day nine.

today about 6 of us + robert and adrian met on site at 10:00, so that we could have an early friday. for the first few hours, we finished up the roof and doors on the clubhouse. anna, megan and i once again worked on cutting and measuring 2x12s for the roof. i also learned how to properly rip a board lengthwise, which was cool. i was very concerned that i was going to screw it up, but i luckily i didn't. yay

after we finished up the roof, cody and josh worked on the doors, and the rest of us went to work on ICFs. Megan explained the whole process to us, since she worked on them yesterday. it was actually quite simple, just tedious because of all the cutting and measuring & such. we did our little corner of the building, while another group worked on another section. around 2:00, we found out that the other group hadn't fully understood the instructions, and needed to redo part of the ICFs they had been working on. since anna, megan and i were mostly done with our area, we helped them figure out what was going on. this was the first setback we have encountered so far (excluding rain & such), which is actually kind of surprising considering we've been working for 2 weeks. it wasn't anything major though, and hopefully the rest of the group got it all straightened out before the day was over.

next week, we are going to start putting windows in, which should be interesting. also, the weather is not looking so great: it's apparently supposed to be cold and rainy/snowy. can't wait...

day eight.

today was the first day that we were on site with the gtcc guys. they meet from 9-1, three days a week, i think. so they started laying down the ICFs, then a group from our class did some more. there was also a group that pumped water, since it was raining for the past 2 days. thankfully, i didn't have to do any more pumping!

the group i was in worked on the roof of the clubhouse. we figured it would take a few hours or so, and that we'd be able to help with ICFs later, but we didn't get finished in the four hours we were working on it. we had to measure each 2x12 individually, which took forever. we got most of the way done, but then we ran out of screws. while anna, cody, renee c. and i were working on the roof, josh and gabe were working on the front wall & doors, and i think they just need to be hung. so tomorrow, the plan is to finally finish the clubhouse!

screwing in the roof / battling with a tree.

the clubhouse thus far.

day seven.

today we all met in the shop because it was pouring out. it was nice to be inside for a while! first, my group finished the dust collecting system, which took about 2-ish hours. then anna, megan and i helped renee c. put together a clamp rack, which took another 1.5-ish hours. then for the last part, we helped with miscellaneous tasks around the shop, which mostly consisted of cleaning and organizing. we got most of what we needed to accomplish for the day finished, and everything else will get finished up once we get the rest of the materials.

tomorrow we're heading back to the site to start installing the ICFs. it's supposed to be super-nice out tomorrow, which will be awesome. however, i'm thinking we'll be doing a lot of pumping water again and cleaning off the footings before we really get started... yay.

day six.

today was rainy and gross all day long. we were originally going to meet at the shop because of the rain, but the ICFs were being delivered and needed to be unloaded, so we ended up meeting on the site. it was quite confusing though, because neither robert or adrian were there, so denise was getting our instructions via phone. so we ended up having to move all the ICFs around because they were unloaded into the driveway, and we needed them moved. however, i'm still not quite clear why exactly... i'm pretty sure no one is going to know what they are, let alone want to steal them. oh well. it took about an hour to move them, and after that we got to leave, which was lovely :)

day five.

today was awesome because the time went by much quicker than the previous days. i'm thinking it had something to do with the fact that i had a job to do for pretty much the whole day, and never found myself just standing around looking for something to do. plus, megan and i had to leave earlier to get to our LEED class. today we all worked on finishing up the clubhouse, but of course we didn't get it completely finished. while about half of the class finished assembling the last framed squares, anna, megan, myself, and a few others helped to make the structure from friday square. then we measured and cut 2x12's for the floor. then as the rest of the class was putting the squares up, we measured some 1x4s for strapping to go underneath the floor joists. then we watched for a while as robert and adrian did some crazy climbing on top of the structure to attatch the 16-foot 2x12s to the top edge. we then screwed the 2x12s in for the floor. that was as far as we got today before megan and i had to leave. we were not sad to have to leave early though, because it got really cold after the sun went down! i'm definitely looking forward to warmer weather.... and tomorrow we start laying the icfs, which should be really fun!

and once again, i forgot my camera, so no pictures...

