It's raining relatives

The Seattle cousins have come to town, and they’ve brought the rain with them. That didn’t stop anybody from having fun, though.

First we went to the pool and swam in the rain. Then we just played in the rain.

This is what happens in our neighborhood when it rains a lot.












Mitchell’s first words to Sebastian: You’re tall. I hate you. Mitchell is a year older, but a foot shorter than Sebastian. Except for that, there is definitely a family resemblance.













There was some ganging up on Sebastian by the girls, but he got them back.




















Isn't this a nice picture of Mercedes... except for Sebastian's foot?

Reunioning

I'm trying out the new blogger picture feature with a shot from the reunion.

Wow, that was easy! Expect more pictures.

Reunion, Reality and Relief

Last night was my 20th reunion, but since Brad graduated a year before I did, he knew lots of people. We had a super time catching up with folks that we didn't even remember that we'd forgotten. I also was lucky to see a lot of friends that I've kept close in mind over the years. The best part was being there with Brad.

Lynn, Marie, Tom, Jill, Charlie W., Brent, John T., and Leslie- we missed you. Everybody else who came- Gosh it was great to see you all!

Today we drove by the dirt and stopped in the sales center to see the model homes again. The 7-9 month time frame is a bit optimistic, we think. This is going to take more like 9-12 months. This is really okay because I’ll have a job after December and it will give us a chance to build up the savings account even more before we have to start making the big mortgage payments.

Brad’s getting handy. Although he can build you a worldwide network and data center or cater your wedding, he’s not as skilled with handy man stuff around the house. All that is going to change, because now he is collecting tools. Bob Villa- move over!

Oh, and just the other day we were driving out to see the dirt and our children actually got a bit excited about the house. They passed around a floor plan and drew in the furniture placement for their rooms. I played it cool and did not show my amazement, but secretly I was thrilled to see them imagine the future a little bit.

The cabinets

Of course we disagree about the cabinets. I want a white kitchen with black counter tops because I think the combination will work as a neutral for any color palette so that we’ll have the flexibility to change the look of the family room/kitchen in the future.

White and black choice 

Brad likes a darker wood look. He thinks that the white will show dirt too easily and that the wood is more beautiful. We do agree on the style of cabinet. We both like simple rather than ornate.

We both like 
There are three beginning decisions for cabinets: door style, wood type and finish. It only took about an hour in Lowe’s to come to an agreement: simple doors, maple or cherry, dark finish. We are going with the dark cabinets because I like them, too. If I get tired of them later on, we can always paint, but we cannot go from white or ivory laminate to wood.

The floor was surprisingly easy. It must be able to handle wet children because of our future pool. Tile would be the most logical, although slippery choice, but we both like a light laminate that looks like hardwood. Durable enough for a pool house, but pretty. If we can’t afford it at the design center, we’ll have to choose something else and wait until it wears out, then replace it with laminate.

The master bathroom gets some upgrades, too, but those will have to wait until we get there. We go to the design center and we have two hours to make all of our choices. Unfortunately, we don't have any prices beforehand, and almost everything is based on price. So, we are setting priorities and I'm basically obsessing while Brad tries to look interested.

To move or not to move

A house in our neighborhood went up for sale last Thursday and sold over the weekend for their asking price. This has set off a bit of a frenzy for us. Should we jump on the bandwagon and try to sell now or wait until the roof goes on the new house to put this house on the market? It is so tempting to try to sell now. We could rent the house that is right next door to our lot and literally watch the house being built.

BUT, we’ve decided to sit tight instead. Moving twice is expensive and twice as difficult. Bishop needs to finish high school here and I’m interning at a school that is 10 minutes away. We have plenty of work at this house to keep us busy until it is time to sell, and even if it does not sell, we can still buy the new house. Like I always say, patience is a virtue. Unfortunately, patience is not one of our strengths.

We had a nice picnic for Father's Day this past weekend. My children were kind enough to pose for a photo.

Happy Father's Day! 

