I'm currently struggling with this. Our plumber sent us to Ferguson's to finalize our selections. Of course, the initial bid isn't what we want in our house. We've been told that at Ferguson's we will pay retail price for the fixtures (I believe there is a kickback to the plumber for the fixtures). Our plumber has said that if we choose to, we can provide our own fixtures and he will charge us $50 a fixture to install, but it is STRONGLY discouraged. If we do this, there they won't guarantee the installation, blah, blah, blah. I'm still struggling a bit with this, but right now I'm budgeting for the retail price as published on the manufacturers site. I would suggest going directly to Moen's website and look at the prices for the fixtures you have choosen. Add up the price differential between the brushed nickel and ORB and see if it comes close to $2K.

We have spent about 15K. We ripped out old carpet, replaced with tile throughout except for new carpet in the bedrooms. We painted the interior completely, including the ceilings, new custom window coverings, new updated light fixtures and plumbing fixtures for the guest bath and master baths. We also took out a 10X10 storage room to put boxes to help de-clutter the house. We don't expect to get all the money back, but we hope the work we have done will at least make the house sell faster. There are two homes exactly like ours for sale right now. One is overpriced and both are very dated. If ours was for sale at the same time, we would probably price btwn the two and hope ours sells quicker because ours is turnkey, whereas the others need quite a bit of work and updating.

Posted by sweet_pea10 (My Page) on Sun, May 3, 09 at 15:16 "In the U.S. we don't usually have that many party hosts. Generally, a simple gift that fits the personality and tastes of each host is given, such as a plant, bottle of wine, etc. " sweet_pea10 - We also live in the U.S. and in our area, it is very common to have multiple parties given to the bride and groom. This one party has 15 couples giving the party. We have one shower given by 4 ladies, and one couples shower given by three couples. We also have the 3 relatives that will host the bridal brunch. ----------------------------------------------------------- gellchom - The $50 gift certificate was very generous! As host in the past, we have received: Basket of mums Silver coffee scoop (I use in my sugar canister and love it!) Silver ice scoop Monogrammed linen hand towels Monogrammed soaps Monogrammed napkins Flowered bud vase Candle snuffer Set of paper products Two other parties were given, but I cannot for the life of me remember what the hostess gifts were. They must not have been very memorable, or nothing was given - wish is fine. LOL As you can see from the above list, I am stumped to give something new and different. The gifts came from the same group of friends, so I cannot copy the ideas (other than the napkins - which are always a welcomed gift - if you entertain a lot.)

Antiquesilver - thanks so much, it feels good to be back ;) I had to take a break because it was getting increasingly hard to know how off our project was at the time and to stay enmeshed in reno talk. I loved seeing the FKB recently and recognizing many names. Luckily, we have been able to pick up from where we left off and much of the work on our end was already done. The tile, paint colors and counters were about all we need to worry about this time. Most everything else is already on our premises, lol. The tough part will be to dig out each element from all the collection of boxes all over our house. We had to replace our family bath's faucet and wanted to use the one bought for the master bath since it was just sitting around. Turns out, we had to buy another one because we could not find the mbth faucet. It has been another year or so and we still haven't found it. Our house will seem so spacious when it all gets installed and sorted out! Gsciencechick - I know the tiles you mean. I saw similar in HD for a contractor I am working with to help flip a house. I could not believe that the "Big Boxes" carried them and at such good prices. That is a great way to add bang for the buck! I will be getting the black accents from HD & Lowes and that will mean fewer pricey tiles. I woke up today and told myself to stop looking for tiles. We found the ones we really want and the $350 for the border accents may be crazy, but in the grand scheme of things, $350 is not so bad for what is admittedly a splurge. The field tiles in lavender only come out to $200 and cover a lot of space. They are not really a splurge since the tab is not that high. I know in my heart I could not replicate the look with anything less. It is not for lack of trying either. I was afraid dh would choke when he heard the amount, but he asked how much we'd save with something else, and when he heard it would be $100-150 or so, he said we should go for the ones we both like better since in time, that difference will seem petty. I guess there are some things one can compromise on such a single french door, not having a front porch added, fewer (but larger) skylights, carpet instead of fixing hardwood floors in master bedroom after extending, etc, but some we shouldn't, like cheaper tiles and counters (mid-range, which is our only other "splurge"). The other stuff we chose to do without cost much more than these items' upcharges. It is work to find the balance of saving money yet still making going through this all worthwhile. We technically could save more, but if we are going to spend over $150k to get the total project done and end up looking at it as ALL a compromise, then why bother? The other things we saved on will not impact our overall enjoyment by very much. I am just so grateful we are back to doing it before too long! With so many people losing their homes, doing any of this is a splurge.