More tile pics

Gettin' things done - Tile, check

We just had the Vietnamese assasin tiling crew at the house this past week. They were fast, really fast. They were also very good at what they do. On the surface, tiling - at least to me - seems like it would be a fairly easy thing to do. After watching these guys work, I now definitely appreciate this art form. You gotta know where to start and how to end, and every tiling project has its quirks.

The stairs have landed!

Oh, what a beautiful sight. I never thought I would say that about stairs, but that's just what they are. We started off by seeing the pieces, and I was generally happy but not too impressed. The sum is definitely better than the parts.

The intricate detailing on the sides of the staircase is Krista's work. Our staircase is in the middle of the house, opened to the Great room and Foyer. It's detailing that the staircase maker has only made a few other times, so it's very unique. Krista insisted on getting it. And boy am I happy she did.

More pics III

The first pic is the trim on the side of the staircase. It's hard to imagine but pics will follow of the final product. The gorgeous newell posts. And our amazing wood floors. Not finished yet, just in their raw form as sub-contractors are still traipsing in and out.

More pics II

Our beautiful new bay windows in the Kitchen courtesy of our father-in-law. Our fireplace. And our master bathtub.

More pics

The first pic is a picture of our front door from the Great room. The second pic is a picture of our Kitchen from the Great room. And the third pic is a picture of our fireplace with our new paint color and new cultured stone.

And now it's moving ... fast

Houston, we have a driveway. I am very happy to report that the house is coming along nicely. One of my favorite sayings during this house building process is "peaks and valleys" in terms of the emotional roller coaster that we've been on. And, as a major side note, we really couldn't of done any of this without the strength and guidance of God in our lives. All the doors that He has opened; that we were sure would not be possible, has been amazing. So, my other favorite saying is "fits and starts" and now we're definitely in a start period.

It's been very hectic over at the house the last week or two. Dry wall guys came in and sealed the walls on the inside of the house in less than a week. We gave a tour to another construction savvy guy; he commented on how well the dry wall turned out, so I'm very pleased. The hardwood floors have been installed and they look beautiful - better than expected. We chose to go with Tigerwood which, I belive is a fairly uncommon choice and especially in Connecticut. It looks pretty much as it sounds with black "tiger stripes" flowing through the wood. We have to give credit to my sister-in-law and mother-in-law for helping us with the selection. So, thanks Yvonne and Kara! We're actually getting a lot of complements from sub-contractors which is nice to hear.

Our builder has been painting the inside of the house a soft, off-white color. We wanted a warmer color for the two-story great room and my lovely, hard-working wife worked really hard to get a color right as it would have been difficult for us to paint it later. After sampling many colors on the wall - I would guess at least 10 - we found "our" color. We continued to hem and haw over whether it was too dark or too light up until we finally saw the end product on the wall in all its glory. In a nutshell, we're very pleased.

Now the staircase is being built. I'm so excited to see the finished product. We've seen the components of the staircase and it is very intricate. We have a "fancy" staircase. I can't wait to see the staircase. I almost left work in the middle of the day to drive out to the house to see how the staircase was progressing. It will definitely be a centerpiece of the Great Room.

Tile guys are coming in this weekend. We're pushing hard to get the house done by the end of December. But, we'll see how it goes. If I've learned only one thing from this project, it's that; in the immortal words of my father-in-law, "sometimes you've just got to go with the flow".

Sometimes it goes fast, sometimes it goes slow

Right now we're in the slow phase of building our house. We almost had a falling out with our builder over who was going to pay for a larger than expected amount of septic sand that would of filled an Olympic sized beach volleyball court. We could of held the inaugural world volleyball tournament in our front yard with the amount of sand that we trucked in. That would of been fun. Unfortunately, the sand needed to be covered, but thankfully our disagreement with our builder was worked out.

Back to the house. We took a trip two weeks ago to a granite factory near Boston. What a sight. We didn't really appreciate the subtleties of granite until we were thrown into a cavernous factory filled with all types of granite - so many colors and textures. It was mind blowing. We might of turned into granite groupies.

The house is now in the "rough-in" stage. The HVAC, plumbing and electrical rough-ins have all been completed. Our stereo guy is coming in next week to lay audio cable in the walls for us to have in-wall speakers - yes, I'm very excited about that. Our builder has graded the front yard, as seen in the picture. And we're almost ready for the siding.

