Posted on

House – Establishing the Site and Leveling for Piers

Level, like an Egyptian. This method is both cheap and very accurate. Note the use of windshield wiper fluid for color & anti-freeze.

IMG_1409

Zeno’s paradox?

 

Unfortunately I couldn’t come up with a way of doing right angles I trusted, so I ended up getting a laser level; which is a pretty awesome toy and confirmed how accurate liquid leveling was on top of giving me a perfect 90°.

IMG_1425

A perfect right angle if ever I’ve seen one.

IMG_1439

End of the day, with every mason strings finely adjusted to a perfect & level square. It doesn’t look like much but it took 7 hours to get there.

IMG_1435

Unlike the pricy electric laser level, the liquid one can sleep outside.

IMG_1414

Posted on

Here we go

Only a year after buying our chunk of land we are building a house. The dream we came to pursue in Vermont is finally happening, 4 years in (we had planned on 2). Vermont felt right going in, there simply could not have been a better place, better people, better circumstances to surrounds ourselves with to make it happen. These 4 years were more than necessary to make the adjustments needed for such a lifestyle change. We are extremely appreciative and in debt to everyone who helped a couple of flatlanders get acquainted with all the awesome skills we wanted to develop. To this list of skills that is so nicely summarized in the “categories” of this blog, we are adding “building”.

house

We spent all Winter learning how to build a house & designing it. It completely blows my mind that we live in a time where all this information is available online. I spent countless hours reading and watching videos on building techniques. Not only is information ubiquitous, so is stuff. Every specialized tool or object referenced in these videos is available to purchase online, with reviews, and unboxing videos…

Preparations in no particular order

  • septic permit, the only paperwork/requirement
  • Sketchup design
    • extensive reviews by multiple trusted builders
  • research & acquire needed tools
    • skill saw
    • clamps
    • rip & plywood blades
    • generator
    • run generator and charge devices with it to avoid surprises
  • create guides for sawing
    • 2×6 with 22.5 angle
    • plywood 4′ & 8′
  • find cheap recovered windows & fix them up
  • visit local lumber yards to get material pricing & delivery fees
  • buy portable shower & potty
  • emptying our current house of superfluous things we’ve accumulated to get ready for downsizing
  • budgeting
  • scheduling