Catching up

There has been a lot going on with the house and I'm so behind posting about it!.  We've been to Mountain Home three times in the last two weeks so we've gotten to see a lot of progress.

First, I want to mention that we've had some visitors the last couple weeks.  Nikki came by one day after work.  It was about to start raining but I was able to show her the progress before it started.  This was her second visit but it has changed a lot since her first time out.   Bill and Donna, the neighbors, also came by and wanted a "tour" because they couldn't figure our floor plan out.  Dale and Ginny came by too and Ginny brought treats!  Lemon bars!  She thinks of everything....she had plates, forks and napkins!  It was good to see them.   We also had one Jehovah's Witness stop by and invite us to a special event.  I didn't have the option of not answering the door, but she was really nice and its nice to meet people from the area.

Okay, so the house is changing almost everyday that its not raining....

The solid exterior walls make a big difference in the way it looks.

The bedroom side. 

The garage.

Paul finally put the window in the pantry.

We didn't realize the cover of the porch came out so far.  But we like it!

The foyer.

Master closet.

Per Bill and Donna, the creek got really big last Tuesday night when Mountain Home received 6 inches of rain overnight.  We had brush piles stacked about where Brad is standing and those got washed together and hung on a tree.  I couldn't believe how high it got!  Everything looked so clean.

I can't wait to get to see the creek up that high.  It seemed to still be up a little by the time we got there but not much.

We stopped by on our way home Monday and were so happy that we stopped when we did.  They were setting the trusses on the garage. It was neat to watch them do it.

Brandon would attach the rope to the truss and hook it to the cable.

Then they'd raise it up while Brandon turned it the correct direction.

Paul and Javier securing the last one.  They were finished in just a little over an hour!

From the sunroom.

I never thought trusses could be so exciting!

From the road.

It was awesome to see all of this progress but we're already anxious to see it next time!

Good news. And bad news.

The good news:  This herd of deer.....

Almost every evening that I'm at Coppercreek, I see this herd of deer.  Its usually right about dark so I haven't been able to get a great shot of them.  But today I saw them early.  They had been up close to the house earlier but I scared them when I starting taking pictures.

 I counted 11 tonight but a week or so ago, I counted 13.  Brad is going to love living here!

The bad news:  This SNAKE!

Um.....YES, its in the house!!!  

Brad and I had been working at the house all day until he had to go to work at 5:00.  I dropped him off and went back to the house to do a little more work.  We have a big tool box full of things we need when we work out there.  We just left it in what will be Brad's gun room so as soon as I got back to the house, I unlocked the box and then realized that Brad had left the door open on the other side of the safe room.  The drain is not working in that area so water is standing and its really dark in there.  Paul has a series of boards he puts behind the door so that no one can open it and I was picking all of those up and trying to put them like he had them.  As I was walking back to the other side, I noticed a stick in the room and I thought it was odd because its all the way at the back of the basement and I wondered how would it have gotten there.  Of course, it wasn't a stick, it was this stupid copperhead!  I freaked out!  Why couldn't I have found it 2 hours earlier when Brad was there?????  I didn't know what to do, we had a gun in the truck, but he was right up next to a wall, right inside the doorway so there was no way I would have actually hit him.   Brad told me to find something to beat it with but its so dark and wet and closed in back there I couldn't do that either.  So I took some pictures of him and just sat outside hoping he would come out.  He didn't.  Its times like this I really wish I knew someone in Mountain Home.  I really wanted to ask Brad if he would call his friend Billy but I decided that was ridiculous since this probably wasn't a full-blown emergency.  I did get a good laugh out of the whole situation though.  I sent a picture of it to Tara and her reaction cracked me up!  I wish I could post it on here, but it wasn't PG.

I grew up in the country and I remember having snakes around, what seemed like, all the time.  But I don't remember being so scared of them then.    I just freak out now.  

Brad got off work at midnight and we went back out there to see if he was still there but he wasn't.  I had already called Paul to warn him so I guess we're safe for now. 

A Kelly Ripa refrigerator

I ordered our refrigerator last week.  The state is giving rebates for certain appliance purchases and we wanted to get in on that and Shay's will keep it for us until we're ready so we went ahead and bought it.

We totally did NOT get the fridge we would have ever wanted. Its an all-refrigerator and an all-freezer but we will put them side-by-side so no one will ever be able to tell its separate units.  Ours will have the trim kit at the top also.  The main reason I didn't want this set is because they are gigantic!  Almost 6 feet wide!  

