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Finished....Almost.

Kelly and I have been pouring everything we have into finishing our home. The goal was to move in Labor Day weekend; technically we made it--we finished everything but the final front door (will be done later this week) and will be moving in by the end of the week. Hoping for our CO tomorrow and closing on the loan on Friday. Kelly finished all of the floors with three coats of a wax like finish and they look awesome! Thanks to all who helped--especially my dad--no way we could have done it without you! I'll post two sets of pics with more to come (camera went dead....).

more pics...

More pics of finishes

Finishes and Fixtures

Well it's been over a month since the last post so I might have to put two posts back to back to get you caught up. The pictures will show a lot of the finish details; i'll list them and you can look and comment on them. The trim is hand pealed beetle killed pine in the great room, powder room, and hallway. The doors are knotty alder throughout. The trim in the bedrooms is mdf painted out white (dad and i made all the trim at his shop). The girls both have a wainscoting application in their rooms to tone down the color; Hannah's room color = Quite Red, and Lily's room color = Razzle Dazzle (bright pink!). Both showers have ceramic tile with glass accents; our shower also has a random travertine floor, shower caddy's and also edge accent tiles. The kitchen island is reclaimed barn wood (not quite finished yet) and slab granite with a stainless steal farm sink. The great-room and dining room also has an antler chandelier. The ceilings in the kitchen and greatroom and tongue and groove beetle killed pine. Enjoy the pics---we hope to be in the house in two weeks!

Stone retaining walls and Firepit

We spent a couple of days last week completing the grading of the site as well as installing the various stone retaining walls. My excavator, Mike, and I installed 7 dump-truck loads of sandstone/mudstone rocks and river boulders. The sandstone has various shell fossils in it making it a very interesting rock for the kids to explore. Drywall is taped now and will have a hand troweled texture put on it this week and interior painting will start too. We are currently building our stairs, and island cabinets in my fathers shop--pics coming soon.

Patio, insultion, and drywall

We poured our last concrete patio yesterday--a 650 square feet wrap around patio that connects the entrance patio to the master bedroom patio. We inset river boulders into the patio to soften the feel of all the concrete. We also place a couple of really special horse-shoes from Grandpa Sand's mountain horses. Insulation has been completed (1" expanded poly foam to seal and then 4.5" of netted and filled fiber glass for an R-26 wall) and the dry-wallers started hanging board yesterday. We are still looking to complete the project by late August or early September. Enjoy the patio pics!

Paint and Stain

The painters are just about done with the paint and stain on the house. The paint is a deep sage green and the stain is a brownish cedar color. A couple of posts and fascia need stain and it will be done. Garage doors are in and painted as well. All rough in inspections are tomorrow, and then we will insulate later this week and start dry-wall next week.

Siding, septic, and concrete stain

A quick update on the project. Siding is completed and the Galvalume (zinc, aluminum and corrugated steel) wainscoting and walls turned out awesome. The brackets, sofits, and post/beams will all be stained natural while the hardi board and battens will be a deep sage green color (it's being painted now and will be done this Sunday), and the galvalume is finished already and will not rust. The concrete stain was an adventure--5 coats of acid stain and one coat of acrylic concrete dye and we finally got the "saddle brown" color we were going for. We hired our neighbor and painter to spray the two coats of sealer on it and then I covered it with a protective material so that the insulation and drywallers can get on the project next week. The septic system is also complete now and the gas service was just installed as well--all utilities are in!!! Enjoy the pics.

Siding, Roofing, and Rough Ins....

It's been a couple of weeks since I've last updated the blog and lot's has happened. The siding is about 90% complete with the house and garage and will be completed by Monday. On the pictures you will see that it is board and batten style (hari-board with pro-trim battens) that will be painted a sage green color. The fascia material is all western red cedar that will be stained natural with UV protectent. The posts and beams (hem-fir) will also be natural as well as the fir sofits--stained to match the cedar. The decorative brackets are also western red cedar (4x4 material) and will be placed at the apex of and ends of each gable. The rest of the blue DuPont house wrap that is exposed will be covered with a 1 1/2 inch corrugated galvalume material--wainscoting on most of the house with accent walls (great room gable and all doors) completely covered with this material--giving it a mountain/ranch rustic look.

The interior is progressing nicely too as all of the rough ins (heating, cooling, plumbing, and electric) will be complete by Tuesday (June 1st) of next week. The garage slab is now poured as well and the shingles are on too--30 year driftwood colored dimensional composite shingle.

It's taken us about 2 and 1/2 months to this point and we estimate that we are about 70% complete with the construction of the house--not bad for a science teacher and school counselor as contractors! Enjoy the pics and we'll update it again soon.

Rough Electric and Garage

Chris Rakes of Rakes of electric met my good friends, Todd, Ryan, Joe, Jawaad, and me this past Saturday and we got busy pullin' wire. After about 7 hours or so, we had enough and decided to go into Erie and have a couple of cold ones. The garage is also framed out now with the roof on. On the docket this week: finish rough ins for the plumbing, heating, and electric, get shingles ordered and delivered on the roof, start siding, start septic system and finish the majority of grading and retaining walls with boulders.