Your first step regardless of which avenue you take regarding a g.c, owner/builder, or hiring a site supervisor is to absorb as much of your spare time researching and educating concerning the build process. Everything from the permitting, legalities, contracts, up to at least the basics of the various trades and what to look for involved with a build.It also helps to get familiar with processes of how suppliers operate if you will be dealing with them, but even at that, if they are builders suppiers, get to know their m.o anyhow.There are many variables with foresight being a hindsight often times, but by getting familiar with the in's and out's as much as possible can lessen delays/problems on the build.Their are many websites to educate such as building sciences, ask the builder,john bridge tile forum,drywall, electrical, plumbing, hvac,etc,etc to get you tuned into the basics which will help you know what you are looking at on your build.Now's the time to start, not when ground is being broke!You'll get a lot of great advise from many,many people on this and other forums in the garden web as well.Wecome and best of luck!

If you are buying a lot of furniture, you really should go to North Carolina (Hickory and High Point especially). The furniture stores are vast, and the prices much better than most places you will see in the US. If you time a trip for after market, many of the stores will be having sales. If there are particular lines you like, you should get on the mailing list--they'll let you know when they are having specials. I lived in NC for several years and I ended up furnishing about 8 homes (mine, family members, and friends) exclusively from deals picked up in the clearance centers. And of course, don't forget your local 'Craig's List' for used furniture--that can be the best deal of all. It helps if you've looked at tons of furniture, because then you can spot quality, you know makers you like, and you know not to believe everything the previous owner tells you. Virtually everything advertised on Craig's List is called 'solid wood' and about 10% of it is. I love a beautiful veneer, but that's more rare than the solid wood. I have some wonderful second-hand furniture, and you might want to consider going that route too. Good luck, and happy shopping. And when you do, make sure you check out your shipper--movingscam.com is a good forum to find out companies to use and avoid. (Yes, I have been through the nightmare international move--it turned a $15,000 move into a $50,000, be sure to start researching that NOW. But double verify everything, before they start loading, licenses, permits, etc.) What was a good company, can turn into something awful very quickly.

I've been in some very uncomfortable situations. No matter how I introduce myself or am introduced by someone, something always goes wrong. In most cases it ends up with people assuming that I am SDs' mother, then they comment how young I am to be their mother (well duh, 45 and SD is 29? and I look like late 30s hmmm). And BM might be right there listening. "oh, no, she is the mother" Awful. We are not married so I don't introduce msyelf as SM. I say "Hi, I am PO1, SO's (insert name) GF". But like i said people don't listen anyways and assume their own things. So I just say 'Hi, i am PO1". Let them figure it out. ha Once in a awhile I had to be introduced by my ex and he always said "this is PO1, DD's mom". I liked it much better than "exwife". I hate going to events with BM and we probably will never go anymore, the last couple of them were disasturous.

Thanks, the storm was awful and I never want to go thru another. The class is a 3 hour class running 6 weeks. I was going to demo a stone and a terra cotta flower pot. The first day they won't have their supplies. I was going to go over what they needed. What kind of dishes to buy and which not to buy(what kinda glazes scratch underfoot, and which fade badly in the sun). Show them how to break the plates and keep the design from fling all over so they don't have a jigsaw puzzle to put back together. And how to use the tile nips. The class is being held in a nonprofit community center which has a handy dandy thrift store on site so I was going to take them over there so they can look at what dishes they have(the thrift has some great prices on dishes) and pick up some if they want to with me being there to ask question so when they head out on their own they know what to look for. Thats the first day. I'm not sure how long it will take them to break up their plates, and complete the stone. And its hard to take a stone home to work on it when you have a bunch of little shards rolling all over. This first project will likely teach me much about teaching mosaics. p