Drywall Has Begun

Not the biggest of updates because most of the work is now hidden from view. I'm told that the insulation was wrapped up and inspected this week and that drywall has begun! Sadly, I don't think I'll get much of a look at the house over the next few weeks, but I'm holding out hope that the Project Manager lets me sneak a peek during one of my weekly drive bys! They still haven't set a closing date for us, but my best guess is that we're about 40 days out which will work out perfect for us. Jen can spend her entire summer unpacking, painting, and decorating!

Why is the work hidden? Well that's because our garage door came in last week! We sprung for an upgrade on this one because I really liked the idea of having something other than your run of the mill flat paneled steel door. Windows were a must, hardware was a must, and the pattern on the panels was a nice touch. A better picture of the door is below:

The builder also installed our replacement front door (still needs to be painted). I still think I would have preferred the glass pane at the top of the door, but Jen was pretty adamant about solid door. Hopefully it will grow on me.

Lastly on the outside, the fypon gable vent has been lowered by about 10" and once trimmed out properly, shouldn't stand out so much on the front of the garage. It may not seem like much, but centering the vent in the gable end really does drown out the large empty space pretty well.

In the meantime, we've been on a pretty steady furniture hunt. By my calculations, we'll have hit up every website and furniture store the Delaware Valley by the end of this weekend, but it seems like Jen keeps finding more. I think a lot of our purchases will come on or around Memorial Day as that's when I'm expecting some pretty significant sales. Appliances, especially, should be on sale that weekend so I'm hoping we can take advantage. Happy Birthday Chase! Here's a new washing machine for you! The only items we've picked out so far are beginner bar stools (3 for $79 from At Home!) with seat bottoms that we plan to refinish immediately and an entertainment center ($149 on Wayfair!) that was just too good of a deal to pass up. It seems like Jen is going for a "modern farmhouse" look with furniture which I'm buying into as well. Hopefully she doesn't ask me to shiplap any walls (Thanks, Chip & Joanna!) Feel free to bombard her with your suggestions!

 

Pre-Drywall Meeting Day!

Big day for us today as we held our Pre-Drywall Meeting! Not a ton of surprises as I've had a bunch of conversations with the Project Manager and I pretty much drive by the house every other day... I spent the afternoon thinking up such a long list of questions/issues to talk about that I was almost disappointed with how well the meeting went.

The top of our list was as follows:

1. Need to make a decision on the front door
2. Double check all lighting and outlet locations
3. What can be done about the large empty area of siding above the garage door?

The front door has been a week long disagreement between Jen and I. Our original drawing set showed a door with two raised panels on the bottom and a single raised panel on the top. Somehow that got mis-ordered as window pane on the top. When we first saw it, we both thought it looked like some sort of exam room viewing window that didn't fit the house. After the siding was installed, it grew on me, however. Ultimately, I wasn't all that attached to the window and Jen was very adamant that the window was just too much in the front of the house. So, team no-window won that round!

The lighting and outlets were right where we expected. In fact, there were a couple of lights added that I didn't quite expect (which I'm not going to argue about!) The electrician was very accommodating when it came to our own thoughts on light locations and sizes. Coming from a home that was nearly 100 yrs old, this place feels like it has outlets and lights EVERYWHERE. Most important to me was just documenting a bunch of the locations for the future. You never know when you're going to want to open up a wall or two down the road! Just a sampling of the dozens of pictures...

Lastly, the issue of the enormous open area of siding. To be honest... this has been the only real disappointment of our entire home building process. None of the original renderings showed this. None of the architectural drawings we've seen have shown this. And right now, it's really noticeable. So much so that we've become a little self conscious about showing pictures of it! But there's a reasonable explanation: The home sits really high above grade. This is primarily due to the fact that the water table is pretty high in the area and therefore the basement isn't as sunk into the ground as we may have hoped. The overall height of the garage will work wonders for us from a storage perspective, but that sea of green was frustrating. 

So what's the plan? The gable vent is going to move down about a foot. Then, it needs to be trimmed out on the sides and the bottom which will add some girth. Then, we've also picked out some trim for above the garage door that adds a little girth as well. The result will reduce the gap by more than a foot compared to how it looks right now. Much more manageable. Our PM suggested that it's a perfect location for a basketball hoop, but I had to point out the obvious height deficiency that our family suffers from. It would make a pretty excellent location for a projector screen for some neighborhood movie nights, though...

The million dollar question of "when will it be done" remains unanswered. When prodded, our PM wouldn't commit, but said May seems unlikely. I'm still guessing early June. 

 

Sunday Funday!

Today marks day 67 since they broke ground. Tons of action over the past few weeks and we finalized what I believe to be our last round of decisions! We wrapped up our electrical changes, our home wiring selections, trim selections, and made the call to delete a door to the basement stairs (put one in the win column for Pat!) The HVAC contractor wrapped up this week, the electrician should be done by Monday, the cable and network wiring should be done by Tuesday, and the siding should be installed next week. If the weather cooperates and the framing inspector doesn't find any issues, we should be ready for a pre-drywall inspection by the end of the month.

But since I was able to walk through this week with the electrical contractors, we really had our first opportunity to root around inside the house and finally get a feel for the space. We're thrilled with the size and openness of the space!

From the foyer looking into my future office

The office is perfectly sized and feels like such a better use for the space than an open living room. We're going to have enclosed french doors and this will also be where all of the networking hubs for the home are located. The front door pictured is going to be replaced with a solid slab door (transom at the top will remain). It doesn't look as awkward in the photo, but since all of the other windows on the home have the grilles inside the glass, we thought the large picture window just looks out of place.

From the foyer looking into the kitchen and morning room

The morning room ceilings are going to remain vaulted which makes the room feel that much bigger. One of my fears was always that the morning room would feel cramped, but this was a big help.

Basement, looking towards the closet

I'm a little disappointed that they had to drop the soffit so low to account for the duct work in the ceiling. I had planned to center the TV on the outside wall, but this definitely prevents that from happening. Instead, we'll be wall mounting the TV to the right of the closet door that's pictured. It's a little odd, but will still allow for plenty of baseball memorabilia display space!

Pull down stairs to the attic.

We have a lot of junk that needs to be stored so between this attic storage area, the height of the garage, and the area in the garage rafters that I plan to open up, I'm stoked about the possibilities. The basement storage looks very useful as well. I'll be building quite a few shelves in the next few months!

This side of the house is going to be insanely bright thanks to the morning room windows, large sliding door, and large living room windows. Concrete patio to start, but the possibilities out here are endless for us!

Still no work as to when closing might be. Our original estimate was May 5th, but that's pretty impossible at the current rate. I'm hopeful that the new date will be the first week or two of June but that will all depend on how fast the inspection process moves! Next week should be siding so soon we'll know exactly what the outside of the home looks like!