We just got our 1st level subfloors installed yesterday!
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Here is a link that might be useful: Let's Build a Home

All of our stuff is little detail work now. We were supposed to have granite installed today but a surprise snow storm and power outage killed THAT plan.

In the meantime, here's our few changes:
Columns:

Sconces:

We lost a few trees w/ the storm, but fortunately we have a lot to spare!

One down on the driveway so we had to walk ALL the way up until it was fixed:

Graceshan - wonderful view of the water and of your neighbor's monkey puzzle tree! I find them fascinating but after reading about them wouldn't want one in my own yard (as a worker in a nursery told us, "careful, they bite") so it's great that you can enjoy it from a safe distance.

Mr. MontanaPacNW has become so eager to see everyone's postings, and to get ours posted, that he already loaded our pictures onto the server. These are a few weeks old now, and it will be a few more weeks before we go back to Montana for the winter. Beagles, it sure is nice to see someone else's snow, but I hope you're digging out. We actually haven't had all that much yet, although you'll see plenty on the higher elevations.

First: Outside - we have pavement!! And a path and lots and lots of rocks. On the right you can see that we had some fire prevention work done on the trees. They have been limbed up and thinned, and all the fallen debris has been chipped and mulched into the meadows. It looks like a park!

Now to the inside. First up is a picture of the great room, with the plaster and the ceiling completed. And those of you who are really observant will see that I FINALLY took off the window stickers - we don't have an inspection so there really is no excuse for how long it took me to get around to that task.

A view of the other end of the great room; the rock work around the fireplace is finished and we are waiting for the tile sub to come back and finish installing the lower section. This week, the flooring is being installed and I really cannot wait to see it. It's reclaimed beech from Mr. Montana's childhood farm in Ohio and our builder says it is gorgeous.

And finally, here is the flooring that covers the kitchen, mudroom, laundry, pantry and powder room. I am so, so impressed with the guys who did this. You have to look carefully, but this picture shows the transition between the cork (kitchen, panty, hall, powder) and the tile (mudroom, laundry). We wanted a tougher flooring where we enter the house, we wanted cork in the kitchen, and we didn't want yet another flooring material. This was the solution and the two different teams (one for cork, one for tile) executed it so well that you can hardly tell where they meet (it's right at the doorway, see?).

Good luck to everyone as we approach winter.

Officially started today. Will be doing a traditional Hawaiian blessing of the land on Sunday. Hopefully will get some pictures posted of that. Not much except beautiful pasture, some cute lambs and broody hens to look at just yet!

Things are slowing down now that the house is dried in. Got all the exterior doors in last week and the siding should start later this week or next. Electrical was starting today. It might take awhile since my father and I are doing it ourselves.

Front - the garage roof was finished the day after this pic

Back

Love the front door that my wife picked out! It was a last minute change due to a spec house down the street having the original door! Cant have that can we!

Does anybody mind sharing the cost to paint the exterior of there new build? The prices I have gotten seem really high so far, especially since all the trim will already be painted and all the caulking done.

Oh, my! Waterfront houses, beach front houses, fabulous Alaskan houses, breathtaking Montana houses and now Hawaii?! When does the gardenweb tour of homes begin? I can't wait! Until then thanks to everyone for letting us all share in your progress (and your views!).

As promised a few more progress photos before the month gets away from me.

We have been doing lots of landscaping:

As you can see, we have also been installing the fences atop the retaining walls.

and railings on the screen porch

painting the porch floor and staining the ceiling

and painting the rails on the side porch (also known as the "dogs and chillun'" entrance.

We are getting really, really close to finishing. I may post more photos later month this if we finish.

Graceshan - congrats on getting started

BDIB - I've never seen so much detail in a home and your land in beautiful.

Montana - Your great room view is unreal! Congrats!

dhuston - You're moving along and everything looks good.

buckhead - I think Veranda or Southern Living will be knocking on your door soon. Congrats! BTW what paint color did you use on the exterior?

Here's where we are currently.

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By bb19 at 2011-11-02

Antique brick

We are starting to finish things - below are some more pics of our house....
Right now final color coat is going on our stucco, the downstairs concrete floors are being polished, final trim has started, and we are getting cabinets next week.

Stucco Color Coat:

Our concrete finish:

Dining Room:

Great Room & Living Room:

No pics available until I upload them from my camera, but we are finally framing. Wasn't able to get to the site today, but they should have completed framing the main floor. Hoping the weather holds our here in MN for a while yet!

bb19, I love your transom above your front door. Was it custom? I recently found a door I loved but then found out it was made custom for a house (that's another thread here). I'm wondering how to go about that if I go that route and how pricey it is compared to going with a premade door/transom. If it's not custom, do you mind sharing your transom source? It's one of the loveliest I've seen!!

Babs711,

Thanks for the compliment. It is custom but the price wasn't too bad since the door is pine. I wouldn't recommend a pine door unless you have adequate protection from rain and sun such as a large porch. I'll find out the price and source in order to post it later.

