Building: Final Walk Through

Well our final walk through was yesterday and it went well. Basically we met with our contractor at the house and he walked us through the operation of all the things in the house (furnace, hot water heaters, etc.) along with some care instructions for the first year. We also looked for any trouble spots in the house to be fixed in the next week before we close. There weren't very many things to take care of, a lose floor tile, some spots that needed touched up with paint, one of the windows needs replaced, plus we need the right stove. We also were informed about problems to watch out for and what to do/who to call. I really can't believe that we move into our house next Tuesday, it's crazy. I can't wait to share pictures after we move in!

Kitchen is done!

Good news our appliances were delivered yesterday, check it out:

Bad news, our stove is not the right one. At least we think it isn't the right one. As we understand it the models change frequently so the model number doesn't match the one that we picked 6 months ago. However, the original stove we upgraded to was suppose to be a five burner but this one is only a four burner. According to our contractor even if the models changed we should get a model similar to the one we picked out, meaning a five burner, which he is working on for us (thank goodness he is so awesome). Although this is kind of a pain, it worked in our favor for the fridge because we got a really awesome fridge instead of the original model we were suppose to get. I suppose we can handle the trade off.

Oh and P.S. We move in less than 2 weeks! Woot!

Guess what we did!

Yesterday Andy and I headed to Ikea to grab some stuff for the new house. We aren't in yet so we have to store it for now. We would have waited until we were in but they were having an awesome deal where they would give you a gift card worth 15% of the price of a couch. Since we needed a couch we decided to go for it, that way we could get some more stuff for free. Take a look:

Yeah those three carts are ours, plus that package that I'm standing next to had to get placed on a cart as well. Lucky for us we brought a little U-Haul trailer, otherwise we would have been in trouble. It feels kind of weird dropping a ton of money (for us) like that, but we have been saving for this couch since we started building, so we basically paid cash. Plus the gift card deal helped out tremendously, we got two chairs for free. I can't wait to get it in the new place and put it all together, it is going to be awesome. Only 2 more weeks y'all!

The only thing I'm seriously worried about is the house looking too Ikea. I mean I love Ikea, I'm a big fan of clean lines and a slightly modern feel, but I think too much of their stuff together can have that first apartment feel that I really want to avoid. We plan on having a nice mix of stuff that we are building ourselves and buying from other stores as well, it's just a concern that I have, but I'm not sure how do you furnish a house on a budget without a little bit of Ikea in there. Any ideas?

A Bartering Christmas

Obviously this year Christmas is tough for us, with a new house and the cost everything that comes with it we are on a tight budget. Imagine my delight when my genius sis-in-law suggested that perhaps this year we barter for Christmas. I think it's a fabulous idea. So in exchange for them helping us with the new house projects (painting, sewing, moving, etc.) we will babysit the kiddos, so they can have some date nights (or sleep). We decided we will still do something small so we all have something to open come Christmas, but still, much easier. I only wish I could get my family on board with this idea.

Even without my family bartering, I think we did a pretty bang up job for Christmas this year, watching the sales and knowing exactly what we wanted to get each person really helped. As for Andy and I, we also have a limited budget for each other and a challenge to only fill our stockings. It's going to be a little bit difficult but I think it's going to be a lot of fun to see what we each come up with and if there will be any "cheating" involved.

Anyone else having a budget type Christmas? What are you doing?

Building: Getting close

With all the hub bub of the last week or so we haven't had much time to see the house and progress, but boy has there been some. Take a look:

Landscaping and driveway are done

Lighting in kitchen and breakfast nook

Foyer light

Master bath lights

Master bath tile/bathtub

Master bath shower tile

Kitchen floors

Master bath floors

Plus we also have flooring in the entryways, laundry room, and other bathrooms! Woot! We also have a date for the final walk thru which will be on December 19th. We should close within 10 days of that date, barring any major complications. I'm hoping there isn't anything major because we need to be out of our rental by the 31st of December. Yikes. Cross your fingers and toes for us folks, it's going to be close.

What a week.