Conflicting experiences

I should have known that everybody in the family would not be as excited as I'd hoped when we went to see the model home. I thought that they might imagine what our house will eventually be like, but instead they bickered over rooms. “Why does he get the biggest room? Why can’t I have the room closest to yours? Why do I have to share a bathroom?” Oy.

This is an important lesson for us. Not everybody in the family is going share the same level of excitement. Mitchell said something that made sense to me. He said that moving is so far off that he just doesn’t want to think about it yet. We’re going to have to save our excitement for the final reveal.

The next step is to begin to choose cabinets, counter tops and flooring. We will go to the design center in about a month. They’ve sent a list of choices, but there are no pictures or prices. Since the family room and kitchen are so connected, we have to make these decisions all together.

The never ending debate about how much work to put into this house goes on. I am always in favor of doing more, and Brad is always in favor of just knocking a few bucks off the price and letting the new homeowners worry about it. Still, we press on. We are painting as much as possible. There are only six weeks between now and when I start my internship, so even though selling is still several months away, my free time is dwindling.

Dirt update: They’ve framed up the future foundation for the house next door.

Today

This day snuck up on me. There are no decorations in my planner to indicate that this day is special, but it turned out to feel very important. Today I attended my last class for my Bachelor’s degree. I still have to intern in middle school this fall, but I’m all done with coursework.

This morning I ran into my very first UNF professor who just happened to walk by. When I first started I was still a bit uncertain about choosing to become a teacher. She listened to me rant about all my concerns (No Child Left Behind, low pay, disrespect for teachers in society, etc…), and then she assured me that every teacher has frustrations, but that doesn’t keep them from loving their jobs. She was right! After that I relaxed and enjoyed my classes, and now I can’t wait to be a teacher. I’m even thinking about teaching middle school- on purpose!

And since I know that you are all avid readers, I’ll give you a tip: www.bookcloseouts.com. You can get books for less than two dollars. Some are even as low as fifty cents. Now you have no excuse. Read!

I know you must be curious about our new bedroom furniture. Here's a picture, but ours actually looks a few shades darker than this. We've had it for a bit more than a week now, but I am still surprised when I wake up in a room filled with grown-up matching furniture. Just wait until you see it with the duvet cover that I am making...

Next week my goal is to read a book for pleasure (not school), watch 50 home decorating shows and clean, organize, straighten and pack some more. Wait, no, that's my dream. Actually I'll probably spend a lot of time with my very patient children who have been waiting for me to finally finish with school. Have you played Cranium Cadoo? It's a fun game for all ages. If you need a fix, let us know because we'll be playing all week.

Tomorrow: The Itchatucknee.

model home

We had the chance to see a model home that has basically the same downstairs layout as the house that we are building. This model has a loft ceiling in the formal living and dining room combo, but ours will only have ten foot ceiling because the upstairs is different. In our house, the master bedroom is above the living/dining room.

The front door opens up to reveal the stairs. Our stairs will be part banister and part wall to avoid the Poltergeist hallway effect.

the front door 

The formal living and dining room are the only rooms visible from the front door. This means that we have a decent chance of having at least some space that is neat all the time. This is my big dream.

living room 

The formal living and dining room are one big room, and for a long time it will be one big empty room because we have no furniture to put in it.

toward dining room 

This dining room design reminds me of the movie Beetlejuice. If you know the movie, look at the shrimp. Notice the cool nook, cut out area behind the table. We hope to have some nice art in that spot someday. We even ordered a light to highlight the wall that will hold the future art. Nobody can say that we are not optimistic.

beetlejuice dining room 

Now you are looking toward the family room. The darker area on the wall is the afore mentioned cut out/nook/future art spot. When you walk through that doorway, the kitchen is on the left and the family room is on the right. In our house all of this will be reversed, so don’t get used to it.

looking toward family room 

The family room looks out the large, sliding glass doors onto the patio. I’m worried about our leather sectional sofa fitting into the room, but Brad assures me that it will fit just fine. He could be right.

family room 

The dining nook has a bay window overlooking the back patio. It is filled with fancy furniture in this picture, but we’ll probably have an oval table with six chairs.

