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New Home Update

07/25/2012

Last week our family was out of town. While we were gone, the framing of our home started. We got these pictures from our friend/neighbor Jeremy:

From the street:

Back of the house (flat roof part is my office/laundry room):

After we got home on Sunday I took these:

Courtyard to the front door (approx where the step ladder is):

Great room (from the dining room, view of the kitchen and living room):

Great room (from the living room, view of the kitchen and dining room)

There will be a corner window in the master looking right out at this beautiful crepe myrtle tree that started blooming last week:

Next week I should have another update of the finished framing. I love this progress. So exciting!

2 Comments | Art, Art: mid-century design, Art: modern design, Art: new home build | Tagged: construction, framing, house, new home build | Permalink
Posted by mahlbrandt

In my previous home update the concrete block foundation was done and they workers were just starting on the front wall and fireplace. Now both of those are done, too. We had a couple of hiccups. The fireplace was about 1/3 of the way up before some errors were discovered and they had to knock it down and start over. There was also a spot of foundation near the garage entrance that needed to be redone. No big deal in retrospect but it caused a bit of stress between our (Jason’s) discovery of the issues and getting both places fixed. Here are some pictures of dirt and concrete blocks, in progress:

This cutie pie strolls down with us to check out the house sometimes. She was so adorable with her pink frilly skirt and flushed cheeks, that I couldn’t help doing a mini photo session.

A couple days later we went back to check out the finished concrete block. Jason and Precious are standing in the garage.

It may not look like much yet but when I see these pictures, I see the office and laundry room…

the courtyard and front door…

the kitchen and dining room…

the living room…

the master bedroom, bathroom and closet…

the kids rooms, bathroom and den…

When Jason and I see the front wall and fireplace, we can envision the whole house built around them.

But, I can imagine it looks pretty strange to someone who doesn’t have the finished house design in mind.

A neighbor we haven’t met stopped by the other day and asked our site supervisor what we’re building.

“A house,” Scott answered.

“What’s that wall for?” the neighbor asked.

“It’s part of the house!”

And that was that.

1 Comment | Art, Art: mid-century design, Art: modern design, Art: new home build | Tagged: chimney, concrete block, construction, fireplace, foundation, house, mid-century, modern, new home build, wall | Permalink
Posted by mahlbrandt

New Home Update

07/03/2012

On Thursday the work on our concrete block foundation, front wall and fireplace began. And it was HOT. In Nashville we hit a record temperature of 109 on Friday. The block workers busted their butts for us and we’re grateful! Turns out half the crew was Salvadorian which is kind of cool because Precious is half Salvadorian, too. Jason took all these pictures while I was working during the day:

It look me forever to figure out the direction of this picture. The corner coming at you is the my office/laundry room/mudroom. Beyond that is the garage.

The beginning of our wood burning fireplace. Woo hoo!

Jason said when the guys take a lunch break, they lie down in the shade and take a nap. Apparently they also eat tamales:

I took the pictures below in the evening, when it had cooled down to approximately 95 degrees. You’ve probably noticed our concrete block is straight stacked in a modern, art-deco style. That was our architect’s idea. We like the grid pattern it creates.

The concrete block will be exposed inside part of the house…in the dining room, the den/playroom/4th bedroom, a tad in the nursery (I think) and the fireplace.

The left side of the picture is the corner of our garage and the right side of the picture is the wall of our courtyard which will lead up to the front door. That front wall is going to get a lot higher.

Here’s the garage. We’ve never had a garage before so we’re pretty excited about keeping our cars out of the heat and rain, as well has having lots of storage space. Those two openings are for access into the crawlspace under the house. That pile of dirt back there will be filled in around the house so less of the foundation is visible.

It’s dirty, dusty, dry and hot—but it’s our home!

2 Comments | Art, Art: modern design, Art: new home build | Tagged: construction, house, new home build | Permalink
Posted by mahlbrandt

New Home Update

06/25/2012

Last week the ground was dug and leveled for our new home and the concrete was poured for the footers (the base that the foundation blocks will sit on). I had to get a phone replacement and I lost a few pictures so almost all of these are from Jason’s phone. I took this one of Precious. We take walks down to the new house several times a day.

There was a lot of junk buried from the previous house. I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it before but the house that was originally on this lot had a fire and was demolished. According to the city codes, they’re not supposed to do this…ahem…although, our contractors and the footer guys didn’t seem terribly surprised. It’s not usable as fill dirt so most of it had to be hauled away.

