House Progress: Movement over the weekend!

There was a lot of buzz on our street today! The only 2 houses on our street going up had 2 or 3 different work trucks outside each house today. Taylor's had gutters and who knows what else, we had a painter, the security system guy installing that and a guy there repairing our blacksplash that was broken when they wired for electrical that was missed. Also, this stuff happened over the weekend:

Shower door and glass was installed (the other 3 are tubs. which means shower curtains. and rugs. and towels. overwhelmed!)

Mirrors installed in all bathrooms! 

This is one 1/2 of the jack and jill bath that the boys will share. I think this will be Walker's sink.

The new wood has already been installed (which makes me wonder where he is with the wet bar wood! They wired for the under cabinet lighting too, which isn't easy when everything has already been tiled and such. But again, we ordered this stuff before sheet rock so they just have to figure it out I guess. Oh, and this picture reminds me that light switches went in (far left). :)

This was last week but the can lights were added to the living room. I have mentioned before how each worker makes a mess for another worker. There have been so many holes cut into the sheetrock to wire for all the lighting we ordered months ago but that they never got to before sheetrock (sigh). 

And most exciting, they are ready to pour concrete for our driveway, sidewalks and walk up! We requested that they extended the width of the driveway to make a little bit more room for our big cars and they agreed to it. But of course, it wasn't set that way. Hopefully they'll make it happen before they pour the concrete - eek!

Hopefully I'll be updating this blog with pictures of concrete, light fixtures (although we're replacing most of them with fixtures my sister has picked out) and some door knobs. Not that you want to see that stuff but it will mean we are progressing!

House Progress: Garage Door and Fireplace!

I'm going to keep complaining here b/c when I do, things happen at the house! ;) Only kidding, I do realize I've been venting here lately - I'll *try* to stop that....On a very bright note, I just thought the house was so pretty when I pulled up this evening! The cedar garage door was installed today. This and the door still need stain but fresh wood is still so pretty.

I knew the fireplace extending to the ceiling wouldn't be one consistent tower of stone b/c  of the angle of the walls but this is definitely different! The top is still wet so it appears to be a different color but it should all blend pretty well. I pulled up as the bricklayers were pulling away. The same guys who used to never make eye contact with me now smiled from ear to ear as they drove off. I guess I'm the "wife of the guy who provided the tequila for their stellar weekend." Not that bricklayers use the word "stellar." Moving on...just happy they were back to work on this!

It hurt my soul to see that the beautiful backsplash was broken into to add plugs, disposal switch, etc. 

And they had to pull this off to do it. I guess it's just a part of the process where every crew has to come back time and time again to fix things. We now need tile, more wood, paint and whoever else.

 Can not wait to see what happens next!

House Progress: Stone Finished-ish!

So, there! The bricklayers honored their word to Beau (and the booze) and finished the stone/brick yesterday! This looks very different than what I was expecting but I do like it. I'm keeping an open mind from here on out. This house is like a box of chocolates for goodness sake. ;)

They have not been back to finish the fireplace and I'm a little curious when that is going to happen. After all, that was part of Beau's bribe. ;) Also, it looks like they ran out of brick for some small spots in the back of the house. Nothing is "finished" at this point so I'm a bit anxious.

I checked on the house today and the electricians were in there installing the wrong light fixtures. Boo! I told them, they stopped and removed what they had put up, I called the builder who happened to be just a couple of streets down and he met me there within minutes. He ordered the right thing but the company sent the wrong stuff. Who knows how long that will take!

It was too bad that happened but I got to have a really good conversation with Jack, the construction manager and the electrician. It turns out that NONE of our add-ons have been ordered. So we walked through them one-by-one and Jack placed many of them while I was standing right there. And since the electricians were halted on light fixtures, they were able to add the lighting that we ordered: under cabinet lighting in the kitchen and butler's pantry, additional can lights in the living room, extra light switches, etc. None of which the electrician knew about. Grrrrr! Apparently the media room wet bar will take 3 weeks to be completed. :( Obviously that pushes our close date again. I just have to let go on all of this. It will just happen when it happens.

