Foundation walls going up today

For our foundation walls we are using a type of high-performance super-wall known as an ICF, which stands for "insulated concrete form." ICF walls are made of modular hollow styrofoam bricks that are stacked together like Legos and then filled with concrete. The insulating property of our ICF foundation walls will be much, much better than the cinderblock walls in the old house.

When I was at the site today the west wall was done and enough of the south wall was up to install the window buck for Tom's office, which faces south. The Morrissey team needs another day and a half before they can pour the concrete, but the beginning of next week will be too cold to work, let alone pour concrete. It was a cold day today, but a little bit of sunshine made it bearable.

If you're interested in seeing the installation in progress, you can head over to our Flickr photostream for a video. You'll see the construction of a corner. After the corner is glued in place it is zip tied to the blocks below it and adjacent to it. The corner is reinforced with angled rebar in addition to the vertical, horizontal, and corner- bent rebar that is standard. The builder says this house isn't going anywhere!