Lemasa's Blog

So I have not blogged in a while because we have been soooo busy recently.  Now I am 37 weeks pregnant and we are just enjoying the “rest”.  The home show is over now and everything was fine for that.  There are still lots of little things that need to be taken care of at the house, but the builder is getting ready to get started on all those things soon.  We were supposed to close on the house last Tuesday but it got cancelled because our house is sitting on Brad’s property.  We all knew about this, but we were planning on re-drawing the boundary lines at a later date.  But, the bank came out to survey the land and they will not allow us to close with our home on someone else’s land…who knew?  HAHA.  So, we have been working with the survey company to have the lines re-drawn and then we can close.  We are hoping to do this later this week or next week.  We have to get it done ASAP because our loan is locked for 240 days, and that time is up the first week of June!!!  Yikes.  We are still living with Bob and Kathy.  Things are going fine here.  We just have a wonderful new house sitting up there with no one occupying it!  We can’t wait to move in!  All of the moving of boxes, furniture, preparing the house, etc, started me into some pre-term contractions.  I have been resting and took some medicine to help slow it down.  I am now off the medicine, but the contractions don’t seem to be coming as strong or as fast as before…maybe I need to get up to the house and do some more work!  I will upload more as soon as I get my house clean Link Under: 09/27/10 – Final Pictures

So we have been told our closing date will be April 16th.  I can hardly believe how fast this has gone by!  The only thing is, we are worried they won’t be done by then.  Pat is on vacation all next week.  We went up there today and there just seems to be a lot of work still to be done.  And, they are holding us up too because if they don’t get certain things taken care of, we won’t be able to get our stuff done before the Home Show.  Two of our three garage stalls are filled to the brim with ALL of our stuff from the old house.  If they could get in there, clean the house thoroughly, we could start moving stuff from the garage to the inside of the house.  We won’t be able to do that until the punch out stuff is done (patching/painting/caulking/staining etc.).  Once they do that stuff, then they have to clean everything.  we technically only  have about 8 days left until the closing.  Then another week after that for the home show.  Pat told me today that they were not doing any work up there today or tomorrow!  They’d be back on Monday.  Which leaves 5 days for them to get everything they need to do before the closing.  The Cavalcade is the following weekend.  This should be interesting how this will play out.  I guess they could just close off the garage so no one can go in there, but you’d think they’d like to show that part of the house off too…??? We are supposed to have our kitchen furniture delivered on the 16th too – I hope that stays on schedule or we won’t have anything to eat on when we move in!  We have carpet, shelving, countertops, faucets etc.  There are just lots of little things that need to be checked off the list for the house to be move in ready.  We’re just crossing our fingers they move fast next week!

Link Under 04/08/10 – One Week and Counting

The wing walls are complete and today they laid the precast concrete slabs on top.  We were able to go watch the crane gently set them in place.  They had cut a temporary road into the hill so that other workers could still get up the hill while the bridge is being constructed.  There is still some additional work that needs to be done before we can drive on it, but it is progressing.  We are likely having the back patio poured and stamped by the end of this week and then after that, they will probably be pouring the driveway pad and then the sidewalk out front.  We had our decking delivered today and Trent has been preparing by drilling holes in the house to set up the supports.  Luckily, the builders went ahead and put up the I-beam as well as the extra wood supports we needed.  They even brought all the decking up the hill for us on a back hoe so we didn’t have to transport it on a truck!  BIG time saver.  Trent hurt his wrist as he was drilling when the drill swung around and smacked him in the wrist.  He went to urgent care tonight but we’re not really sure if it is broken or not yet.  Our FIRST injury on record with the home building process . . . Hopefully also the last!  We are getting so excited because our home buyers are closing on the 30th at 2pm so we are in big time packing mode and trying to coordinate all of our timing with the new house etc.  The carpet is set to be installed on the 8th and 9th of April – so we are almost finished!!!

Pictures Link: 03/17/10 – Water under the Bridge

The bridge has started.  Both forms have been poured!  We are so excited!  Granite is supposed to be in the kitchen on the 19th of March.  We are in the finishing stages of the house.  They have all the bathroom counters in, putting up mirrors, door knobs etc.  Hopefully things will start moving quickly soon!  The exterior stone was started and is almost finished too.  Lots of little things to be done still, but we are making lots of progress!  We accepted an offer on our house at the beginning of this of month so we are packing and getting ready to move.  We will need to stay with the in-laws for a few weeks until the house is ready, but it shouldn’t be long!

