June/July — Excavation & Foundation
We started this house in summer of 2003. Excavating in sand always poses special problems - like moving about twice as much material and the having to retain the sand bank so it doesn't slump down and cover the footings.
In this picture the foundation crew is just about ready for the first pour.
We had to do this in two pours, since the library foundation stepped up the sand bank about six feet and there was no way we could retain the bank. So we poured the lower walls, backfilled, and then poured the upper foundation.
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Above are two pictures of the foundation guys tieing rebar on the walls with the exterior forms up.
We've got the rebar down for the slab in this picture.

The basement slab is poured and the upper walls are formed. That colum in the center of the basement is the masonry mass for the fireplace upstairs.

And here we've started framing the basement stem walls.