PHactotum Wheneverly

Most of the interior doors are hung.

A lot of the trim is put up.

We now have nice treads on half of the stairs.

Our good friend Tara is running for local office. We spent the morning showing our support in the Zanesville Homespun Day parade.

We would like to welcome into the world Elina Lara Handorf, born 12:55 pm 9/4/2006. Elina weighed 9lb 6 oz and was 22 inches long.

Congratulations Brenda, Lance and Aja.

Treads on the stairs are done. They have started to put in the banister, starting with the newel posts.

The mantel is installed.

More doors and trim have been installed. We noticed that two of the doors have the wrong hinges, and one door was already marked as bad...it had a bad spot on the inside that we had missed. Mike must have caught this one.

The painters are back. They begain with the trim.

The carpenters have also finished with the stairs and they look good.

They also installed steps from the garage to house.

The painters continued to work on the trim.

Yesterday we had found a box on the basement stairs with what looked like shelf peices. Very long shelf pieces. Well today we figured out what it was. Seems we didn't realize that there would be columns around the entry way. We found some of those "shelf" peices in the office out of the box.

I drew up a picture that might gives you an idea of what it will look like.

Okay, so it is pretty lame alterations, but you get the idea.

They're wanting the 4th draw on the construction loan! Only one more to go before it's ours!!!!

Today Schumacher let us know that closing will most likely be in early October!!! Only about a month to go! Perry and I are so excited!

The columns around the front door are up. It really gives the front of the house a very classic, traditional style. I love it! The best part is that it doesn't look like any of the other houses in the neighborhood (at least that we've seen so far).

The tile people were there until after 8:30pm working! So, we didn't get to look around inside. Hopefully we'll be able to tomorrow night.

However, since the garage door and the front door were both open, we were able to see that the cabinetry has arrived and is waiting for installation. (There were a lot of boxes in the garage.) And it looks like the stairway has been stained.

All of the hard flooring (wood, tile, laminate) has been put in. We peeked under the edge of the protective cardboard and it all looks great, especially the wood and tile (no grout yet). I'd almost forgotten what they looked like, since we picked them out back in March. (Wow, has it really been almost 6 months ago?!)

All of the interior doors have been stained and are waiting to be hung up again. These turned out beautiful! I think they're going to be one of my favorite things about the house. We're so glad we went with this choice.

The stairway is all stained and looks great.

They've sanded the edges of the OSB floors awaiting carpeting.

The cabinets are in the garage waiting for installation.

It's been raining nearly everyday this week and we have a "moat" in the front of the house, complete with a bridge of wood planks to help cross it.

We actually owe a little bit more money, as the dirt removal and running the water lines was more costly than expected. Oh, well. Much better to have had emergency money built in and pay a little more, than to not, and have several thousand to pay out of pocket.

Perry told Candy at Schumacher Homes about our website showing the house build. She loved it and printed out all 58 pages to show at their production meeting!

Perry found out today that they ARE running fiber (TV, telephone, internet) for our area. It should be up and running fall of this year. We had seen orange conduits here and there in the area and he wistfully wondered if they were fiber lines. So, he's all excited being the computer geek that he is.

Our dishwasher and microwave have arrived and are waiting in the garage for installation.

It looks like the painters have put on the final coat of paint on the trim.

The garage entrance door has been painted.

We dropped off the hall lights and the pendant lights for over the island, as well as the dimmer switches. (These were all added by us at the walk through with the electrician.) Now when the electrician comes back to install the lighting, he'll have everything.

This morning Perry showed me an e-mail he received from Schumacher Homes Graphic Designer. They all apparently loved our website and are interested in using the images and comments for their testimonial section of their website as well as in their advertising! Wow! That's quite a compliment!

No pictures tonight. Cherie took the kids to the parade and took the camera. I had to work late and stopped by the house after supper.

The painters have been busy. The front door is now painted black. The trim is done and I'd say 75% of the walls are painted. It is looking pretty good.

The tile people must have been back as well. I noticed that the floor tile was grouted, and the fireplace tile and bathroom tub tile was in place. Well except for about five tiles around the tub. Not sure what is going on there...they must have ran out. I did see an unopened box of tiles in the basement, but maybe they are different somehow.

They also hung the doors back up.

I finally got a chance to go see the house this week. Things are looking really good.

The front door got another coat of paint and looks great.

The stairway is uncovered, except for the treads. The color is very nice.

They now have the cabinets installed! (Except for one of the island cabinets.)

The only problem is the outlets above and in the cabinets in the kitchen. They appear about a foot too high as if the electrician measured from the ceiling and not realized that they are 9 foot ceilings, not 8 foot. So, I think we're going to have to have them be moved, so that they're less noticeable. It just looks bad as is.

Perry talked to Mike and let him know about the outlets being too high. Mike said he'd have the electrician fix that. He also said he was aware of the missing cabinet and brass hinges. He also said to go ahead and have the rest of our appliances delivered on October 6th, which is when the house should be done, except for final walkthrough and any little things that need to be addressed.

No new work today. Just waiting on things to come in like lights, cabinet....

We visited the house today with Perry's parents. They hadn't seen the progress for over a month, so they were curious to see how things had changed since they last saw it.

We figured out that the electrician put in the outlets per plan, but that the plan measurements for the cabinets were wrong.

Gutters and down spouts went on today.

Perry called Phyllis, our Sears rep for the appliances, and let her know to go ahead and deliver the rest of our appliances on October 6th.

We haven't been inside the house for a week. A few things have happened since then. Our missing island cabinet is there waiting for installation, our lights that were purchased with the house are sitting in the garage waiting for the electrians and the tile surround for the master tub is finished off. The garage was also cleaned up.

As we were leaving we met the FedEx truck with a delivery for us. It turns out that it was part of our cabinets. When Perry called Mike to let him know that there was a delivery, Mike said he was wondering why they had shipped it separately and was planning to call on Monday to find out where it was. Luckily, we happened to be there at just the right time. Mike also let us know that this next week there should be lots of activity going on. The concrete should be poured on Monday, the electricians will be back and the countertop guys will be in to measure.