Quite a bit of progress in the past, oh, month or so

Okay, so I realize that my last post about the house was one month ago, to the day, but I think I have some fairly good excuses.  Once the Richtfest was finished, we had two weeks to prepare the apartment for our visit:  my cousin, Elizabeth, and her friend, Carla, came to us at the last stop of their whirlwind European tour.  Also, the last 2 weeks of work were really crazy, and invovled a couple of late-nighters for me.  Then, Carla and Elizabeth arrived.  We've been having lots of fun, and have done quite a bit of exploring in Germany.  Of course, I should not forget the most important reason though:

Yup, this is ours!  Joern and I are having a baby, who we have named, "Erbse" (German for pea.) A baby who I happen to think is the absolute most adorable baby in the world! 

Despite all the goings-on in our lives, we have finally seen progress with the house!  The plaster guys finally started on June 4, a Saturday.   They were able to complete plastering the walls on the top two floors, but not the staircase.  After the Richtfest, the guys came in and fninshed by the end of the following week.  So officially, the plaster guys finished on the 18th.  Of course, they are not completely finished, but they are finished with the first layer of plaster, which is quite thick.  They will be back after the Estrich (the cement-like material poured over the insulation, pipes, and radiant heating,) so probably in late August/ September.  The walls look incredible, and I really need to take pictures of how lovely our very finished-looking walls are!

Last week, the electricians were at the house again.  All of our alarm contact wires are installed, and they now installed all of the outlets, without their covers, of course. 
Here are a few pictures:

                                                      Three plug outlets in the kitchen.

Not sure what the four holes with wires are for, but the squares with arrows

are for our exterior metal blinds.  It feels like "command central."

And last week, someone from Mr. Builder came in to pour the foundation for the air heat pump.  The plumbers came and put up the air filtration machine, and worked some more on the pipes in the mechaical room.

Yesterday, the plumbers came, and put up the air-heat pump.  They connected the air intake and outake portion, but of course, there is no plumbing completed yet.  It looks amazing so far though!

Today, the plumbers installed the gas pipe for our stove.  You can also see how nice the plastered over walls look in this picture:

The blue along the wall is the protection between the walls and the poured concreteish floor covering. 

We were also surprised to discover that the plumbers started to lay the insulation that goes beneath the radiant heating.  They started in the Erbse's room:



So there you have it, a very brief update!  Hopefully, now that life is a little calmer, I will be able to update with much more frequency! 
Ciao!





Filling in

Today the builders focused on finishing the waterproofing of the cellar walls, insulation, and filling in the trench surrounding the house.

Waterproof cover over Joern's garage

Insulation covered by waterproofing cover along cellar walls.

Filling in the hole around the cellar with gravel.  The gravel is for drainage.

German builder- on the phone.

Filling in the trench with gravel.

Friday

For a variety of different reasons, I decided not to go to the house yesterday.  Mostly because I decided to clean the kitchen and do some laundry, and I was just toasty and warm.  Plus, I had plans this morning, so I knew that I could always stop at the house on the way out today.
So, this morning, before I headed out to meet my friends Stacy and Mandy for brunch in Stuttgart, I stopped by the house.
Normally, the procedure of checking out the house begins with stopping at my in-laws' house to check out the overview, and then driving back down their driveway, and driving up to our house.  This morning, I figured since I was in a bit of a rush, I would just stop at our house.
The only difference I could notice was that there was even more stuff in our driveway.
And then, I noticed that the builders put bricks above the doorways in the entertainment room.  And honestly, I was a little disappointed.  I know that the builders don't really do too much on Fridays.  I wouldn't want their job for the world, its cold now, and they work the butts off.  But come on, this was the only difference I could see from Thursday to Friday:

Notice the red brick along the top of the doorway to the immediate left. (Thursday)

Now look at the top of the same doorway from yesterday.

So, this was it.  That and a beer bottle had been removed from in front of the brick cutting machine.  The beer bottle was a little weird anyway, builders aren't allowed to drink on the site.  Huh.  But okay. 

Anyway, I was moderately sad that more progress hadn't been made. Then, I looked through the light well, and saw a little white, could  it be insulation?





That little white peaking through the light well (that rectangular cutout in the wall?)  Is it insulation?

I figured I couldn't leave without checking out the back of the house.  So, up to the in-laws' house I drove, and it turns out that the complete back of the house had been insulated!





All that gray along the back is a covering over the insulation!

The back of Joern's garage is also insulated:

The builders also filled in a lot more gravel and the big orange pipes were made higher.  Those big orange pipes are part of the drainage system.



Well there you have it.  The builders worked pretty hard yesterday, even without their Thursday / Friday food.

What a cool way (or hopefully warmer way,) to wrap up the end of week 9 of building!