I was already shivering, but the migrating geese flying over the Momplex was extra chilling.  Even the birds know.  That's why they are packing up and leaving.  Winter is right around the corner.

And our Momplex project is in danger of getting snowed on . . . without a roof overhead.  And a snow line creeping closer by the day.

Don't get me wrong, we've been working very hard and making lots of progress.  It's hard to believe just last week the Momplex was only a footer in the ground.

And now today, just seven days later, we've got blocks stacked 12 feet high.  It is really amazing to stand back and consider that one family, in one week, with minimal prior building experience with ICFs, can get this far.  Amazing really.  Really amazing.

But there's no time to be amazed or to stand around today.  With concrete on it's way later this week, there's much to do before these walls get set in stone.

First up is adding the handrails to the scaffolding system that ties in with the support system that we rented from ARXX.  The handrail pieces has slots perfect for two 2x4s.  Knowing we would be using tons of 2x4s for interior wall framing, we went ahead and bought them now.  We'll reuse them in the interior walls.  No money wasted there.  Those ARXX people think of everything!

The handrails and scaffolding go all the way around.  Guess where we got the decking from?

And as spendy as it was to purchase these form boards for the footers, they've sure come in useful.  We are using them as decking for the scaffolding system.

And to support the garage door openings for the pour.  By the time I finally get to make furniture out of them, these boards are going to have quite a bit of history to them!  

But the main task of the day is to put a system in place that will support the second story floor.  There is a few different ways that you can support a floor with ICFs.  We ended up choosing J Bolts.  With J Bolts, you simply cut a square of foam out of the ARXX Blocks, and then cover the hole up with a piece of plywood with J Bolts positioned in them.  The plywood is screwed to the black fastening strips.

When concrete is poured in the blocks, the J Bolts are secured inside the concrete, and there is no foam between the concrete and the ledger boards where the J Bolts are fastened.  The spacing and number of J Bolts is per engineering requirements.

Then when you go to put your floor on, you simply remove the plywood pieces, and replace with a ledger board drilled for the J Bolts.  This will all be much clearer when we blog the floor building step.

The Ram and I ripped plywood the night before into 12" widths.  Then the plywood was cut into squares, followed by holes drilled in pattern in the plywood.  

Our factory sets up shop out of the rain in the trailer to assemble the bolts into the plywood pieces.  We purchased extra nuts to hold the J Bolts in place on the plywood.

Just like this.

Now we are talking.

And then a pattern is cut from a piece of scrap plywood.

And used to trace the location of the foam cutouts on the ARXX blocks.

A simply hand saw is used to cut a square out to the pattern as shown here.  You bevel the top and bottom cuts so when you pour the concrete in the forms, air pockets don't form in the cutouts.  Now imagine when the concrete is poured, and the plywood removed.  You'll be looking at a J Bolt end sticking out of cured concrete - no foam in between.  Sounds like a good spot to anchor a floor, doesn't it?

And here's one in the running for our Christmas card photo, a very "us" family picture.  That's our Uncle Bill in there placing plywood.  Sweet Gracie, picking up trash on her own, right?  She is sweet, but she's actually not picking up trash.  She's salvaging the foam cut outs and stockpiling them as "telelphones" to play with.

There's still quite a few loose ends - literally - to tie IN and UP before the mud truck arrives, so we'll be staying busy.  But now at least we can check tying in the floor off the list.

Thank you so much for reading.  Your comments are keeping us motivated and excited about building and blogging the Momplex.  We hope you are there for the concrete pour!