Sunday, August 28, 2011

We've been told that we are targeting a completion date somewhere around mid-late September.  Sometimes we think "yeah, ok.  That seems reasonable" and sometimes we think "there is no way in Hell that's going to happen!"
It truly seems like now we are in the home stretch, only dealing with the final finishing touches.  But there is still a lot of installation to do.

A trip over to the house gave us a nice surprise - the kitchen granite countertops had been installed!  And we were so pleased with how it came out.

Here are some pictures of the progress:
Kitchen

Close-up: Milky Way granite
Mom helped me find this old decorative metal stove top cover.
I plan to use it in place of a stainless steel backsplash to the oven/range.

Looking into foyer
Jacob's room - they've installed all interior doorknobs
Jack & Jill bathroom - vanity top & light installed.
The trim work looks amazing in here!
Mady's room
Master bedroom with tray ceiling
Making progress on the bar
The kids were in a goofy mood and were actually trying  to get in my pictures!
 

Doing a dance
 For some perspective, I took a few shots of our surroundings.  With any luck, it will fill in and we will forget we ever had this much space between our neighbours!
Looking west to the front of the house/greenspace
 Here, you can see the apartments we are staying at currently way at the end of the street.
Looking south to the left of the house/backyard
Looking east towards back of the house
Another east/back of the house angle
We've each had a chance to meet some of our neighbours this week.  One family has been in the area for a few years and has a son just one month younger than Jacob!  We stopped to meet them and their adorable Goldendoodle puppy while we were out for a dog-walk ourselves.  And as the parents were talking, the little boy brought out his own scooter to play with the kids for a short time - and the kids had a great time!  Another future neighbour was at the playground with his kids and talked to Brian about the house they are just starting to build.
This just helps to confirm for me that we hopefully have made the right decision for our family.  Moving to the " 'burbs" is a sacrifice we are willing to take for the kids.  I look forward to my kids going on bike rides with neighbour kids, running into the doorway for a drink and running back out again.  An easy-going feel where we feel safe having them outside.  Not to mention the schools and the convenience (for us!).

And the next day, the kids were asking to go by the house with the new kids again.  :)  I think we are going to be happy here.

Sunday, August 21, 2011

More progress - the painters have been visiting this week.  Unfortunately, our walk down to the house came just in time for a quick summer rain shower, so lighting was bad and everything was covered up downstairs in the bar area, where they've painting the panels black to match the bar cabinets.

My new assignments this week are lighting and faucets.  Not an easy thing to do when you are supposed to be staying within an allocated budget.  To compensate for that, I've been buying a light or two here and there from our own funds along the past few months, since I highly anticipated based on the sheer number of lights/fans needed for the house, that we would go over budget (just based on my general choice of asthetic).  Because of that, I think we will be theoretically "under budget" on lighting!

Again, I will say that, we chose to go with a smaller "custom" builder, because we wanted more control and flexibility on design and finishes.  The frustrating part of that is the sheer lack of guidance we receive in our instructions.  I don't know if that is just Kai, or custom builders in general (because I assume most people would have the help of a designer?).  But it can be quite aggravating to get an email that says, ok, you should probably start picking out faucets now if you haven't already,  Um, ok.  Timing, schedule, requirements/restrictions . . .??  Just wingin' it.  : )
A majority of the new houses in this neighbourhood are being built by the semi-custom builder.  It's probably a price-competitiveness thing - limited choices in finishes, but flexibility in design, allows for better pricing.  And I'm coming to think that there is probably something to be said about how much easier it probably is.
But honestly, I cannot think of a better way to do this.  I would be sure to be less happy if I had to choose something I wasn't all that into, knowing I'd replace it down the road.  After 7 years of making over our last house to be closer to what we wanted, I am seriously not in the mood to step into something brand new that I'll make over again later on.  Fixtures are one thing.  It's relatively easy to change out a sink faucet.  And even a light.   I'm trying not to spend too much time fretting over those.

We have signed a short-term lease with this apartment - a 3-month one.  I was hoping that since there was no other way to do month-to-month, that this would allow us the freedom to move into our new house at a more leisurely pace.
But who knows!  We have no idea what our timeline to finish this house is on, and it's frustrating when people ask.  It's one thing that Kai has been very poor about communicating about.  At this rate, we don't even know if September seems reasonable.  We just don't know what is really left, besides the obvious.  Which is unfortunate, because interest rates are about a full 1% lower than they were when we initially signed, and we have the ability to refinance.  We think he is shuffling between multiple houses, and I'm sure he works with the same set of folks.  He also mentioned to us that subcontractors are harder to find these days due to the economy - they've gone out of business!

