Since we moved in the kitchen finally got finished (10 days after the move-in. Did I mention before that our cabinet maker, while good, was slow as molasses?) The one dishwasher that was working sprung a leak and caused a bit of water damage to the ceiling of the basement below.  Finally got both dishwashers fixed and the sheet rocker came and did minor repairs yesterday.  The carpet for the stairs had to be put off until the front of the stair treds was correct. (too long a story.) Finally got those done today.

We got new family room couches, but are still looking for 1 or two leather recliners and some tables.  I also got my new digital piano that is gorgeous!  I’m having a blast opening up the volume all the way, setting it to play like a pipe organ and going to town on The Phantom of the Opera! Such fun.

I agonized over the kitchen cabinets: did I plan enough drawers? were they big enough? in the right place? I would wake up at night and stress over them. I worried as Clyde put them in. BUT… they are fine.  Enough drawers and plenty of cupboards. Everything has a place and everything is in it’s place. I’m fine now.

Thanksgiving Dinner will be at our place, probably from now on.  Mom really can’t handle it any more and we have a bigger place for all the company.  We are planning on about 29 people, give or take.  We will have a few extras, like a couple of friends of Jared and Kellee’s, plus Jared’s grandpa. Should be fun and lots of good eats!

The boys both have new queen size beds and have been fixing up their rooms with posters on the walls.  We still need a mattress set for the guest room, but will have something by next week because Ray’s parents will be staying over 1 or 2 nights.

Still unpacking the boxes.  I have cleared out a lot from the basement, but we still have boxes at the storage unit that we’ll have to go through.  It’s my big job.  After Thanksgiving, I will be concentrating on Christmas, so those boxes will just have to wait.  I am planning to do several homemade things for gifts, so won’t have time to unpack.

As we have now moved into the house and most everything is done, (except for landscaping, but that’s a story for next spring.) I am suspending this blog and moving over to my other one “Between “ewe” and me” also on wordpress.  If you want to follow this blog, then move over there.  There is nothing more to say about home selling and home construction, and frankly, I am sick of both, so let’s just move on!

The plumbing.  It was supposed to be done last Thurs, Fri, and Sat.  They came Thurs. then had another commitment on Fri. Sat. the plumbers wife, who is pregnant got sick, so he didn’t show up. Monday was his next work day, but stuff came up and he didn’t come.  Today, his assistant’s truck broke down, so he won’t be out until tomorrow.  I hope they make it by next week.  It’s kind of hard to live in a house without water and toilets.

The kitchen and master bath cabinets.  Clyde was supposed to come and work all day on Tues with a helper.  Never showed, except he snuck in at some point and put up the upper china hutch cabinet.  So, now all the cabinet are in and we are just waiting for drawer fronts and doors.  He told me that he would be working on it all this week and “hoped to have it buttoned up by the end of the week”. But that he might spill over into Mon. next week.  I told him that was fine since we weren’t planning to move until Sat. But at the rate he is going, he is going to be spending Sunday with us as we unpack and he puts up doors.

The pantry.  I drug my feet on this for too long.  Ray was on me to decide what I wanted. I had had a technician come out a while ago and put together a plan, but I didn’t really like it.  After much nagging, I called out a couple of other technicians and got other bids, but they were too high.  Finally I went back to the first guy and let him know what I really wanted and we finally worked it out and for a decent price.  Unfortunately, they won’t be able to get to me until the 3rd.  So the pantry will be a bit of an afterthought.

Carpet goes in on Mon.  I thought I had bought nice quality carpet, but I am not impressed by what I am seeing on the rolls in my garage.  Our dealer says that’s because the fibers are crushed from being rolled up and they will look great once they are vacuumed and walked on. I hope so.  I haven’t been impressed previous dealings with this guy.  When I first met him and ordered the hardwood floor and carpet, he told me repeatedly, “I am going to take care of you. You are getting a really good deal and great carpet. I want you to be happy. Don’t worry, I am going to take care of you”.  Well, they messed up the installation of the hardwood floor because they installed at 11:30 at night by light of a flood lamp.  After lame attempts to fix it, they finally did it right and pulled out some of the boards and fixed the underlying problem.

