Tag: Construction
Construction Project – Flooring – Part 11
by squiggie on Mar.07, 2009, under Construction
About 3 months ago we started looking for hardwood flooring. We knew we wanted something fairly dark but other than that we didn’t really know what else. We started looking at the usual places, Lowes, Home Depot and some local flooring companies around here. We found some that we really liked but most were pretty expensive and were just out of the budget. We then started looking online. We were pretty comfortable with the idea of ordering them online because we did that in our last house. We bought some engineered Bruce hardwoods from www.iFloor.com and were pleased with the quality, price and looks. The cool thing about them and other flooring web sites is they usually let you order samples at a pretty cheap price so that you can actually see the color and quality. We found some really nice chocolate colored Asian mahogany solid wood floors from www.builddirect.com. We decided to go with these and we are really pleased with the results. They compliment the cabinet color very well. Buying hardwood floors online saved us about $1,000 over what the same hardwoods would have cost locally. Even with a couple hundred dollars for freight, it still ended up saving us a lot.
Also, we had previously picked out tile and knew what kind of tile we wanted. We had previously picked out a color called Truvian Stone from American Florim. We chose the lava color as it had darker tones in it to match the wood. This ended up looking amazing and we really like it. This tile was a little over the budget price, but to offset that, we found some tile at Lowes on clearance that was a neutral color and looked nice. We snatched some boxes of that for less than $1 a sq. ft. and then just installed it downstairs. It still looks really good and offset the price of the truvian stone.
The carpet is one of the last things that will go in so I won’t have pictures of that until next week, but other than that, all the floors are down and we will start installing lighting and fixtures next week. Hopefully we will be in it the week of March 15th barring any unavoidable circumstances.
Also, they got the driveway poured and got some piles of top soil sitting in the yard waiting to be spread. Hopefully this week they will get that spread, the irrigation system installed and the sod and seed down so we can start getting some grass (not that I’m looking forward to mowing it or anything).
Driveway and Entryway
Construction Project – Paint, Trim and Cabinets – Part 10
by squiggie on Mar.05, 2009, under Construction
So this post is more than overdue. The last month has been slammed with things keeping me busy both with the house project and outside for other things. We have made a significant amount of progress on the inside of the house. All the cabinets are in, the painting is done and the trim is laid (all of it that can be).
With the exception of a few color choices, we didn’t really have any hard decisions or choices. We had to alter the stain color 1 time to try and get it as close to the hardwoods as we could but other than that, everything went pretty smooth. Greta picked out all the colors. We didn’t paint too many rooms different colors because for a while we will really only be using a few of them. So we decided to paint the mast bedroom a green color and the office a blue color. Everything else got a nice coat of neutral tan and the doors and trim got shot with white.
As far as the cabinets go, our hardwoods are a chocolate color and although we wanted the cabinet stain to match, we didn’t want it to be an exact match. We thought that would make it to monotone and uniform so we wanted a slight variation. Like any wood, there are always going to be slight variations in the color of the wood as it gets stained. Our cabinets are Alder so they have quite a but of variation in color. We settled on a dark color but not too dark. It is slightly lighter than our hardwoods are, but matches great when the stain picks up the darks in the wood. It looks amazing!
As far as the outside is concerned, all the brick and stone have been put on and it looks great as well. We didn’t do too much with the brick or stone as this is where you can sink a lot of money into the house. The all brick cost alone was pricey, but worth it in the long run. We decided to stick with the standard window outlines and ledges and stone accent the entry way but nothing else. We plan on getting some cedar planters for underneath the windows and cedar shutters to tie into the cedar around the garage doors. I think it looks nice and although we could have done a lot more stone work or more stone accents, I’m happy with the balance of cost and the result.
Exterior
Interior
Construction Project – Sheet Rock and Brick – Part 9
by squiggie on Jan.30, 2009, under Construction
Ok, so I’m posting two posts in the same day, sue me. I’ve got a little behind a little bit over the holiday season and am just now catching up.
