day 76

I finally had a chance to grab some progress photos on the real camera.  I've been out to the lot a few times this week to check on things, but it's always been a quick trip at lunch.  The siding guy must think I'm nuts.

Speaking of the siding guy...  He was out working again today - by himself.  The first few days there were two workers, but all of this week there has only been the one.  It just doesn't seem efficient to me.  The good news is that he's just about done.  There is a little bit left to do on the side of the garage and then he'll have to wrap up the trim on the front of the house.  I'm anxious for the stone to go up so I can everything pulled together, but based upon the cold front coming our way, I'm guessing that's still a while out.

We also finally had the inspection on the carpentry, rough plumbing and rough electrical this past Thursday (day 74).  I have no idea what is normal, but there is a list of nine things that must be corrected before they grant approval.  The various crews are supposed to be out there making fixes this weekend so that the inspector can come back on Monday or Tuesday.  Once we get sign off, they'll begin insulating.

The HVAC was installed at some point this week as well (day 73 maybe?).  We've been told it's ready to be turned on as soon as they're done insulating so that drywall work can begin.

And, thanks to a Garden Web forum, we took a second (or one hundred and second) look at our kitchen plans and realized that the pantry door and refrigerator door would have interfered with one another as laid out.  The cabinet guy suggested adding a 15" utility cabinet to scoot the fridge down a bit, so we now have slightly altered kitchen plans.  I also had him make the switches I'd previously talked about -- getting rid of the full-height doors between the oven and cooktop and then switching to three drawers under the cooktop.  The floating shelves aren't shown within the diagrams below, but we're still planning to hang them to the right of the fridge.

 

There were several other changes people suggested, but I wasn't willing to make the trade-off for some of them (e.g. getting rid of our pantry to extend the space to the right of our sink or moving our sink to the peninsula).  I'm sure there will end up being things I want to change later, but right now I'm thrilled to have something larger than our old galley kitchen (which, despite being small, I adored - the before/after photos are worthy of a post... actually the whole house is).

[ignore that there is nothing on the wall - this wasn't long after we moved in]

My dad came up this weekend, so Hubby and I had a chance to get out for a date night tonight.  We went grocery shopping, hit Taco Bell for dinner and stopped at Pier1, JCPenney and Target.  Date nights have seriously changed in the past three years

i'm dreaming of a white... kitchen

We have kitchen stools!  After calling at least five World Market stores, we finally found a location that had more than a lone stool or two in stock.  Apparently these little guys are popular - we've had a hard time finding them in store anywhere.  The sales gal Hubby talked to was nice enough to verify actual stock on the floor and then put the only four they had on hold for us.  E was napping at the time and we were worried that by the time he woke up and we made the hour drive, one or more would be gone.  Luckily, they were all there when we arrived and were just as gorgeous as we remembered.  I barely withheld from doing a happy dance in the aisle.

By the time we got home last night, we weren't motivated to unload the car but Hubby got on it right away this morning.  We were curious how many pieces the stools would be in when the boxes were opened and were super excited to discover very minimal assembly was required.  Even the two year old was of assistance!

Swooning over the stools all day today got me thinking more and more about the overall look of our kitchen.  My Pinterest and Houzz boards are full of beautiful white kitchens, but none are exactly what I'm imagining.  We still need to pick out our counters, so maybe once we do that, everything will finally come together.  Who am I kidding?  I won't be sure of my choices until everything is in place and I've stood in the middle of the kitchen staring at everything at least twenty times.  Oh well.  Until I can do that, the inspiration board below will have to do.

