Let the Lies Fly - Its ELECTION SEASON

Its going to be an interesting election season full of half truths and slander from both sides.

Case in point: The Obama camp saying that "Romney and Ryan will end Medicare as we know it."
Medicare "as we know it" is nearly insolvent, rife with with fraud, and soon to have VAST growth in the number of 'dependents' added to the system which will only hasten the insolvency.

Several key aspects of the Obamacare program are aimed at reducing Medicare costs and curtailing billing fraud. If Medicare "as we know it" was a good thing, the Obama administration wouldn't be looking to reform it.

Would Romney/Ryan make fundamental and drastic changes to Medicare? I hope so. Someone needs to. Would those changes differ from what Obama is trying to do? Absolutely. 

Does the Democratic platform of continuing to provide unlimited coverage to Medicare recipients sound appealing? Yes. Who doesn't want to hear that someone else is going to cover your medical expenses? My grandmother is on Medicare and I certainly want her expenses to be covered.

Realistically though, there's a HUGE national deficit. HOW do we keep funding something like that? Regardless of which party wins the election, we NEED an overhaul of pretty much every aspect of government spending.

When do we get to the election debates when the candidates have to stand face to face and make claims that other party can explain/defend/debunk before the same audience?

Regardless of which party you identify or which candidate you're already planning to vote for, you NEED to listen to what both parties say and then research on your own to sort through the bull they're both slinging.

Can't fit a regular newscast in your schedule or can't find a news station that's not either openly biased or so phony in their attempt at fair and unbiased coverage that it makes you sick?  Get a Twitter account and start following the Presidential and Vice Presidential candidates, the campaign offices,  and then add the various individuals and groups that you'll find offering commentary and reference material. 

I promise that its interesting and I promise that you'll be amazed at how skewed and misleading each side can be on their own.

Project Homestead - part 5 - NOW the neighbors hate us

After the four day rush to have sub-rough plumbing inspected, the damp proofing done, back fill completed and gravel placed and leveled, we were ready to have the concrete floors poured.

On October 2, 2011, I left town for a work conference with absolutely no intention of letting the concrete contractor know that wouldn't be around to check their progress each day.

On October 3rd, they were on site installing rebar for the floors (we opted to spend an extra $650 adding rebar to avoid any shifting later) and called that evening to let me know they'd be starting the pour at 6am the next day in hopes of avoiding a rain storm later that day.  The contractor was a bit concerned about upset neighbors calling in a noise complaint to the police.
 

Laundry room, bathroom, and entrance area.

On October 4th - as reported a few neighbors who happen to be friends - the crew (complete with flood lights) and concrete truck (complete with backup alarms) was on site at 5:15am.  By the end of the day, our floors were poured and the flatwork was done.

Family Room

LESSONS LEARNED:
1) The concrete will NEVER be perfectly flat and level. It Just Won't Happen.
2) A good rain storm after the floors are poured will really show you how true #1 is.
3) Friends won't complain about the 5:15am noise and light but they will harass you about it a bit.

Bedrooms and Family Room

Project Homestead - part 4 - Where's the Gang?

Once the concrete walls were ready, it was time for sub-rough plumbing. Sub-rough plumbing really just consists of the drain pipes that are installed below the floors and will connect to the sewer line. The plumbing contractors dug trenches and placed/connected all of the drain pipes for the home.  Once that was done, I had to shovel the dirt back into the trenches and pack it down as prep for the gravel fill.

While the plumbers were doing their part, I spent two days with a 24 gallons of tar, a paint roller, and a roofing brush coating the foundation as damp proofing.

After the damp proofing was done, the backfill started.  I rented a bobcat to do some back fill around the outside of the garage where the dig was rather shallow and compaction wasn't critical. I also moved a lot of dirt so that the excavator and I could get a backhoe around back.

I opted to install a french drain and bring it to a vertical culvert where a sump pump can be installed later. Wow, that was a pain! The plastic drain tile (flexible pipe) kept shifting up when gravel was dumped on it and it took a long time to install.

