we didn't check in on the progress much last week ... our schedule was crazy. harper had y camp, henry had swim lessons and play dates daily, marc was in and out, we lost an afternoon to driving an hour away to pick out counter top slabs, it rained ...
but when we did finally go out, we were amazed to see walls had gone up.
i'm not sure why we were amazed, but we were. seeing this house go three-dimensional after all this time is sorta awesome. now we can walk the floor plan and get a feel of the space and the layout, and it helps solidify where we're heading so much better.
now that we have an idea of how the house is oriented and where the windows are, we're more convinced than ever that we have a great view, a great lot, and how on earth did we get so lucky that no one snapped up this piece of earth during our year of waffling?
speaking of great view, i may have gone overkill on the windows in my studio, but dang! i can only imagine what the light will be like! and when i'm not shooting, sitting in front of the window is going to be pretty peaceful.
toward the end of the week, we got the best surprise: stairs!!
(i've mentioned my lifelong quest for stairs, i believe ...)
to finally have an upstairs, a place for all the bedrooms so all the noises of house don't keep the kids awake at night and wake them early in the morning, is heaven. can't wait.
speaking of heaven, can i show you what we'll see first thing in the morning?
sold.
it isn't a direct lake view, but it's close enough. and those trees? how pretty will that be in the fall?
while we were wandering our new halls, henry decided the better entertainment was watching the guys at work.
can't blame him; this whole thing is fascinating.
we missed the progress of thursday and friday, but yesterday we drove out to see what had taken place and were giddy to discover framing on the second floor!
hey there, master bedroom closets and bathroom!
seriously, can someone tell me what we're supposed to put in those closets?? i think marc and i could fit all of our clothes easily into one of them and still have room to spare. maybe we should turn the other closet into a little evil lair? a disco? have another kid? i think each of these closets is the size of our first apartment's kitchen. and i'm really not exaggerating.
the kids are eager to have their little homework loft space. and i can't wait to put a window seat under this window!
we'd heard that the roof could be up this week and the electrical and plumbing could potentially begin, but now we're in for about five days of rain. so i'm not holding my breath.
regardless, our home is materializing. just ... wow.
we're still finalizing things like fixtures and cabinets and paint colors and carpet.
(which i'm second-guessing and stressing about waaaaayyy more than you think, mrs walsh!! ;o) )
i really don't want to move in and regret what color we painted something. or have to immediately repaint. and carpet? gah. that's stressful. carpet is a HUGE expense and a HUGE element to have to live with if it's wrong. in fact, i'm going to the design center today to change our selection for the basement. i got the swatch on friday and took it home, and it's way too dark next to the furniture we'll be using in the basement. back to the drawing board on that one. i kinda hate carpet anyway, so this one is tough for me. i know what i like when i see/feel it, but to pick from a little square is really hard. and the ones i seem to think are okay are, like, twice our carpet allowance. soooo ...
one thing we are sure about?
after much going back and forth and getting bids for various options, we decided to put this little pretty in the master bathroom.
not in a million years did i think we would/could do marble. so why are we?
well, we have a narrow detail in the shower and on the tub backsplash of this tile:
and i couldn't figure out what i wanted on the tub deck and vanity that would look nice with it. the rest of the tile in the bathroom is very basic and simple (ie within our allowance and cheap) white ceramic tile - 8x10s on the shower walls, 2" white octogon and dot on the floor. the stacked tile will give the master a bit of "something special," but it didn't look nice with the standard white cultured marble vanity that the builder offered. the color seemed ... off ... and the cultured marble seemed like it would not wear well. so we explored our options, and amazingly enough, the marble came in the least expensive by, like, half. who knew. so now i get to feel fancy every time i brush my teeth.
the master bathroom and kitchen will be our splurge areas. we've added some things to each of those rooms to make them a little more ... more. we can change and upgrade and mess with all the areas of the house over time, but we wanted those rooms to be as close to perfect as we could get them from the beginning.
can't wait to see it all come together.
this week we'll cross our fingers that it doesn't rain as much as they say it might! because i baked cookies yesterday for the builders, and if it rains and they can't work, i'll be forced to eat all those cookies. and no one wants that to happen.
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