day four.

today started out quite dull: for the first hour or so anna, lauren g, ashley and i scooped leftover water out of places we pumped yesterday. the pools were too shallow for the pump, but there was still enough water that needed to be removed. it was slightly ridiculous because we were removing the water with a 4-cup measuring cup. so, it took forever. we did this for a while, but then another group needed our buckets to shovel gravel for the clubhouse [not that we complained, because we could then move on to something else]. so the four of us then used the pump to get the water out of some of the deeper places. all this water-removing was quite annoying, because we weren't sure why we had to do it today, especially considering it might rain this weekend. hopefully it doesn't...

while all this was occurring, the rest of the class was getting started on the clubhouse. after we finished pumping, we went over to help, but it seemed that everyone already had jobs, so we spent a while observing/looking for something to do. finally, anna and i helped measure and sort 2x12s. after this, we measured and marked sheets of plywood so that josh could pre-drill holes in them, so that they can be easily screwed to the 2x12s. as a class, we then assembled half of the clubhouse, and it looks pretty cool so far. robert mentioned Dwell a few times, so i guess he's going to try and get it featured in Dwell somehow, which would be pretty awesome.

i forgot to bring my camera today, but katie took a lot of pictures of us working on the clubhouse. so until i get some of those, here are two quick sketches of the clubhouse:

day three.

today we spent the afternoon at the site, and it was pretty fun. i was expecting it to be freezing, but it was actually quite nice out, which was a lovely surprise. anna, megan and i spent an hour or so getting nails out of some 2x12's that we're going to use tomorrow to build our clubhouse. we figured out that none of us knew how to use a hammer properly, but after observing gabe, we quickly learned, and are now pros at removing nails.

next, we spent an hour or so chipping dirt out of the keys in the footings, and getting them nice and clean so we can lay the ICFs. this involved a lot more work than i originially anticipated, but after renee went by with the leaf blower, they were all clean and lovely.

the last part of the class was spent pumping water off the site. this was the only task left to be done, and there was a group of about 5-8 people who had it under control, so the rest of us pretty much observed. i didn't like watching everyone else doing work, but there was nothing for the rest of us to do, so we observed and helped out if we could.

so since we got everything we planned to do that day finished in about 3 hours, robert let us leave early! he warned us not to get used to that though...

ripping out nails!

digging

pumping water

day two.

today we met out at the site for the first time. the footings are already poured, so we could see the footprint of the building. there is a lot of ice in between the footing, and i suppose tomorrow's project is going to be removing said ice. we walked around the site for a bit while robert gave us a "tour" of where everything is going to go. he pointed out the areas that still need to be designed, and it's actually quite a lot. it's going to be fun to design + build at essentially the same time, but i'm a bit skeptical as to how it's really going to work out... but surely it will! robert also explained more about how the ICFs are actually going to work, and it makes so much more sense after seeing the footings. after seeing the site, i'm not quite as worried, and i'm very excited to get building! currently, there are massive chunks of ice in between the footings, as well as dirt on top of them, so our project for tomorrow or later this week is removing said ice and dirt, so we can put the ICFs down. hooray!

after the site, we went over to the shop at the university research park. the building we have is part of the old greensboro school for the deaf, and it's really cool. adrian and robert have set up some tools and tables and such, but there's a bit more work to be done to get it a fully-functioning shop. today, we spent over 3 hours putting together a dust collecting system, and we only got halfway done. we had to be very creative and do some finagling to get it together, but it turned out [fairly] well. we ran out of parts though, so we are going to be finishing up the second half of it later at some point...

sign at the site

the site!

josh & cody hanging the dust collecting tubes

day one.

today it snowed! and we met in the conference room to discuss the the project a bit and what to expect for the semester. we saw the model, and it was the first time it really hit me what we would be building. we saw a quick movie about the first urban studio, which got me really excited about building! robert also talked a lot about the ICFs we will be using for the exterior walls, as well as about a few other things, and it was a bit intimidating to hear him talk about all this stuff, and not fully understand what he was saying. after today, i'm a bit worried about what i've gotten myself into, but also excited to get going!

my sisters' house model