Excavation begins - 07/10/07

I will try to post updates to the status of our Heritage log home being built by Scott and Kathy Pearson who own Heritage Log Homes of Lake Martin and Scott Pearson Construction Company in Alex City, Alabama. Scott and Kathy have both been terrific in helping us to get to this point. We believe that they are the best people we could have found to build our house.

Some of the initial posts are actually pasted comments that I have already sent to family and friends so there are going to be some duplication until I get up-to-date on this blog. I thought that it might be the best way for all of you to keep up with this process. If I find out that it is not then I'll re-think my method of communication. :-)
Rob

First, I'd like to give you a close approximation of what the finished home will look like. We are building a modified version (changed inside mostly although we will have a screened porch outside the master bedroom that the model below does not have. Also, our roof will be dark green metal roof instead of the red that the picture below shows. The model is one that Overland Trails Log Homes in Ellijay, Georgia uses as their sales office. Ed Grant (the president of that company) and his staff have been very helpful and willing to let us ask questions for as long as we wanted to even though we didn't buy our log package from them and are using another builder since we are in a different state. We appreciate their advice when we've asked them questions.

The picture below is their model:

Tuesday July 10, 2007 was the beginning of the excavation. They have to cut a place for the driveway to come in off Scenic Peak Rd and angle into the garage which will be on the right side of the basement. Then they cleared the area around the basement and dug it into the side of the hill.

The road has just been roughed in to allow the equipment to get in. Later they'll put in a mixture of rock/gravel/sand/rock dust to allow for a safer trip up and down the steep hills.

The man in charge of the excavation is Louie Owens who works for CraneWorks and is in the "dirt" division and his hat says LoaderWorks. Louie is a nice guy.

Excavation Continues on Wednesday 07/11/07.
The basement is being dug out of the side of the hill. From there is where I got Barbara some red dirt from Alabama. The area cleared out is huge! They removed trees from around 15 or 20 feet of where the house will go. They took out more in front than we originally expected, but it was so we can also put in a driveway that curves in front of the house so visitors can get to the front door rather than to our garage! The 2 trees left in front are Mountain Oaks. Louie says that they will fill out a lot now that the other stuff has been taken out. Let's hope so.