Dining room through to library and a peek into the kitchen on the right.
Kitchen…and Joshua.
Stairwell up to the studio.
Studio…in need of railing…
Front stairwell in need of a railing upgrade.
Guest bath.
Hall bath. Tile guys are getting all of the floors prepped to start tiling next week!
Master bedroom.
Tile, waiting patiently to be installed. Hardwood floor installation starts Monday, too!
And…garage doors have been installed. They will be painted black to match the other exterior doors, but I am in love.
We are entering the exciting phase when all of the “pretty things” are installed over the next two months. Stay tuned for tile, cabinetry, trim, doors, countertops, appliances, hardware, lighting and plumbing fixtures, and all the other things HGTV leads you to believe can all be installed in three days.
It has been another week dedicated to electrical wiring, plumbing piping, and HVAC ducting.
Are you still there?
Just thrilling.
They used the template provided by the tub manufacturer to cut out the tub deck.
Unfortunately, they did not consult me on placement before they did this and the cutout is too close to the windows. But that is easily fixed.
Though I’m glad we will have adequate ventilation in the house, I cannot wait until it’s time for drywall and all of the ducts and returns are out of sight.
I’m sure it’s all very efficiently run, but this ceiling looks like a hot mess to me.
Meanwhile, outside, part 1 of 27 of the electrical to the house has been inspected and approved so John has filled in a section of the ditch wide enough for a vehicle to pass over. He also started spreading gravel up the rest of the driveway while I was there. It was exciting to see the beginnings of the circle drive!
We’ve also been working hard on finalizing orders this week as raw materials seem to be skyrocketing in price.
We’ve been trying to pick our spots and make some trade-offs to stay in budget. The herringbone brick floor in the mudroom and the heated floors in the master bath are on the chopping block. My dear husband offered to start driving for Uber Eats so we don’t have to give up these features. I’m sure he’ll have no problem squeezing that in between working a full-time job, getting his MBA, and building a house.
We decided on #1 red oak instead of select, which has no knots and less tone variation from board to board. Josh and I agreed that we’d like a little more character in our hardwood floors and this was a good area to save some money. This showroom sample has no stain on it so it’s much lighter than our floors, which will be stained dark walnut.
Though the hardwoods will likely be installed in the next month, they will not be stained until the very end of the build, so it will be a while before we get to see the full effect.
Our builder and I had a long meeting yesterday to finalize exterior trim, siding, columns, and garage doors, as well as interior trim, doors, transoms, stair parts, and miscellaneous millwork.
As I was double-checking the door quote today, Bu decided to make himself a little napping Bu-rrito in the house plans. He stayed like this for over an hour. I’ll take it as a sign that he’s excited about the new house.
Last night after work, Josh and I went over to check out the progress at the house. I had been there just over 24 hours before but it was amazing to see how much had changed!
I spy a some second floor walls!
It was at about this point that I almost jumped out of the moving vehicle to run up to the house.
They finished both sets of interior stairs! Here’s Josh, casually walking in the front door.
Hi, honey!
We walked upstairs and my daredevil decided to sit on the edge.
The closest I got was about 10 feet away.
This explains a lot about us.
Meanwhile, in the opposite direction, the guest room at the front of the house is shaping up to have the best view. Who wants to come and visit?!
…in 2021…
Next we had to go up the back steps and check out the office.
I will be able to look out these windows from my desk and see what the neighbor horses are up to.
Hopefully when I got by tomorrow, they will have finished framing the second floor.
And I hope they add a few more temporary supports on the back porch. I think they are asking an awful lot of these few 2x4s…
I can barely concentrate on anything else at the moment because I’m so excited about the framing!!!
But, first things first: Check out our driveway that has been graded up so there’s no longer a pond in the middle of it. They also put in a massive pipe specified by my dear husband who does not mess around when it comes to proper drainage.
I had been parking at the very beginning of the driveway due to it being impassible in my short SUV. Next time, I will drive on up and park in front of the house…
… right by the front porch!
They are starting to put in the floor system for the second floor. The room above the front porch is the guest room. Kath (my mom) will be so delighted to see this as she is eager to stay in her suite.
They put in the stairs to the future headquarters of my design firm. The way things are going with COVID-19, it sounds like I will be subletting some of my office space to my husband.
Ok, back to the tour.
My kitchen!
Which will eventually look like this!
But probably not for 6 months…sigh.
This is the living room, which overlooks the front porch and yard. They had somehow missed one of these windows in the first round of framing, but they quickly got it added in after I brought it to their attention.
I’m sure I’m their favorite already.
Though I planned for all rooms to have lots of light and pretty views, I am particularly smitten with the view from the dining room.
I am also a big nerd about sight lines and axes. This is the view looking the opposite direction of the previous photo. Once all of these lovely temporary supports are removed, there will be a sight line down through the hall and out the windows of the library on the back of the house from the dining room table.
The L-shaped screened porch that wraps the back and side of the house will have an uninterrupted view of the tree line. Though right now, these temporary supports are really killing the mood.
Here’s another angle showing the screened porch and those library windows I’ll be able to see through from the dining room. I foresee spending a lot of time on this porch. So does our cat, Bu.
And this is the beast from her widest angle.
This house has been in my head and in my heart for so long that is really surreal to see it come to life.
Still quite a bit left before she looks like my rendering, but well on her way!
