the commons

The recycled wood floors have been installed and they look amazing.

The 100% FSC wood was sourced from Viridian Wood Products, which gets their wood from the Port of Portland. The wood is initially waste, pallet wood (from the shipping of goods to Portland from Asia and likely elsewhere) that is milled into flooring and decking products.

It rained hard last night and it continues to drizzle. As I drink my morning coffee and ready for the day, I’m listening to the news which just announced that the sewers have overflowed into the Willamette River. Portland has an (outdated) combined sewer system, which combines surface water (roads, etc.) with sewer water (toilets, etc.). When it rains hard the surface water overwhelms the sewer system, which then overflows into the Willamette carrying all it’s fun contents with it. This event is called a combined sewer overflow or CSO; CSOs happen every time there is a heavy rain in Portland. The radio also mentioned there was a warning to stay out of the river for the next 48 hours. Here at the commons, we’ve opted to install a composting toilet, not only does it save clean water (which saves energy, through saved conveyance and treatment), but it also reduces the load (ahem) on the sewer system and ultimately the water and environment.

A big thank you! to our cousin Midori and our Uncle John, who helped us paint our (kitty) catwalk.

They worked tirelessly for multiple days; our family is awesome! Thanks, you two!

The painting and drywall are done!

Well, almost, after we move in there will be some touch-up work to be done.

Thanks for all your help, Dad.

And thanks to Mom too!

Thanks to our friend, Kelly, for dropping in and helping us lift one of the beams into place—crossfit actually applies to real-world applications of lifting heavy things!

Today dad and I finished welding on the post bottoms and top plates and erected three of them. The posts weigh just over 200lbs each and were a bit unwieldy to lift into place, especially considering that we needed to get them over the threaded rod that has not yet been cut to length, adding an extra foot of needed lifting power. But we’ve placed the three hardest ones (each ~10′ long) and the remaining two are less than five feet each. We’ll place those two and begin lifting the adjoining beams into place tomorrow. Stay tuned…

Today we finally received the steel order for the catwalk and began welding the posts up in earnest. Below is a little video on the extreme heat involved with welding 3/8″ to 1/2″ steel.

All the catwalk pictures can be seen here.

Over the weekend Garrett, Dad and I made up the seat for the street-side bench out of 2″x lumber reclaimed from the old house. Yesterday and today dad and I made the backrest and the mounting brackets. In the photo below are our wonderful and lovely parents testing it out.

The drywall is done and tomorrow we’ll start the painting process (well, we won’t actually do the painting, as with the drywall we’ve hired Lo’s Contracting to do it).

For the paint and interior finishes (on the wood and concrete) we’ll be using entirely non-toxic and VOC free products made by Ecos Paints. They specialize in paints and finishes for people who are chemically sensitive or otherwise concerned about the environment. The company is located in South Carolina, but was started in the UK. Apparently the government agency in the UK, that requires truth in advertising, paid them a visit one day to check on their claims of “non-toxic.” And the owner, who’s also the head chemist, said, “Pick any barrel and I’ll eat a spoonful.” They did and so did he… While I wouldn’t recommending eating the paint chips, at least it won’t kill ya.