Day 135

The last couple weeks have really run James and I ragged. It took us a solid four weeks to complete the electrical rough-in. That's a lot longer than we expected it to take and I'm not going to lie, it was rough. Work all day at the office, work all night at the house. Eat take out. Repeat. All the hard work paid off though. We passed our electrical inspection last week and got the go-ahead to start insulating the house.

Part of our green building plan is to create a super energy efficient home. Insulating the house is one of the most important pieces of this puzzle. It certainly doesn't stand out the way, say, a nice set of photovoltaic solar panels in our back yard would, but it's fundamental to creating an efficient "envelope" in our home. When it comes to insulation, there are a lot of choices - traditional fiberglass, blown in cellulose, open cell polyurethane foam, closed cell polyurethane foam, etc. All of them have different R-values and of course, different price tags. We settled on a hybrid system of closed cell spray polyurathane foam and traditional fiberglass batting. The closed cell spray foam hardens when it dries and seals any gaps or crevices to the outside and is an excellent insulator, preventing conditioned air loss and greatly reducing heating and cooling utilities consumption. And since we are investing in a geothermal heating and cooling system, having a well insulated home is essential.

(excuse the terrible iPhone pics!)

The insulation should be finished by the end of the week and I'll have more pictures to share with you. Other fun things are going on this week on the outside of the house. Siding is going up! I don't want to share any pictures until it's done so you'll all just have to wait a little longer to find out what color we went with. I'll give you a hint though...it's one of the two most popular votes...yellow...or green? Check back soon to find out!