3 = 1

3 Ends = 1 New Beginning

A lot has happened in the last three months and easily sums up my year


Ending #1:
Three months ago I ended my job with Green Hammer. If you've read my previous posts or know me, you might find this as a major surprise. But it's not tragic. After being there for a year and in the position of a part-time office and project coordinator, I was starting to feel a bit lost, unmotivated, not living up to my potential and most importantly I had trouble envisioning a growth path within the company. For a couple of reasons, neither of which reflect poorly on the team there or myself. First, they are a small business, they don't have the resources of a large business to offer me the experience I was after. Second, I felt like my role was developing into a receptionist/secretary with little structure or a path to higher ground. I was finding myself feeling unappreciated, not valued enough, unhappy. (In GH's defense, this was last winter when business was so low, there was not a lot going on for me to do and if I would have stuck it out long enough, I may have been able to accomplish my personal career goals - but I didn't) I quit. But with there support as you'll soon find out.


Ending #2:
Last week I was invited to the Habitat for Humanity dedication ceremony for the new Women Build house. I wasn't going to miss it. Even though I've slowly fallen off the page with the group I spent a good portion of last fall on the donation-in-kindness committee and was able to secure donations for all of the flooring in the house. Wood floors for the downstairs and Green Label Plus carpeting for the upstairs. I really wanted to see how it turned out or even if the companies actually followed through. I spent a lot of time that fall educating the other committee members about green products and how we could increase the health and comfort of the home by searching for sustainable options (this was a semi-novel idea for HfH because they weren't committed to making every home sustainable at that point, indicating that donaters wouldn't be willing to donate higher quality products) To my surprise when I showed up for the dedication, the house had been Earth Advantage Certified! All in all, it was pretty neat to see the final product look so good even though I had a minor role this year. I have a lot to owe HfH, actually I know I wouldn't be where I'm at now without the yearlong experience of building a house two years ago that I shyly endeavored.


Ending #3:
Yesterday was my last day working with the Sustainable Food Coordinator at OHSU. Eecole has been the most valuable mentor through my little career journey. Not only is she a remarkable role model but she has become one of my most supportive and biggest fans. We accomplished a lot in the last two years! And I very proud and honored to have been involved in such a major transformation in waste reduction at the largest university/hospital in oregon. I will miss my time in the office with Eecole, Justin and Riikka.



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1 New Beginning:
All of these endings have led me to where I'm now. And I'm very happy to tell you that I was offered a job, out of the blue, to work in the Design + Construction Department at OHSU! I've been there for the last three months, slowly transitioning out of the Food and Nutrition department. And so far I love it, I can't believe how lucky I am and can't seem to stop bragging - I just can hardly believe how far I've come since that spring day when I showed up at a lot in North Portland to a foundation that I eventually would build a home on and become a member of the WB committee and become a well known volunteer. And last year when I was so anxious nervous, excited to apply to GH's internship and I thought the interview went terrible because I received no call until 6PM on the day they said they'd get back to me (I had already given up and said oh well). And then the day I went to talk to the Assistant Director of D+C, I sat in my car for minutes, almost deciding not to go in and bailing. Wow, what a relief I overcame my fears and followed my dream so persistently. And as I'm realizing of all that I have accomplished in the last two years, thinking of myself as just a young student not qualified really to lead anything, I am reminded of how much I have grown. As a testimate, I was nominated to be President of the NW Ecobuilding Guild this Spring, I declined and opted for the VP position but really as all of my fellow steering committee members were encouraging me, I am qualified to be President, public speaking skills and all!


