Our Big New Dirt Pile

They've dug our hole!!!.... While there's not much to see, we are clearly moving forward! they've put in the general location of the driveway and have dug a hole that kind of resembles the shape of our house. We are stunned by the size of the dirt pile.... where are they going to put all this dirt once the house is up??? We snapped a few pics today on the way home from work.... We're hoping they start on the footings before the weekend :)

Its hard to actually see the size of the hole, but its basically about 3 feet deep in the back at the morning room and about 7 or 8 feet deep at the front.  So we're guessing the back of the house will be elevated off the ground about 4 feet or so which is what we wanted.  In the second picture you can see the beginnings of some plumbing.  Its not entirely obvious from the pics but because the hill leading up to the house is so steep they dug the driveway down about two feet at the top to make a more level driveway.  This will lower our garage about a foot or two and we're a little worried about how this will effect the overall look of the house. We asked if a retaining wall would be necessary, they said a retaining wall wouldn't be necessary and that the land should grade nicely... a couple steps might be necessary however to get up to the the front door or around to the other side of the garage.  I guess that's all hard to see right now with just a big dirt pile...so we'll see.