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Well, some interesting developments: 1. We bought a caravan! Even though it's only about 8 miles from where we are temporarily renting (though that "temporary" has ended up into it's 3rd year since we sold our old house!) , it's a pain working on the house then having to hide/ lock everything away each time, before going home, then spend half an hour getting it all out again next day, so we gave notice on our temporary tenancy and are moving onto the site at the end of the month. That should make it far easier to do work on the site. 2. The stone has arrived. It's backed off stone from an old convent school, and we've also got a few interesting bits of stone found on the site which we intend to have inserted into the stone walls, like ones I cut up for the dry stone waller which have fossils in (nothing startling, just marine corals and the like) and one small piece which for various reasons we believe is likely saxon. I also managed to get free of charge 2 genuine old stone gateposts of which I know the provenance - goodness knows how old they are. One of them looks like Stonehenge is probably missing it . But I really like the idea that we know the provenance of all of these things, even the roof slates are recycled (they have not arrived yet but are imminent). We are really pleased with the stone, and fortunately amongst it are enough quoins, which is an unexpected bonus, 3. Openreach came out and were helpful. We discussed options and in the end we are going for armoured cable which we are laying as it can be laid simply on the surface, so is going along behind a hedge where it will disappear into the ground of it's own accord. All perfectly acceptable to Openreach due to the low voltages, and actually something they do quite commonly in rural areas where digging would be an issue. The nearest pole is too far away. Only downside is that despite the entire village getting fibre in only about a year ago, they'd want an arm and a leg to get it to us - however, the guy tells me we'll be the only people on the exchange on ADSL so will probably end up with quite a respectable speed anyway for less money, so I'm not too bothered if this turns out to be correct. I know that as houses in the village were moved onto fibre and off the ADSL, those still waiting were noticing speed increases. 4. Electricity board say they'll be progressing things in the next couple of weeks, so I've cracked on with getting their cabinet installed - it's going onto a retaining wall rather than on the house itself (they are perfectly happy about that) so we have a second cabinet alongside for our junctions off for our sub mains to the garage/workshop and the house, as well as putting an external RCD socket on the outside to give us a temporary supply (handy for the caravan!). The retaining wall is built in blockwork, but is getting covered in real stone, so that's definitely not it's final appearance. 5. With deciding to move onto the site, I need to get the utility room and downstairs bathroom (though the caravan has loo and shower of course) sorted ASAP so we can have a washing machine and so on, so instead of doing the insulation, UFH pipes and screeding on the ground floor all at once, I'm going to have to do those two small rooms first (staged finance prevents me doing it all at once just yet), so am looking now at screeding them myself, though will get a firm in to do the main parts of the building later of course. So last night I put the base of the partition wall in to make it more manageable for me to do in 2 smaller lots. As ever, our dog is fascinated by the laser level (that's not it shining in her eyes I should point out!).

Another week of hard work by the builders and the foundations are complete. Type 1 up-fill (only 100mm or so required) was spread then compacted down with a vibrating roller. A final layer of quarry dust was added to finish the blinding. In keeping with previous comments about a clean and tidy site, you can also see the digger spreading type 1 around the foundations. Internal drains and ducts are added, DPC / Radon barrier laid and 150mm PU insulation fitted. Whilst doing all this, the concrete wagon stopped by and the strip founds for our garage were put in. The plumber subsequently put in the UFH pipework, over 1 KM of it! A track system was stuck down (black lines you can see) onto the face of the insulation and pipework clipped in. Individual clips direct into the insulation were used where required. The following day, an hour of light drizzle forecast, the main concrete slab was poured. Two wagons and just under 14 m3 of concrete with glass fibre mixed through. Again, a concrete skip and crane were used to move the concrete from wagon to foundation. You'll notice the twin (scaffolding pole) rails running the length of the foundation. They had simply been set as guide rails for the vibrating leveler to run on and were removed once the main vibration runs had been completed. The next shot shows the slab ready for power floating later in the day. Unfortunately, it kept on raining which meant a 0430 start the following day for my builder. He did a cracking job power floating the slab, which is now beautifully smooth and level. The final stage before building the walls can start, is painting a radon barrier ( the green paint you can see ) on the concrete core of the ICF block. Apart from a bit of unwanted news - 3 week delay for our windows due to a summer factory close down - things are moving in the right direction. The walls should go up this week so we are going to see big changes over the next few days.

A busy week on site has seen us transition from foundations to solid structure. First order of the day, getting prepared - ICF blocks, braces, window formers and other equipment moved onto the slab. Building the walls up - basically a giant lego kit! Blockwork finished and scaffolding going up. Although the ICF blocks interlock with each other, the walls themselves (6 blocks high) are subject to a lot of movement. To counter this and secure them for the concrete pour, adjustable braces are fixed to the slab, and to tracks bolted into the plastic ties that form the core of the ICF block. Timber sheets are bolted over internal and external corners for additional strengthening, Timber window formers are fixed into place inside and out to prevent movement during the pour. Rebar is used to reinforce around openings; and finally, any gaps or damage to the ICF blockwork is sealed with expanding foam; Erecting the ICF took two days, with all the preparations taking another two. Concrete was finally poured on day five, using exactly the same method as per the foundations. A hoistable skip attached to a crane, was filled with steel fibre reinforced concrete. The builders worked their way around the walls in three circuits, filling to a depth of 2 1/2 blocks on the first two passes, and finishing the depth of the last block on the final pass. Again the same hopper was used to run along the top of the block wall and direct the concrete from the skip outlet down into the wall. A vibrating poker was used to help settle the concrete. A lot of work went into getting the concrete to flow around the window openings. To ensure full fill beneath the windows, the builders cored holes in the window formers and manually topped up the concrete in areas where required, again using the vibrating poker to ensure the concrete filled any gaps and settled. Having filled the ICF core, the final things to be done were floating the surface of the concrete in readiness for the wall plate, inserting lengths of rebar into the gables in readiness for the final sections of ICF being built when the roof goes on, and checking all the walls were true. Two separate rounds of checking the walls and adjusting the bracing were made, to ensure any movement in the curing process was countered. In this picture you can see the curing process in action - water from the concrete being forced out of the joints in the blockwork; Around 22 m3 of concrete went into the walls. The builder had ordered an additional 1 m3 but it wasn't wasted, being deposited in the garage foundation (it's a useful tip - have somewhere prepared where you can deposit / use any spare concrete) All being well, the roof goes up this week.