The Story of the Side

It all began when we decided we should lay down some grass and throw in a few plants so we can get our landscaping deposit back. Simple enough...or so we thought. Here is the story of how our easy lawn job has escalated to structural work to the side of our home.... (in point form cause I have 4 kids and a busy life and it hurts my head to come up with full sentances)

-we wanted underground irrigation for the lawn, that had to happen first

-upon inspection, the landscaper informed us that the wall the neighbor had put up to retain his dirt was on our property...in the exact spot that he wanted to lay the irrigation

-when asked, the neighbor politely declined the opportunity to split the cost of taking down his wall which retains his dirt and putting up a proper one, revealing 2 feet of our property that was at that point, under their wall...

-this brought feelings of frustration towards our brand new and quite nice neighbors...we dealt with that and moved on

-under deeper contemplation, Mike and his dad decided it would make sense to pour cement stairs on the side so that we can get from the front yard to the back(makes sense)

-once the new wall is done and a house is built on the other side, there will be no possible way to get a digger in the side where the stairs need to go so we decided that had to be done before the new wall.

-this brings us to the point of the photo I posted the other day...

-and from there, here is a photo diary of the events that unfolded....

The guys removed a few of the large boulders from the side of our yard which the builders (let's heretofor call them MVV which stands for Mid Valley Ventures) had placed there as a cheap alternative to the logical thing which would have been pouring stairs in the first place. It became clear to all of "the guys" (we'll call them "the good guys" from here on out) that the sonatube was not properly supporting the house and the cement steps off our back door(directly above the sonotube pictured above) and the cement slabs in the backyard sidewalk were all poured directly onto shifting, soft sand...placing tremendous weight on the improperly placed sonotube which holds up the back door porch...removing anymore large rocks could create a problem. The good guys came up with a solution and set to work bracing the deck and preparing to make a new, properly placed sonotube. In the meantime, various members of MVV continued to peek their heads around the corner to view the happenings. They are working on a new house 3 doors down. They appeared to me to be quite nervous....hmmm...

Apparently this is not what you want...that is an inch gap between the dirt and the cement sidewalk.

Again, not a good sign. At this point, the good guys had hooked the problematic cement walkway slabs to their digger and pulled them out revealing this dirt. Notice the shovel...one of the good guys stuck this shovel in, with just one hand, to the dirt that had been supporting the cement walkway. Not good.

So where there once were steps and a sidewalk to the backyard off the back door, this was the new scene...a gaping hole and the deck being supported by wood braces the good guys put in. Today the good guys poured a new sonotube and as I understand it, once that is ready, they can continue with the stairs. Most likely we will be putting in that cedar deck right away instead of next summer due to the gaping hole:)

On a side note: this view is from our backyard, looking toward the front of the house. In a few days, from here you will be able to step down into the front yard!

Second side note: see the right hand edge of the sidewalk? Now do you see the higher bank of dirt further over to the right? That is the property line as it should be, now that the rock wall has been removed. Previous to the removal, the rock wall was touching the sidewalk.

back to the point....
Today the head hog from MVV duh-dum-tee-dumped over and got all in Mike's business telling him that we shouldn't change the structure of the house, that we had the nicest house on the block and that he would gladly buy it back from us for the price we paid and easily flip it for 100grand more. This comment made a whole lot of nonsense on more than one level but that is beside the point. My unsolicited completely unprofessional opinion: MVV is nervous because they know they did a crappy job and they really don't want to get stuck with higher insurance or whatever might become of them if we decide to do hold them accountable. Oh we'll be holding them accountable allright. check out all my incriminating photos above...I have a folder on my computer full of even more!!

So dear readers, don't feel sad for us, that is not the intention of this rant. Feel informed and up to date on the latest upgrades to Banmanland. This is a great place to live and the good guys are helping us make it even better!!