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We are making exciting progress inside our home at Maisto Mountain!
The drywall “mudding” has been completed. We had a great finishing crew from Moody Drywall in Muhlenberg County, Ky., who even put up with Sarah’s requests for some extra thick window drywall treatments. Seeing the drywall on the walls did reveal three electrical outlets that needed to be installed, but thankfully, the electrician was able to fix those issues before the drywall mudding was completed. The drywall crew helped Brad get started with the painting by spraying on the ceiling primer in the kitchen, dining room, and great room, which greatly helped Brad meet the timeline to have the kitchen painted in time for cabinet installation. Brad now is in the arduous process of painting the entire home. He doesn’t complain about it, though, and so far, has not ordered any massage therapy. As we write, Brad has the entire first floor primed and just needs to finish the upstairs trimming for the primer.
We spent two weekends choosing our paint colors. We first met with a paint consultant from Porter Paint in Evansville, Ind., on Feb. 5. We showed her samples of our flooring, woodwork, granite, bedspreads, etc. We learned that most people these days choose a base neutral “color” for their walls that goes with all the key components of their base decorating colors. We learned that we are people who prefer cooler colors (grays, whites, blacks, etc.) vs. warm colors (tans, yellows, golds, off whites). We also learned that is not very common, especially in the area where the consultant works. It explained a lot about why we often had to work so hard to explain what we wanted when vendors kept showing us colors that were not our first preference. For the home’s paint, we chose PPG Lazy Afternoon for our upstairs main color. We will paint the upstairs library a unique color – PPG Crystal Lake (a chalky turquoise). Our downstairs will be PPG Ashen, and the unique kids’ playroom (which we call the “Narnia” room) will be PPG Dynamo. Brad calls the Dynamo color “Illini orange.” Sarah allowed “Grandpa/Uncle Brad” to choose the playroom the color, and it’s going to be a wonderful, vibrant choice.
Our kitchen cabinets arrived on Feb. 16! We had to delay the installation one day due to snow because in southern Indiana, the roads do tend to be quite slippery, even with just a couple inches of snow. Our cabinets are a natural maple color and a simple Craftsman style from Phill’s Custom Cabinets (www.phillscabinets.com) in Owensboro, Ky. The cabinets turned out to be stunning, and I think we both can hardly believe that is our kitchen! Phill’s customer service has been top-notch the entire time we have been working with the shop, which is almost as long as we have had house plans. Some of the best advice we have received in the building process was to begin working on the kitchen plans as soon as the building process begins. That was excellent advice because it takes a while to choose a vendor and to choose the style, features, and layout. The folks at Phill’s cabinet truly listened to us about the style and features we wanted. Their installation service also was excellent. We would highly recommend them if you are looking for cabinets in southwestern Indiana/north central Kentucky. We’re also just a little bit proud to say that our cabinets were locally made, too! Unique Granite in Owensboro will be supplying our countertops. They have hosted Brad at their yard to select the granite and have been to our home to measure. We expect our counter top installation in a couple of weeks.
Progress has been made on our heating system and water, too. The geothermal heater is now completely hooked up and just waiting on our public water source to be attached to the home so that it can fire up. The heater has a special Sanuvox UV light filter on the unit to help filter out any mold, allergens, chemical VOC odors, dust mites, etc. Those of you who know Sarah know that she needs all the help she can get with her environmental allergies, and she is excited to have this feature out there in the middle of 70 acres. It was recommended by her HVAC guy (her brother), who knows all too well how sick she can get. We also have our water heater hooked up and ready to go. Finch-Newton Water (a county public water system) began trenching the water line and installing pipe on Feb. 8. More than a mile of pipe must be trenched, so we are waiting for that work to be completed and the hookup to the home be finalized.
Meanwhile, Brad has ordered the upstairs flooring and has the vendor lined up to install the master bathroom tile shower. (Water also must be hooked up for this tile work to begin.) Today, Brad met with a long-time friend who does trim carpentry, who will provide some assistance in that area.
We decided during our Valentine’s dinner that this may be the most difficult stretch in the building process. We can begin seeing the house as a home now, but we also know we have many more projects to complete before we can move in. We’ll see how long it takes. In the meantime, we just have to keep celebrating each new small project that is completed and keep our eyes on the goal: being back to a one-home couple.
