ready for cement slab (almost)

The oven is ready for the slab to be poured, but we aren't. We need more "needles". For each bag of cement we use for the slab, we need to add 1 pound of 1" long stainless steel needles to give it added strength to span the 3 foot gaps on each side of the oven. Hopefully the back ordered needles will arrive soon.

The top photo is the completed layer of insulating bricks. The middle picture is of the completed plywood forms supported underneath by short 2x4 posts (check the Picasa web album to see these). There is a ring of 1x4" strips around the top to hold the 4 inch thick slab.

The bottom picture is of one of our many 6x10 beams being sanded. The fir is beautiful after a bit of sanding. We only have about 38 more hours of sanding to go!