So, we are biding our time.  Apartment living isn't the worst - it's even convenient sometimes (except when you go grocery shopping!).  And the anticipation is building. . . .


Stone has finally been added to columns

Front door stained to look like wood.  A real-wood door may have warped
or faded due to the west-facing sun.
 Paint!   Benjamin Moore's Owl Grey covers the entire first floor and second floor hallway.
Kitchen
Kitchen island

Column at Office

Jacob's room

Mady's room is a dark chocolate

Master bed/bath are the same as Jacob's room



1st floor looking to back door/dining nook

Kitchen

The kids play on the back patio while we wait out the rain

Friday, August 19, 2011

I'm a little behind in the catch-up of the goings-on with the new house building, since we had been soooo busy in dealing with the old one and moving.  And, now that our apartment is so close to the house and we can easily walk down and review the progress . . . it seems things are moving as slowly as ever.  :)  I'm sure that's just how it feels to us.

Here are some of the things that have been accomplished in the past couple of weeks:
Driveway has been poured:
The front porch, steps, and walkways have been poured; and the porch rails must not have been there last too:

Here are the kids pointing to the "new front steps"
Dancing on the front porch!
We gave our builder heartburn - again - when it came to the back patio.  After initial inspection of the frame, we decided it was worth it to pull it out a few feet further to extend the space into the yard.  We also added colour to the concrete and Kai designed a nice pattern to be cut into the concrete to make it more visually interesting (of course, at extra cost).  Also, because we had had so little rain in weeks, Kai spent a few days watering the rocks again just to be sure the land was settled.
Framing
The pattern is a boarder and diamond in the middle. The colour is a light tan.


Wednesday, August 10, 2011

SOLD

Our house is Sold!
Well, this is it!  We had our final closing with the new buyers, Amber and Andy.  They are young and very sweet, and remind us of where we were in our lives when we first bought the house.  We exchanged contact information, since we still had 4 days to move before we had to completely be out of the house, and just in case there were any questions in the future.  It's been great working with them, and they have been so appreciative for everything we've done.  We even left them a bottle of wine on the island as a "welcome home" gift.  Oh, and a brand-new A/C unit.  ugh!

And here's the story with that:
So, not two weeks before our closing date, but right in the midst of a terrible heat wave, we come home to a hot house.  Initially we thought (were hoping) that the A/C was just not keeping up with the 100deg heat, but into the next day it was obvious that something was wrong.  The A/C unit is really the only major piece of equipment that we had not had to replace along the way, and we were really hoping to make it through this summer.  We were already paying big to remedy the mold in the crawlspace and some plumbing for the sump pump.  But alas, as the house reached 88deg inside the house we could not bear it.  We had to pack up and move to a hotel for the weekend until we could find someone to come evaluate the problem (which our luck meant a total replacement) and do the repair.  And the dog enjoyed a weekend at Camp Bow Wow.

Since we had to stay in a hotel, we decided to enjoy it, and found a great deal at a hotel downtown.  The hotel staff outfitted each of the kids with a little backpack full of fun little toys, which they went bonkers for (1 month later they are still using them!).  Unfortunately, it meant one more weekend of not being able to do more prepping and packing at the house.  I was starting to stress for sure.


Closing weekend was an extremely busy one for us.  It went like this:
Thursday - Movers come to pre-pack
Friday - Packing for apartment move & final closing + mom and younger brothers come for the weekend
Saturday - Jacob's 5th birthday party!
Sunday - Moving major items to apartment
Monday - Packers finish packing and take everything that is moving to storage + first night in apartment
Tuesday - Final clean up at old house (trash, donations, recycling).
Thankfully, our cleaning couple agreed to do the final clean down of the house, which was such a help for us.
And then we said our good byes; it was bittersweet!


Moving Day!

 And the now-empty rooms:
Dining room
Nursery / Mady's Room
Jacob's Room
Master Bedroom
Here are some pictures of the kids enjoying all the newly open space:

 And the kids in each of their rooms:



 Jacob takes a picture of the rest of the family: