Week 14 - So close to the end now...

PLEASE CLICK IMAGES TO SEE THEM LARGER...

Just 12 days to go to meet our deadline and Leon is doing everything he can to keep everyone on track...We now have soffits and fascia, giving it a nice finished look...All that is left now is to add the porch lights and the door bell...at least I think that is pretty much it for the outside...Well besides landscaping, but that will come later and be done by us.

On the inside, I am LOVING how the french doors into my workspace are looking, and the wall of built in closets look great too...I am so excited to get them filled with fabrics and set up my sewing machines and get back to work...I knew I would miss working but this is about driving me nuts...Watching Project Runway is like torture right now. :(

As I mentioned in my previous post, all the lights are installed but for the one in the living room, we needed to find a 1/2inch diameter, foot long extension rod for the fan inside the ceiling tray...This proved harder than it sounds, though we found one, it was the wrong color and had threads at both end so David had to grind them off to make it fit and then painted it black to match the fan.

Even with having to do all that, I am glad to report that all the agonizing over my light fixtures for months, most definitely paid off, I am loving them all...Pictured here is a mini chandelier with ceiling medallion is in Mic's room and will help capture the French country feel we are going for. You will be surprised to find out this fixture was found on walmart.com...Once the bed is in place the chandelier can be lowered, for the moment it is hooked up so we do not walk into it .

Before I tell you about the cabinets, I do have to mention the 3 pendants over the breakfast bar, because the extension rods that came with them are 12inches long and the kitchen ceilings are only 8foot high, using 2 rods per pendant made them hang a little lower than I had hoped for, BUT having just one rod made them too short, while trying to work out which height would work best, I had the electrician hang one short and one long...and BAM...we had our solution...I love how unique they look now.

Ok, now for the cabinets...I had wanted and "thought" I had ordered an off-white (ivory) cabinets with a caramel glaze for the outer wall...well it seems when you combine ivory with caramel glaze you get TAWNY BIRCH...which would be the color we painted the walls...I have thought of little else this week end but how can we fix this problem of my cabinets now blending in with the walls and still keep on schedule...

Well a couple of things, once the counter tops are added and the appliances, this should help define the cabinets some more...Plus we do plan to add a tile back splash, and this may now happen sooner rather than later....Obviously sending them back is not really a option if I want to have a kitchen when Mum and Nina arrive from Australia...So PAINT...after much mulling over and discussion in the wee hours of the morning, since this is literally keeping me awake...We go with the easy option and paint the kitchen and dining walls a darker color...and if it gets to the point I just CAN'T live with the cabinets this color then I will just have to paint them white myself....ANY AND ALL INPUT WELCOME BTW..

On a happy note... LOVE LOVE LOVE my hardware...after much searching online I was able to find the exact cup draw pulls and cabinet door knobs I wanted for less than 1/3 of the price of the ones at homedepot...So thank you The Knob Store on ebay...http://stores.ebay.com/theknobshop

I had my heart set on these cup draw pulls as they remind me of my Aunty "Loopy's" kitchen and bring back so many fond childhood memories of visiting her on the farm and chasing their many many ducks...

So is it surprising at all how fond I am of ducks now...Here are our 2 new additions, Peeps and Hula at only a week old...they are now more then twice this size and still growing...They are Giant White Pekins and supposed to reach 7lb's by 8 weeks of age...YIKES lol.

That's it for now. Hope to have some exciting counter top news by the end of the week.

Week 13 - Exterior Painting Done

View of the house from the North East, steal blue body, white trim and red door (Not sure what color red because they lost the sample card..oops). Still have to add the soffit, which will be white like the trim and should add the final POP to the outside...That is until until we have the time and money to add the railing to the porch and get some landscaping done.

Talking of landscaping Spring is definitely in full bloom here in Florida...I could not resist taking a photo of the wisteria that drapes the driveway and gives such a pretty frame to our little blue house.

In other news, all but one light fixture has been hung and they begun laying the flooring today...I hope to be able to get inside to take some pictures tomorrow afternoon or at the very latest the weekend. Also meet the granite guy, can't wait to see those counter tops go in...But first we need cabinets (due middle of next week)

I mentioned in my last entry that David had the septic guy use his machine to dig the trench for the underground electric conduit. Yesterday the electricians hung the outside box on the wall, allowing David to run the final pieces of conduit to make the connection from the pole by the road to the house complete. I have a great picture of David in the hole but he said I couldn't use it so this is the only one I have to share :(

David also ran all the phone and satellite lines for the TV and Internet throughout the house. Plus has framed in additional attic floor space the full size of the living area tray, which is about 16x16 square feet on top of what the builder had already made into attic storage space...

So not really house related but "down on the farm"...We got 4 more Chickens this last week...One is already laying and the other 3 younger birds are just pullets but should be laying soon also...For the moment they are still using the small pen to keep them safe at night but have free rain of all 5 acres during the day...though the younger birds seem to prefer the safety of the pen....Not sure if they are hiding from Bravo (rooster) or Sara lol...Actually they all get very excited to see Sara because she always brings them food.

David also brought 2 ducklings today, but they are just a week old and are currently snug as bugs in the old cockatiel cage in the utility room...About the time they are old enough to live outside full time we should have the new chicken/duck pen build closer to the new house and under the shade of the trees for both shelter from the summer heat and also predator birds.

I guess that is about it until I have some pictures from inside the house...I am very excited to see how the flooring looks tomorrow.

