Fabulous Foundations

It is becoming more and more obvious that we enjoy a challenge, as we really couldn’t have made this house any more complicated to build. Because we have five different footings levels (thanks to varying floor materials ranging from bamboo, earthen floors, timber bedroom floor, piers under the deck and a sunken lounge), as well as a curved wall, the footings contractors didn’t want to touch the job unless it was set out by a surveyor with a total station. The quotes for that ranged from $1500 to $3000, but thanks to Karim’s past life as a Hydrographic Surveyor and a really nice man at Walch Optics, we were able to hire a total station for $440, and use it throughout the entire construction of the footings. So by the time the contactors arrived, we had the house marked out, including all the plumbing and electrical points, and Karim’s artist’s impression of a crime scene in the kitchen, depicting what would happen to the contractors if they messed up his sacred geometry proportions.

We had the contractors booked in since early December, and with a stroke of luck, received our building permit the day before digging commenced.

Because we needed to insert a drain on the inside the footing around the sunken lounge, and we have curved steps leading into the lounge, we were left with this mini Grand Canyon.

Fortunately we didn’t come across too many large rocks, and the boxing kicked off on the second day. The contractors were somewhat dismayed by the amount of boxing that was required to reach the various levels, and our house soon became known as “Box City”.

The curved wall and steps was quite a challenge for them, and they did question whether we knew they were concreters not carpenters.

If the amount of boxing and the curves wasn’t enough to frustrate them, Karim following them around with his right royal pain in the arse prism to ensure they were within millimetric accuracy certainly did, especially when they were expected to maintain that accuracy while bashing star pickets into hard, rocky ground!

That said, the contractors did love having the total station on site, especially the plumber and electrician so we could make sure the shower actually did end up over the waste pipe, and the gas was where the stove will be.

And eventually they got revenge by asking Karim to get any loose material out of all the pier holes ha ha

We had always tried to keep the plumbing central in the design of the home, and were pleased to see that the entire job only used three lengths of pipe.

Jack and I placed a timber rebate along the straw bale curved wall, which will act as a render stop…

And made some formwork for the decking piers with off-cuts from industrial plumbing suppliers.

Having set those at the right level, it was really easy to bring the concrete to the right level. Though it was an opportunity for the contractors to take revenge by constantly checking my work and telling me that I was 5mm too high!

By the third day all the lovely chalk lines were gone and the nice level site became quite a mess

Much to the dismay of the project manager…

But once the sand and gravel went down, the site started to look more ordered.

The site wasn't quite ready for the pour in time, which was happening first thing Monday morning, so we were taught how to lay all the insulation, moister barriers and slab mesh so we could finish the job ourselves over the weekend. It was nice to be able to do so much ourselves, and of course we saved quite a bit of money in labour.

After a manic weekend, Karim left for Manilla at 3.30am, so he missed the pour, however we were ready for the concrete trucks.

It was a hectic day, but by the end, we not only had fabulous foundations, the contractor charged us less than his quote even though it took longer than expected... a good deed you may no longer find in too many places other than Tassie Mania.

Carly helped put the left over concrete in the bottom of a new storm water drain. But more importantly, while all this was going on, she took on the role of master chef, harvesting food from the garden and preparing delicious, healthy meals to sustain us throughout the challenge.

And John watered the foundations every hour that evening and the next day because the weather was quite warm and we needed to avoid the concrete setting too quickly.

Ben and John then spent the next few days cleaning the site (which looked like a bomb had hit it), ready for the build to commence. We realised that the contractors had left their whacker packer behind, so rushed in a delivery of gravel to lay in the earthen floor areas and used the machine to compact it, which gives us a clean, hard surface to work on in those areas.

We also placed temporary drains through the footings (bottom centre), so that any rain can exit the building until the roof is constructed. This photo also shows what a wonderful job the contractors did of the foundation for the curved wall, let alone the whole project, as they reached accuracy of within three millimetres. We placed recycled plastic containers over any protruding steel bars (which will reinforce blockwork), to ensure no-one gets staked on them if they trip.

