Computer and the Real Thing

It's starting to look somewhat like the computer model:

Although the kitchen and living room still have a ways to go:

In the computer drawing above there are some arches that will be part of the support system for the upper story. Here's the footings for those columns:

Starting to Look Like Something

We finally get a little break, all the lower electrical is finished. Now we have to wait until they get the walls up to the 9' level, then all the recessed, and ceiling light wiring has to be run.

It's been so windy (two weeks with wind over 35mph), that it's been difficult to lay block. The windward walls had to be braced against the wind with 4x4 posts until the mortar dried.

There's somewhat of an entrance door. The wood form above the door is the mold for the poured concrete beam above:

We can tell where the living room windows will be:

Interior rooms:

Kitchen:

Barely Ahead of the Game

We have two guys helping with electrical and plumbing now. With three of us, it looks like we're going to finish in time for the masons to pour the bond beams tomorrow. I don't know what I was thinking when I decided to do this solo.

One of the main reasons we're pushing so hard is that hurricane season is coming upon us. We'd like to at least get the walls and roof up before there's a possibility of being in the path of a storm. Plus it will be nice to have a roof over our heads before it gets really hot.

Here's the sewer lines...fun:

More wires. Each orange conduit contains one strand of Romex wire. In a wood house the romex can be run unprotected, but with abrasive block, concrete, and steel, it has to be protected from abrasion in these orange conduit tubes. Pulling wire through each length of tubing gets a bit monotonous. Keeping track of what goes where is even more of a challenge.

Erasmo, electrician extraordinair. We're so lucky to have a guy with his talent living in such a small village.

While the masons were waiting for us to finish the wiring, they began building the support columns for the patio cover:

The stack of block above, to the left isn't a crooked column! It's block they're waiting to use :)

Lots of Wires

We've been doing electrical for a few days now. It's difficult staying one step ahead of the masons. I had planned on doing most of the electrical myself, but wound up hiring an electrician so we could keep the job going without delays. With his helper, there's three of us working. What would have taken about 10 days, will now be finished in about three.

In the picture above, note where the wires pass through the footing. One of the hardest design features was figuring out ahead of time where 4" pipe had to be installed in the footing for wires to pass through.

The walls are starting to take shape. Today they poured some of the steel reinforced concrete beams that go below and above the windows:

Walls are Going Up!

Today they started laying block for the walls of the house!

Now it's my turn to start installing electrical wires, these hieroglyphics are my wiring and plumbing diagrams :

The foam insulation started going in, which was a real treat once the wind started to blow:

Below Omar and Martín are trying to get out of the wind to load the distribution bag:

Dia de Santa Cruz

Today was Día de Santa Cruz. It's a day to celebrate construction workers. We awoke this morning to see one of the builders mounting a giant cross over the construction site.





We had no idea that today was a holiday, in fact we had planned to go to town. Fortunately we were here, because tradition dictates they all gather and have a meal on the construction site (so the house doesn't fall down).

We rushed to the store and bought a couple kilos of beef, chili peppers, other goodies, and of course...cerveza! The owner of the store, who was also adding on to his building was dressing a big goat for his workers. Mmmmmm.

After pouring the footings for the patio, we all gathered and had a great meal and visited for most of the afternoon:

At the end of the day, the sunset seemed to focus on the cross: