Andy and Penny are Building a Home
Saturday, August 25, 2012
Saturday, June 2, 2012
-- Throwing Up Some New Pictures
Here's a tip from
your good friend Andy... It's probably not the smartest thing to do to take one
of the most time-consuming and stressful things you'll ever do in your life,
and promise to write a blog about it. I
know I should be posting more pictures and writing more funny stuff, but I'm
just whipped.
Here's another picture of our great room. The mantle still has to be painted or stained (I've forgotten which). You'll also see we have paper and cardboard down on the floor to protect the hardwood which has already been put down.
Honestly, I don't
even know what I think anymore, It's just been push, push, push to get everything
done. I spent most of this morning
packing up my entire garage - and keep in mind that my garage has extra storage
space where we keep Christmas decorations, heavy duty kitchen stuff, all of my
tools, and all of our dry goods that we stock up on at Sam's ('cus a home ain't
a home without a 96 pack of toilet paper, enough paper plates to feed all the
troops in Afghanistan, and enough red solo cups to make Toby Keith ashamed).
I'm so tired, in
fact, that I just realized that last paragraph was one long run-on sentence and
I don't care enough to go back and edit it.
ANYWAAAAAAAAYY...
Let's get down to
what you're here for. Here's the latest
picture of the house:
We still have to
stain the cedar around the entrance, swap out the front door, hang a light in
the entranceway, hang the cedar shutters and cedar trellis, and stain both of
them.
Here are two
pictures of our Roman master shower. To
keep anyone from having to Google the term, a Roman shower is a type of
architecturally designed shower stall that does not require a door or curtain. Trust me on this one... DO NOT GOOGLE THE
PHRASE "ROMAN SHOWER" unless you want to be nauseated.
The accent tiles
look a little orange in that picture, but that is the setting sun shining
through the transom window.
Here's another picture of our great room. The mantle still has to be painted or stained (I've forgotten which). You'll also see we have paper and cardboard down on the floor to protect the hardwood which has already been put down.
Here's another
shot of our kitchen. You'll see our
backsplash is up. Under the piece in the
center will be our gas stove and over to the right will be our microwave and
oven set up like a double oven. In the
space above the center backsplash we will have our hood.
And that's about
it. Penny won't let me put too many
pictures up, I've got to save some of the goods for the Big Reveal Party. they are supposed to be done with
construction on June 12 (7 more working days), we do the walkthrough/punch list
on June 13, we do the signing on June 20, a few piddle paddle things for us to
bring over/ install June 21 and 22, and the movers are coming on June 23.. AHHHHHH!!!!!!!
Oh well, it will
all be OK, it will all be OK, it will all be OK. That's what I have to keep telling myself.
Until I put up some more pics, take care.
PS - June 21st is
Penny's birthday. Make sure you wish a
happy one.
PPS - And if you've already looked up "Roman Shower"
on Google... For shame...
Tuesday, May 8, 2012
-- 5 Weeks And Counting
I really
wanted to be more up to date on this blog, and I'm sure things will soon start
to ramp up, but I feel I could only type," more bricks on the outside,
more drywall on the inside" so many times.
Who would have thought that this phase would last this long? Not I...
So where were
we? Oh yeah, more bricks on the outside,
more drywall on the inside. In addition,
the interior paint first coat just went up as well as baseboards, crown
molding, wainscoting in the dining room, and the tile has been set in the
laundry, master bath, and around the fireplace. Here's the most recent pic:
Penny told me
not to keep giving out too many interior pics, because she wants everyone to
come see it in person. Something about
buying the cow when you can get the milk for free, but let me sneak a few to
you anyway.
Great Room looking into Kitchen
Formal Dining Room
Quick Shot of the Tile in Master Bath
The Rear of the House
Finally, we've all been getting ready for the big move. Where I once had a reasonably sized office in the current house, we now have a staging area for where we are storing our packed boxes. Now I just have a desk, a chair, and a small pathway to get there. Even p-nut lost one of her beds in my office. I had my hands full and kicked it to the side, near another one of her beds (that dog has more beds than Dennis Hof). It landed on a 45 degree angle against the filing cabinet. I came home over the weekend to find p-nut's horizontal bed untouched, and p-nut curled up - upside down and under the blanket - in the bed I had tossed to the side. I managed to snap a pic before she woke up.
That dog is
spoiled rotten...
Monday, April 16, 2012
-- What's going on?
First off, I
realized I haven't put a picture up in a while.
This was taken this past weekend.
4/14/2012
Since the last
picture I posted three weeks ago, the roof has been shingled and you'll see that the
unpainted shake and soffits have been hung as well.