After the french drain was installed, we started back fill with the excavator running the backhoe and me running a compactor.  Rather than fill the inside of the basement with 6" of dirt, level it and compact it then fill it with  4" of gravel that also had to be leveled, I opted for 10" of gravel and no need for compacting.

All told, the back fill, compacting and gravel project amounted to four days of labor and felt a lot like working on a chain gang without the chain.  One day, I drank water all day but was still 8lbs lighter that night and couldn't pee until the next day.  I shoveled and raked a crazy amount of gravel but, it was all even and ready for to support the 4" concrete slab that will be the basement floor or our new home.

LESSONS LEARNED:
1) Shoveling and raking a LOT of gravel was brutal but it was still better than back filling, leveling and compacting 6" of dirt and then shoveling 4" of gravel.
2) Hire a few laborers to help shoveling gravel next time!
3) The ICS foam block forms would have saved a lot of time and effort damp proofing the foundation and would be far more effective.
4) Never use the perforated hose style drain tile again! Using the solid PVC with holes drilled only on the top would be much easier and more effective.

Project Homestead - Part 3 - Filling the Hole with Cats!

The concrete crew was on site August 24, 2011 setting forms for the foundation footings.  Haylie, Zander and myself took a walk up to the job site (did I mention, its 1/4 mile from our apartment?) to take a look that night and our cat walked along to check things out. The cat (Sam or Bocephus depending on whether Haylie tells your or I do) just jumped right down in the hole and walked around. At one point, he even laid down and rested a bit.

Since that day, the cat has continued to follow us to the job site and I've even found him already there several times when I've gone over in the evenings. Moving likely won't be a problem for him.

The walls could have gone up a few days after the footings were poured but, that's when we hit our second setback.  The concrete crew was busy on other projects and left us hanging for three weeks.  UGH!!  Three weeks in mid summer wouldn't have been too bad but in the fall, it meant there were pushing us into cold weather and possible snow. I was NOT pleased about that.

We had actual basement walls on September 16th, 2011.  For the most part, the concrete footings and walls turned out well.  There's one second of garage wall that sagged a bit though the framers were able to shim the floor truss at that point to make up for it.  There's also one window that's not placed correctly.  The laundry room window is only three feet tall (the other basement windows are four feet tall) to allow for washing machine against the wall. Unfortunately, the concrete crew set that window even with other windows at the BOTTOM rather than even at the TOP.  The owner of the company said he'll give me some keystone blocks to use when building the retaining walls at my basement door and, though I'll ALWAYS thing that window is dumb, I'm going to go with it.

We've since also found that the north wall or the garage sagged a bit - the framing crew was able compensate.  The concrete crew also neglected to offset the anchor bolts correctly on that same wall for the section where garage/house wall becomes garage/outside wall. That wouldn't be an issue if the anchor strap were placed to line up with the bolts.  There are ways to frame around it but its still annoying.

LESSONS LEARNED:
1) If the contractor isn't there and moving forward when you expected, call right then and ask what the hold up is. Waiting to see if they'll show up just kills your project timeline.
2) Check everything yourself regardless of how experience the crew is. That low window is going to bug me forever.
3) Next time, I'm using the ICS foam block concrete forms. Having not seen the entire foundation process before, I didn't trust myself to get it right but having seen the process, I'd feel comfortable doing it myself.

Project Homestead - Part 2 - Getting Dirty

I'm pretty sure the neighbors behind our lot don't like us.  They purchased their home about one month before we purchased our lot. The home formerly belong to friends of ours and they said the new owners were happy the lot behind them was vacant so that they could move trailers and other items through to their back yard.  I hope they made good use of that feature for the two months prior to us excavating because we definitely messed that up.
At the end of August, I made arrangements with an excavator to dig out for our foundation and basement. Leslie and I measured and marked the lot and a few days later, there was a backhoe where our dirt had been!  The kids were getting a little bit excited about things but they didn't really get what this meant for our dream of being in a house again.

