Windows mostly in, framing wrapping up

This week many of the windows went in. They look great! Since they are not all in yet, I'm not sure if the window we added for Nicholas is there or not, but if not, it won't really matter.



Side view....



Here's the master bath window.... I couldn't get a wide angle shot to get the other 2 windows too.



Here's the breakfast room --- this is where I believe the header at the room entrance needs to be raised so we can actually see the arched window!



Spending the last several days in Great Falls was really fun.... talk about some eye candy if you like looking at houses! Here are 2 homes which have sloping up yards and 2 different ways to grade the front. The white house has a small stone wall in the front, and the stone house just slopes gently away from the house and then more sharply.




The porch decking is 100% complete now. I'm meeting with a lighting / electrical person this week and the cabinet guy is supposed to come and take measurements. Other than that, I'm not sure what exactly will happen this week... I know they will need another day or 2 to finish the windows....roofing maybe will start too? I'm not sure when the siding and stone will go on either, it must be pretty soon.

Tyvek and roofing just about done....

The framing is more or less done. There are some little details remaining... it was hard to really walk through and scrutinize because the framers were there working today and we wanted to stay out of their way.....

I don't know what it is, but seeing the house pretty much enclosed this week is really exciting! It looks really cool and Nick and I are thrilled so far. I can't wait to go out tomorrow to look at it without saws and hammers and guys everywhere!

Some of the interior details are appearing, like the "kick-out" returns at corners on the first floor. That will be a pretty detail once they wrap them and trim them out. They did drop the header down to 8' in the hallway to break it up a bit. I'm not too sure about that --- think we'd prefer it dropped, but more like 9' so the crown detail appears, but it isn't so low. Here is how it looks for the moment....



In the end, we want the hallway to look like this, a dropped detail, but not 2'....


Also, the Breakfast room header is low, at 8' and that will hide the pretty window in there. I asked Lloyd to raise it, and he said no problem, but we are going to get the big window in first so that we can decide how high to raise it. I am glad we are waiting.

Our little charging station framing went in in the mudroom, that is cool and I have a feeling it will be one of our favorite things. It is about 12" wide and it will have shelves up to 8' tall. I think a trashcan at the floor will be super handy to get rid of junk before even really getting it into the house.

The great room is framed, and we can see the chalk lines on the floor representing where the ceiling coffers will go. That freaked me out because the alignment doesn't look good. They are spaced equally, but the windows / doors are not all the same size, so the coffers slightly overlap one of the windows. It looks like a mistake instead of perfect alignment. To fix it (it hasn't been framed yet and won't be until we are ready for the trim guy), we would need to make the coffers unequal. I think this is the right solution, but am not sure yet. We need to think about it a bit. I am wondering if we should just ditch the coffers and do something else in that room. Any ideas? Since the fireplace wall will be stone with a rustic beam mantel, I am thinking maybe we should put rustic beams across the ceiling.... this will be a TBD area.
Here is one with beams....would you do something like this vs. coffers?


Here is the room in question... the fireplace will be on the left.


I think if we do coffers, they need to be in the space between the door and the window, not partially over the middle window like this chalk line shows (the red lines, not the seam in the floor).



Other spaces...

Ryan's room backs up to an attic space and I can't help myself, I am scheming about making a "smurf" door for him into a little secret room. It would be really cool because 2 of the dormer windows would be in the secret room.... And then of course, Nicholas' room backs up to the little upstairs playroom, and a little tunnel would be really fun to get into that room..... I know, I know, I need to stop thinking about these crazy concepts...but when you are there looking at it, it is hard to imagine closing off these little areas!

Today I'm going to post a view from each exterior side.... the Tyvek is covering some of the windows, and some of the windows go higher than it appears because the Tyvek is not cut-out perfectly yet.
Front...


walkout side....



rear view....





garage side...



Other happenings for the week...
There is a pine tree farm near us with 100's of big pine trees. I loved our little "grove" of 3 pine trees in Cincinnati, so I have some pines in mind again when we get to landscaping. Well, every time I drive by that pine farm, I think about it and wonder if they sell any of those pine trees? So, I wrote a note to the family asking about the trees. Mr. Barger, a very nice man called me back and told me he'd be happy to sell me some of his trees. I met him over there and he took me to a different area than I expected --- the trees here were quite tall (25-30' I would guess). Anyway, I thought, uh-oh, these are awfully big, how much do you have in mind for them? He said, "$20 a tree, if you think that is fair?" So, Nick and I have picked some trees we really like and now we just need to find somebody to move them for a reasonable amount! That will be the catch we know, but the trees are great. Thanks Mr. Barger! I think he liked that my brother has a walnut farm and that Dad made a kiln out of the back of a milk truck.... it was fun to talk about some of the woods. The perfect time to plant the pines is Nov, Dec or Jan, so the timing is good if we can find a way to move them. Somebody with a tree spade is difficult to find! If by chance we do find a tree spader, we are going to take a pretty maple tree from our current back yard. It is hidden at the far back of our yard and it will not be missed in this yard, but it would be nice to have a decent sized maple over there.

I bought a sideboard at an antique store to convert into our powder room vanity --- very exciting because it was $159. This compared to the cabinet guy who estimated $1900 to make a sideboard for a vanity. It is EXACTLY the right size. We will just remove the top, put on a piece of granite or marble with an undermount sink, and leave the rear little valance detail....