More to come about my new job . . .

welcome home

Leonora, a single mom and her three sons move in to the Women Build HOME of 2008-2009
well worth the time . . .


for more photos, check out my flickr group: habitat for humanity - portland metro/east

progress

playing a little catch-up with the habitat house

well i've been a bit behind on the habitat build update

three weeks ago, all four exterior walls had been already raised (the previous saturday, july 19th), we accomplished two things:

1. we learned about bracing, bow bracing to be exact
2. we started laying out the interior walls and drawing the plan on the floor decking

it was super hot, in the 90's, and i think i suffered a bit from heat exhaustion - although i didn't physically feel too hot, i had a hard time following what was going on (from adding and subtracting fractions and when i went from crouching to standing - i was blacking out, something that i'm used to, but hasn't happened in awhile).

two weeks ago i missed habitat all together, due to a dentist appointment. i missed habit in more ways then one and i've realized how satisfying this build has become to me. and i made sure to get as much out of my teeth cleaning appointment as possible, if i was missing the build, that dentist better make it worth my time! :)


last week i showed up and all the interior walls had been raised. so we finished a couple of tasks:

1. we added scrap 2 x 6 to the top plate of interior walls that ran from side to side so that when the sheet rockers were putting up the ceiling, they would have something to nail into (they couldn't have more than a 4" gap between the pieces).

2. we wrapped the house in weather protection paper.

3. we plumbed all of the walls using bow braces and wall braces (i forget what they are called)
so now it is all set to have the roof trusses dropped on it tomorrow. we were actually ahead of schedule so nothing happened last saturday or today.

building a wall

work has progressed slowly which i actually benefit from because i've been able to be part of every step along the way

but the wall raising date was set months ago, july 19th

so we were determined to at least have a wall ready to be raised for the publicity event

with the floor decking only 3/4 of the way done, we started framing the north wall. work progressed smoothly and quickly and by the end of the day we had framed and sheathed the north wall in oriented strand board!

decking not quite finished

framing studs laid out

finished wall - ready to have window and door openings cut out

looks like we're back on schedule!

i'll be missing out on the wall raising event but i'll be back next friday to see what is to be done next!


last week when i showed up, half of the decking for the foundation had been laid and things looked like they were moving smoothly, but our lead had us pull up all of the decking instead of putting on the finishing pieces. pulling out work moves much faster than the actual work so once we were back to the basic foundation, work moved much slower in reinstalling the decking. we used 1 1/4" tongue and groove oriented strand board with a thick glue and 8 penny nails, or maybe they were 16 penny nails. we only laid maybe six 4' x 8' boards in the day. some extra work was needed to make some of the boards make the more than 96" stretch on a few beams, yes the foundation is that bad with pockets limiting our adjustment capabilities.


to build the walls we used 2" x 6" studs every 16" and then used king and trimmer stud pairs for framing the windows and door. the trimmers support the headers and then the cripples support the window sills. The base and top of the wall were made of 2" x 6", using three to span the length, so six all together. Then the top of the wall was covered in another 2" x 6", i wasn't part of this process so i'm not all too sure about it's name, dimensions, or purpose. I helped make our corner a "california corner" for energy efficiency so that there would be no uninsulated gaps, but there wasn't enough space to use a 2" x 6" or barely a 2" x 4" so i suggested just slipping a 2" by 6" next to (parallel) to the end stud, and Shelly (the lead) liked my idea. we covered the stud wall with oriented strand board again, this time with a cut dimension of 100 1/2" x 48". the length was determined by the height of the studs (96" - 1/2") plus the thickness of the base and top plates (4" - 1/2" - 1/2" = 3") plus the extra top plate (2" - 1/2" = 1 1/2") plus the thickness of our sill plate (1 1/2") on the foundation and the floor decking (1 1/4") plus 1/2" of overhang. and then we used 8 penny nails to put it together. i think i covered it all but i might be missing some details.

i'm building a house!

with habit for humanity that is

i've joined the "women build" and worked on day 1 and 2

the concrete foundation was poured and we set the sill plates and got half way done with laying the beams and posts on a perimeter wall foundation. work takes much longer than a typical build because none of us know all the shortcuts and tricks that an experienced builder would. so we learn by trial and error and figure out our own tricks.