Practicing What You Preach is Tough

The first resident

No more mud!

A sampling of our haul

Front with porch cavity

Once the stone and brick were completed last week, the yard was littered with mounds of unused concrete, brick pieces, and stone chunks. Instead of having it all go in the dumpster or being mixed in with the dirt that will be used to grade the yard, we decided that it would be a much better idea to put it in the cavity of our front porch.

The mason finished the outside wall of our front porch last week, but the cavity hasn't yet been filled with dirt and finished with concrete. The mason had thrown into the cavity a few used buckets and empty bottles, which I pulled out, but it gave us the idea of filling it in with more substantial matter. We collectively hauled to the front porch what probably amounted to about 800 pounds of concrete, brick, and stone pieces, plus a huge piece of bent rebar that's been rusting in the yard for two months that was too big to put in Patrick's truck for recycling.

We've tried hard to make the house as sustainable as we can afford, so it made sense to reuse these materials. First, we've already paid for them, so why not use the materials to their fullest extent instead of throwing them in the dumpster? Second, the concrete, brick, and stone will add considerable strength to the front porch. Third, diverting the waste stream to a usable space means that we use fewer raw materials, saving money and natural resources. It was backbreaking work and we were all exhausted when we finished, but it feels really good to be able to put ideas on sustainability to work, even when building a fairly "conventional" house.

I've said before that we go to the house each weekend to clean up the messes that the workers leave. We find not just construction waste such as nails, wood, drywall, etc. but also drink cups/lids/straws, discarded banana peels, food wrappers and such. Yesterday, we spent hours sweeping up drywall and plaster dust and getting plaster blobs off the floor. We also found that about a cup of unshelled sunflower seeds along with other trash had fallen in the gap that is the base of our kitchen island. It blows my mind that people working on a new house would be so careless as to throw their trash all over the place or leave it where it falls. Building a house is, of course, a huge financial undertaking and it's disturbing to see that people treat our future home with such disrespect. The sunflower seeds-if they weren't removed by us-would spend the life of our house rotting and attracting rodents and insects. And we wonder why our indoor air quality is worse than outside air quality?

On a much lighter note, I picked out the tile for the bathrooms, kitchen, and laundry room this week. Fun stuff! I fell in love with one particular tile as soon as I walked in store and ended up designing the kitchen around it. When I got home that night, I realized that the tile is in the same pattern on our dog's collar--hilarious! I guess I'm fairly consistent in my taste. I could pick tile all day!!

I also got all the paint colors nailed down (seven, plus trim). All that's left to pick is the door and cabinetry hardware.

I can hardly believe that we're getting so close to completion now. I know it's another two months until we're in, but still, it's hard to contain our excitement at this point. Patrick is always sad to leave the house after cleaning and is trying to see the light at the end of the tunnel, and it really won't be much longer now. The trim carpenter will be there this week and will hang interior doors, install cabinetry, and make bookshelves and a mudroom bench. The driveway, back porch, and part of the sidewalk are poured and curing. The back deck should begin this week. There's no denying it's coming together now. And we are happy!