10 foot extension of the existing roof line. We're excited to see this done as the south side of the house looks pretty chopped off.

Sean drilling footer bolder for the post anchor bolt.



View of deck from the west.



View of deck and boulder retaining wall from the east.

Plumbing and electric

Finally, after lots of preparation, planning, and purchasing, we finally got our hands dirty with the plumbing and electric. Sara's done some plumbing before but there was still lots to figure out, and Chris has been connecting wires since before he could walk but has never done any residential wiring. So far it's going well but we're just getting started.

Our water line finally got connected to the well, so hopefully we can backfill the trench soon. It will be nice to not have piles of dirt everywhere for once.

Early in the week we had a very successful trip to the big city. Our good friend Jack loaned us his truck and horse trailer, and we proceeded to raid a couple second hand building material stores, craigslist, and Home Depot. We returned home victorious with a used refrigerator, clawfoot bath tub, shower pan, kitchen sink, a few plumbing fixtures, all our light fixtures, and our plumbing and electric supplies.

The backyard

We took a break from house stuff today and went up into our backyard. A 2.5 hour hike from the house took us to one of our favorite spots in the Sawtooths...Goat Lake. Overcast skies and cooler temps provided nice conditions for a walk, and the exercise felt great.