So, they were supposed to pour the garage and basement slabs Monday or Tuesday. The weather was uncooperative (thank you, Cristobal) so that didn’t happen. I decided to drive out to the property on Tuesday between meetings on the off-chance that it wasn’t raining there and there was concrete being poured.
It was raining heavily. And there was no concrete being poured.
This photo was taken shortly before I stepped out of the car and my foot was nearly swallowed whole by the mud.
This was after 10 minutes of cleaning.
There was only so much I could do with a roll of paper towels and a travel size bottle of hand sanitizer.
Also, did I mention I was between meetings? As in, after this I had another client meeting?
Thankfully, I had a pair of flip flops in the car. Hopefully that is the first and last time I will wear flip flops to meet a client.
Moving on.
We had an early morning meeting with our builder today and we were pleasantly surprised how much had happened since the shoe incident on Tuesday.
They were pouring the garage slab as we arrived.
Maybe I should ask them where they got their boots…
The also poured the basement steps today. The basement slab will be poured tomorrow.
At least I didn’t step in wet concrete…
The lumber was delivered yesterday (on schedule!) and they got quite a bit done in one day.
Just over 200 days in and there is cause for celebration!
We have footers, y’all!
The weather has been uncooperative, per usual, so after a lot of back and forth, they decided to dig the footers and pour them all in one day to beat the rain. Josh and I headed out to the property after work/meetings just in time to catch the last few minutes of pouring around 6PM.
I could not believe my eyes when I turned onto the easement road and saw this machinery as tall as a skyscraper!
OK…slightly taller than the trees.
This is some major equipment.
John, our earthwork guy, inspecting everything.
This looks like ancient ruins to me so I’m glad someone knows what’s going on.
I’ll be honest. When they said they were pouring the footers, I had no mental picture of what that was going to look like. I’m not even sure I would have gotten it right on multiple choice.
I might have guessed they would look more like big blobs or squares of concrete rather than a strange concrete maze.
Good thing I’m not in charge of this operation.
Josh is much more familiar with concrete pouring so he was eager to check it out and walk dangerously close to the edge of the wet concrete.
Here he is walking through the hall into the dining room. I’m imagining many lovely, leisurely meals in that room, soaking up the golden hour.
After those lovely meals, we can head out to the front porch to watch the sunset. This is where the front steps and porch will be.
This terrifyingly narrow and deep trench is for drainage. Josh is a major drainage nerd so he was delighted to see this.
I was less delighted, but still appreciative of the water mitigation planning.
I still can’t believe this is real.
2020 has been the most bizarre year of our lives. Though we have had sadness and challenges, we have so much to be thankful for. Building our forever home brings us a lot of joy in the process and in the hope of many happy times to come.
Things haven’t changed much in the last few days. Apparently, the ground was still fairly wet under the surface, so earthwork dude was letting it dry out.
We had a safely distanced meeting on-site with our builder to discuss the next few steps. There is some more grading to do and then the digging of the footers and the basement. I must find my pink sunglasses Josh got me before it’s time for me to inspect these items.
I did a little practice inspecting today.
Looking good and level.
I had to check out the view from Pride Rock…er…Pride Dirt Pile.
Josh decided to have a little too much fun with photoshop after I started calling our pile of dirt “Pride Rock”. Here I am presenting our house cat, Bu, to the kingdom.
I blame it on the quarantine.
Moving on.
We moved the trail camera back to its original location because I have recently learned about myself that, to me, watching dirt being moved is like watching paint dry.
The usual suspects showed up: Bambi, house cat, opossum, and a few curious neighbors.
Then came one of the funniest videos yet.
It started with a young lady turkey casually strolling by. I’ve just learned this is called a “jenny”.
Hey, Jen.
Then a few seconds later she inexplicably picks up her pace and exits stage right…
I’m starting to think we actually live in Portland, Oregon, not Nashville, Tennessee, with the number of rainy days we’ve had the last few months.
This weekend, however, we’ve had two lovely, dry, and mostly sunny days. Let’s hope this trend continues into next week and for the next few months so they can grade the spot for the house, pour the basement, and frame the house without further delay (ha!). Word is that the earthwork guy is showing up rain or shine this week. We shall see…
I have many pictures that look like this. I’m looking forward to having pictures from this angle that have a house in them.
Back to the nice weather this weekend. Friends of ours that live very near our current house were taking out some landscaping that had become too much to manage. They generously offered us some boxwoods and azaleas so we went over to help dig them up and then headed out to the property.
We planted them in the two front property corners so they would be out of the way during construction. Once the house is complete, it is likely we will transplant them to the landscaping beds, but for now they are anchoring the front of the property.
The landscape architect, carefully placing the shrubs while I document from a safe distance.
Though it appears they are practicing proper social distancing, the reason for their spacing has more to do with ease of mowing than a health risk.
Aren’t they cute?!
Here’s how they look from the future front porch. Josh had to limb up the tree a little bit more so construction vehicles can maneuver.
My phone camera is not doing this justice at all, and the orange septic field fencing really isn’t helping, but this is one of many beautiful “volunteer” dogwoods along the edge of the property.
This past Christmas, we asked for contributions to our landscaping fund along with the gift giver’s favorite tree, shrub, or plant. Now that the weather has turned a corner, we are excited to start planning for more planting around the property!
Primm & Property 