Insulation finished and inspected.

The insulation has been added throughout the house. They don't necessarily inspect or care about the insulation, they care about the moisture-control plastic that is added over it and under it in some places. There was just one issue with that the plumbers are going to have to come back and fix. Apparently when they were puting the pipes together under the whirlpool bath, they melted some of the plastic UNDER the bathtub. So they have to fix that. Otherwise, we are good to go. So, they have closed off the basement "stairs" area and stuck insulation in all the vents and started the hanging furnace in the basement. They have it at 50 degrees right now to see if that will thaw out the ground so they can pour the basement floor. If that doesn't work, they will turn it up to 70 degrees a day or two before they pour the basement floor. After that, they'll put in the steps. That carpenter will also fix the master bath shower door which ended up too wide. He'll add a little bit to each side to make it big enough, but not too big of a door. Some time next week they'll start delivering sheet rock and then not too far after that, they'll start "rocking the house". What else have we done lately? We had the way the door swings in the laundry room changed to swing out instead of into the room. That way we can open the door and iron things in the doorway because we'll have a hanging ironing board in the room. We think this change will work out perfectly. We have looked at, but have to finalize, a change in height for the countertop in the laundry room. We're making it a little higher so that we can put a pole underneath it that we can hang shirts and things on that can't be dried in the drier. Brilliant! Pictures coming soon.

3-14-09 The parents/grandparents came to visit. Mom said, "I can't find anything wrong with it." :)

All the siding is on. Front and back. The parts that look like they don't have anything are where the brick will go. They are waiting for a few days straight of good weather so they don't have to use any type of winter construction techniques (should save us $100)...the next update will have insulation!

3-9-09 Electrial stuff got put in. We customized a few things and added a few things to make it more functional. The electrician was great.

Even though this blog hasn't been updated in awhile, progress is being made! :)

The siding has been started. It should be finished next week. We met with the electrician. He should complete his work M-W next week.

"Don't panic, Chris." That's what the builder told Chris when she called to ask him why the siding was not the right color. :) It is primed so that it can be painted the right color. That will happen soon enough.

Above is the front door. It is a temporary construction door, but the side panels of the actual door are in. You can see that there is a metal stripe thingy in the glass.

Above is the east side of the garage. My car is in in the background of the picture. It is at the street where the driveway will eventually extend to.

Above is the back of the garage on the left, the kitchen window in the middle, the kitchenette "bay" on the right, and lots of mud on the bottom of the picture.

Above you are looking up at the windows to the second floor computer room.

Above is the back of the house. The picture shows the living room window, the back bedroom windows, and two of the exposed windows from the basement.

Exposures above.

These are the exposures from the inside.

This is the hanging furnace that they need in the basement to get it all set up for puting in the basement floor. That is expected to be done soon.

This is the ladder that Jason climbed down to get to the basement. And climbed back up again! The carpet people are not sure how to calculate carpeting for a ladder so we might have to get stairs eventually.

The tubs are in for the master bath and the upstairs bath.

This is the front of the fireplace. They actually sent the wrong fireplace box so we accidentally got an upgrade to a slightly bigger fireplace. It's about the size that our current one is on Heatherly. Unfortunately, then they installed gas into it. It's supposed to be a wood-burning fireplace so we'll see what happens with that. UPDATE: Since they put in the gas piping already, it isn't going to cost too much more to add a gas loglighter...so we're doing that. This will allow us to have a wood-burning fireplace, but if we don't feel like using kindling to start the fire, we can start it with the gas loglighter. Another accidental upgrade. Yay.

This is the mini-closet in Jack's walk-in closet. The builder and the carpenters realized they could add this extra storage space so it's pretty neat. They just have to get it past the inspectors. They are planning for that.

This is what the arches look like. This one is the arch from the foyer going into the dining room.