Kitchen or Kitsch?

3rd Week of November

I know I haven't done justice to the progress inside the house these past couple of weeks.  We have come to that point in the project where there is a lot going on, but everything seems to remain "in progress".  There are tools and materials everywhere, making it hard to distinguish the completed work.

Like everything else in the design, we spent a lot of time on the Kitchen.  Between window placement, spatial openness, materials, not to mention every cabinet size, configuration and function.  It's amazing how many details go into a Kitchen.

View of Kitchen from Eating Area

There is a quiet but consistent color scheme throughout the house.  And most of the colors come together in the Kitchen.  The cabinets are natural-stained cherry.  The wood floor, which will be in the Eating Area, is white oak (very similar to the natural cherry).  The floor and wall tiles are the same material; just different tile sizes.  The tile colors range from slate grays and blues to gold hues.

View of Kitchen, looking toward sink

The kitchen cabinets arrived last week, and within 24 hours they were being installed.  We have known what our appliances were going to be for some time.  But the Builder was not ready for them, so we waited to actually buy them until last week, including the range hood. The appliances are stainless steel finishes, and they will be delivered on Saturday.  We also just selected the countertop material, which will be "silver gray" granite in a honed finish; the fabricator came out this afternoon to measure all the surfaces, and it will arrive in about a week.

View of Kitchen, looking toward Refrigerator

It is hard to tell from the pictures, but the Kitchen feels very large to us.  The cabinets seem to go on forever. I deliberately did not want many wall cabinets, so that the space would feel more open.

Desk Area

As if the Kitchen didn't have enough cabinets there are several in a desk arrangement, in the Eating Area. And in the corridor behind the desk wall there is a small "bar" of cabinets!  So I think we're covered.

Playing in the Dirt

2nd & 3rd Week of November

Steve and I sincerely believe we are not "pack rats".  Before we moved to 10208 Carol Street - in 1999 - we had averaged living in one place about 2 years.  Moving is a great way to remove clutter.  But then we lived in our old house on Carol Street for 14 years!  I regularly went through closets and either donated or threw away things.  But three children grew up in that house, so it was a bit inevitable that "stuff" would accumulate.  Some of the things most difficult to let go were favorite toys; things like Legos, Kynex, cardboard "bricks".  And Tonka Trucks!

Nick & Alex's toy backhoe

Some of the things we moved into the new house last weekend were these toys.  We used to tease Alex because he liked to randomly dig holes in the yard.  For the last two weeks our entire front yard has been a series of holes and trenches.  I couldn't resist having a little fun with the back hoe :o)

Septic field ditches, waiting for final inspection

Of course we had to wait a few days for the Fairfax County Health Department inspector to visit our property and "approve" the septic field construction and all pipe connections.  That was done this past Tuesday.  By Thursday the trenches and holes were filled in.  We have a front yard again!

Backfilled Septic Field, i.e. our front yard

All day Friday our builder "played" on his backhoe, doing a lot of the final grading around the house.  And Saturday the masons were back to do the last bit of masonry work - the stone and slate around front steps!

Masons working on Saturday

Somehow we have ended up with some leftover dirt (on the left in the picture above).  I have asked the Builder to spread it over the side yard, to the left of the house.

Taking a Break

10 November 2013 - Veterans Day

Some of you know that Lauren, Katherine, Carol and I ran a race in September.  Lauren, Katherine, and Katherine's friend Liz, ran a half marathon!  Carol and I ran a 5-mile course.  Training for that race took a few months.  We all enjoyed the accomplishment, even though finding the time to adequately train was a real challenge for all of us.  Feeling like we were in reasonably good shape, Lauren started looking for another race we could run.

She found a 10K (6.2 miles) Veterans Day run that was the same general course as the September race. This time we got Steve and Alex to agree to run as well!  Somehow training for this race proved to be challenging for all of us, for lots of different reasons.  But we all showed up, we all ran, and we all finished!  It is probably the farthest Alex and I have ever run, and Steve hadn't run that distance in many years.  Even more amazing, Steve only arrived home Saturday night after spending 16 hours en route home from Germany.  Needless to say, there was a bit of jet lag going on.

Katherine!

Lauren's time averaged 8.18 minute miles!!!!! Steve ran with me until the last quarter-mile, so his time wasn't much better than mine.  But I was very happy to average 10.10 minute miles.  And I was delighted that Alex finished, given that he did not train at all.

Once again we lucked out with the weather.  The early morning was chilly, in the 40's, but the sun felt good, and by the end of the race it was well into the 50's.

Reflecting Pool on the Mall

Break's over!  Back to the house.

Footnote:  The five of us are talking about doing another run in December - "Jingle All the Way 8K", in downtown DC!

Another Working Weekend

1st Weekend of November

Kitchen - cabinets being installed

The Kitchen cabinets arrived on Friday.  The Builder has been working weekends for about a month now. They are making a good effort to be done as soon as possible.  Today (Saturday), while we were moving in boxes in the Basement, they were installing the cabinets. There are deliberately few wall cabinets that you see from the Eating Area (which is where this picture is taken from).  The exhaust hood for the gas cooktop will be to the left of the window, and a couple of shelves will be to the right of the window.

