Ikea - nobody gets hurt

Jackie and I spent yesterday afternoon putting together these dandy dining room chairs. We're getting good at Ikea furniture - and we have plenty more to do to get our kitchen stuff together. Once you get the hang of it, it goes fast and easy, and is relatively painless...unlike some of our other projects!

Drywall

...or gypsum or wallboard, but not Sheetrock (a trademark name), as I was reminded by my friend Debbie who works for Lafarge and has been trying to train us for years, but I slipped. Anyway, the walls are covered and Jackie likes this design the joint compound makes. We may be looking at it for a while. Really. No money for paint... And appliances from Sears arrived. Very exciting day.

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving on the other side of the Mason Dixon line. Live and virtual family present (I'm happy with slightly pixelated versions of people I love if they can't be there - thank you Skype), lots of gratitude despite some hardships.

On long road trips, I like to collect odd place names. When we lived in St. Augustine, I wondered how it was for people who had to give their address as "Glimpse of Glory Rd." or "Mosquito Control Rd." Last week we discovered Pigs Ear Rd., Cheater Lake, and Upper and Lower Shut-In Rd. Many years ago we loved Powhite Highway, but we don't drive that way anymore.

Snow Day

There was a dusting of snow today - and school was cancelled here. It's all relative. (Higher elevations do get big amounts, and it's not safe for the school buses.) And no sheetrock today, since workers got snowed in.

We're very happy with the stained glass windows we put beside the front door. They travelled from St. Augustine to Boston, back to FL and now here...

When we get back from our Thanksgiving travels, we should be almost ready for final inspections. Crawling to the finish line!

Seems like a good sign...

...but forget about the pot of gold - it's spent!

Concrete Karma

Seems like fate, after working on the Big Dig (3.8 million cubic yards of concrete), that we'll be living on this slab. It's good to use with radiant floor heat and works well as thermal mass for the passive solar heat. The floor will be sealed next week. Stay tuned for stucco and sheet rock...

A series of tubes...

...not to be confused with the Ted Stevens series of tubes. Radiant floor heat has been around for centuries in different forms. It's very comfortable, efficient and clean. Concrete will be poured on this pex tubing. Our hot water boiler will heat water that will go through these tubes and warm the slab. Deco will be ecstatic, but we're really not doing this just for her!

It was a busy and productive week. The crew installed all the windows, and Jackie and I unloaded the Pod over the weekend. We ask the perennial questions, why so much stuff and why do we keep lugging it around with us?

We really love these Avonni windows - they are aluminum clad outside and wood on the inside. They are manufactured locally and go really well with our metal roof. Glazing is one of the key elements of passive solar heating.

Not sure we mentioned one of the best sources of information about this type of construction - The Passive Solar House by Dan Chiras.

One of these photos shows the glass block that will be over the countertops in the kitchen (reduces the need for daytime lighting - Jackie's good idea!). Chris the Plumber and Jeramy, our project manager, are in this picture.

Halfbacks

People who move from the north to Florida (which they discover is as hot as hell, surprise!), and then halfway back to North Carolina are halfbacks. It's not technically halfway, but there's foliage and snow, so it's very un-Florida like.

We are officially here, but can't move in to our house until the last few details are finished - windows, doors, floors, sheetrock, boiler... Many updates to follow this week!