Brad wanted a French door style fridge and I don't even know anymore if I had a preference but this was really the best deal so we went with it.  Besides being big, it doesn't have ice and water in the door.  At first I thought that was a big deal, but the fridge we have now has that feature and we rarely use it.  And we're keeping that one to put in the basement which is where we're probably going to be most of the time.  I have spent several hours at Shay's looking at appliances and I finally just came to a point that I asked the owner which fridge he recommended.  He said this one and I was just happy to have a decision made.  I'm not sure why there are so many refrigerators to choose from.  They all just keep food cold.  There should be 5 choices, not ten thousand.

There are some pros to this fridge though.....its built in and its Electrolux! If its good enough for Kelly Ripa, then its definitely good enough for us!

I'm so happy to have one less thing to think about! 

Lots of progress

There was a lot of exciting progress made at Coppercreek this week.

Every room is framed.

This is from the back garage side.  

Its exciting to be able to see all of the rooms!

Mudroom coming in from the breezeway.

Office.  

You can't tell in this photo, but this ended up being on the lower side of the house.  So there will be a couple of steps down into this room.  None of us had realized it was going to turn out this way but we like it a lot.

The pantry.

Kitchen

Sunroom

Foyer

This area looks way bigger to me than I had visualized.  And Paul said he even stole a few inches from this to put in the study.  

Formal study

Tiny hall closet and powder room

This is standing in the kitchen looking at the dining area, the formal living room, and the master bedroom.  The wall separating the bedroom isn't standing at this point.

Master bedroom closet.

We ended up with a nice little closet in the basement that we didn't realize we were going to have.  

The windows in the basement have been cut out.  

On the main floor, the four windows to the left are in the master bedroom, the next two are in the closet and the last one on the far right is in the master bath.  All of those face the creek.

The view from those windows.  We have a lot of work to do down there!

They put the wall between the master and living room up first thing Wednesday morning.

Part of the porch.  

I've been trying to figure out how this part was going to work and still don't know.  You can see the concrete part of the porch but all of that and this little part are the whole porch.  They will pour more concrete for the porch, but there may be a step here.  Paul said he hadn't figured that out yet.  

Solid-ish walls!  This is the garage.

They delivered some trusses on Wednesday.    Can't wait to see those go up!

Exterior inspiration - The Cedar Ridge

I should have posted this a long time ago.  Brad and I have looked at the photo below about ten thousand times on dongardner.com and it would have been nice to have it here.

We took this image to the architect, the engineer, and the builder we are using now and told them that this is what we want to see when we pull up to our house....with three major changes.  We will paint the brick, we will have rock in certain areas,  and our garage doors will be in the back so we won't see the doors when we pull up.  I wanted the garage doors facing the front like this one, but our development will not allow front facing garages.  Now that they're switched, I think I like it better anyway.  Another minor change is that the truss above the front steps will not have that curve to it.

We haven't completely decided on the colors for the exterior yet, but I think we are leaning towards a combination of gray and rich-colored wood for the posts, truss, and front door.  I wish we could see that combination somewhere so it would be easier to decide.  The easy route and back-up plan will be shades of tan.

When we first looked at this plan in a magazine, we liked some parts of the floor plan but didn't really like others.  After all of the re-drawings, our final floor plan of the main level turned out very similar to this one.  But we didn't like the basement floor plan at all so ours is completely different.

We've changed our minds on almost everything so far during this process, but we still love the exterior of this house so I think we'll be very happy with it!

They're finally driving nails!

Brad talked to Paul yesterday and found out that the garage, breezeway, and basement walls were framed.  We ran up there to take a look since we now have more than just concrete to look at!  We thought it would be a good day to go since it was so warm.  However it was NOT warm in Mountain Home.  We nearly froze!  I pointed out to Brad that was another way Little Rock was better.  :)

They repaired the driveway.  YAY!!!

The front of the house (but back of the garage).  

They also got the garage and breezeway poured.  I love that breezeway and the porch behind it more than I should!

Brad standing on the little back porch.

Breezeway from the front.

We think we know where everything is but then usually have to resort to the plan to really figure it out. :)

Opening for the stairs which are going to be "L" shaped.

The little square behind the opening of the stairs is the office.  I wanted this to be small and I think I'll get what I wanted!

Standing in the basement looking out.

The two bedrooms and bathroom in the basement.

Back view.  Garage is to the far left, then the sunroom (on main level), and basement.

Its exciting to see this kind of progress.  Paul said that he hopes to have plumbers, electricians, and heating and air guys ready in April!