Lights! Camera! Lots of Action!

This is going to be a long blog...we are down to the wire & now things are happening fast.

We went to the house to meet with the landscape guy this morning but he wasn't the only one at the house; the builders were there, the electrician, the trim guy & some of his crew, and the plumber was on his way over.  It was a busy morning, to say the least. 

Dana, Shane and I picked out an exterior trim color.  It should be more in the brownish black range and less in the chocolate brown range...but who really knows what it will look like on the house?  Regardless, it will not look just like the neighbors.

We have some good news and some bad news...

Here's the good news...we have power.

YAY! 

Here's the bad news...

The power guys dug threw the middle of the yard rather than along the fence line.  This means that if we ever install a pool we will have to have them come back out and move the line.

Shane tried to stop them and have them use their easement, but they told him that we'd have to pay for it if they did it now.  However, if they come back later to move the line, they'll do it for free.

That's the craziest thing I've ever heard.

Here's a pic of the front entrance with the exterior lights turned on.

...and in the kitchen, the over & under cabinet lights are turned on in this pic.

Here you can see the chandelier that hangs over the dining table.  Shane's looking out the window with one of our future neighbors, who is also building a house in the neighborhood-we are using the same builder.

We've got power in the refrigerator.

...and the freezer made some ice while we were in the kitchen.  I tossed it out, but here's some little chips, the bucket hasn't been put in yet.

The dishwasher was installed today, as well as the knobs and pulls on the kitchen cabinets.

Some of the lights in the living room are turned on & the inside of the fireplace has been painted black.

Our neighbor agreed that when you are standing in the house, the island granite seems too small for our kitchen.   The roll in the front of this picture is the carpet for the office and staircase. 

I love this carpet & I'm so glad it wasn't on backorder.

Now that we have lights, you can see the pantry.  Well, this is half the pantry, you can't see the rest of it in this picture.

On the back patio, the ceiling fan and lights have been installed.

And in the garage, we have lights.  This will be Shane's work area.

The powder bath is looking awesome.

We think this will be the vanity in the powder bath. It just appeared today.

Some plumbing was installed today, like the toilet in the powder & this one in the master bath.

Oh, speaking of master bath, I'm sure you want to know that the tub has been set where it belongs.

Don't you just want to soak in that tub?

And here's the master bath with the chandelier lit up.  If you look closely, you can see that a hand towel ring has been installed.

The shower still isn't completed.  Apparently, they were short some tiles-I think they plan to finish tomorrow. (That might be wishful thinking on my part).  You can see a corner seat/shelf in the bottom of the pic.

Here's the laundry room, complete with under counter lighting. 

It's a long way from the days when my friend Virginia & I would grab some quarters, load up our laundry and sit at the laundromat while we waited on our clothes to wash and dry.

Upstairs, we have faucets & towel rings.

Towel bars...

And running water.

Bathtub faucets and such have been installed, but we are still missing some tile.

We have tons of storage in the hallways and bedrooms...

And they have laid out the game room carpet.

Here's a better view.  You also can see the bar front with the acrylic inserts.

It's become a very fun game room.  The bar area is still not completed; they need to install the black tile on the floor behind the bar, the bar fridge, counters and sink.

I may never get Shane to leave this room...and isn't it great that red is my favorite color, too?

The First Day of June-Take 2

Some crews were still working when we left earlier, so we went back over tonight to lock-up the house.  I suspect this will be something we have to do every night between now and the Parade.

Here's the house with the garage doors painted the same color as both of our neighbors. 

Here's the neighbor's garage on one side of our house...

...and here's the neighbor's house on the other side...

Unfortunately, some of the taping they did to paint the trim has fallen down.  Now they'll have to re-tape before they re-paint tomorrow.

The sinks in the master bath have been firmly attached and the clamps removed.

Here's a better picture of the master tub area faux painting.

They've installed the shelves in the master closet cabinet.

...and the sink in the mother-in-law bath is securely installed...

They have hung the cabinet in the MIL bath.  Apparently, this cabinet was installed upstairs and had to be switched with the one that was built for the upstairs.  These poor bathrooms are going to have identity problems, everything about them has been switched or confused at one point.

In the mudroom, they've installed the wood strip where the coat hooks will be attached.  It still needs to be painted.