Just broke ground and basement and foundation will be poured next week.

babs,

The door was custom made by Endura doors and the cost was about 3k for the entire unit(door/transom).

Here is a link that might be useful: endura

Thanks so much! That's not too bad for both. I appreciate the information!

We're at the very beginning....the builder and excavator met us at the land on November 1st to stake out the house location. It's a very modest 2,200 square feet (approx.) 3-bedroom walkout. The excavation was to have begun today but I don't know if the building permit came through yet. We received a copy of an email from the builder to the county today wherein he asked for an update on the status.

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Looks like an exciting month. Congratulations to everyone who is beginning this process! The pics above are great! I love all the various settings. I can't wait to see the finished homes!

Speaking of finishing, we are about 2 weeks from closing! Which is 3 weeks behind schedule, but I won't complain. Today our home was full of the wonderful sounds of drills, saws, music and men as the cabinets and trim packages began going in. I usually stop by the house twice a day, but had to make a special trip to clear up some specifics on some of the trim and built ins.

Bathroom cultured marble top

http://ncblessedhome.blogspot.com/

A lot of progress since we broke ground on October 7th. Our project manager says we should "go vertical" by the middle of the week.

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Just thought I"d pop in & see. Beagles - fanTASTIC! What paint color did you use on your stairwell w/the sconces? Thanks. I am thinking a light Wedgewood blue & cool cream in one of our rooms....

Buckhead, your home turned out so well!

Bunch of fab looking & very cool looking homes here!

We're still walking in circles looking for stuff, unpacking boxes, and trying to chew thru the punchlist, LOL. See y'all.... - Les.

wwwonderwhiskers that color is Sherwin Williams tinsmith. We looked at about 1,000 grays to find one that did not have any purple undertones and that wasn't too blue because we have a lot of blue elsewhere in our house.

Wedgewood blue and cool cream sounds fantastic. I love any kind of blue against white/cream :)

Looking fantastic everyone! Pcandlyte - can't believe you will be in so quickly! We are in basically the same stage of completion minus the cabinets and we expect February . . . of course, our cabinets have not been finalized so that is an issue! They are putting up doors and trim beginning today and then floors and then cabinets . . . Of course, nothing is without issues when you are building a home and the doors were sent pre bored for hardware, which we did not order, because we are doing a smaller rosette . . . so doors are being hung so they can trim - and then they are going back for replacement!

I will take pictures this week and update. No paint on our brick yet - so hard! - but the brackets are up on our garage overhang and friends porch and the bluestone is in on the porches so we have some progress!!

Granite (and marble) installed TODAY! We still need the granite for our center island which is coming from a different place, but it is coming along!

You might see a little gap here between the cabinet and the counter. That's OK, it isn't really there :) We had the cabinets pushed over a bit because we didn't use a seam here so this huge thing had to be slid in, and we didn't want to risk scratching the cabinets.

Pantry:

Master fireplace

Upstairs laundry. This stone is AWESOME!

Guest bath (this isn't actually In the bath or placed yet because we haven't yet resolved our tile issues with that bath):

Master Bath. We are having issues here because the faucet is too tall- it will come up too high in front of the mirror and it will obstruct the TV that is inside the mirror. We tried to offset the faucet but the sink is too big. So, we either need to switch the sink or switch the faucet. Any thoughts on a good sink that might work?

The yellow ring isn't in the stone, it's just a piece of packaging:

This piece actually needs to be redone because the sink cut out was made in the center and it needs to be on the side. There's also going to be a matching backsplash. But, in the meantime...

We are VERY happy with our granite installers. We used Imperial Marble and Granite in Lester, PA. They gave us a great price, were very helpful, scheduled the install quickly for us, had a nice selection of stone and did a great job. There was one area where a miscommunication led to a sink cut-out being put in the wrong place (really my fault) and they are remarking it at no charge. I'd definitely recommend them to anyone around the PA area.

Yes Athensmomof3, we'll be in before Thanksgiving. It's hard for me to believe too considering all the work that still needs to be done, but we are right on schedule now. Things are looking differently everyday. The time difference in our completion dates may be because your home is considerably larger than mine. I can't wait to see pics!

BDIB- Beautiful stone! My favorite is the upstairs laundry! Wow!

Cbusmomof3, great updates. You're chugging along quickly!

Since Monday the trim went in, cabinets are all in, and the painters started today. The driveway, walkway, porches, and patio will be poured tomorrow. I'm really excited.

Here are a few more pics. I'll be glad when I get my camera out of storage. We've scheduled the movers for the 29th! I haven't seen my furniture or other household goods in over 3 months!

Here is a link that might be useful: New home progress

Wonder-
what is the name of that stone in the laundry? Is is more gray/white or is there blue in it too? Its hard to tell.
looks great! Trying to figure out on our own kitchen. Not sure if we want the patterns of granite though, love soapstone and quartz.

Wow everyone! Beagles I still love your pantry. I talked to my cabinet guy and he is supposed to get me a price for that awesome lazy susan! I can't believe Pcandlyte will be completed in just 2 weeks, that is amazing. We are about the same stage but the cabinet maker is holding us up since he had to finish a huge job that took longer than expected before he could start our, lucky for him he makes incredible cabinets or we probably would have moved on...