After the ground is leveled, they did trenches for the concrete. There is a trench for every load-bearing wall as well as some square pits for support pillars. Our house will have a crawlspace, not a basement, in case you’re wondering why its so shallow. Our ground is very rocky in Tennessee so basements are not very common. (Unless it’s a hillside property, blasting is usually required to get deep enough into the rock for a basement. $$$) We considered doing a slab instead of a crawlspace. I’m happy to explain why we decided on crawlspace if anyone really cares. Otherwise, I’ll spare ya the details.

Once the trenches are finished, rebar is set in place for the concrete. I learned the difference between concrete and cement last week, in case anyone else is interested. Quick answer: cement is an ingredient of concrete.

Speaking of, here comes the concrete truck! On my birthday. Biggest and most expensive birthday present I’ve ever received!

It was about 95 degrees out that day.

This was taken after the first truck load. It took about 2.5 truckloads of concrete all together. Later on in the building process the concrete truck will be back to do our garage and back patio.

On Thursday the concrete blocks were delivered.

This week, that block should be going into place around the foundation and the front of the house. It’s so exciting!

1 Comment | Art, Art: modern design, Art: new home build | Tagged: concrete, construction, footers, foundation, new home build | Permalink
Posted by mahlbrandt

New Home Update

06/19/2012

Last Wednesday, the surveyor came out to mark the four corners of our property and to plot out where our house will be situated on the lot. We were pleasantly surprised to find out that our property is even larger than it appears, especially because one of the side fences is about 10 feet inside the property line; not right on the line as we (and our neighbor) had assumed. Thankfully, our neighbor is not upset. We’ve met several of our neighbors already and I’m really thankful we seem to be surrounded by great people. Jason took all these photos of the surveying.

On Thursday we broke ground! It was a wonderful anniversary present.

Things are moving quickly so I’ll have one or two updates a week on the house build. Today is my birthday and we’re hopefully getting a delivery of concrete for our footers. We might even get a delivery of concrete block for the foundation and front wall.

1 Comment | Art, Art: modern design, Art: new home build | Tagged: ground breaking, new home build, property, survey | Permalink
Posted by mahlbrandt

New Home Update

06/14/2012

On Monday, we closed on construction loan. YAAAAAAAYYYY! I’ve never been more excited for a loan closing, probably because we’ve been waiting months and months for this. Kudos to local Wilson Bank for working things out for us and being super awesome so far. Now we can break ground. Woohoo!

Jason and I stopped by the property the other day. It’s hard to not walk around and dream about our new home. I can’t wait to start seeing progress! (SIDENOTE: Today is our NINTH wedding anniversary! Happy Anniversary, Jason. I love you!)

While we were piddling around at Home Depot the other day, we spotted programmable light switches. This one made by GE is only $19.97; a better deal than I found last week. We got one for the front lights at my parents house so we’ll get to test it out and see if we’d like to have one or two at our new home.

While we were there, we also looked at some paint swatches. These are all just ideas. Most are Martha Stewart Living and a few are Behr. Sherwin Williams colors are my favorite so we’ll probably get colors from there (plus there is a store right down the street from us) but anyway… top left: kids room; top center: Jason’s studio (which is going to look like a cave…); top and bottom right: my office/laundry room; bottom left: baby’s room. Precious wouldn’t stop eating the paint chip for Behr Raspberry Lemonade (fourth from the left on the bottom) so I’m pretty sure that’s her vote.

1 Comment | Art, Art: interior design, Art: new home build, Family, Family: Jason | Tagged: anniversary, new home build | Permalink
Posted by mahlbrandt

Programmable Timer Light Switch

06/11/2012

While we’re waiting to break ground, I’ve been pouring over the plans for our new house hunting for anything productive we can do now. I’ve even studied the electrical schematic, looking at where light switches will be placed for which lights.

Our last house was lit at night by a spotlight kit we got at the local big box store. It came with a timer box, which eventually broke and we just put a regular programmable timer between the outlet and the plug for the lighting system. We had the lights automatically come on at dusk and shut off in the early morning hours (around 4am, usually). In the winter when it got dark at 5:30, it was so nice to arrive home from work to a lit up house. It increased our home security also, since anyone snooping around our house would have been hit with spotlights, making it difficult to be unnoticed by our close neighbors. When I saw the light plan for our new house and the marker for a light switch by the front door that operates the front under-eaves down lights, I had an idea. Surely, someone makes a programmable light switch; one that can be set to flip on and off at set times everyday.

