First Milestone: Preparing the Construction Site

Building a house, sure that's nice. Building your own home, now that is exciting! It has taken us a long time, a whole lot longer than anticipated to get to this stage of our building process, but here we are!! Have a look...

Yellow = building envelope; blue = geothermal field; red = septic field.

Here's the plan:

Phase 1:

• Clearing - Steve cut down the trees within the building envelope and geothermal field, being very selective to avoid over clearing. He fell a total of 87 trees, saving a handful of maybe's that just might be able to stay.

• Chipping - A crew of 2-3 laborers took a solid week to clear away branches off the site and send it all through the chipper. It created a massive pile of mulch Steve is calling the whale.

Phase 2:

• Stumping - Steve's lining up a large excavator (with a thumb) for the site. You might not know this, but I have a little experience with operating an excavator. Yes, I do! It was a big one too. One with a thumb. Steve rented it a few years ago because, you will soon see, I secretly love oversized earth-moving machinery. So he got me one for my birthday! And an orange hard hat. He's the best! I happily wore it while dragging large dead logs and branches and piling it up toward the back of our lot. (Scroll down for proof :) I'm hoping he lets me operate the excavator for some of the smaller stumps... fingers crossed!

• Stripping - This step involves stripping off 8" of the top soil and stock piling it for later use. The top soil contains a lot of organic matter that decomposes and deteriorates. Because it deteriorates, it's not as stable as the virgin soil beneath it. However, it is great soil to use in landscaping and gardening later on. I'm not sure if this is when the fill comes in to level the site, but I do think the grading happens at this stage.

• Laying Anti-Tracking Pad - This is a necessary step to help keep mud, rocks, and sediment off the road as big machines exit the site. Neighborhoods hate dirty, messy roads outside of a construction site. This involves laying a bed of trap rock at the entrance/exit of the site. It's basically the same idea as a door mat for muddy boots.

Here's some throwback pics of us doing some cleaning up the land back in 2020.

I'm dragging a dead log down a hill... beep, beep, beep...

My first pile of logs.

My birthday present. Thanks, babe! I love you so much.