Week 12 - The count down begins.

I feel like I have been chasing my own tail all week, trying to make sure everything we need to get done is completed and we are not holding any of the work on the house up. We really need to hit our April 30th deadline and I refuse to be the cause of any delays....Everyone and everything needs to run smoothly over the next 29 days.

So the big things for this week, we have color on our interior walls..Tawny Birch...the best I can describe it as is, a yellowy beige. Notice they have removed all the doors again. They took them away to spray paint them...They will not be rehung until the flooring goes down sometime next week.

With the ceiling tray walls painted the same color as the rest of the walls, the tray really takes on definition. You can also see the A/C vent covers have been put in place, Can't wait to see how it looks with the light fixture and recessed lights installed also.


The septic tank was also installed along with the drain field..While the machine was here they also dug the trench for the conduit to be laid for the underground power line....



Other stuff but not photos:
All the shelves in the closets have been installed today...And we have got an outside color match, so they will start painting there on Monday...They switched and did the inside first so we can get the next wave of sub's come thru in order for us to keep things moving towards the looming deadline.

Weeks 9, 10 and beginning 11 - Where did the time go

Everything is really moving along now...Our walls all have insulation now...The inner walls have batts, but the outer walls got a spray in foam type stuff that fills every little nook and cranny, making it much more energy efficient...First they spray it in the walls, then they take what looks like a drill operated paint roller on a frame to knock down the excess and smooth it back to the studs...Then they have a second guy with what looks like a super large vacuum hose sucking up all the stuff that is knocked down, it is sucked back into the truck and reused....then the walls are left for the glue/bonding agent in the insulation to dry...I do have video of this process but it needs editing and I do not have the time to mess with it atm, so will post it at a later time.

BUT the biggest difference to the interior of the house so far is the drywall has gone up and we have walls and ceilings now...YAY.

This is a view of the soon to be kitchen area, you can see the built in pantry and the half wall that will be the back of the kitchen island bar.

It is amazing how much bigger the space feels now...all the rooms for that matter..

And talking of making a space feel bigger, here is a view of the living room ceiling tray...The extra 18inches really make that part of the living area feel huge.

It also gives that part of the room a feel of separation from the kitchen and dining without having to be closed off by a wall...it is hard to describe, but it is a very positive thing.


After the drywall was up and it had passed inspection and all the joints plastered, they came back and "shot the walls" to create a Spanish Knock Down effect...This will give the walls a slight textured look...With the soft yellow color I have chosen for the interior walls, it should really help lend to the country cottage look.

You can also see in this picture that my interior doors have arrived and are actually been installed as I type this...The painters are supposed to be coming by today also to start caulking in and prepping the walls to start painting tomorrow...I am so excited to see how how the colors we choose are going to look.

Kitchen cabinets have been chosen and should be ordered today...I have chosen my counter tops...See pretty picture of Uba-tuba granite to the left...I am loving the subtly of the coloring and hope it should contrast nicely with our cabinet colors.

We have also finalized our flooring selection, our lighting fixtures have been picked, door knobs purchased and OH BIG NEWS...The duel flush toilet price has been reduced to just $118 per unit...So not only are we saving more money, but hopefully this will make even more ppl choose this energy/water saving option for their bathrooms.

Well I think that is about you all caught up now...And hopefully by weeks end I can show you pictures of our pretty Steel Blue home.

Week 8 ends and week 9 begins...

Where to begin...So much going on all at once this last week...Well on the outside as you can see, the siding was completed and the roof is now on...Once the siding is painted they will return and do the soffit and facier.

And talking of painting the siding, though we had originally thought we would paint the siding white, but after much pondering and driving around looking at older cracker and craftsman homes in our area decided it would look better with color that would really make the white trim pop...Not to mention we have been living in a white house for the last 6yrs and it is a rather safe color.....

So final decision is "Steel Blue"...I know those that know me well are rolling their eyes at me painting yet ANOTHER house blue...though in my defence..A: this time it is the exterior and B: It was actually David's idea and decision...I had wanted green but seems he is allergic to green houses or something lol...oh and the fact out that 3 out of the six houses on our little country road is already green lol.

So anyway moving right along to the interior work for the week....The Electricians did the rough in, which then left me to fuss over every light fixture placement, having them tweak and tweak until I think (hope) I got them just where they need to be...After tomorrow it will be too late to move anything as they start spraying insulation and adding drywall.

I also have to choose 23 different light fixtures for the house....My head has been swimming in possibilities...I have so much respect for interior designers, having to decide both the function and the form of each fixture is proving quite overwhelming...

The plumbers were back and put the drop-in fiberglass shower and bath units...I am so glad I went with builder standards for both bathrooms (besides the duel flush toilets) because I am not sure I could take the pressure to make any more decisions.

The pantry in the kitchen has been framed out...I know I mentioned just getting a drop in pantry later, but well I am a woman building a house...I AM going to change my mind many times lol...I am getting more and more excited to see how this kitchen turns out...Meeting with the cabinet maker soon to discuss cabinet doors and finishes.

Picked up some possible color samples for the interior but until we have walls inside the house I will not know what the natural lighting will truly look like to see if these colors will work....But at least I can narrow down my selection compared to my furniture colors before I buy the sample pots.

I am sure I am missing something in this weeks post....Well as my mummy would say "Can't have been that important, if you can't remember it"