Pictures under “On the Move”

The bridge construction started today!  I went by a couple times and within two hours they had dug a big hole on the far side of the creek.  I’m hoping they are able to get the concrete poured today.  The weather is supposed to be good all week, so I can’t imagine it taking them very long, but who knows?!  I have never been part of a bridge build before, so we’ll just have to wait and see.  In the meantime, Pat is going to cut out a temporary driveway up the hill so the contractors can get up there and still be able to get there work completed.

The cabinets are installed now.  Having major issues with our granite people – lack of communication/service.  Snow expected Saturday so painters are up now trying to crank out the 2nd coat.  Issues with cabinets are that the fluted collumns don’t match the rest of the cabinetry.  HD is trying to see if they can get a finish guy to come out and repair them to match the stain better.  If it isn’t one thing, it’s another.  Also thinking our gutters and downspouts are not the right size.  Waiting to hear from Teddy on that.

New pictures Link under: 02/18/10 – Cabinetry

Well because the last 2 days have been full of snow, there is not a lot of work being done up at the house.  The cabinetry was installed (mostly) except for the kitchen because they thought they were missing some pieces.  But they double checked and were able to find what they needed.  We are working on the brackets for the countertop support on the island right now.  My dad is building them for us and we are just waiting on the information from the granite company.  Waiting, and waiting, and waiting. . . They will likely be ready for a measure early next week once the cabinets are fully installed.  They are building the cubbies currently for the mudroom and doing some trim work around windows and ceiling.  There is still a lot to be done, but at least the house is starting to look like a home now!  All of our lights and fans are in as well, so we have on a few more selection items to finalize.  The exterior stone installer has been selected so as soon as weather permits, he’ll be finishing the exterior of the house too.

The tile is all finished.  The hardwood is also finished.  We had some complications with our interior doors because 2 of them were sent wrong.  We ended up getting some basic stock doors from HD and they are going to install those and then when our regular doors come in (2weeks) we will swap out the slab part of the door!  Seemed to be an easy fix, but I did have some frustrations with the HD employee who was not very nice to me (and made me cry)…Trent took care of it though and called up and spoke to him and his manager and was able to get us our doors for free and an apology  We also got all of our Kraftmaid cabinets delivered yesterday.  A bulldozer or something had to help pull the delivery truck up the hill, but they made it!  Now there are just a bunch of big boxes up there waiting to be installed!  I have new pictures of the tile and the flooring/doors:

Pictures Link under:  Tile/Flooring Doors

The house is making progress.  They started some of the trim work on the inside ceilings.  They prepped the floors for the hardwood (to be installed Monday 2/1).  We ran into a little roadblock with the exterior stone, but we are getting a bid for the installation tomorrow from Tim Bates.  I am excited for that to begin because then the exterior of the house will look complete!  The tile is done on the floors, they will start on the walls next.  Cabinets to be deliver on the 5th!  Here are some pictures:

Picture Link:  Progress, Interior finishes

The first coat of paint has been done today!  It is a little difficult to see since there are no lights on in the house yet.  They use their own lighting to paint, but they took it with them tonight when we were there, so it was hard to see.  I’ll go back up tomorrow and try to get a better look at it.  So far, what I have seen, I like it!  We also got the hardwood in on Friday!  We were really worried about bc we thought it was going to be late, but ended up getting there when we needed it.  The tile guy is starting (Tom Cox) this week.  He started installing the concrete board and  sloping the shower.  He should be halfway finished on Friday this week.  The stone fireplace guy is getting started on Tuesday (tomorrow) (Tim Bates).  The exterior stone guy (Mark Hasler) is also starting tomorrow on the outside of the house.  We have lots of other selections and purchases to make (interior and exterior lighting, mirrors, etc.)  The cabinets are supposed to come in on February 5th.  At little later than we expected, but nothing we can do about it.  Interior doors will be delivered Wednesday.  Things are moving very quickly at the house this week!  Lots of stuff going on all at once.  I also think that the interior trim guys are supposed to do work this week too.  Hopefully everyone can stay out of each other’s way!  The other major issue we have to deal with is the lack of bridge.  The bridge people are meeting with us on Wednesday.  They don’t want to start digging/construction in the rain, so we are PRAYING for good weather!!! I know that all the subcontractors are going nuts driving through the creek and getting all muddy…It is a pain.  The drywall guy popped a tire on the driveway and we have already lost a tire and a muffler on the driveway too!!! Uggh.  We need a jeep just to get up the hill!  The middle of January is no fun.  Hoping the weather will start looking up soon though.  I”m going to take more pictures and post them of the paint as soon as I get some good lighting up there!