robyn-I read your post and thought, hmm, so much really has happened since we started that I'm not even sure anymore! It seems to go very fast and very slow at the same time? I think illini's pretty much got it down as I remember. I am all about 'give me 3 choices', that would make things much easier, lol! The trick I think might be making a decision and then sticking with it. Hahaha! Will they send you pictures of the progress? It'd drive me crazy to be so far away (not that you can help it), but your builder sounds fantastic. illini-if it makes you feel any better I thought the electrical walk through went really smoothly and not near as challenging as I thought it might be. The electrician had some really good suggestions as well and we did defer to his experience on many things. Some things needed discussion but most placements just made sense, ya know? BUT, I will say that afterward, as in the very next day I went back and already started getting confused on this and that. Hahaha! Did we do this? What is that? Do we need a plug here? Lol! jdez-I like the brick you like on your other thread. And OF COURSE it's out of budget, that is just how it goes. ;) I'm with you though, if you can find a way to get it IN budget then it's definitely worth investigating.

musicgal, is your carpenter building all your items? Everything is just stunning! I love your back porch! Robyn, glad you are there now! I bet you were totally overwhelmed walking through the new home. Breathe and those decisions will be made as you go along. bluemoon, love your arches!!! carson, that snake creeped me out! We see lots of wildlife where we are building: deer, fox, racoons, groundhogs, crawfish, wild turkeys, heron by the lake. I've only seen one snake so far and it was a black snake. I don't want to see another! :-) Our carpenter is trying to finish up today. He's going to build our fireplace mantel, install the hideaway wall mounted ironing board in the master closet, and install the closet rod brackets. DH will help him and continue to finish trimming out the closets. He will have to come back to install the window seats when those ever get here. I emailed our sales guy to find out when they would be ready since he thought they would be here this past week. I didn't hear back from him. DH & I went shopping yesterday afternoon. Productive day. Found dining chairs to go with the double-pedestal table I had bought. They are on order. Bought laundry cabinet hardware and master bathroom hardware. Bought LED light bulbs for the can lights. And, picked out laminate countertop for the laundry room. Whew! Found some counter-height bar stools we liked, but dang, they are higher than we wanted to spend. We're going to wait on those. We had heavy downpours yesterday so that didn't bode well for getting the septic laterals dug. We can't pour concrete until those laterals are in. We still need to have driveway, walkway from garage to front of house, and the large back patio poured. I feel we are in slow mode right now getting all the last minute stuff done. Granite still scheduled for June 12 and hopefully plumbing will be able to come right after that. At least DH is getting stuff done that might have waited until we moved in.

Tell us more about the kids. Gender and ages. Having a teeny tiny jack and jill bath with 2 daughters, I can say that there are several areas that need to be addressed if you want the bath to have some semblance of presentability. And avoid losing your mind. 1-kids are not tall. Do not put storage out of their reach. They won't use it. 2-kids are not married--they don't respect each other's property and share well. So Susie may want Crest, and Sally may want Colgate. Susie may want apple blossom shower gel, Sally may want peach blossom shower gel, etc. So frankly it's easier to have each child have their own set of everything. This also eliminates problems when Sally spends the night at Betsy's house and takes everything with her. 3-kids are not careful like adults. They will get nail polish on your nice tabletop. So very utilitarian surfaces are required. I also suggest using a silicone hot pad under hair straighteners so the countertop isn't singed. 4-Teenage kids are Pigs. Disgusting. And old enough to clean their own bathrooms. Make them do it. Plan a place in the bathroom to store Lysol wipes, glass cleaner, toilet cleaner and brush, and paper towels. I recommend having this chore due on trash night. So at least the trash should get emptied. And any time you hear "mom, can I have a friend spend the night?" the answer is, "of course, but you have to clean your bathroom first" So I think when designing your space, to take into account where and how these items are stored. The functional part is more important to get right the decor part. I found that the $4 paper storage boxes with lids that are sold at Hobby Lobby (for VHS tapes and photos...that size box) are great to use to organize in the bathroom. The lids keep things dust free, and daughters can store "unmentionables" there (so they don't steal all of yours!) and they stack up easily and can be labeled. If you have a shower curtain, there are some that have liners with about 20 pockets on them. These are good for organizing there. And as big of a trash can as you can fit. With a plastic bag liner.

egganddart, I do it the html way, which is very easy, once you know it. You need to get the image address...I have mac so I control click on an image and it pops up with a menu including "copy image address" and I select that. Then I come here and put the following expression in pointy brackets (less than and greater than signs) where xxx is that image address I copied. img src="xxx" If the picture comes out too large, then I just add a width phrase within the pointy brackets as follows: img src="xxx" width="600" That's it. You can use that phrase as many times as you want to post multiple pics in a single post.