April 3:  First day of excavation. The little hummocks are where the stakes marking the outside boundaries of the house sections are located.  Note that the region to the right has to be lowered several feet to create a level pad for the slab and the rear driveway.  Essentially the whole ridgetop has to be terraformed to provide the right amount of level ground and proper drainage.  The mountain range to the right is the top soil, which has been banked in reserve to recover the clay base after the slab is in place.

April 5:  Pad complete. Front part of pad is leveled and ready for foundation work, while back part has been cut back and sloped for proper drainage.

April 10:  Driveway grading. It's about 300 ft from the road to the house up the smallest slope available, so there's quite a long driveway that had to be cut. All the top soil was scooped out, then excess clay from the pad excavation is hauled in and packed down to provide a level and firm road base.

April 14:  Water meter installed.  The water line running along the highway is a brand new 6in line for the city of Omaha, and we hang right off the line.  Hopefully that'll mean decent flow rates!  It's roughly 270ft from the water meter to the house service entrance, with about a 30ft rise to overcome, so we need all the flow and pressure we can get our hands on.  Sure hope we don't have to install an auxiliary pump!

April 22:  Driveway graveled. It sure is smooth right now!

April 23:  Batter boards.  Getting ready to lay the foundation lines...too bad the storms came again just as things were starting to happen!

April 29:  Footing trench dug.  Getting ready to pour first concrete!