Parker Concrete  & General Contractor   Lic.#581606  B, C8

We are located in the high desert community of Yucca Valley in sunny southern California nearby Joshua Tree National Park

We specialize in Residential & Commercial Foundations (Monolithic & Pour in Place Walls), Site work I.E., Curb&Gutter, and Flatwork I.E., Driveways, Patio Slabs,  Custom Flatwork, Stamps, etc.

We also have a "B-1" General license for spec building in the near future.

A little background of myself:

I graduated from La Mirada High School in 1975.

I moved to the Yucca Valley area at the end of 1983 after weekending in the Landers area since the late 60's riding dirt bikes and such. Loved the area so much and decided to move there.

I first got my feet wet in the concrete trade in 1976 while living in Placentia, CA shortly after high school. For the next several years up until the time I moved to the Hi-Desert in 1983, I had done everything from more concrete including industrial concrete to building custom patio covers, block walls, room additions and a 3700 square foot custom home on the Chino side of Carbon Canyon engaging in all aspects from the ground up until completion, and also installed a ton of those turn of the century style antiqued embossed metal ceilings.

I also did a semester at Cypress College and 4 semesters at Fullerton Junior College enrolled in several related trade classes including contractor law and architectural design classes at end of the 70's and early 80's completing just under 60 units while conducting an unlicensed construction business on the side. Thank God for good and productive employees while I spent the 1st two thirds on my days in class. Then it was off to check on my crew and work out the rest of the days till dark.

Near the end of my college days, I hooked up with a real good guy in a few of my classes (Jeff Nunn) and we then got into the contracting business. This is where the room additions, and a custom home, and all those metal ceilings came in.

After a few good years with Jeff, all good things came to an end. The extra large spec home we built for Jeff sat on a dead market for too long and he could no longer afford to pay me what I was used to. That was what lead to me fulfilling my quest to Yucca Valley. We parted our ways (Bitter-sweet!) and I moved to the Hi-Desert at the end of 1983. 

I worked for several concrete contractors until I found one that I liked. I worked for Steve Heard, the best in the entire region up until he took an early retirement/mid-life crisis. Within a year afterwards, I took the state exam and passed 1st time for my C-8 (Concrete) license. That was at the end of 1989. I have been self-employed ever since. 

We moved to Colorado in April of 1997. I continued to contract in the concrete business. That is were I learned how to do basement and stem wall foundations on a much larger scale. I had also done a few styro-foam block foundations as well. I worked in Montrose and Telluride, CO. Telluride was a whole different league of it's own. I did a few major mountain-side high-wall foundations up there year-round. We worked right through winter in the worse conditions, snow and sub-zero temperatures. However the money was very good and made it worth the experience. 

We moved back to Yucca Valley, CA in December of 2002. Not long after I took the state exam for my B-1 (general) contractors license, again passed 1st time. However I still to this day have not used it. I have been too busy operating my concrete business. We steadily employ 10 fine folks that make it possible to average 8 residential foundations a month along with the flatwork.

By the way, we are always looking for more top notch employees.

This is an early morning placement here in Yucca Valley-->    These are 12" thick concrete walls   Here are the footings for the above walls-->    

Prior to monolithic placement   

Got Trencher? Yup!   However the trencher is not for hire. I use it for our own foundation needs.

Setting forms for a typical residential foundation. Note: Footings and plumbing ditches were trenched just prior to formwork.    

Placement of monolithic residential foundation, Yucca Valley, CA   

A-Curb in Yucca Valley, CA

Here are a few photos from Colorado:

Exterior Flatwork in Ridgway, CO

Commercial curb & gutter with city sidewalk, Montrose CO  

Commercial foundation with 4' crawl space Got Rebar?!

Placing concrete at same foundation, Ridgway, CO 

Ready to place commercial concrete floor at same Ridgway project     

Another Foundation in Ridgway. This is a Foam Block style foundation

Walkout basement foundation in the Little Cimarron's, CO  

Here are a few miscellaneous job photos also from Colorado. Some are a Styro-foam stucco wall I constructed at our church (Calvary Chapel of Montrose) at the back of the stage/pulpit area.

 These first two photos are from the Joshua Springs Calvary Chapel here in Yucca Valley. Their concept of the "Wailing Wall was all I had mentioned and next thing knew, I was appointed the project. Problem was, I never had done anything remotely like it before ever. I had observed that in the cold climate areas, the exterior stucco was done by shaping styro-foam and then coating it with a material called Dryvit. It's a polymer based stucco product. It comes in 5 gallon pails, just add pigment for color.    

I also had no idea how the stucco folks shaped their walls. I experimented a bit until I thought about making a custom made hot knife out of an old soldering gun. I used several types of wire until I realized that good old 12 gage copper wire worked best. Then after trial and plenty of error on test pieces, I found the need to rig up a depth gage to controll the depths and angles of my cuts. All the horizontal cuts were done free-hand. The tough part about that was the cuts varied in depth and width. The vertical cuts were much easier, they were done with a straight edge for a guide.  

Next was painting clouds above the wall. Another project that came on me of which I had never done. At this point of the project, I was scared to death. I had no idea how to make these clouds look real without looking like some dumb cartoon. I experimented again, and found that rough and modified sponges and rags worked well. About 18 hours or so and I was done. Oh ya, the blue sky thing. I wanted it to have dimension to it so I had to do a fade out thing, ya, another thing I had no idea how to do. I did 10 passes with a spray gun. I started out at the bottom of the sky and at every pass I added just a bit more pigment of blue until I made the top. By the way, any place I goofed, that's where I put the first clouds.  

I attempted to do the stucco application myself. But shortly into it I realized that I needed to let the experts take it from there. They did a much better job than I could have ever imagined.      

Then it was time to give the wall a 3D effect. I achieved that by doing the same layering of paint as I did to the sky but vertical. Then I aged the wall by shooting at random bursts of darker pigments throughout the wall. Unfortunately I have not found any of my completed wall photos other than this one and only wedding photo. As soon as I do, I will post them.  

Now for the outside of the church.

Again, anothe task that I have never attempted. I had never done any free-hand concrete scribing. I knew what the typicle Calvary Chapel dove looked like. But every time I tried to do it, it looked like some form of turkey. I had realized that I needed to desperately pray for God's hand. I prayed and said "Lord, here is my tools and my hands, please make this dove look like a dove and nothing else, just guide my hands and tools, amen." Well it worked!

I also was asked to do a dove above the entry similar to the one I did in the sanctuary. The doves were sketched by using a projector projecting the image to the styro-foam panels and the tracing the image to the panels. Was actually easier than I thought it was going to be.

Just a few more random shots of the entry in progress.  

Here are a couple of lots that we own. They are for sale and will include a 2-story custom adobe  home. Located in Yucca Valley, CA

For info please email me at smparker1@earthlink.net

Both are .5 acres and will sell them as is with no improvements for $115,000.00 each as of September 2005.  Utilities-Yes

760-401-3233

Our Home Addition Project, 2006