Kitchen Cabinets

The cabinets are natural-stained cherry.  The sink will be directly under the window facing the backyard (left window in the picture above).  The porcelain tile floor is covered with heavy kraft paper to protect it.

Kitchen cabinets being installed

There really are a lot of cabinets!  Many of them aren't seen from the Eating area.  The big box by the ladder above is a tall pantry unit.  There is also a Pantry Closet.  Lots more storage space than I have ever had.

I don't know if the guys will be working tomorrow, but just one more day and all the cabinets should be installed, at least in the Kitchen.

Beating the Path, Again!

1st Week of November

Starting to move back - boxes in the Basement

It was Deja Vu for me today, only backwards.  I asked our Builder if it would be okay to start moving boxes into the Basement of our house, and he said yes!  (The Basement is done, except for some utility hook-up work.)  He asked that we stack in the northwest corner.  Lauren and Alex helped me - thanks, guys.  Once again the 4Runner was put to good use.  We were able to fit about 12 boxes into the car at a time.  We made about eight runs, and made a good dent in all the boxes currently being stored in the basement of our rental house.  The "pile" grew pretty quickly.  Most of the boxes we moved were taken out of the basement of the old house, and will hang out in the new basement for a while until we can figure out where we want to store certain things.  We also moved some shelves and cabinets, and lots of shelving brackets.  Of course, Lauren and Alex suggest that several items should NOT be moved back to the house, like old computers.  We shall see ;o)

I also cleaned all of the bedroom ceiling fans, brought them over and placed them in each of their respective rooms.  The Builder said they will install them for us!

It may only be a start, but it feels like the beginning of the end of construction.

Milestones

2 November 2013

Milestone: an action or event marking a significant change or stage in development.

Fencing to define "Limits of Construction" - 12 May 2013

Six months ago today Steve and I signed the contract with our Builder, to build our house, with a clause stipulating a construction time of six months.  Of course, the clock did not start ticking for the Builder until he was able to get his Pre-Construction Inspection with Fairfax County and have their blessing to proceed with the work.  That did not occur until the 12th of May, so the Builder tells us the clock started "ticking" then.  I can live with that.

Here today, gone tomorrow - 19 May 2013

Demolition happened quickly.  The one blog I have not done is one to memorialize the demolition of our old house.  I must do it at some time, because the demolition guy was amazing.  His skill with that giant backhoe was amazing.  That one piece of equipment torn down the whole house.

Concrete Foundations, Walls & Slabs - completed 19 June 2013

One month later we had a concrete-encased hole in the ground.

House walls framed and sheathed - 19 July 2013

Another month passed and we had the definition of our new house, with wall stud framing and sheathing, and roof trusses.  And then progress seemed to slow.  I've talked about this in previous blogs, but progress in August seemed to be hard to spot on a weekly basis.  However, by the 1st of September, we had a fully roofed and wrapped house, with almost all the windows in place.

View from the Mailbox, 1 September 2013

Exterior Siding, almost complete - 19 September 2013

Stone Facade completed - 23 October 2013

Six months later - 2 November 2013

I just took the picture above.  I really like it, because there are people working all over the place, and it's Saturday!  The cloud of dust is from the mason; he is cutting some of stones and I have no idea why.  There are two guys on the entry roof, installing more of the railing pieces there.  And there is a guy walking up the driveway.

It is a beautiful Fall day, with temperatures we don't deserve but I am delighted with - 60's!

The septic field trenches are half-completed.  They are trying to finish all the tile work by Monday.  I don't know that the house will be complete in two weeks, but everyone is talking end-of-month.  If I have to I can live with that.  Of course, we never stop pushing :o)

Halloween!

31 October 2013 - Trick or Treat?

5:00 pm, Halloween

Steve and I started getting a little nervous about having a construction site in our front yard on Halloween. Lucky for us we get very little foot traffic in our neighborhood on Halloween, but I was more worried about the "tricks" that could occur.  And as if the normal dangers of a construction site were not enough, the septic field crew started digging our trenches on Halloween!  Ugh.  Now the hard-wire fencing is temporarily down, and we have 5-foot deep trenches for someone to fall into, starting right at the front edge of our driveway.

I don't know if the Builder had been thinking about it, but I called him in the afternoon and asked that he do something to try to stop people from walking up the driveway.  Even though the house is totally dark at night, on Halloween that doesn't necessarily stop people.  You can see in the picture above a lot of yellow "caution" tape.  (Of course, on Halloween I can imagine someone thinking this is "decoration".)  I was nervous all evening, but it turned out my worries were not warranted.  The tape and dark lot did the "trick".

Anyway, all is good.

Footnote:  We didn't get a single trick-or-treater at our rental house!  We noticed as soon as we moved in that there is no light outside the front door.  So it's pretty dark.  But the houses are closer together on Ellsworth and there are a few street lights, so I thought we would at least get a few.  Year to year, we never know how many trick-or-treaters we will get.  It has ranged from 4 or 5 to 25, but we have never had none!