Hopefully more to come soon! :)

House Update for the Past Week

I wanted to put something like: "woo hoo, it's closing month!!" or "Just 2 more weeks til we're in!" but those are untruths sadly. We received word earlier this week that they are indeed delayed again and that a November 15th close is looking more like around Thanksgiving. Our realtor and Beau both think December is more likely. I'm so disappointed but encouraged by the progress from this past week...

The granite sink is in and I love it! I mentioned this before but the plastic is off and faucet was added.

Front door is in and just needs to be stained and hardware added.

As far as the exterior, I left off saying that our request to add more stone to the front was denied due to timing. However, with a week of rain delays, they were able to order and have delivered a lot more stone and they got busy adding it over the weekend! I asked for stone to be added to EITHER the top 1/2 around the third window OR the top 1/2 of the garage. They put the stone on BOTH areas. That plus the panel above the front door and you have yourself A LOT of stone. Perhaps too much. Be careful what you wish for, I guess! I'm sure it will look fine; just a little different than I imagined. This builder is full of surprises! :)

You know who else is full of surprises? Beau Reynolds, himself. While I was on a little girls getaway weekend to Canton, he headed over to the house and made friends with the head bricklayer. When the guy quoted 2 weeks until they could be back to finish the exterior and fireplace, Beau did what any rational man would do and bribed the guy with beer and tequila for his crew in order to have it all done by this Monday. I love that Man! Just never know what's in store with him. :)

I never dreamed they would add stone to this whole top portion! 

A crew of 8 or 10 worked all day Saturday and got about half of the stone work done. It's a tough job!

Halfway completed. I'm eager to see how they will solve this with those angles.

I'd love to see the momentum picked back up on the inside of the house this week. We're in need of light fixtures, bathroom mirrors, A/C work, sheetrock and paint repair, and door handles among many other things. They need to get busy on the media room wet bar and the cedar garage door. I could go on!

Halloween with 2 lil Ghouls!

This Halloween has been a bit slower than the past couple of years but for good reason! We've all been under the weather at some point (for me, 3 different points!) the past several weeks. And then we had off and on rain during that time. But we've had plenty of fun...

Grayson got a cute haircut while Walker went to the Accute Kids for one of our many illnesses (honestly, I can't remember what this one was...). Precious smile!

Grayson and I headed to our play group's annual Halloween Party in the Smiths' HUGE backyard! In addition to the bounce house and fun treats and music, Mickey Mouse made an appearance! So fun!

Mamas and kiddos.

Today we met our play group for another tradition we have, Trick or Treat in the park. But since it was raining, we headed to the mall! A little different but it worked well and we had so much fun!

Kelly is the coolest mom! Here she is as a ghost as KJ looks on... 

Martha's son Brayden and Grayson having one of their unintelligible conversations ;) 

Batman without his mask

Sophia and Seton held hands the whole way to the food court. Adorable!

Grayson and Mimi made Halloween cupcakes complete with orange icing, sprinkles and candy corn toppers. He was just so excited and such a big helper! I want every second of his little conversations on video!

We joined our playgroup at the pumpkin patch in Celina! A great time, fed some animals, missed out on the hayride but we got to pick our 3 pumpkins to take home to Mimi and Pop. A fun 80 degree day!

Grayson overseeing Walker's every move. Good big bro ;)

My MOPS table gathered to decorate pumpkins with our littles. Grayson decorated his all by himself and he did such a cute job. He even added eyebrows! :)

And of course, we made plenty of crafts. Grayson requested crafts just about every day and loved making Q-tip skeletons. He's really getting into helping and it's such a change from last year! I love seeing it. Here he asked to name his skeleton "Beau" but I thought he wanted to add a "bow." Ha! Love his little language!