dining nook 

This is the kitchen. It is not as big as we would have liked, but it does have a generous pantry in the corner. The door on the right is the door to the garage, and the other one is the pantry. The island will have a raised back that will block the view of the sink from the family room.

kitchen 

If you continue to the left through the kitchen you’ll find, on the right, the pool door that leads outside to the patio; on the left, Mitchell’s future room; and straight ahead, the downstairs bathroom.

downstairs bathroom 


You are standing between the kitchen and the dining nook looking out over the family room in this view. Brad is walking toward the formal living/dining room.

from kitchen to family room 

Our back of the house will have a full porch that runs from end to end. After listening to the neighbors describe the yellow flies that populate the woods behind the house, we are seriously thinking about some screen.

back of house 

the neighborhood

Tonight we met our first neighbors. They were very nice and confirmed that there would be no houses behind our lot because we back up to a nature reserve area in the other development. As long as the other development doesn't put up a fence, then we should have a nice view of lots of trees. Good thing, because we paid a $5000.00 lot premium for that view.

The nice neighbors also told us that their house was somewhat delayed by the hurricaines last year. The storms around here were not the problem, it was the increased need for lumber in all the other areas that pushed back construction. So, this needs to be a quiet hurricaine year. Did you hear that Bret, Cindy, Dennis, Emily, Franklin, Gert, Harvey, Irene, Jose, Katrina, Lee, Marina and Nate? Stay away!

This picture shows the house across the street. I think it is a nice looking house. We picked our house color in less than five minutes. I just eliminated what I didn't want: grey, green, light anything, etc... and chose from the few left over. Really, we should let our neighbors choose our colors and we should pick their's. We are not going to sit in the yard and look at our house, but we'll be looking out the windows all the time and we'll see their houses. By the way, that house is for sale if you'd like to be our neighbors.

 
This is the other house across the street. It looks grey, but it is really more green in color. The woods behind those houses also stay. Trees all around!

 
This is the view up the street. You can walk across the street, get on the sidewalk and it takes you all the way around to the neighborhood pool. The pool is not yet finished, but we like to drive by it all the time anyway.

 
Okay, maybe we WILL sit in the yard and look at our house. Luckily, we picked a nice color.

Front Entry

The banister has set us behind a few weeks. For some reason, a banister is a special request on our model. This picture shows a staircase that is similar to ours, but in our house, the wall to the left of the stairs will be a full wall, which will make the stairs seem dark and long. Instead, we want to put in ten feet of banister to break up the wall and open up the stairs. Also, it is the first thing you’ll see when you walk in the door. At $240 per foot, the banister won't be cheap, but as we’ve discovered, not much is cheap about this process.


stairs 

We want our door to be a fancy, glass model that will let in a lot of light and create a beautiful entry. One of our "deal breaker" requirements for this house is that there be a nice view (of the inside) from the front door so that somebody can step inside and see order rather than the usual chaos. If we like you enough, we'll invite you to the back of the house to see the squalor.

model close to ours

visiting the dirt

Building a house is like being pregnant without a due date. Sure we know that eventually there will be something tangible for us to see, but for now we can only drive out and visit our dirt.


dirt

dumpster on our lot 


We’re already living in this house in our minds- “we” meaning the parents in the family. The kids have their own visions as well:

Mitchell wants black walls.
Olivia wants to make her bed into trees to match a jungle theme.
Charlie wants to bring in sand for his ocean/beach theme.
Bishop wants a hammock in his room.

Our idea to paint one wall a color of their choice (not black!), make window treatments, put up matching posters and bed spreads does not excite them. Perhaps they have an even bigger vision that we- one that is not clouded by resale value and cleanliness issues.

I think that this negotiation goes deeper than just paint color choices. They want to know how much our family will change if we all have our own spaces. Will we still be the same parents? How much will the rules change if we are not just a few feet away from each other? Will there be too much freedom or not enough? They’ll just have to trust us about that.

In some sense, I suppose it is our job to provide the walls and their job to decorate them in their own individual ways, but just not with black paint!

next door neighbors survey lines 

our back view of trees