For the one or two of you who may check in occasionally, I have moved my blog. I am now blogging about living in our green home at www.illinoisgreenhome.com Come see what is happening in our world!

We are moving in!

Well, time flies when you are having fun! Or when you are working like crazy to finish building your house!

We are actually just about completed with our home, and we are moving in soon. I have, obviously, failed miserably at keeping things updated here on the blog. I am going to continue the blog after we move in. I have continued to take pictures and video, and I have a bit of journalling I have done to help me keep track of what happened in what order.

My desire is to take you through the steps we went through to build this home, and then I'll let you know what ideas we implemented that are working beautifully, what is Ok, and what I wish we wouldn't have done! (I am hoping there aren't many things in that last category!)

I look forward to sharing all our fun stuff with you in the next few months. Meanwhile, keep praying for us as we are in the final days of preparation for the big move!

We are moving in!

So sorry!

I have been trying to move the blog over to my domain, but I'm having trouble. So sorry about that1 I'm back, kind of!

We are going to be out of town for several days at a conference. When we return, I'll start posting again, with a vengance!

Upstairs!

The next time we went out to the house, they had the second floor on! Still no roof, that will come next. Here is Larry in his office - great view, don't you think?

Here are the boys in their bedroom. They are so excited, I almost couldn't get them to stop jumping around long enough to get this picture!
Here are the little girls in their bedroom. Again, the hopping was only interrupted momentarily for the photo opportunity!

Slideshow of inner look of walls

Here is a slide show of what the walls looked like from the inside the day after they were installed. I just stood in one place and turned around to take the pictures.

More about the walls

Here is a look at what our walls look like in a cross-section. You can see there is a piece of OSB on each side, and there are 2x4's every so often that run vertical through the wall. Then, there is a very dense foam filling in the wall. This is what gives these panels such great energy efficiency. They are only 4 inches thick, but they are so well insulated! We are using the solar heated water to heat our basement, and a fireplace for the rest of the house. The fireplace sits in the middle of the main level, and will put out enough heat to heat all the 2,200+ square feet of those two floors! The walls will hold the heat in very well, so we will be able to heat with just water & sun, and wood! Both are renewable!I can't wait to get in there!