Now the Work Begins

We had an official ribbon cutting ceremony on Friday, immediately after we were granted occupancy (around 11:30 am). Several dignitaries were there (ok, just our builder) but we had a blast cutting through the ribbon to make it official. We spent 16 hours hauling boxes on Friday using a cargo van and probably wouldn't have been able to do the third trip without the help of Jeff. I know there's no way I could have lifted the other end of our TV, even if I hadn't been hauling stuff for 12 hours already!!


The move on Saturday went very smoothly. The strapping young lads shown above made it all possible. They were able to load the moving van with all our furniture in around 2 hours! And although the weather was less than ideal (mist and fog), everything was in the correct rooms a little after noon! I hear that there was even enough time for one of the guys to ride the elliptical trainer down the hill behind our house, but I have yet to see photographic proof of said ride.


And finally, here's a preview of the house taken last Thursday after all the cleaning had been finished. Above is the kitchen and the two below are of the pantry. I probably won't post more pictures until we get a little more settled (since there are only two rooms without boxes in them right now).


We are truly blessed to have been able to take this journey over the past year and a half and we're really looking forward to being settled. Then, I can find our next big project!! Actually, I think we're both ready to have no next project and to just relax and enjoy everything.

I Heart Organization

Yesterday could very well be my most favorite day of checking the progress on the house. Not because everything is finished (it's not, there are several little things that will need to get done over the next few weeks, plus some exterior work in the spring). No, it was because the closet systems were installed! For a person that has a slight tendency to be organized, there is no more magical a thing than full rooms and closets dedicated to organization.


All of the pictures shown here are of my closet. Our friends at All About Organization helped us decide what to include and what would work best for us. Aaron's closet is completely different than mine (more tailored to what a dude would need, which I guess is less shoe storage, among other things). We were both thrilled with the results! Ok... I was ecstatic and Aaron was as excited as a guy can get about closets, so I think that averages out to thrilled.


The closet installers will be back again today to work on the pantry and finalize all the little details on various things (knobs on doors, etc.), so we'll have to check it out tonight when we bring my car home! That's right, starting this evening, we can attend two different events at the same time because we're a two car family again!!! That's almost as exciting as closet systems!

Magic Carpet

I know that tile has nothing to do with carpet... but our kitchen tile is up and grouted and looks fantastic! We are waiting on a few more tiles to be installed behind the stove, and a small strip over the fireplace, but otherwise, the tile is looking fantastic!


Our carpet was installed on Monday! Like most of the selections, it looks a lot different filling up a whole room vs. the tiny square we've been carrying around, but we love it! And it's made out of corn by-product, so it's a green choice. Carpet was installed in our bedroom and closets and then in the loft and upstairs bedrooms. It looks and feels great!!


Finally, our closet systems were delivered yesterday! I have been waiting for this moment for a long time (and think about it every time I try to pull something out of my tiny, inefficient apartment closet) so I am really excited to see this installed. They are going to start putting them up today!

Smoke and Mirrors

We arrived at the house on Friday night and were rewarded with something unexpected: shower doors! They look fantastic! The rest of our mirrors were also installed (one in the upstairs bath and one in the master bedroom closet area). But wait... that wasn't all! The glass in our cabinet doors was also installed! It looks even better in person than it did at the show room when we picked it out all those months ago.


Another very important, but less visually impressive improvement was in the basement. All of our heating ducts are in, which means that instead of just blowing hot air into the basement, it is directed to each room in the house. It made spending 3 hours waiting for the cable guy this morning much more enjoyable.


The last of our light fixtures are also in. The final few were outdoor lights, so not nearly as important as the others. Below is the light in our screen porch.


We're heading into the final week of construction and are busy trying to pack up everything that isn't already in a box. There are a few key things that still need to happen before we move in, but we're on schedule to start hauling stuff on Friday! We're really looking forward to this portion of the home building experience being complete!!

What Can I Say About Balusters?

On Tuesday, work continued on the plumbing and the electrical in the basement... but that doesn't exactly make for interesting pictures (some might argue that the majority of my pictures qualify!). All the balusters (aka railing pieces) were installed in the stairwells and in the loft. They really look sharp! I'm sure the cats will be eager to stuff toys through the slats...

