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Pink House
A string of nasty, rainy days has coincided exactly with all the days we needed to do work outside-- which has meant a number of no-work days. But it finally dried out. As a result, there's now an inch of pink foam insulation wrapping the exterior walls of the new construction.
In large part, we did this to make up for an error--at least that's the way I see it. I'm sure I'm never going to build another house. But if I do, I'll do 2 x 6 construction so that we have thicker walls and a 5 ½-inch-deep wall cavity to fill with insulation, and end up with at least R-18 for insulation.
Instead, we went with the more conventional 2 x 4 construction, so there's only a 3 ½-inch space for insulation, with total insulating value of R-13. Less space = less insulation = more costly to heat. By putting up the pink foam, we added another R-5 in insulation to the walls. That brings us back up to the R-18 of 2 x 6 construction.
There's an added benefit as well. Every 16 inches along the outside wall, we have a supporting 2 x 4 stud. Those strips of wood conduct heat much faster than the insulation does, with an R-value of only about R-3.5, so in essence we lose a little insulating power through them. By placing the foam on the outside wall, we're putting it over all those studs so it insulates the whole wall better.
Next step is shingling, which is really going to disappoint our neighbor, Lyle (age three). He ran up to Chum yesterday and announced in an excited voice, "You have a pink house!"