I am having a hard time containing my excitement because this week we are expecting windows and doors.... whoo hoo! I am really keeping my fingers crossed that they look good because I changed the mullion pattern on the windows SO many times and I was so difficult about it. I am worried about it now.... I don't know which days the guys will work this week since it is Thanksgiving week --- I want to have low expectations so we are not disappointed when we get back from Jen's house.

Happy Thanksgiving Week!

Roof framing.....

This week it has been more detail framing --- the master bath has some complicated walls and those are done. The dormers are complete, and a significant portion of the roof sheathing is on. There has been an area connecting the main body of the house and the bonus room and the kitchen that Nick and I could not understand. When the roof started to go on, we thought it was going to be a disaster, but this week the lightbulb went on and we could finally "get it." The bonus room looks especially cool this week because it has all kinds of beams coming in at crazy angles and the room is big and bright. We are tempted to keep it one big open room, vs. the small finished playroom and the roughed in bathroom and a large unfinished room. But, we are realizing part of the reason it looks especially cool is because the roofing plywood is not covering all of the ceiling, so it feels particularly bright and airy! Once they close it up, it will not be so awesome, so we might as well stick to the plan. Nick is really questioning the rough-plumbing of a bathroom for that area...and truthfully we will likely never need / want a bathroom there, but if we did, the plumbing would be difficult to get up there at a later date.

It is all looking very cool.... we think they'll pretty much get it "under roof" this coming week, though they haven't started on the circular porch ---- that will be interesting! We are realizing that while we intend for that to be a vaulted ceiling, we are not sure if the plans reflect that.... we don't have that detail page. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it is already that way in the plan, and if not, hopefully it won't be a disaster to change!

Hopefully by Thanksgiving week we'll see some shingles and metal roofing starting to be installed (though I'm not sure when the metal roofing goes on -- -do the porch skylights need to be installed first.... probably).

Also, once the entire roof structure and plywood are complete, we'll be able to tell if the house is dark, or not bad.

I went to Ikea this week to look at some stuff. I have always thought we'll put one of their sofas in the kids playroom (inexpensive). Anyway, the denim slipcover was discontinued.... darn.... but I was in luck, they had a "last chance bin" and the slipcovers were marked down from $149 to $9.99... what luck! My storage in this house for things in the next house is getting out of control! I asked Lloyd to make a lock room for us in the new house once drywall goes on for all of the things I have purchased for the new house. No problem he said, but I need it NOW!!

That is about it, we are enjoying going out there and poking around.... I was showing Nick some fabrics and window treatment ideas. He said, "this would all be so much easier if we could wait for the house to be finished and then I could just hold them up to see...." WHAT, is he crazy? Doesn't he know the planning is most of the fun! At least he pretends to look at my drawings.... so far!

Roof framing in the works

This week a fair amount of the roof framing went on the house. It was cold and rainy for several of the days, so I'm a bit surprised some of it was completed. They have constructed all sorts of crazy catwalk / scaffolds throughout to aid in the roof framing. The highest ones are beckoning Ryan. Shocker. They terrify me, but the higher the better for that child!

Here is how it looks this week....

The dormers are not on the upper level, and not on the 2nd floor gable yet. No roofing over the keeping room/ kitchen area yet, but they do have a center beam running the length of that gable.... I have no idea how they got that in place, nor can I imagine how they got the upper beam / joist (whatever it is called) into place at the top of the house.

The window in the upper bonus room which was going to have such a beautiful view out to the horse pastures doesn't look as good now because the window is awfully high.... darn, but not worth changing since this will be an unfinished space anyway. If you are near the window, it is fine, but when you walk into the room that pretty view isn't obvious. Oh well....

Nick and I met with the cabinet guy this week. We have made lots of tweaks to our cabinet plans which should save us some money in the budget. I am a bit sad to give up the banquette drawers for a fixed banquette, but the cost saving allows me to get an entire laundry room of cabinetry. That will be nice. We are going to delete a "hutch" type of cabinet in the kitchen to save money, knowing that we will be able to find a neat antique to put there instead. We are going to make the linen closets in our master bath framed and drywalled, vs. cabinetry which will save enough to allow us to put in a basement bar, and a few other little tweaks like that. They seem to be worthwhile, and I don't think we will really miss that cabinetry too much....

Our master bath shower is causing me trouble. It is framed with some weird angled walls (per the plans). The tile lady said, "you are not an angled wall kind of person." This is true and she convinced me that we should just have squared off walls in this shower. I have asked Lloyd to change it. He accepted the changes (actually all 16 of my questions), and let me know that they'll get to these things a bit later (like on a rainy day). The only change that they questioned was related to this shower because the angled walls were a bit complicated, and now we want them torn out. That made us take another look at it today and now we are thinking we should keep the angled walls as is, but then we have no soap / shampoo shelf unless we have some sort of bench.... anyway, we have gone around and around about how to set up this shower.... and it is just a shower! Stay tuned.... (I know it is hard to stand the suspense)!

That is about it for the week. Hope to see it entirely under roof soon. That will be nice. It was freezing today, so we want a roof, insulation and windows asap!