The noticeable progress in the house is slowing down as we've hit a snag on the windows. Our window provider is having issues delivering the windows on time, so the builder can't side the house until the windows are hung. Our next major projects are deciding on the kitchen cabinets and hardwood floors - very costly items. Wish us luck.

Da Duck Tuar

This past jammed packed week was the big visit from Krista's mom and sister to help us pick out colors and color coordinate the whole house. What a big project and boy did they do a good job. If there was a record for longest time spent in Home Depot and Lowe's over a week's time, these ladies might be in contention for the record.

We took a break in between picking out hardwood and carpet to take a break and spend a gorgeous day in Boston. The highlights of the day were inadvertently meeting up with my sister and brother-in-law in Chinatown at one of our favorite restaurants and da duck tour.

I was heading into the restaurant and saw the back of a lady that I thought looked exactly like my sister. I turned around to my wife and yelled "that looks like my sister from the back." The lady then turned around and it was my sister! What a coincidence. After lunch, we walked around historic Faneuil Hall - the most visited site in Boston. We then walked to the Prudential center for the main event - the Duck Tour.

We're talking about a WWII amphibious troop carrier turned tourist carrier that covers Boston over land and water for an hour and a half of rollicking tourist fun. The co. is also known for its colorful drivers that give the tour. Needless to say, fun was had by all.

We ended the day with a fabulous meal at our favorite tapas bar on Newberry Street. My favorite dish was the short rib stew. Other favorite dishes were goat cheese in a honey glaze and scallops in saffron sauce. I can't wait to go back.

Wow, great fireworks!

I hate to say it, but we needed a break from building our dream home. So off we went back to Martha's Vineyard for a long weekend. It was great; better than expected. This past weekend was the end of the summer fireworks extravaganza in Oak Bluffs. In a word - intense. Lots of fireworks and lots of them groupsed together. I felt like I was back in 'Nam.

This past weekend was also the annual agricultural fair. It's your typical local ag fair with horse riding competitions, rides and greasy fair food. We ended the weekend with a sunset dinner on the beach in Menemsha. It was one of the best sunsets on MV that I've seen in a long time. The sun's rays bouncing off the clouds was stunning. I wish all my weekends were like last weekend.

Now it's looking like a new house

Here comes the good stuff. Digging the big hole in the ground for the foundation and cutting trees down is over. Moving dirt around is mostly over. Building the house has now begun. They started framing the house and it looks gorgeous. The two dimensional drawings we've been analyzing for the last 5 months are now three dimensional. We can actually walk into our great room and visualize ourselves kicking back on our couch watching tv or the trees in our backyard.

One of the most exciting features of our house is our 10 foot bay window in our kitchen that looks onto our back yard. Simply put, it's huge. I don't think we've seen anything like it in any other house. And I don't expect to see anything like it anytime soon. It's definitely a defining characteristic of our house and I'm so excited that my lovely wife suggested we do it. See for yourselves.

So much progress, so little time to process

The lot is not just a piece of dirt anymore. It's actually turning into a piece of dirt with a house on top. We've stopped calling our visits, visits to the lot, and have started calling them visits to the house.

Things have moved along very quickly, maybe too quickly. They've already framed the first floor and tomorrow will put on the flooring for the 2nd floor. We should be ready to seal the house in two to three weeks when we get the windows. Then we won't have to worry about the weather. Everything is working out really well. Let's keep the ball rolling. (Crossing my fingers.)

Here's some pics of the foundation goind in and I promise to update the site more often!

I'm back with big news!

Wow, has it been almost ten months already. How time flies when you're having fun. So much has happened in so little time. It's truly been a blessing.

The blog machine is starting back up and the inaugural post is a big one. We're now homeowners! Technically, we're only landowners with the land being cleared as we speak and the home getting built very soon.

The journey to this point has been long and tedious with many ups and downs. One possible scenario was buying a multi-family unit in a rougher part of West Hartford. Another scenario was buying a typical center hall colonial in snooty Simsbury. We decided to break from the pack and build in the up and coming cow town of Ellington, CT. We couldn't be more excited.

We plan to move in by the end of the year. Between now and then, wow, we have a lot of work to do. Every little detail must be decided by us. And if you know anything about us, we're going to research, analyze and question everything. I pray that our builder and sub-contractors (GC and SCs in builder lingo) will have the patience to put up with us.

Here's a pic of the lot after 2 days of clearing.