Final House Plans

I've finally finished the construction drawings ("blueprints") and plan to get them printed out on Monday and submit them to the codes department to get a building permit.  I can't believe it has taken me this long to get them done, but the drawings are very thorough and I have a good grasp of what I'm doing now.  Here are the basic drawings without all the extra notes and labels, plus some views of the exterior and interior.

(Note:  I realize the house looks a little out of proportion now, but hopefully by next fall (2012) I'll be able to add the full wrap-around porch to the two ends and the south side.  That should make it look a lot better!  The cookstove will also have to wait until next year.)

view of the northwest side

view of the southwest side

looking toward front door (west)

looking toward back door (east)

in the storage loft looking east

ground floor plan

storage loft plan

west and east elevations

south elevation

north elevation

section (looking north)

sections (looking west and east)

A Stroll Around the Homestead

My mom and I took a stroll around their land where my homestead will be.  Just wanted to share a few pictures I took along the way.  It was such a beautiful spring day!

view from my great uncle's barn across the way

wild turkeys in my yard

the yard and the view

the adjacent property behind mine where geese love to hang out

the pond

the pond

the shed and the field beyond

the pond and the shed

Driveway Update and Pricing Constraints

A lot has happened since my last post, but while it was happening none of it seemed particularly noteworthy.  But I seem to be way past due for an update.  It's Spring, the dogwoods are starting to bloom (in addition to all the myriad of other beautiful trees, shrubs, and flowers) and things are really starting to turn green around here.  It's a great feeling to be out in the country (even if I am technically in the city limits).

Since the last post in late January I spent about three weeks digging tree stumps out of my driveway, and then another three or four weeks re-grading the 440-foot driveway -- all by hand.  The reasons for doing it by hand instead of getting a bulldozer in there are because I'm not really fond of machinery (especially big, destructive, noisy, polluting ones), plus I wanted to save money, get some exercise, and do a good, thorough job.  I still have some final touches to do on the re-grading, but it's just about done.

I've also gotten well into pricing out the cost of the house and have discovered that I'll have to cut back on the house, both in size and scope.  Since my last posted picture, I've shortened the house in both height and length, eliminated some windows and taken out the spiral staircase.  The new design will be a 12' x 32' footprint and 1-1/2 stories (instead of two).  I still plan to have a wrap-around porch and the wood cookstove, but they will have to wait until I go back to work and save up some more money.  So basically, I'll just have a basic, no-frills rectangle house for now.  At least that's the plan, assuming there are no more pricing surprises.  I'm hoping to finish up the pricing this week and then finish up the plans the next week.  Maybe I'll have a building permit in 3 or 4 weeks!  It's about time, isn't it?!

Farmhouse Drawing and Site Photos

Progress on the home front has been going much more slowly lately due to the unpredictable weather and church and dating activities.  I've been cleaning up the limbs from the tree-cutting operation, cutting down dozens of 'weed trees', and yesterday I started digging out some stumps from the driveway.  My dad and I also put in some cedar logs along the sides of the culvert at the road to keep the gravel from washing into the ditch.  I've also been doing some research on metal roofing, spiral staircases, and building code requirements.  The plans are still in progress, but I've got the major design changes worked out.  Yesterday (while it was sunny!) I took some pictures of the site, including the new fencing and the driveway.  I've also included my latest SketchUp drawing to give you an idea of the new look of the house (above).  Enjoy!

Plan Enlargement and Fencing

I had been sick for a couple of weeks around Thanksgiving and have made a few major changes to my plan, so that's my poor excuse for not keeping up on here. Plus, a new dating relationship and church activities have kept me distracted.

The tree guy finally finished cutting most of the excessively tall/large trees from the wooded area and hauled them off. That procedure left a lot of mangled fences and piles of branches. So two weeks ago my dad and I cleared things out again and got started putting in some metal fence posts and stringing up the barbed wire. We're on the last leg of the fencing, which will total around 750-800 feet in length (we have about 150 ft left to do).

On bad weather days and evenings, I've been redesigning my house to accommodate a family of four, just in case my family size changes in the future. Instead of being around 300 square feet, we're looking at around 700 sq ft. The newest plan is two full stories, with two upstairs bedrooms and a full bath downstairs. There is a spiral staircase connecting the floors. The exterior would have more of a traditional farmhouse look with a wrap around porch on all sides except the north. I'll try and post some updated plans and some pictures of the fencing in the next few days.

A couple of other house decisions that I've made recently are to abandon the idea of using a wood cookstove as a water heater and to hold off putting in a solar water heater. I'll just use a 28 gallon electric water heater. The reason for not using the stove for hot water came after much (much!) research and realizing that it was going to have a lot of maintenance and safety issues, not to mention being complicated to design and install (I still plan to use that wood cookstove for cooking and heating though!). I may put in a solar water heater eventually, but I'm leaving it out now to save on initial cost.

Well that's about all the news for now. Pictures to come soon!

Tree Cutting and Code Compliance

Once again I'm behind on reporting the local news. On October 21st, the Cookeville City Council gave us final approval for the rezoning of the land, but then it took two weeks to take effect. So by November 5th I was allowed to apply for a building permit. Unfortunately there have been some hang-ups.

First, we decided to have a bunch of top heavy, towering pines cut down because they tend to get blown over onto the fences, and I figured it would be a good idea to get them down before I put up any new fencing. Well, the guy we hired only works on the weekends and he's still working out there. Plus, we've had a lot of rain lately, which has slowed him down.

The second hang-up is with the design process and making sure everything I'm doing is up to code. You may remember that I mentioned the code book, which happens to be 1 1/2" thick and those 674 pages don't exactly read like a novel. My dad and I read one paragraph about six times, trying to decipher its meaning. Then there are the drawings. I am one of those types of people that probably came up with the Boy Scout motto, "Be Prepared." The code enforcement office doesn't need everything that I'm putting into these 'blueprints,' but I want them to be thorough so that I know what I'm doing and so that I can pass the 9 inspections that are coming down the pike. I also realized that even though my house is only 339 square feet, it has almost all the same components of a 3390 square foot house.

So, basically I'm trudging away with these drawings, and as soon as I can get them to a comfortable completion, I'll apply for a building permit and get back out on the site work. It'll get there eventually!

Oh - we did manage to get a culvert put into the ditch along the road, so now I have driveway access, which the logging trucks have been using extensively. By the way, the whole logging operation is so destructive to the woods -- it looks like a scene from Lord of the Rings where Saruman slashes and burns a big chunk of Fangorn Forest (and the Ents, outraged, retaliate and drown Saruman's estate). But I'm sure by next summer it will all be grown up again. I'm planning to plant some new trees wherever there are big gaps.

Till next time!
Barry

House Drawings, Cookstove, and Sorghum

Here are a few updated drawings of my house.  Hopefully they're self explanatory, but feel free to ask questions.

Floor Plan

West Elevation

South Elevation

East Elevation

North Elevation

Section - North Wall

This is the stove that I picked out at the Lehman's store in Ohio.  It's a Heartland Sweetheart model.

Here are a few pictures of the sorghum operation in Muddy Pond, TN.