For those of you who are worried about us not having enough storage in the kitchen, the shelves have been installed in the pull-out-pantry next to the fridge.

...and for those of you worried that the fridge doors will be too close to the island...

Just for fun, here's a pic of the fridge doors opened.

Love it.

...and lastly, the laundry sink is huge.  This is so much better!

We also marked off where the vegetable garden will go in the backyard so it's ready for the landscape meeting tomorrow. 

I wonder what kind of excitement we'll have tomorrow?

The First Day of June...

There are only six days left to work on the house before the Parade judging begins.   Wow.

This morning, I got word that the electric would most likely be hooked up today.  When I passed that information on to Shane, his reply was, "Great. The exterior painters are there and they had ladders everywhere.  I bet PSO won't install it because ladders are in the way."

So naturally, Shane & I both ended up at the house around lunch today to check on things. Here's what we discovered...

The painters had indeed arrived to paint the exterior trim & garage doors of our house. 

Yay!...Right?

Well...luckily Shane has a keen eye and is great at double-checking things-he noticed that it wasn't the correct color.

We had taken a photo of a house whose garage doors we liked as well as sent an address of another house who's garage color we liked to our builders.  Both garages were on the brownish-black side of the brown spectrum...we didn't really have a specific color we wanted, just in that general realm.  BUT, we absolutely did not want chocolate brown; the brown on the brown-red side of the spectrum.  One color to specifically not use?  The exact color of the neighbor's garage.

Guess what?

It was exactly the same chocolate brown color of the neighbor's garage. 

So, I called Dana and she immediately phoned the painters and picked up some trim colors swatches then drove out to our neighborhood to compare the swatches against the "approved" houses colors.  The painters continued to prime the house with a brownish-red hue. We are hoping that tomorrow we will have a better color.

We really aren't that picky.  Really, I promise.  But it's a good thing we randomly stopped by at lunchtime.  Wouldn't want to upset the neighbors before we even move in by copying their house.

Also, the faux finisher girls were there today.  Sorry the picture is slanted, but hopefully you can see that they hand textured the outside of the wine room and glazed over it with a brown color so the texture is more noticable.  I love it.

The girls used the same hand-textured-glaze technique on the vent hood in the kitchen.

We still only have the two appliances that were installed yesterday...

The foreman has been at the house most of the day finishing up little things.  He straightened up the doorknob on the front door, made sure the drawers pull as smoothly as they should, and put some of the shelves where they belong.

This is the shelf to the left of the fireplace.

The doors to the office have been hung, but still need to be stained.

Someone put the trim around these ceiling tile pieces.  This trim will be stained to match the rest of the trim pieces.

Here you can see the ceiling tile accent pieces outside the wine room. 

The faux finisher girls worked in the master bath and did a two-tone charcoal/silver stripe on the walls in the tub area.

It's the same shimmery paints they used on the ceiling of the master bedroom.

Are you ready for this?

I LOVE the powder bath; it has this really awesome crocodile print in the texture of the walls.  You couldn't really see the texture until they applied the glaze this afternoon.

And here's another picture of that room...

The powder bath is going to turn out just like we wanted.  (I say "we"-but really, Shane wasn't that concerned about this room, he was more worried about how many wires we have running through the walls.  I mean, I'm glad someone was worried about the wires & I'm even more pleased that I was left to worry with things like sparkley-crocodile bathrooms.)

Also, sinks have been installed in the master bath.

If you noticed the super tiny cut-out for the sink in the laundry room-don't worry.  Without my even having to ask, Dale has brought over a sink about three times this size and it will be installed soon.  YAY!  I was wondering how I was going to rinse my muddy rainboots in that tiny sink!

Some toilets have been delivered and are just waiting to be installed.

The acrylic has been installed in the upstairs bar front.  The bar will be put back together soon.

It's funny that I said soon, I guess at this point, everything will happen soon.

By this evening, they had primed most of the exterior trim.  Hopefully, tomorrow a color different than the neighbor's house will be applied.

Tomorrow morning, we will meet with the landscaper.  We want to stake off where we want the vegetable garden so that sod is not installed there.  Also, we will select some of the plants for the front flower beds.

Oh, in case you were wondering.  The electricity wasn't hooked up today. ;-)