We are expecting a mid December move in, we are finishing up the hardwood floors and have the tile in baths and laundry left. We still need to get the trim and interior doors set and painted. The cabinets should be done in 2ish weeks and our granite is on order to be installed the first week of December. We still have to get the fireplace stone installed and we are getting ready to order it from a local custom stone shop!

Since we have had so much rain the exterior has been at a hault, we need to have the final grading finished to get the septic system in and the driveway and patios poured.

Here are some progress pics...
Entry

Formal dining (the blue isn't that blue in person)

Wow, everyone's houses are looking great!

jamiecrok, your floors and your blue dining room (and everything else) are beautiful. I hope you get the lazy susan :) We didn't even get a separate line-item charge on our quote from our cabinet maker, it was just included in the linear footage price of our cabinets, so hopefully you'll get a good price on yours.

lzerarc were you asking me about the laundry stone or wonder? If you were asking me, it's Calacatta Cielo (a marble). It is pretty much gray/white with an undertone of blue. Here is a picture of a slab. It is very beautiful in person.

We have made alot of progress and painting should start need week,

Mid October

Today:

View from Kitchen to dinning room:

Livingroom

Master bedroom

Walk-in master shower

superior walls in and contractor now off to a hunt in alaska til thanksgiving!!!

Click here to view these pictures larger

Mel,
Looking great!!! do you happen to know the make of the stone? is it stone veneer? color and make? it goes very well with your brick.

Annicade,

Thanks, the stone is from Centurion and is called Bucks County Brown, we had some of their red version mix in for a contrast. The Brick is called Meadowbrook
We are really happy with the way it turn out. I was worried about the red hadi plank, but with the ston it really came togather

http://www.centurionstone.com

Jamiecrok, I love all the archways!

Mel,those are going to be beautiful ceilings, and I can't wait to see the finished walk in shower!

If it is too good to be true, then it probably is. I got a call from my agent today tell us our builder needs an additional 17 days to complete. It's ok. We want it done right and not rushed, however, we've agreed that HE is paying for all the additional costs that go along with this delay.

On another note, we are moving along very quickly!

The shake will be painted Sherwin Williams High Tea.

Waiting for the screen for the porch.

Sherwin Williams Bamboo Shoot wall color

Arizona Ledgestone on the fireplace and kneewall in kitchen

Sherwin Williams Bamboo Shoot wall color

Sherwin Williams Bamboo Shoot wall color

Dining room. Sherwin Williams Tigereye

Beadboard and chair rail trim.

Great progress being made. I love looking at these pictures every week.

Framing started on Monday and now we have walls! Yippee!!

The one thing I can't stand are those condos behind our house, especially now that the leaves are all gone. In the summer you can barely notice them, but now they seem right there! I had our builder move the leftover dirt after backfilling to the back of our lot and mound it, instead of hauling it away. I'm hoping(praying)that the landscapers can work some screening magic with the right plantings. Our old house was on a lovely, private, wooded lot so this is going to take some getting used to for me. But, you can't get everything you want, at least we can't :-)

Well we are moving along - I hope that December will be our last month posting in these threads.

We had our utilities hooked up over the last few days - today the gas lines were being set. I thought I would post a few photos updated our progress.

So far the biggest delays have been the concrete polishing. We originally choose a finish polished to 1500 grit and after seeing the bathrooms and laundry room done to this level we decided to scale it back a bit and do more of a satin finish of 400 grit. In order to go to 1500 grit we would need to polish deeper into the slab which would reveal more aggregate and we didn't like that. Knowing that now we might have spread special glass or decorative aggregate when the slab was poured. The 400 grit finish is still very shiny, and while not perfectly flay is a bit easier on the eyes, and in the long run may be more forgiving for cleaning.

Photos Below...

Outside Views

Concrete floor finish at 400 grit:

Upstairs Flooring & Kitchen Cabinets:

Montel,
I love your modern home! Congrats on being so close to finishing!

Can you tell me the color of your kitchen walls? It looks so nice with your cabs, which are very similar to ours and we need to make paint choices next week! Thanks!

Wet and muddy!! We are setting forms for the basement walls. Hopefully we will be pouring walls by Tuesday.

We are finally starting...woohoo!!!!

Pics aren't glamorous,but I'm excited to finally be able to start posting :)

Starting with the driveway...it's about 350 feet long...glad I'm not the one who has to shovel..lol!

Here are a few pics standing from the road looking at the house site...

And this is looking out from the "front door", onto the road....

They are finishing up the circle drive today, and we should start the real digging next week!

Well, I was going to wait to post till next month but just couldn't resist posting our muddy mess. The mud is soooo bad that even our dog uses the makeshift bridge to get to the house. LOL!

Congratulations everyone on your various stages of progress and have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

ICFgreen:

The color on our kitchen walls is a Kelly Moore "Beach Bum" KM3964-1

Thanks!