Until next time …
The drywall “mudding” has been completed. We had a great finishing crew from Moody Drywall in Muhlenberg County, Ky., who even put up with Sarah’s requests for some extra thick window drywall treatments. Seeing the drywall on the walls did reveal three electrical outlets that needed to be installed, but thankfully, the electrician was able to fix those issues before the drywall mudding was completed. The drywall crew helped Brad get started with the painting by spraying on the ceiling primer in the kitchen, dining room, and great room, which greatly helped Brad meet the timeline to have the kitchen painted in time for cabinet installation. Brad now is in the arduous process of painting the entire home. He doesn’t complain about it, though, and so far, has not ordered any massage therapy. As we write, Brad has the entire first floor primed and just needs to finish the upstairs trimming for the primer.
We spent two weekends choosing our paint colors. We first met with a paint consultant from Porter Paint in Evansville, Ind., on Feb. 5. We showed her samples of our flooring, woodwork, granite, bedspreads, etc. We learned that most people these days choose a base neutral “color” for their walls that goes with all the key components of their base decorating colors. We learned that we are people who prefer cooler colors (grays, whites, blacks, etc.) vs. warm colors (tans, yellows, golds, off whites). We also learned that is not very common, especially in the area where the consultant works. It explained a lot about why we often had to work so hard to explain what we wanted when vendors kept showing us colors that were not our first preference. For the home’s paint, we chose PPG Lazy Afternoon for our upstairs main color. We will paint the upstairs library a unique color – PPG Crystal Lake (a chalky turquoise). Our downstairs will be PPG Ashen, and the unique kids’ playroom (which we call the “Narnia” room) will be PPG Dynamo. Brad calls the Dynamo color “Illini orange.” Sarah allowed “Grandpa/Uncle Brad” to choose the playroom the color, and it’s going to be a wonderful, vibrant choice.
Our kitchen cabinets arrived on Feb. 16! We had to delay the installation one day due to snow because in southern Indiana, the roads do tend to be quite slippery, even with just a couple inches of snow. Our cabinets are a natural maple color and a simple Craftsman style from Phill’s Custom Cabinets (www.phillscabinets.com) in Owensboro, Ky. The cabinets turned out to be stunning, and I think we both can hardly believe that is our kitchen! Phill’s customer service has been top-notch the entire time we have been working with the shop, which is almost as long as we have had house plans. Some of the best advice we have received in the building process was to begin working on the kitchen plans as soon as the building process begins. That was excellent advice because it takes a while to choose a vendor and to choose the style, features, and layout. The folks at Phill’s cabinet truly listened to us about the style and features we wanted. Their installation service also was excellent. We would highly recommend them if you are looking for cabinets in southwestern Indiana/north central Kentucky. We’re also just a little bit proud to say that our cabinets were locally made, too! Unique Granite in Owensboro will be supplying our countertops. They have hosted Brad at their yard to select the granite and have been to our home to measure. We expect our counter top installation in a couple of weeks.
Progress has been made on our heating system and water, too. The geothermal heater is now completely hooked up and just waiting on our public water source to be attached to the home so that it can fire up. The heater has a special Sanuvox UV light filter on the unit to help filter out any mold, allergens, chemical VOC odors, dust mites, etc. Those of you who know Sarah know that she needs all the help she can get with her environmental allergies, and she is excited to have this feature out there in the middle of 70 acres. It was recommended by her HVAC guy (her brother), who knows all too well how sick she can get. We also have our water heater hooked up and ready to go. Finch-Newton Water (a county public water system) began trenching the water line and installing pipe on Feb. 8. More than a mile of pipe must be trenched, so we are waiting for that work to be completed and the hookup to the home be finalized.
Meanwhile, Brad has ordered the upstairs flooring and has the vendor lined up to install the master bathroom tile shower. (Water also must be hooked up for this tile work to begin.) Today, Brad met with a long-time friend who does trim carpentry, who will provide some assistance in that area.
We decided during our Valentine’s dinner that this may be the most difficult stretch in the building process. We can begin seeing the house as a home now, but we also know we have many more projects to complete before we can move in. We’ll see how long it takes. In the meantime, we just have to keep celebrating each new small project that is completed and keep our eyes on the goal: being back to a one-home couple.
Until next time …