Random pieces from today….

Another big day at “the ranch” with lighting and plumbing going in. Loads of painting going on also.

One thing that Mike did that made a HUGE difference was to remove the iron fence that was outside the main windows overlooking the rear yard. Here is the gate in it’s new location.

Now if feels much more spacious!

He started working on the faux wood beams for the Great Room and did a mock up of the size. The stain will be darker.

Lighting was really getting going today too! Ceiling fans were also installed.

These pendants are the ones we will use for our island

 

Yes, the master bedroom has a gold ceiling.

Be sure to put your sunglasses on to see the laundry room! It is a bright coral color. I think it will look great when the lighting and table are in place.

(I don’t know why spots are showing up on my camera lens sometimes!) It is a solid color, I promise.

Bob painted miles of crown molding today!

Ben’s Gray bedroom. The trim is painted a darker gray now and I will get a better picture tomorrow!

I was super excited to see the faucets going in place. This faucet is the Delta Touch 20 where you can touch it anywhere on the handle or spout to make the water stop or start!

Tomorrow the cabinet folks come and will put the doors and drawers and make it really look like a kitchen! The electricians will continue to install light fixtures and the appliances too.

Counting the days now!

Painting and Mantel Installation

The painting has begun! We love the Balanced Beige color from Sherwin Williams and it turned out just perfect!

The ceiling and walls will be painted the same color. In a couple of days the decorative faux beams will be installed on the ceiling.  The beams will be stained the same color as the floors.

This afternoon I stopped by and got my first look at the mantel! It is perfect! Awesome! Great in proportion to the room and the fireplace. It just feels “right.”

You can even see the special grooves that John put in it for us to give it that old world scraped look.

The stone will be installed beginning on Monday. What an amazing sight that will be! Remember the stone? It looks like this:

We are still working on the hearth stone.

16 days until we move: Mantel delivered and modified

The fireplace mantel and corbels were delivered and John did a wonderful job! He did some tweaking on site too so that the electrical box can be inserted in the middle of the top of the mantel.

John uses chemicals to stain the wood. He showed me an example of the crazy color that was used on our mantel. It oxides the wood and starts out as a reddish pomegranate color then turns brown in 5 minutes.

Here we are looking at the placement on the fireplace. We decided the corbels were too long, so John took them back to his shop so he could use his band saw to remove the bottom portion.

We also found out that the stone is not a 4 inch depth. This impacts the design in a couple of ways. The electrical boxes on the side stick out too far, the overall size of the fireplace will now be 4 inches narrower than planned, and the mantel is more wide than anticipated. I think we can fix the electrical outlet boxes and live with the width of the mantel.

We worked with Brian at Old American Lumber.  He worked so hard to find exactly what I wanted and really was easy to work with. He responded quickly to my questions and emails.  You can call Brian at:

Old American Lumber

864-427-3193

864-541-8111

1218 S Duncan Bypass

Union, SC 29379

They have gorgeous reclaimed wood from old barns and NC mills that can be used for ceilings and floors. Be sure to look at the gallery on his website for some wonderful inspiration pictures!

38 days until we move

I have been interviewing moving companies. What a wide range of pricing! Hopefully, this move will be less painful than the last. Of course, we all hope that don’t we?

I saw a neat article that talks about the housing trends of the future – 2015 to be exact!  The interesting thing is that we are incorporating many of the ideas that are in the article:

• A combined great room that includes kitchen, family room, and eating area
• No formal dining room
• Green concepts
• Larger laundry room

You can read the article here:  A Look Ahead