Sources:
stools: Twist Swivel Stool from World Market

cabinets: Tolani in Chiffon by Merillat

drawer pulls: Liberty Hardware Cup Pull from Home Depot

knobs: Liberty Hardware Contempo Knobs from Home Depot

flooring: Ponderosa – Alamosa Hickory from Real Wood Floors

faucet: Moen Wetherly from Lowes

pendant light: Murray Feiss Urban Renewal Mini Pendant from Build

pendant light: allen + roth Bronze Traditional Pendant Light from Lowes

And, it might help, if I shared our kitchen layout.  We originally had an island included, but we're going to leave it out for now.  I don't want the kitchen to be so crowded that we can't easily move around.  Our old kitchen was galley style and it was difficult for more than one person to be in there.  The only thing I'm unsure about are the lower cabinets on the oven/cooktop side.  Does the asymmetry look weird?  I asked our cabinet guy to quote me to change the lower left cabinets to drawers/doors and the lower center cabinets under the cooktop to drawers.  If it's not drastically more expensive, I might do that instead.

The remaining kitchen decisions are: finalize cabinet layout, select granite for counters, finalize faucet, choose paint color and select backsplash.  Our builder/plumber prefers Kohler fixtures but I haven't found a Kohler kitchen faucet that I like in our price range.  For now, we've chosen a Moen one and are hoping the plumber agrees to install it.  We're also undecided on a backsplash and paint color.  We'll probably do a simple subway tile for the backsplash, but I'm not completely sure if we'll do white, like shown above.  We have a bit of time, though, because we're going to wait to do the backsplash later, on our own.  We're going to pick out the granite for our counters this coming Saturday, so I'll probably start thinking about paint colors after that.  There won't be a whole lot of paint in the kitchen, but we will have one wall of open shelves and then the dining area will also be painted the same color.  Maybe a dusty yellow?  Or a blueish-grey?

Spill your beans.  Things I haven't thought about?  Colors you like?  What you love/hate in your own kitchen?  Personally, I'm pretty excited about the pantry, dishwasher and ability to store all of my dishes/pans/small appliances in the kitchen itself.  The pretty cabinets, shiny appliances, and fun fixtures won't be so bad either.  Okay, I'm giddy about it all.  There's no hiding it.

master bath inspiration

Remember the whole "I really hope all of decisions we're making come together cohesively" statement I made a few days ago?  Well, this is my attempt at starting the get an idea of what the master bath will look like once it's all put together.  Fun and scary at the same time!  I should be going to bed instead of playing with this, but knowing I don't have to work tomorrow has left me wide awake.  I suppose it's better than being wide awake on a night I do have to go to work, though.

Sources:
vanity: via Chalet Development
tile: San Michele Vein-Cut Tile by Daltile
toilet room: via HGTV Rate my Space
tub: Reverie Freestanding Tub
paint: Quiet Moments by Benjamin Moore

When I saw the vanity above while browsing Houzz, I immediately fell in love (by the way, check out the sidebar - I added a link to my Houzz Ideabook!).  Lucky for me, we found an amazing cabinet guy through my uncle and he was able to re-create the vanity for us using various cabinetry pieces.  I am stoked to see it in person.  The base cabinets are from Merillat's Portrait series and will be in the Sable color.

I love the mirrors that are pictured and I'm desperately trying to find non-Restoration Hardware versions.  As much as I adore their Vintage Oval Pivot Mirror, I can't bring myself to pay that much.  I've found similar versions that are frameless, but I prefer the look of the frame.  Our local Restoration Hardware Outlet has several brass versions for less than $40 if anyone is looking for an amazing mirror in brass!  Or if anyone knows how to turn a brass mirror chrome without it looking cheap, I'm all ears.

The freestanding tub was actually our first house purchase.  We found it on sale at Menards and ordered it a couple of months ago.  It's currently sitting in their warehouse and I'm waiting for the day they call to tell us we finally have to pick it up.  I'm hopeful that call doesn't happen until we have a garage to store it in, but I'm guessing it'll end up in the kitchen at our condo at least temporarily.

The tile is still my biggest unknown.  Hubby and I had both agreed on a simple subway tile before meeting with the Designer.  While discussing our selection, however, the Designer highly encouraged us to choose a larger tile due to the upkeep of smaller subway tiles.  Apparently the skinny grout lines are more difficult to keep clean in the long run - especially if we were to have gone with the white tiles and light/white grout we'd originally picked out.  As sad as I was to give up the aesthetics, I know it's best for the long run.

