Getting Excited!

The "young ones" left the family reunion to come see the house:

Goofy daddies.
Our pickle right now is the City of Rockwall who is making things difficult for us to get running water. I'm hoping our inspector can enlighten us so we can push past this and start painting and tiling.....you know, things that require water.

More brick, More doors

We really like the brick. It's subtle, but not boring. Did I say we really like it? I think there's more pink and red tones in real life than these pictures show. And the doors continue to go in. A couple every night. Now we need to paint....Outside and inside. And we still need water. Turns out, Bill's ready but the city of Rockwall installed a meter box but no meter. Seriously, guys. Come on. Here we go again...

We are 1/2 Bricked!

Drove straight to the house after school today to see the brick and it's 1/2 way finished! Unfortunately, I forgot to bring my camera with me, and can't find the cord to make pictures go from my phone to my computer, so you will have to wait until it's more than 1/2 way done and see it tomorrow.

Doors

The front of the garage door (the hardware will make it look even better!):

The door to the attic:
The door to the closet in the game room:

The door to the water heater closet in the closet in the game room:

Erik's setup in the game room, now complete with a radio so he can listen to the football games as he works:
He has now completed around 10 out of 25ish interior doors. Needless to say, he has a ways to go. But 10 in like 2.5 days is pretty decent and the more you do, the better you get, right? The supplies are all bought for the mason, so he should start this week. I'm excited to see what the brick will really look like on the house instead of in the piles you see now. But for now, there are a lot of doors to go up!

Advancements

This week we got brick, in the yard at least:

And texture (can you see it?):

And a garage door (I'll get a pic from the front this weekend. I was too short and by myself to pull it down when I went out there):

So, the next step here would be paint and mouldings and Erik's putting doors in already....

Bill's finally making some progress as the utilities have been marked for him to dig and he's rented a back hoe. It's a start. The cabinets should be in by the end of next week and I really don't know when the mason's going to start putting up the brick, but it should be soon. Next week? I need an update from Erik.....

Getting closer to paint...inside and out!

Here's the latest...a tour of the house. It is not narrated, because really, who want's to listen to my voice? (By the way, the sheetrock guys were able to "tap" into the water even without BILL and we will be able to get 'er done until he gets his act together. Or we fire him.)

Dry inside, wet outside

I've been talking up the drywall and here it is!


This is Erik's closet in the closet for the 2nd water heater. I know we need a second water heater, but I lost all that beautiful storage!

It's not quite finished, and we're still calling BILL every day and have yet to see a back hoe. WE NEED WATER TO TEXTURE!!! Can you tell we're getting a little frustrated? We're about to threaten to dock his pay and hire someone else to finish the job. Seriously. This is rediculous.

Ordered

Today we went to Seconds and Surplus and ordered cabinets. 3 hours after we arrived, we left with a really good deal on kitchen and master bath cabinets that look something like this:

They are "shaker" style in "pearl" which is fancy for off-white. We're thinking about a darkish brownish granite for the countertops. I think that will warm things up a bit (I think these countertops look a little cold - gray...). And, yes, I'm getting my pot drawers (as seen above). : )

They should arrive by the end of the month. That's about the same time as the arrival of the brick. We're supposed to get sheetrock delivered on Monday, a garage door on Tuesday (which means locks can go in and we can "lock up"), sheetrock goes up on Wednesday and texture on Thursday. In order to get texture, we need to connect to the water main which means Bill has to actually do what he says he will and get it done. We definitely don't recommend Bill. It's getting done, but seriously. He's been a bit of a thorn in our sides.

Mom teaches a lot of kids who live in Chandler's and told them we were building the house you can see from Ridge Road. "The green house!" was the general response, which is sweet, but a sign that the brick needs to happen. Please, brick, come soon!

I also saw Ms. Elliston today and finally got a chance to say hi and see Andie and make that reconnection since we'll be neighbors. I'll get to actually see Scarlett this coming weekend...at my high school reunion. Crazy. Moving back to the old stomping ground....at least for a little while...

"It looks like it snowed weird gray stuff...."

The insulation guys came out today and sprayed newspaper into the walls. I know it sounds all eco-green-weirdo and all, but the aim here is to fill EVERY single space (which the pink panther stuff can't do) in order to reduce the noise of the road behind us.

This is the lentel installed including the red ties Erik put on it to drive with it in his truck. Good job, guys. Where's the common sense here?

We really needed masks at the house today. We didn't even go inside, but there was dust everwhere! I could even see it surrounding the house as I drove behind it on Ridge Road...

The did the insulation under the HVAC now, because once sheetrock goes in, it won't be accessible from the attic.

Since we took back some of the neighbor's yard, their sprinkler heads are no longer optimal and spray over our wall ever day making a mud pit and making a mess of our wall. We'll have to fix that one.

This is the back wall of the garage. I don't know why there is some pink stuff mixed in there...

This is some of the cellulose (newspaper). You can find letters every now and then.

Master bedroom....


Gray snow.

A Long Time Coming

The prediction was made that once school started, the house blog would slow down. This was in some sense true, but in all honesty, very little has happened since the last post. At least that I could document well with pictures. Bill the plumber kept at it with gas lines and PVC and we got up the brick ties for the mason. Then it was time for an inspection. Chris the framer had his fare share to fix, the HVAC guy and Bill the plumber, too. Erik also had to buy this huge lentel to go over the garage for the brick to rest on. After two attempts, we passed today and look forward to insulation tomorrow and sheetrock on Monday. That means we get to order cabinets this weekend. Cabinets? Yes, cabinets. That means decorating/style/furniture...it's starting to take shape. Post sheetrock and texture we can paint! And install molding (some of it at least)!

These are the brick ties (the short metal things attached to the zip wall):

The fireplace is in!
This is the electrician from Oncor rigging up a temporary line since ours is somehow down:

Ah, the sewing room...
This is the lentel. May not look like much, but it's like 24 feet long and made of really heavy metal that had to be lifted onto Erik's truck with a fork lift. Don't ask me how it was hung over the garage to pass inspection.