Then we saw the carpet we are installing in the basement.  We knew it was an inexpensive carpet, but we were shocked when we saw how cheap it was. Then we were really shocked when we were shown the price.  We felt it was way overpriced for the quality of the carpet.  I took a sample to another carpet place and they showed me what I could have gotten from them for the same price and it was clearly much better.  When I brought it up to Brent, he countered with the fact that his carpet was nylon 6,6 which is a very good quality carpet.  I did some research and all it meant was that nylon 6,6 is more durable.  Doesn’t mean it’s better quality.  I argued it with him, but he would not budge or lower the price, all the while saying, “I want you to be happy”.  I would have been happy if I had never met him.  He was bugging Ray to be paid, so Ray finally paid him.  When I asked him about when they met to pay him, Ray refused to discuss it.  All he said was, “He’s been paid” in a tone of voice that told me that he was not happy about it, but there would be no further discussion.  He just better not have his sons (who laid our hardwood floor) do the carpet installation.  If they show up, I’ll be happy to show him how unhappy I am with him.  He will NOT be getting a glowing recommendation from me or any referrals, except to tell people to avoid him at all costs.

Oh, and I forgot to mention that on top of all the flooring issues, he tried to horn in on a piece of the plumbing bid and the granite bid.  When we got our first plumbing bid, it was really high.  At the same time we were wondering over this, Brent was telling me to be sure to let the plumbing supplier know to send their bids to him, like he was helping us or something.  When I talked it over with Ray, he enlightened me as to  why Brent was so interested in our plumbing, because he apparently got a cut for referring us to the suppliers. No wonder the bid was so high.  Brent stood to get $1200 for his cut.  He has absolutely nothing to do with the plumbing, yet he’s going to profit from it?  Not on my watch!  He did the same thing with the granite.  He had a guy who could do it, he said, but when Ray tried to get ahold of this guy, he would never call back.  I am assuming he would have gotten a cut from that too.  This guy is a piece of work, yet he comes off as honest, caring and truly interested in my happiness.  How did I hook up with this guy in the first place?  My decorator.  She took me to his shop and we picked paint, flooring and carpet in 45 min.  It was all so wonderful, until we got the installation and bill.  I will be so happy NOT to recommend him to anyone.  OH, so many lessons learned, painfully!

So, am I excited?  I don’t really know.  Right now, that house has caused me so much stress and tears and agonizing decisions, I hate even going over there.  Does that seem weird?  I know most people would be so excited, but I am feeling very ambivilent about it. It will be nice to actually be able to unpack and settle in. I am tired of this old, little, uncomfortable house we have been renting and it will be nice to spread out.  We have built a truly lovely home (as my mom keeps telling me), but I am so sick of it all, I can’t even enjoy it.

My kitchen is not what I wanted.  I thought I had it laid out exactly how I wanted, but we made so many changes over time that I can’t remember what my original plan was.  I don’t think I have enough drawers where I wanted them. I’m not sure where I will put things.  I know this seems silly, but my last house, when I planned the kitchen, I knew ahead of time exactly what would go in each drawer and each cupboard. This one, I have no idea. Plus, Clyde took a couple of liberties and changed a cupboard from a pan cupboard to a cupboard with a shelf.  It is so narrow, I have no idea what I am going to use it for.  I am sure I will adjust, but I hate that feeling of being out of control and having to adjust from what I wanted to what is there. I actually woke up at night and obsessed over this on so many nights.  A bit silly, huh?

The most exciting thing to me is that the stess of it will all be over!  I will be so happy to get out of this building stage and feel like I can move on with my life.  When you have to live, breath, and think house for so many months you forget what life is really all about.  I can see why people divorce over building a house.  I never thought of divorce (who would get this house?) but murder did enter my mind occasionally. (Then I would get the house for sure.)  But we are still intact and hope to have many happy years in our new house.

Home improvement stores are great for getting alot of things one needs for a house.  You have to be careful not to get the cheapest thing, because then they don’t work, or they break, but if you are careful, you can furnish a lot of your house with stuff you can get there.  We went to a fancy lighting place where they heaped us with catalogs to see if we could find anything we liked.  We went to Home Depot and Lowes and found exactly what we wanted, and I’m sure it cost quite a bit less than what the fancy lighting store would charge us.

However, there are certain drawbacks.  If you want something less expensive and right off the shelf, then you have to go with standard measurements.  For example, bathroom vanities come in up to 5 sizes: 24 in., 30 in, 36 in, 48 in and sometimes even in 60 in widths.  In  the boys’ bathroom, the 60 in works great as the space is 60 1/2 ” wide.  However, the vanity top comes in 61 in widths.  To get it to fit just right we would either have to have one custom made (which the home improvement stores can also do, but at quite a cost) or improvise.  We chose to improvise.  We will cut out a piece of sheet rock on both walls, slide the vanity in the opening and then cover the cuts with side piece splash guards that one can also purchase.  Problem solved there.