I really like the vein-cut tile we picked out as our second choice but it only comes in 12x24 tiles.  There is a cross-cut pattern in the same family, but I just don't like it quite as much.  Our current selections include the 12x12 cross-cut tiles laid in a diagonal/diamond pattern on the floor.  The shower  has the 12x24 vein-cut tiles laid horizontally with a couple of rows of the 12x12 tiles laid diagonally on top.  And the tub surround is just the 12x24 tiles laid horizontally.  Hopefully the sketch below helps visualize what I so poorly explained - at least for the shower!

I'm not sure that I'm totally sold on the diagonal floor pattern.  It's more than likely one of those things I'd stop noticing eventually, but I really like the look of more rectangular tiles.  Ugh.  I just need to make up my mind!   And any thoughts on not doing a tub surround?  I raised the question with the Designer but haven't heard back yet.  I'm thinking of doing wainscoting instead.

Anyway, to help pull it all together, here is our rough floor plan.  The area on the top right corner is a small pass-through from the bedroom to the master bath (shown) and walk-in-closet (not shown, but slightly smaller and on the right).

Other details that still need finalized - paint color (I'm thinking a blue/gray like shown), whether or not to hang a small TV by the tub, lighting, mirrors, hardware ... and I'm sure several other things I'm currently not thinking about.  At least it's a start!

day 14

The excavator was out this morning doing a little more grading but otherwise not much has changed since the weekend.  The exciting news is that we're told they'll be out tomorrow to start framing.  It's been an unseasonably warm week up here, so I'm sure the crew is looking to take advantage of the nice weather.  I'm not sure if it's the still recovering economy, the time of year or just luck, but I'm amazed at how quickly this is going.  Outside of the waiting period for the foundation to cure, there has been progress every day.

However, since today's progress wasn't very visual (I think even I have reached my max of dirt and concrete photos), I thought I'd share the exterior house plans.  Since these were printed, we did decide to remove the bottom window grids.  And I'm still debating whether or not I'd like to add a railing between the front porch posts.  That might be something we do later.

[Front Elevation - north]

That center stone wall was one of many issues we went back and forth with the Developer on.  The ACC covenants have a 65% masonry requirement, but several houses in the subdivision don't meet that.  Despite my best negotiating efforts (as well as our Builder's and Realtor's), we finally gave in and added stone to the roof line.  With the right landscaping (hi, Dad!), I'm hoping it will be a nice accent wall, rather than a weird connector between house and garage.  Our kitchen sink is below the window and I think it might be fun to add a window box, possibly filled with herbs.

[Rear Elevation - south]

We're planning to add a patio off the back porch, but I'm not totally sure how it will work since our yard slopes down on the one side.  Maybe we build up the east side with a patio wall?  Although, I can totally picture E jumping off the ledge as he gets older.... The area between the triple window on the left and the double window on the right is our back porch (the small section between the two single windows is our living room fireplace).  I am so excited about having both covered front and back porches.  I swear I was from the South in another life.

[Right Elevation - west]

Our garage doors have windows along the top and will have carriage-door style hardware.  I'm pretty excited about them.  I'm also excited about the bath tub that will be going under that window.  I should share my inspiration photos for the master bath soon... it's going to be ah-mazing.  At least I hope!

[Left Elevation - east]

One of the big reasons we liked this Lot was the ability to have a partial exposure basement.  Our floor plan is a split bedroom ranch with a master and two additional bedrooms on the main floor.  We knew we eventually wanted to finish the basement and want at least two additional bedrooms down there.  Even though egress windows are always a possibility, I wanted the ability to have 'normal' windows for the bedrooms down there.

It's hard to believe it's been two months since we signed off on these plans (September 19) and five months since we saw the very first draft (June 15).