Today was completely cold and rainy for most of the day, so I expected to see no progress. When I swung by the lot before picking up Hudson, however, I was greeted by my finished foundation walls, sans molds! Look how high the floor level will be... I know they'll be grading the land, so I'm sure it will all make a lot more sense, especially when there's grass and a driveway and stuff. But when it's bare it seems quite high... Probably important for water runoff, etc. to keep the foundation dry in the long run.

Welcome to my front porch!

A straight-on shot of the back of the house.

Step inside my walk-out basement!

You can see the cement 'beams' on the ground (yes, I looked up the technical term on a construction website) where the interior walls for the stairwell will be.

Taken while standing in the area where the sump pump, hot water heater, etc. will be.

progress

We had two days of really great weather and I was excited to find the molds all set up and filled with concrete onTuesday!

Stonehenge

So day 3 of excavation wasn't too exciting, looks like they just did some marking with spray paint... I'm sure they were more productive than than (perhaps there was much leveling and surveying involved??), but to my unknowing eye it looked prettymuch the same as Day 2.

Today, however (Day 4 of building - not counting weekends), I pulled up to this! It was a Stonehenge of foundation molds! And they'd poured some lines of concrete that kind of outlined the permiter of the basement and garage... I assume to act as a foundation for the walls as they set up the molds and pour the concrete in (pure speculation here...).

Broken Ground, day 2

Though I doubt I'll be able to hold myself back from visiting 'the lot' very, very often, I hope I can eventually contain my excitement... for now, though, here is the progress made on the 2nd day of excavation!

View from the curb:Another vantage point... is that as deep as it gets?

Our hill, dug into...Climbing the dirt... we had a Rocky moment: King of the mountain:

See that little speck of orange in the middle of the trees?

Three words: Playground. Hudson. Runaway. "Mommy, look at this big dirt!"

Our boots after climbing around on the muddy mudslide (a Dora/Diego reference):

BROKEN GROUND!!

Woo hoo!!!!! Finally!

It's some weird form of torture, I think, that they make you sign your purchase agreement so far in advance of when they will actually start work on the house. Seriously, I reserved my lot in October, signed the purchase agreement in November... now it's February and they're just getting started. Hudson and I arrived to see this:

It doesn't look like much, I realize, but I take comfort in the fact that they've at least gotten a leg up... one small drop in the bucket. And to Hudson's delight, a guy pulled up with a flat-bed semi trailer with a DIGGER on the back (that probably has a more technical name...? In our family, it's a digger. A Yellow Digger, specifically). He watched with rapt attention as the 'guy' climbed out of the semi, hopped up on the digger, backed it off the trailer, and parked it in the dirt/mud next to our lot. I think he truly understands what the heck mommy is talking about now, when I say, "oh yes, Hudson, they are going to dig a big hole in the dirt on our lot, and that's where our basement will be, and then they will build walls, then put on a roof, and it will be our HOUSE." He repeats it faithfully, but until now, I was a bit unsure of the comprehension. Actually seeing the digger poised and ready has made all the difference.

Also, I'm no foreman (not Foreman, but foreman, know what I mean? tee hee), but I assume those shallow trench-like things are to make it easier for the little digger to get in there and start hauling away the dirt, line by line. That's what I like to envision, anyway.

On a different note, I was perusing a blog I enjoy called the Nesting Place, and she had the perfect example of the Dining table ambiance I was looking for. Makes me feel like whatever I decide for lighting above the table will be a definite improvement. Look how cute the chandeliers are:

laundry room

This whole stimulus package thing got me thinking... It could potentially provide a nice tax credit for homebuyers in 2009. While I likely won't be able to collect the whole thing, it will be a little added money to what I expected to have. Which got me thinking about what I would do with some extra funds.

• fence - this is a big one, potentially life-changing for someone like me, who is the mother of someone like Hudson. Just knowing that playground is blocks away will cause him to be gone in a flash every chance he gets. Containment is key. We could really use a backyard fence.
• deck stairs - the deck I've chosen for the back of the house won't have stairs to the ground. Hearthstone was trying to charge an extra $2000 for them, and I felt pretty confident I could have them built for less than that.
• crown molding - something I'd really love to have - it adds so much character!
• flat-screen - my living room is pretty small. to save space, it'd be pretty sweet to have a wall-mounted tv, instead of my big (WIDE) 27-incher sticking out.

One option that's really intriguing me is putting cabinets in the laundry room. I'd like the extra storage space, and a prettier place to do laundry wouldn't hurt. Ikea has some (relatively) inexpensive kitchen cabinetry that I could install (myself?). More importantly, they have a really cool design program that allows you to plan your space. There are tons of cute options, but my fav is the bead-board looking cabs in white. So cute! There are tons and tons of options for base cabinets, tall pantry-like cabinets, wall cabinets, drawers, shelves, doors, any combo you can think of. Here is what I've been messing around with. The laundry room is about 6x8 feet...

What's really cool is that they have a TON of accessory-type stuff to make your cabinets really work for you. Like this ironing-board-in-a-drawer. How perfect would that be?! Also, the laundry-sorting bins that would fit underneath the drawers to hide away all that to-do work (so I could procrastinate just that much longer by not having to look at it...).

lighting details...

I'm thinking I might want to switch out the ligh fixture in the 'breakfast nook' (nook? um, I know I won't have an actual dining ROOM, but does that mean it can't graduate from breakfast to an all-meal eating area? Regardless, it will be where my only dining table will be). I paid to have all my lighting fixtures done in oil-rubbed bronze, but the one above the table seems a bit blah to me. I think it'd give the area a lot more ambiance to put in a cute rustic-y candleabra chandelier type thing. A simple one, but enough to have character...

Here is what it comes with, except imagine a darker finish (as opposed to the satin nickel)...

Here's some inspiration... what I'm not sure of is how big a fixture would be appropriate for the space. The one it comes with is just a smallish glass bowl thing, so I would lean toward the smallest 3-shade one, but maybe that's not dramatic enough for me.

HGTV has a formula for determining how large a chandelier should be - based first on the room dimension and then on the table dimensions. I don't know how big my table is (it's been banished to the garage until the house is done) - relatively small I think... and the 'room' is really one long(ish) combo of kitchen, dining/breakfast'nook'/living room. I can tell you it's 11'6" wide (i.e., from the patio door to the garage door).

I know photos are great, but the plain chandelier on a white background doesn't give the best mental imaging, so to push it even further, here is some quick and dirty photoshopping. Keep in mind I have no idea if these are true to scale! Hmmm... something to think about, anyway.

Mom didn't like the fake white candles... here's one with black.