Within the last couple weeks the house has started looking more like a home more than ever. They are almost done with the brick as well as completely done with the sheet rock and mud. As we speak, they are working on the trim and cabinets.
There isn’t much to say on the sheet rock other than we decided to round all the sheet rock corners. This is pretty standard now days and looks really nice as compared to your standard square edges. We’re not doing any fancy wall texturing or anything. We are just sticking to the standard spackle and then the knockdown on the ceilings. We felt that texturing ages the house too quick. If you look at houses that have some cool texturing in them from 10 years ago, it doesn’t look so cool now. It actually dates the house. That was just our personal opinion (no offense meant to people that have 10 year old wall texturing in their house).
As far as the brick goes, we aren’t doing a whole lot there either. The whole house is going to be brick with a little stone work around the entry way. There will be some brick ledges under the windows and an outline around the front windows, but other than that, nothing special. We really like the brick color that we choose as it is the same brick that was on the last house my sister and brother-in-law had. It is a deep red with some darker black accents. We also chose to leave it unwashed so that the mortar stays on the bricks a little more and looks a little “sloppy”. I really like this look as it gives the brick texture.
Brick
Looking South
Looking West – The back of the house
Looking North
Hopefully they will finish up the brick this week or next and we will be able to see a completed exterior minus some lighting and finishing touches. Check back as this month will be jam packed with stuff. Hopefully this time next month, I’ll be posting about moving in!!!!!!!
Construction Project – Insulation – Part 8
by squiggie on Jan.30, 2009, under Construction
Well again it has been too long between posts. I can’t believe how hard it is to stay on top of this from week to week. There have been a lot of exciting advancements in the house since the last post. We have since insulated, got all the sheet rock hung, taped and mudded as well the mason’s are vigorously working on getting the brick done.
Insulation
When we started this project, we agreed that we didn’t want to completely blow the budget on stupid things that didn’t matter like extravagant light fixtures or high prices flooring rather if we were going to go over, we wanted it to be on things that would have a payback. These things included any efficiency upgrades in the house appliances and house heating and cooling. Any house that is going to be efficient is going to have a tight wrap and a good insulation r-value. One of the many things that goes into insulating a house is the wall insulation. There are a number of choice to go with here but the most debated right now is whether or not to spend the extra money and get spray foam insulation or the more standard and less expensive fiberglass. The main difference between the two are cost and air dissipation. It is common sense that the way to make an efficient house is to keep the warm air inside in the winter and the cool air out and vice versa in the summer. Air dissipation is the enemy to efficiency. Spray foam tends to eliminate this because it can be sprayed in liquid form to seal all the holes and leaks in walls to the outside. It bonds to the wall and expands in every direction. Fiberglass insulation cannot seal the holes as well as foam can. It just simply doesn’t expand into the crevasses like spray foam will. Now, with that said, you can still achieve the same r-value with fiberglass as with foam, you just have to put more or thicker fiberglass insulation in the walls. There is also a theory that you can make a house too tight and it won’t be able to breath allowing for proper ventilation and circulation. The flip side to this decision is of course cost. You will be spending thousands more to do the entire house in spray foam insulation over traditional fiberglass. With that said, you need to compute your pay back period, or how long it will take you to pay back that extra cost with the saving you will realize in lower utility bills. In the end, the cost was too much for me. Conservative calculations place this payback period somewhere between 15 and 20 years. It would have cost approximately $2500 more to do spray foam insulation than fiberglass in our house. Even with a savings of $20 a month in utilities, which is a pretty high estimate, it would be around 10 years to pay that back. That is a pretty long payback period and ultimately was too much for me. What we did opt to do was insulate the ceiling of the basement. This wasn’t too much more to do and it essentially separates the two levels and slows the dissipation of heat from the bottom level to the top. What that means is more of the heat stays in the basement when it is heating and the furnace doesn’t have to heat the basement near as much. I believe this was a good investment.
So without further delay, here are some pictures of the insulation.