Good old Amazon.com! Seems like I can find almost anything on there! I have two of these Honeywell 7-Day Programmable Timer Switches ($28.75 with free shipping)on my wish list for our new house—one for the front lights and one for the back lights. It can have a different program for everyday of the week. It fits a standard light switch box with a standard face plate (same size as a GFCI outlet, I think) and it comes in white. Perfect!

1 Comment | Art, Art: modern design, Art: new home build | Tagged: electricity, lighting, new home build, programmable light switch | Permalink
Posted by mahlbrandt

New Home: Kids Room Plan

05/23/2012

At our last house, I designed a combined nursery and kids room as we were becoming foster parents. It had to be suited for 1 or 2 kids, either gender, newborn up to age 5…all within a 10×11 bedroom. In our new house, we’ll have a nursery for Precious and another bedroom that’s set up for our future foster kids. I’m not really sure what parameters we’ll set next time around so I’m planning this room for 1 or 2 kids, boys or girls, ages 2-12. The room is approximately 10×12. We already own the bed, dresser, curtain, book ledges, owl, sheets and chair. The rest would be new purchases.

Sources

1. Sherwin WIlliams Mélange Green – accent wall color

2. Sherwin Williams Greek Villa – other three walls

3. IKEA VANDRING RÄV duvet cover and pillow case $20

4. Woodland shower curtain from Target Home (as window curtain) – no longer available

5. Owl wall art – vintage

6. Dresser – vintage

7. IKEA VANDRING RÄV Soft toy, set of 2 $8

8. Jimco orange lamp with drum shade from Lowes $40

9. IKEA KURA reversible loft bed $199

10. IKEA RIBBA picture ledges (to use as book ledges), x2, $10 each

11. Target Home 325 Thread Count Wrinkle Free Sheet Set – Blue Diamond $28

12. Chair – vintage

13. IKEA RINGUM 2′ round rug in green, x3, $10

Floor Plan (to scale)

2 Comments | Art, Art: interior design, Art: new home build, Art: new home kids room, Family, Family: Foster Parenting | Tagged: bedroom, foster parenting, inspiration, interior design, kids, kids room, mood board, new home build, new house, precious, room plan | Permalink
Posted by mahlbrandt

New Home: Nursery Plan

05/16/2012

At our last house, I designed a combined nursery and kids room as we were becoming foster parents. It had to be suited for 1 or 2 kids, either gender, newborn up to age 5…all within a 10×11 bedroom. In our new house, we’ll have TWO bedrooms for set up for kids. Hooray! (And another bedroom that we’ll set up as a den/playroom for now.) Here’s my plan for the nursery, which will be for our daughter. She will be about 1.5 when we move in. The room is approximately 10×11 (not including the doorway). The only new purchase for us in this room will be the curtains.

Sources

1. Sherwin WIlliams Rosebay – accent wall color

2. Sherwin Williams Greek Villa – other three walls

3. Petit Collage Animal ABC – Basic $40

4. IKEA BARBRO curtains $15

5. Lamp – vintage, thrifted

6. Dresser – vintage (changing table height)

7. Mr. French Poster Pop-Tone Monkey $30

8. Mobile – handmade by me

9. IKEA SOMNAT crib – no longer available

10. IKEA RIBBA picture ledges (to use as book ledges), x2, $10 each

11. IKEA GOSSIG SPANIEL – no longer available

12. Braxton Studio Letterio White Cradle Chair $80-120

13. IKEA TOFTBO bathmat (x4, taped together, MACHINE WASHABLE!) – no longer available in this color $13

14. Nightstand – vintage, refinished by me

Floor Plan (to scale)

1 Comment | Art, Art: interior design, Art: new home build, Art: new home nursery | Tagged: bedroom, inspiration, interior design, kids, mood board, new home build, new house, nursery, precious, room plan | Permalink
Posted by mahlbrandt

Light Ideas

04/11/2012

This whole home building process is taking a loooooong time. We’re still waiting on bids from the general contractors (hopefully we’ll get numbers this week) and the banker just told us the approval process (checking references of the GC we chose, approving our construction loan, appraising the house based on plans, etc.) could take another month. Ugh! We just wanted to get started with the building already.

I’m trying to make good use of this waiting time by researching interior fixings for the house and making some decisions about things like paint colors, materials, appliances, etc. So I’ve been looking at lights lately. Here are some that I’m dreaming about…