dave and christina

After moving in to the house, we’ve been so caught up with unpacking, chasing after bills, and watching the new grass seeds grow that I really haven’t updated the blog with “moved in/semi furnished” photos. (A recent commenter suggested a grass lawn is not so hip, which is true but we desire anything green to […]

Martin smoothing the concrete of the hearth.

Hearth and surrounds of poured concrete installed! Yea!!!! This turned out really smooth and beautiful!! The oven to the right is in a holding position waiting to be installed. Not in this room!

Ash cleanout.

More garage photos.

Detail at garage door.

After living in the garage and on the terrace, it is […]

As I mentioned previously, Dave found this chandelier at Cosmic Closet in Memphis and they ordered it for us. He worked wonders in rewiring it to make it drop the necessary 13 feet then Dave and Bob the electrician put all the glass pieces together and installed it last week. It looks wonderful!! I am […]

 
The glass shower doors, mirrors, and glass for some of the kitchen cabinets arrived today.

Dave looking through the sidelight glass of the shower

The handrail installation has also started. The "feet" were screwed in today and the stainless rail will arrive soon after the stairwell painting is finished.

A stainless steel […]

There still seems to be alot to be done but it has been good on site each day this week with different crews all working toward the finish. Trim guys are finishing up downstairs and the painters have started painting upstairs.
No more plywood front door- the real one was installed yesterday!! The mail slot was […]

Now that the cabinets are in we were ready for the countertops which were installed this week. All of our sinks are undermounted and came installed with the counters. We ordered the sinks through faucet.com, Martin delivered them to Highland Systems, and they cut the quartz for the countertops. All of the tops (bath, utility, […]

Since starting the blog we have loved the questions we have received from all those interested in building with AAC. I decided to respond to this comment as a post so that the q&a didn’t end up too buried. I felt that others out there might also benefit.
 
The comment:
 
My wife and I have designed a […]

We chose to use a 6″ thick poured concrete with a broom finish for the drive and front walkway. There are expansion joints at strategic locations. The concrete is reinforced and we chose to leave it in its’ natural color and not stain it.

The doors at the back are access to storage closets.

Diamond pattern on […]

Seems as if these last two posts are getting very political.
Our house was shown on the front page of the local news paper recently in relation to an ongoing series on immigrant workers in Memphis. Even though the house was shown our names are not mentioned. The story is about Jose our framer and other […]

Well, the correct stucco has arrived and is on most of the house. We are waiting for the masons to finish up a few things, and for the proper scuppers to be installed (this may have happened today). There was a hiccup with the stucco, but Ivan made it right. Thanks, Ivan.

Sorry if we haven’t posted for a while. We hit a snag with our stucco. We were excited to learn that Sider Oxydro could match any Sherwin Williams color for the stucco. We looked at some color chips and chose three that we liked. We asked Sider Oxydro to provide some […]

I thought certainly we had a link to Aercon Florida at the list on the right, but it wasn’t there. But it is now. We had a great experience with them and definitely recommend them. Their product is superior to the others we’ve looked at, and the service is great.

The electrical rough in has gone well, but at times seemed time consuming once the cutting into the block took place. If I had things to do over with AAC construction, I might create specific chases for the electrical and plumbing to save having to cut out the block. Furring out the sheetrock could also […]

We’ve been analyzing the mechanical system alot over the past week. This is what gets tricky when you start building out of materials new to the local industry. Suddenly there are a lot of questions and many different answers. Not being a mechanical engineer or HVAC installer, the information seems convoluted to me. My wonderfully […]

As far as tools for AAC go, this is my advice:
Order from Demand Products (see link at right). We bought a tool from the company in Georgia, and it came crushed. They never did anything about it. Never called back.
Buy the expensive 4″ drill bit for coring. You will never order […]

When Christina says the arches were cut out, they were literally cut out. The masons put up a rectangular frame and then blocked straight across, with a lintel positioned above where the arch would be. Then they traced a plywood semi-circle directly onto the block (front and back). Then they took a […]

Notice the bolts protruding through the block to connect the floor joists to the walls. Concrete is in the U-blocks at this location and you can see the gray drips of the concrete. The drips are a good sign to us and let’s us know the blocks have been filled correctly.

Work on the arched […]

A few weeks ago a couple who are building in the western United States contacted us through our blog and asked us more specific questions about building with AAC. We are very excited that others are considering using this material and love the questions they posed to us. We thought it would be helpful to […]

Dave called Friday night as a perfect night for porch beers- really more like slab beers. We gathered on the side porch (and spread into the kitchen a bit) and enjoyed the great weather and catching up with friends. The trial run of the porch without walls or roof was very good. I anticipate that […]