Drywall Tape

Taping the drywall and kerfing the windows. Kerfing the windows is when a slot is carved into the window trim (must specify when ordering windows) and the drywall corner trim piece runs directly into window. This means the windows don't need extra wood trim moulding.

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the garage- wood rectangle on ceiling is a pull down door with ladder for access to storage space over garage

window kerf detail before texture

kitchen/dining area

living room

more detail of window corner and edge

same window from further back

main hallway

ceiling skylight and air vent

master bedroom

view from Thomas's closet to Houston's bedroom at the end

Comparisons

Here's the original house drawing from the online house plan that I ordered with my modified drawing, and the actual house so far.

Home Sweet Home So Far

 

Time Lapse

June 6, 2013- November 21, 2013

Some Stuff I've Bought

Some of the appliances and things I've bought for the new house.

The boys' bathroom was running short for cabinets because of the required distance from the toilet to the cabinet so I decided on a fun commercial type sink by Kohler called the Brockway. I purchased the 4 foot version with two Chicago Faucets that are similar to the Kohler faucets below but are polished vs. the brushed finish seen in the sink below. Some people paint the bottom of the sink but it comes in black. I ordered mine from build.com and am very happy with their customer service.

Chicago Faucet from Build.com

Some examples of the sink installed in homes:

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The stove I chose is the 36" Wolf Duel Fuel. I purchased it at Spencer's Appliance.

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The range hood is by Proline and is the 36" Pro V

 with a stainless full size chimney

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 The refrigerator is by Marvel an Aga company, the pro 42. It's 42" long, stainless interior with glass door on refrigerator side.

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 a Thermador dishwasher

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Built in microwave by Summit will go in the island cabinets

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and a beverage fridge

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Drawings of kitchen cabinets by my cabinet maker. the only upper cabinet is to the right of the fridge. I don't really like upper cabinets and I made all the wall space in the kitchen windows right down to the counter-top. The perimeter cabinets will be white shaker style with black granite and the island will be dark espresso cabinets with a light granite or marble top.

That Ikea Kitchen Planner Was Awesome!

When I was planning the design of the house, I used the Ikea kitchen planner to get an idea of how the rooms would look. Windows, floors, room dimensions, can all be customized. So far I think that my house is looking almost exactly how I set it up in the Ikea kitchen planner except for the beams at the ceiling which I added to the real house as an after-thought. This is a great tool for anyone wanting a 3D picture of a room layout. It's free and so easy to use!

 before

 after

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before

after

I also used the photo editor to help decide if I wanted the beams and what size and color beams would look good in the room.

 photo of the room

added brown lines using PicMonkey photo editor

 

 actual beams going up- i think i got pretty close

Pool Tiles

I'm not very good at imagining how something will look so I use a photo editor a lot to create an image of design ideas I have. Here is an example of how I used a photo editor to see how the pool tile will look. I could take it a step further and superimpose the tile images onto my pool, but I think this might be enough for me to get an idea of what I like and don't like.

some tile samples in the pool

The pool tile company (NPT Pool) has a website that shows how one tile will look in a pool, but it doesn't allow you to mix two different tiles. So I used a photo editor to mix and match the tiles to get an idea if it will look OK or terrible. I'm still not sure what my choice is, but here's an idea of some tile layouts.