MOVING IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION

We're thrilled to share that our newest home construction project has reached an exciting stage, with framing now in progress. This crucial step lays the groundwork for the home's design and structure, bringing us one step closer to realizing this beautiful vision.  

Since my last report, we have been doing a lot of work behind the scenes, sourcing tile, roofing and siding material, dreaming up landscape ideas and mostly, managing the budget!  Just yesterday, I met onsite with my project manager, my landscape architect and interior designer.  What a fun day.  It's all feeling real now that we can walk around in most of the spaces, see their potential and in some cases, the limitations so we can get real about the other elements that we need to select to make it our home.  

After, what feels like months of back and forth, we have finalized the window order.  We upsized, removed, explored options, repriced and finally landed at a good place.  As seems to be the case with everything we have decided on so far, we were way over the spec budget but it was important to accomplish the look we wanted.  One big decision was the slider in the back of the home.  Who knew the option to open two of the three panels rather than just one and the other two being stationary was a MAJOR UPCHARGE!  Like double the cost.  I hemmed and hawed and really tried to convince myself that the few other options presented would be okay, I just really wanted to have more of an open flow outside.  As this is the only way in and out of the backyard, I wanted it to be welcoming and have an easy flow for entertaining.  This isn't the fully opening Nano door concept but it gets us a little closer to that feel.  So, we are moving on and will hope to find other places we can save in the budget.  

Another recent accomplishment is that we have finalized our stair design. It will be a continuous staircase from the basement to the 3rd floor so it will be really open and a nice flow between levels.  The stair budget we were given was pretty small for what I had originally wanted.  This was an eye opening and humbling process as I had to let go of some of my wish list items.  I wanted floating stairs originally but this was much much more than we wanted to spend.  Then I wanted a continuous oak tread and riser.  Again, a big difference in price vs. doing oak tread and painted risers.  We settled (but I am not feeling like that now as I am excited for what we chose) a thicker oak tread with a painted riser and we modified the ballusters from a basic black to something with a softer, rounded vibe to offset some of the squared edges.  We will have, as some recall, other rounded features like the arched range hood and thinking of a few arched casings to tie the theme together but not go overboard.  I felt like the straight balluster look started to look like a jail cell (and we needed to add one more per tread so it was going to be busy looking and it was going 4 floors up so would be A LOT!).  Also, we will not have the stringer below the stairs so it'll be a much more open air feeling which was important as the spaces are tight.  I am learning that this is important to acknowledge so we can adjust and find extra space wherever we can.  

Next progress point is with the cabinetry.  We did many renditions of the elevations including the kitchen cabinetry and our catch all hallway cabinetry which includes a pantry cabinet, bar and coat catch all closet (including a pull out for the printer!), the basement entertainment wall, laundry room and the bathroom vanities.  Again, there are so many ways to customize these spaces and while I set out to make this a simple process, I started obsessing about limited space and wanted to take the time to think about what I was going to put where and ensure that I hadn't missed anything.  I am not sure that's really possible and ultimately, we will just make space for things I have overlooked but I think we covered most bases.  Where will the air fryer go, is there a space to hide the toaster, can I have a coffee station, where will the extra bottles of shampoo go and most importantly, where will the junk drawer be?  I went through the exercise of listing everything in my kitchen cabinets now and finding a space for it all in the new kitchen.  This was very helpful.  Here's to hoping I don't find a new kitchen appliance to purchase!  I'll have to restrain myself!  Once the kitchen is complete with sheetrock, we will meet with the cabinet maker and finalize the measurements and details.  Will we paint or stain?  Hardware or hidden pulls?  This is what makes a house a home, all of the personal touches.  Fun, fun!  

Next up is finalizing the roof material and the exterior selections.  We are doing a combination of materials including stucco, horizantal siding and some warm, rustic wood elements.  I think it'll make some of the architectural details stand out.  Then on to finalizing tile and plumbing fixtures.  I really want to stay on schedule so there are no delays.  We have done some preliminary shopping trips but have to pull it all together.  Stay tuned.  This is the start of the interior design process that brings me so much joy!  

I'd love to hear from you out there about your process or thoughts or anything else you are interested in knowing about the building and downsizing process.  It's been a learning curve and I am sure there's a lot more to come but we are making progress every day!  

Keep an eye out for more updates as we continue to make great strides forward!