A Picture Says 1000 Words

So much happened at the house today that I can't seem to put it into words... Instead, I'll narrate it with a little text and a lot of pictures (kind of like Aaron's favorite books!).

Undercabinet lighting in the dining room and kitchen.

The fans and overhead lights were installed in the living room today.

Our upstairs bathroom now has a shower curtain rod!

Our dining room light fixture has finally been installed! It's not at the right height for safety reasons, but it's still exquisite!!

The mirrors and towel bars have been hung in the master bathroom.

The mini faucet is for our reverse osmosis system. Translation: the drinking faucet is the tiny one.

Oh yeah... we have appliances!!!

The mirror and towel ring in the powder room.

Shelving over our washer and dryer!

The lockers in our drop zone - they still need hooks and handles to open the cabinets, but they sure came in handy when we were putting our boots back on tonight!

Door Number One

We have a front door!! We didn't notice right away because we drove the other way around the circle this morning. The people working on our tile were locked out of the house (the lock box froze in the awful weather we've been having) and we were hurrying to let them in.


The door lets in lots of natural light and looks beautiful inside and out. Although, given the temps today, I much preferred admiring it from the inside.


Meanwhile, the fireplace is really taking shape. We did our best to stay out of the way as they were putting up more tile and cutting pieces, but we needed to mark the locations of all of our remaining hardware (towel bars, toilet paper holders, etc.). It took a little longer than expected, but we got it all done and can't wait to see the final product!


The rest of our faucets were installed on Friday, so we now have all our fixtures in. There isn't water running yet, but we're another step closer to it!!

The Faucets Will Floor You

We stopped by the house tonight to shovel (the snow wasn't done yet, but we thought we'd get a head start, thanks largely to our big little helper, Kacie) and also checked out the progress. There are signs on the door asking for everyone to wear clean shoes or boot covers to protect the finished areas! If that's not exciting, I don't know what is!!


The plumbing fixtures have started to go in. We have one of two showers in the master bath, the powder room sink & faucet, all fixtures except the toilet in the upstairs bath, and the kitchen faucet. It seems like the crew is about halfway done with the plumbing.


Our hardwood floors are finished and look exquisite!
The corkoleum has also started to be installed in the upstairs bathroom and will be put in the drop zone next. Everything is looking great... and just in time! Only 2 weeks to go!!

Floors and More

I have refrained from using chat-cronyms in the blog (mostly because I don't know that many)... but OMG! The floors look spectacular!!! We have wood flooring in the entry, the dining room and the living room so far!!


We've been carrying around one board as a sample for 12 months now (thanks again Advantage Flooring!) and even though the flooring is exactly like the sample, it looks so different and so much better with multiple boards all together!! Most of all, it really makes the house feel finished to have an actual floor vs. the plywood subfloor that we've been using all these months.


I can't imagine what it's going to look like when it's finished because it already looks so much better than my imagination... but I guess we'll know for sure in just over 2 weeks!!


Also, one person had the very un-enviable job of installing exterior lights yesterday! This weather definitely makes a desk job look good!!

Lights... Camera... Tile!!

More of the finish electrical work was completed yesterday, which meant than in addition to taking pictures of the progress, Aaron and I also ended up needing to run some errands. A few of our lights were missing pieces, so we needed to stop by Lowe's and Menard's to get the correct stuff. At Menard's, they immediately got us our missing hardware to hang a light and apologized for our inconvenience. At Lowe's they hassled us, told us our receipt was older than 90 days and then finally checked with a store manager, who agreed to give us the pieces, but needed to do a bunch of additional paperwork to make it official. Ugh! We finally got home about 8:30pm, but did have everything we needed to get.

Tile was put up in the dining room and the kitchen yesterday as well, and it's looking really sharp! Hard to believe how quickly so much of this can go up!!

Here's a few more shots of lights. The electrician will still be back another time to finalize all the outdoor lights, the rest of the indoor lights (including the dining room chandelier) and some outlets and undercabinet lights.