Our six month project

Saturday we started a project which will take approximately 6 months to complete. We're building a new home. We've been planning, drawing, thinking, and saving for years....are we ready?...probably not, but we're going to tackle it.

This is the home we live in now. The main part of the house was built in the 20's and was built from used lumber from another house that stood here. It's been added onto three times.

I've showed pictures of it before. It's a small home, but I've raised three boys in it. We've been here almost 17 years, but it's time to make a change.

We've talked about remodeling and adding on ourselves, but different parts of the house have settled and since I'm NOT married to a carpenter we decided (after 15 years of thinking about it) that it would be more cost-effective to just build what we want.

The new house is going to be built right next to the old one with the basement being about where these trees are.

The Chinese Elms have seen better days anyway. They've been good shade but the last ice storm really did a lot of damage to them. The Oklahoma wind isn't gentle either.

The guys tied the big trees to the plow so when they started falling it would convince them to fall the right driection! It actually was a good idea. I don't think my homeowners insurance would've paid for damages to the old house (is that self-inflicted wounds?)
This picture just struck me funny. Oldest son Travis was watching Dad cut the first bite out of the tree. lol

Troy finding a safe place to stand.

Three chain saws and Troy and I picking up brush and cut limbs made a fast job out of it.

The fastest way to load and unload cut firewood. Ready for the splitter.

This is the clean yard after the guys got done. The shrubs are even gone from next to the house. When I woke up this morning, there was a backhoe tractor setting out next to the road. He's going to take the tree-stumps out and finish taking the concrete from the bottom of the fence out.

With 52 subscribers I'm hoping that I'll get lots of input to the thousands of questions I'll have about this building project. Everybody has an opinion and since this will be the first and last house we ever building I'm gonna need lots of help. Everybody up to it?!

Answers to questions so far:

The old house (minus the front screened-in porch and the back part which has a cellar underneath) is going to be moved off--it's a wood floored house. We already have a guy who wants it. They'll take several old houses and make one out of it. The walls in the house are plaster, but the wood can be reused. There's actually pieces of glued flooring(linolium) on the decking in the attic. Used and re-used. The screened-in porch has a solid concrete floor which is cracked in two places all the way thru. That part of the (roof) porch will be brased up or taken off--depending on if he wants it or not. The back part where the cellar is will be left and we can build a new top part--depending on what DH wants to do with it.

House plans: we had an idea of what we wanted and started drawing. I found a software program at SAM's for $70 that I used to draw our actual plan. Our contractor gave me some pointers as to size and location of some rooms because of how building materials come. We added 2' to the garage because there would be less waste. Cost the same, so might as well have it instead of wasted materials. Some states require buildings be looked at by an architect or engineer but we didn't need to. We're also 8 miles from town so a lot of specificiations don't have to be met. But...we're doing everything to code for loan purposes.

YES..there's going to be a sewing room...nice sized one actually. Two bedrooms downstairs in the basement and two upstairs with one of the one's upstairs being my sewing room. Two living room areas--one in the basement and one upstairs. Two full baths and a large kitchen (with an island).

I can post the actual houseplan if somebody/anybody is interested, or give me your email. I cannot respond individually to comments with beta-blogger, so bear with me.