But the real
updates are what is going on inside. The central vacuum system has been installed, all of the electrical and plumbing has
been run, and all of the insulation has been put in. Most of the drywall has been hung downstairs,
and everything is moving right along.
In meeting
with our contractor, he gave us a very tentative schedule for upcoming
projects:
- 4/13 Sheetrock Start
- 4/27 Tile
- 5/01 Trim (baseboards/crown molding)
- 5/04 Paint
- 5/09
Cabinets
There was one
piece of news we received that wasn't great.
All of this time, we've been told that we should be finished around May
29. The contractor has been telling us
that the weather has been good and that we are ahead of schedule. Well, we discovered that somehow, the wires
got crossed, and he was given a completion date of June 20 - 3 WEEKS
LATER!!! So when he's been saying we're
ahead of schedule, he's been meaning we're ahead of that June 20 date. He said he didn't think the May 29th was
possible. Of course, we told him not to
rush, and that we want everything done right.
We were just excited for the May date, and now it seems like the extra
three weeks is a lifetime.
Oh, well. C'est la vie.
Wednesday, April 4, 2012
-- Quick Update
Just wanted to give out a quick update. No new pictures to post, the outside of the
house pretty much looks the same as it did in the last photos. The inside however has had the plumping,
electricity, air conditioning, central vacuum, and surround sound wiring
installed. We are scheduled to do a pre
drywall walk-through at the end of the week.
Once we sign off on everything, they will start putting up the doors and the bricks.
My leg is back to normal and the house seems to be ahead of schedule. I think it's a good week!
Sunday, March 25, 2012
-- How Do You Measure Crazy? Very Tenderly
So, in
case I haven't mentioned it before, Penny and I can be a little crazy.
Normally, we offset each other because only one of us is crazy at a time.
But occasionally the perfect crazy storm
occurs where our craziness combines and exponentially multiplies our craziness
ten-fold. Let me explain...
From the day the chain wall was laid out on
the new house, both of us thought that the footprint of house was a little
small. We were certain it was smaller
than the model home we looked at - which had our same exact floor plan. Then the foundation was poured, and we both
commented that there must be a mistake. So
we took a tape measure to the foundation, and sure enough, the length and width
of our foundation exactly matched the floor plans we had been given. We must
have just been mistaken, but were put at ease... until... the framing went up.
This time we
were both sure something went wrong. The rooms we were looking at were way way
way too small to be the rooms we saw in the model home. So in a clandestine twilight operation, Penny
and I took the tape measure out and measured each and every room in house and
once again, it matched the floor plans exactly.
How could it be? How could both of us be wrong about this? Then we came up with the only possible solution, and it made both of us sick. We had been swindled. It was the only explanation. The model home had to have been built to a slightly larger scale. You see, we're already apprehensive because we kind of got pushed around by the contractor who built the house we live in currently. Some shady work in some areas, some things promised to be fixed that never were, some general half-@$$ work that we had to pay someone else to come and fix. It must have happened again. Despite this new contractor's sterling reputation, they must have done it to us as well. We called our real estate agent, told her what was going on, and asked if we could see the model home one more time.
We showed up
armed with our tape measure and walked into the model home. One look around and
I knew this wasn't going to be good. We
went into the dining room first. This
was the room that I was sure was the most off.
We took out the tape measure and... It matched the floor plan exactly.
The kitchen was next. Penny was
certain the kitchen wasn't right, but it too matched the floor plan
exactly. The large great room, that one
was definitely off. I could tell just by
looking around that the spacious model home that it's great room was practically
palatial compared to the half-closet great room that was being built on our new
lot. Zip went the tape measure and... it
was actually one inch shorter than our floor plan.
Room after
room was exactly like it was supposed to be. We had not been swindled. Penny and I simply pushed each other to the
brink of crazy and paranoia. Suddenly,
the movie, The Shining, made sense. Needless
to say, both of us were more than slightly embarrassed by this. Apparently, houses look different until the sheetrock
goes in.
Once again, I have to give a big shout out to our agent, Susan Reardon. She must have taken some course on how to handle crazy people in real estate school. Penny and I had both hoped we could stay in contact with her once our business relationship was over. But she probably prefers her friends to be a little less of the neurotic nut-job variety.
Anyway, in summation, everything is right and on track with the house. the only thing wrong is the new owners.
3/24/2012 Back Patio
3/24/2012 Office Loft
3/24/2012 Kitchen
3/24/2012
Friday, March 23, 2012
-- Latest Pics
3/19/2012 View From The Front
3/19/2012 View From The Rear
3/19/2012 View from inside the Great Room
3/21/2012 View From The Front (The Roof Is Up)
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