However, the problem is not so easily solved in the guest bathroom.  The space for the vanity is 33.5″.  Remember,  one of the standard widths is 30″, and then it jumps to 36″.  What to do?  Well, we decided to get a 30″ vanity and put a face frame on either side to cover up the left over space.  But then there is the issue of the vanity top.  No 33.5″ tops.  Ray had Lowe’s price out a custom top and it was somewhere in the $400 range for a 33.5″ top.  We could have our granite guy who is doing our kitchen do one using left over granite from another job, but the room is blue and most granite is earth tones (browns, tans, reds, greens)  Won’t exactly go.  There’s always formica (ugh, cheap looking) and I don’t know that we would save that much.

Decisions, decisions.  See, isn’t this fun!

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Just to prove we are actually moving ahead on our house, a few pix…viola’

Here is the front. As you can see, the stone work is being done. Kinda makes me think of putting a jigsaw puzzle together…and I HATE jigsaw puzzles.  Today they started applying stucco.

We are now in our new rental house and pretty much settled in. The phone is hooked up, we have DirectTV and internet is working, so we fill more at home. It is a little frustrating still having so much in boxes, because I will think of something I need and then realize it’s in a box somewhere and I have no idea where. Or I have unpacked it and put it in the house, only I can’t remember that I did, or where I put it. Thank goodness we are only supposed to be in here 4-5 months. Of course, at the rate the building seems to be going on our house, it could very well be a lot longer than that.

We have also had some very nice, annoying critters here to greet us. A few days after being in the house, I watched as a little mouse waltzed about the kitchen floor like he owned it  We set out traps, but it was almost a week before he finally bit.

Then for two nights we had a nice little cricket chirping away under our fridge. It’s amazing how loud they can be when they are practically under your nose. We finally set a flashlight on and pointing under the fridge, and that seemed to discourage his chirping. However, his friends decided to sit out on the back deck and make up for his absence. Since we had the doors open to catch the cool night air, it was just as noisy. Ah, life in the country.

I have been getting up every morning and going for a walk. Let me tell you, walking around these streets is more of a work-out than any treadmill, even set on highest incline. I am panting most of the way of the walk. And because it’s up and down, I work both back and front leg muscles equally well.

As for the house under construction, we are almost ready to sheetrock. That will be exciting because then we will be able to get a better idea of what the house will look and feel like when it is done.

I have called an interior designer to help me with decorating. I am a decorating illiterate and have no vision, so I am very happy to have some professional advice. She was very excited and commented that she was already picturing all kinds of things she would do. I can’t wait to see what she comes up with.

What’s really funny is when they ask you if you know of anyone who wants to sell their home. I just have to laugh: “In this market?!? They would have to be idiots!”

Well, I won’t have to blog about the ills of selling a house any more and can now move on to what this blog was really supposed to be about and that is the “fun” of building a house. More of that to come.

We found a nice family to rent the house who also want the option to buy eventually. They have 4 kids and already know several people in the neighborhood, so they should settle in quite nicely. Check that one off the list.

I haven’t actually started packing, but I have some boxes. Every day I think, “okay, today we really get down to it” and then I let all kinds of other things get in the way, because I really HATE to pack. I know I am going to be very sorry when it gets down to the wire and becomes crunch time, but I really HATE to pack. It’s not that hard, just take stuff off the shelf and out of the drawer and put it in the box, (did I mention how much I really HATE to pack?) Oh well, I know it will get done…eventually!

We have been really fortunate in that we were able to rent the house next door to where we are building. They have their house on the market, but are allowing us to rent for 4 months, as long as we keep things clean and allow the realtor to bring people through. Well, I am VERY experienced in doing that. The nice thing is that it’s not my house, so I have no vested interest in whether it sells or not (except eventually when it does, knowing what kind of neighbors we will have.) I am not worried that the owner will sell it out from under us while we are renting because it is priced too high and really needs some work, especially on the outside (can you say curb appeal?) This house has NONE! So, I think we are set for the 4 months we will need it.

So, now it’s full speed ahead on getting the construction going again to “get ‘er done!” DH thinks we’re about 1 month away from sheet rocking and 4 months from completion.

And now on top of it all, I also get to plan a wedding. DD got engaged over the weekend and the wedding is set for Sept. 6. Fun, fun, fun. At least I have some experience, having done it twice already.

Should be a fun, interesting summer!

On the renting front, we have two interested parties desiring our house.  Now we just have to figure out who needs it the most and with the right timing.