Spring has come early to Maine. Couldn't be a better year for it for us. Although we are mentally prepared for winter weather returning, it seems less and less likely.
Last Saturday, we officially restarted construction by removed all the styrofoam covering the foundation. We were very happy to see the concrete came through the winter just fine. What a great day to work outside. I think it was supposed to be in the 50's but it felt much nicer. Not a cloud in the sky either.
We spent the rest of the day installing pressure treated 2x4 sills around the edge of the slab. Unlike a house built on a basement (cellar in New England), the sills on a slab have to be straight and parallel to each other. So I spent a good bit of time adjusting and re-adjusting until the goal was achieved. Sunday we laid out the support post locations on the newly installed sills. Getting the layout right will save a ton of grief later.
We did run into a layout problem that had us stumped for awhile. No matter how did the layout, the total was 1/2" wider than the foundation. This was not good or logical! Then Cheryl theorized problem was "cumulative error" - she was right! In lay person terms, cumulative error happens when a bunch of little errors add to create a big one. 1/2" in our case. Thankfully the errors were only pencil marks.
Cheryl and I took our time and cross-checked each other to make sur
e it was done right. Jane came along to check things out too. Since there wasn't anything for here to do yet, she relaxed with some knitting.