LESSONS LEARNED:
1) A soil report calling for "shale soil" and very likely water problems isn't necessarily a death sentence to your basement. We lucked out and had no problems at all. We also set the basement three feet shallow to hopefully avoid problems later.
2) A quality excavator makes life easier. Kerry Krompel did a great job and actually had the hole flat and level. The concrete crew had an easy time setting the footing forms and we didn't waste any concrete trying to fill low spots.

Project Homestead - Part 1 - The SLOW start.

After searching for months trying to find a home we'd like to buy in Price, we eventually decided there was nothing worth purchasing. Everything was either far beyond our price range (the new homes), in need of far too much repair/renovation (most of the homes in our price range) or BOTH. There is an astounding number of older (1950's or 1970's) home in Price that have had minor renovations and are now priced more expensive than brand new homes in some other areas.  The phrase "polished turd" kept coming to mind but it didn't really apply because most of them hadn't been polished.

Rather than paying too much for something that still needed a lot of work, we've opted to build our own home. I've done some framing before and seen, at least at some level, everything involved in building a home I'm just foolish enough to tackle the entire process, and much of the work, myself and will document the experience here.

In February 2011, we chose a house plan from an web store and purchased it for $700. We wanted a few changes but figured we could hand draw the changes we needed.  After talking to the local building inspector about the plans though, it became clear they would need a lot of change to pass 2009 code because these were from 2006.  I spent $100 for a home design software application and started re-drawing the plans and putting in the necessary changes. We were still saving up money for the down payment and so the extra time didn't matter much.

In March, 2011, we made an offer on a lot we really wanted but were turned down. In July 2011, we finally felt we had enough money saved up to get started and that we'd have the plans ready soon so we placed an offer on an alternate lot. It wasn't the lot we really wanted but the price was within our budget, we already knew some of the neighbors and it was laid out just right for our home plans. There was some confusion with the real estate agent and the developer/seller over which lots were actually still available and so we didn't get the lot we wanted.

While trying to clear up the confusion regarding which lots were available, the real estate agent remembered the lot we originally wanted and mentioned that another on the same street had just sold for a price we could afford. We made an offer and landed our preferred lot for the same price as the second choice lot was selling for.  SCORE! The lot we grabbed is on a street of new homes, across the street from a church next door to friends, and up the street from the school Leslie teaches at and Haylie attends. BIG SCORE!!

We lined everything up with the bank and headed to the city offices to have our plans approved. That's when we hit our first setback. The "setback" requirements on the lot meant our home, as designed, wouldn't fit on the lot and we'd need to re-draw the plans.

The same week our plans and lot were going to the appraiser as part of the loan process, I had to completely redesign and redraw the entire plan.  Three days later, we had something the appraiser could use and a week later, we had something that would pass inspection.  UGH - that was a LONG week!
The loan process was easy and we signed the papers mid August 2011 with our approved plans in hand.

Building a home was no longer a dream, it was a commitment we had to come through on.

LESSONS LEARNED:
1) That 20% down is due when you sign papers on the owner/builder loan. You don't have until the home is complete to have the 20% ready. They also add 10% to the projected costs betting that a non-professional builder is going to go over a bit.
2) Building code requirements have come a long way since our previous house was built in 2004.
3) Washington Federal in Price, UT (the bank we used) is really friendly and helpful with the whole financing and planning process.

DISGUISE THE BUM!

On Sunday, while I was changing Zander's diaper (yes, a diaper @ 3 1/2 yrs old because he's stubborn), I asked him to lift his legs and then he belted out "DISGUISE THE BUM." He proceeded to tell me to disguise the bum throughout the diaper change. When we were done, Zander told me he'd be telling the kids in the nursery at church to disguise the bum. I asked him not to. You can guess how that request was taken.
True to his word, when Zander walked into the nursery, his first words were "DISGUISE THE BUM!" I asked him to stop talking about his bum and then explained that he invented that phrase on his own.
Tonight, Zander was enjoying another diaper change and once again exclaimed, "DISGUISE THE BUM!" Right after that, he went into some speech about how he's a hero and his power is to disguise the bum. I really wish he'd warn us that he's going to wax poetic so that we could film those moments.