So now the build is in full swing, and to give you a sneak preview, the first four columns have been raised!

Who knows what stage we’ll be at by our end of February update, but just to put it out there… it would be truly wonderful if the curved clerestory wall is in the air.

Hallelujah Wwoofers

After several weeks of bending over building plans to study the house like the back of my hand and list every single nut, bolt, screw, piece of timber etc. that we need to start building, I’m amazed at how much information my brain has managed to absorb. I even know what an angle cleat is, and can tell the difference between a bugle screw and a coach screw! My brain must have dumped some historical information in order to take in this new mammoth load… let’s just hope it didn’t dump anything that I may need in the future, like what’s my middle name again?

Bar a few small things still to organise, we were pretty much ready to start construction by NYE, ten days before the footings were due to commence. This meant we could spend some time in the garden, one last maintenance session before the house build, and low and behold some wwoofers were sent to us from the heavens that very week, Tim and Bree.

We couldn’t possibly list the myriad of things they helped us with, but it included quarrying all the decent soil from the earthworks and sowing seeds on the new terrace above the house site

Clearing huge piles of branches to reduce our fire risk, and using the chipper to create a big pile of mulch for the strawberries.

Then munching on the strawberries with us

Potting up all the native plants

Saving seeds and chopping firewood

Blowing kisses to the bumble bees

And removing and pruning quite a few Albizia trees in order to let more sun into the garden. We’re considering using them to enter a new “green” float in the next Mardi Gras…

It felt wonderful to share food out of the garden with Tim and Bree, such as these beautiful beetroots

And gigantic cabbage

Thanks to Tim and Bree’s help, the garden couldn’t be in better shape and we can now focus on building the house without worrying about the garden being out of control. They are passionate about permaculture with similar goals to ours, and are currently travelling around Australia looking for their perfect piece of paradise. Tassie Mania has certainly caught their attention; we wish them all the best with their endeavours, and promise to nurture and feast from the fig tree they bought for our garden.

Reviewing photos from last year to put the amount of growth into perspective was quite a shock… this is the garden at the beginning of January 2011:

And only twelve months later is evidence of the benefits of the permaculture principle of succession and evolution, with established ground covers, herbs, small shrubs, vines, support species and target species creating quite a beautiful and productive food forest.

We’re sure that Joan, the woofer from Spain who built this mandala in January last year...

Will be thrilled to see what it looks like now.

This one mandala bed alone is producing fantastic carrots, beetroot, lettuce, parsnip and sage.

We’re learning more and more every year, as evident in our 2007 carrots te he…

Compared to this year’s carrots :o)

There are apples on the trees…

Peas on the trellis…

Potatoes multiplying in preparation to feed us over winter…

We couldn’t be happier with how much we’re learning and the amount of food we’re harvesting after such a short amount of time.

Apart from all this, our major highlight in December wasn’t Christmas, and it wasn’t New Year’s Eve (although that was a magical evening), it was watching four Welcome Swallows hatch, feed, open their eyes for the first time and then continue to develop right through to witnessing their first flight. It was truly amazing, and we now enjoy seeing the whole family fly around the property during the day, and return to their nest in the carport at dusk. Only to crap on the table mind you.

There’s also pademelons and wallabies with joeys at the moment, and we were fortunate enough to witness three bandicoots playing with a joey only metres in front of us, as they didn’t realise we were standing behind the glass sliding doors.

And if that wasn’t enough animal adventures, I witnessed a cow giving birth, much to the bewilderment of its friend the sheep. How quickly the calf stood up (within ten minutes) was simply incredible to watch.

And finally on the fauna front, two more Khaki Campbell ducks have joined the family since Tumble, Weed, Bubble and Bee’s successful slug eating probation period. The ducks now have full range of the garden, and have completely annihilated the slugs from the composting area, which was previously a slug breeding ground.

Well construction of the house footings has now commenced, so from here on in look forward to some exciting straw bale building blog updates!