It's been a couple weeks, folks. A week and a half ago, we received the news that Andy's maternal Grandmother had passed. It was very unexpected, which made it all the harder to process. We had to carpool up to Michigan with Andy's brother and our nephew, our sis-in-law is due any day now, so it wasn't a good idea for her to go too far. Between that and the holiday we have been very busy and I haven't had time to post. It's been very hard on everyone and I think we are still processing. I promise to myself and you readers to be a little more diligent in posting. I was going strong there for a couple of weeks, but life happens. Hope all is well with everyone out in blogger land.

Tornado Drill

I have a love/hate relationship with storms. I love watching the wind whip around, the sheets of rain, the lightening. However, I live in Ohio, therefore storms can result in tornadoes which I hate. Don't get me wrong there is a small part of me that would love to be a storm chaser, but the rest of me is terrified. I mean 95% of the time the sirens go off there isn't a tornado, but I take precautions anyway. We have a routine in our house. Prior to actually living in a house, if we were under a tornado watch we would put the cats into their carriers, ready to go if we needed to head to a safer place in our apartment building. It's been much easier living in the rental house because currently our basement is finished so we just haul everybody down to the basement and chill.

Last night was no different (which, by the way, is pure crazy, it's November, not the season of tornadoes), when the TV sent out the signal that there was a warning we rounded all the animals up and headed downstairs. However, we couldn't find our one cat, Izzy. We used all our old standbys, shaking the treat container, pouring out some food, but she wouldn't come. We started to panic because we had been in and out of the house for the past few hours and Izzy likes to jet out into the back yard when she can. After searching everywhere in the house we came to the conclusion that she must be outside. So we grabbed our flashlights and the treats and spent the next hour combing the area around our house and our neighbors houses. We turned up nothing. We had decided to take a break and wait for the rain to let up when suddenly there she was sitting in the kitchen, completely dry. I'm really surprised I didn't crush her when I scooped her up and started crying. Which Izzy was completely against because she isn't a lovely cat. So we were back together safe and sound. Thank goodness. I still have no idea where she was because we tore through all the closets and her favorite sleeping spots looking for her but I don't care because she is safe.

Have you ever had a scary moment with your fur baby?

Building Progress: Holy cow!

So I kind of fell off the face of the Earth for the last week, bear with me please. It was one heck of a week last week. Work was a bit crazy for both Andy and I, we were dealing with some mix ups with the house, and we got the e-mail to get our closing documents submitted! I know, right? Before I dive into the nitty gritty, here is what you are here for:

Siding almost complete

Love our shutters, why we don't have siding near the top there is beyond me.

Our lovely cabinets.

Things are really coming along at the new place. It's amazing. It's also the reason we received an e-mail last week to get our closing documents submitted no later than today. I was a little stressed out about that. It isn't that I didn't know we were going to have to do that soon, it was more that we had three business days to obtain things, two of which we were going to be on vacation. You would think the fact that we had the days off would have helped but we had so much already planned that it didn't. On top of that we had some mix ups with our tile that we were trying to resolve. Apparently there is going to be tile around our tub in the master bathroom, which we were not informed of and never selected. Our design consultant had the same tile that we had in the shower around the tub and while I love that tile, I don't think that brown tile around a white tub would look quite right. We got that fixed as well but it was a bit stressful too.

Other than all that, things are well, we spent our vacation catching up with the family, cleaning, and trying to fit in a bit of relaxing. Hopefully I will have some project posts for you soon.

DIY: Mock Pallet End Table Top

I have a slight obsession with pallets that are turned into coffee tables. I think it's amazingly resourceful and looks wonderful, if you have the right pallet. We are planning on attempting a pallet coffee table for the new house but we have never been big into coffee tables, mostly because the dogs like to run around. What I really wanted to do was create end tables out of pallets but something that size is really hard to come by. So a few weeks back I had an idea to create an end table that looks like a pallet out of furring strips and some 2x4 studs. It was a super simple project and I'm excited to share it with you.

For this project we bought:

• 2- 2x4x8
• 3- Furring Strips 1x3x8
• Plus wood for legs (will get to that later)

Cut List

• 2  - 2x4 @ 24" (for table top support)
• 3 - 2x4 @ 21" (again for table top support)
• 9 - 1x3 @ 24" (for table top)

Tools we needed

• Miter Saw
• Drill
• Counter sink bit
• Phillips head bit
• 7/64" drill bit*
• Measuring tape
• Pencil
• Hammer
• 12- 2" wood screws
• 27- 1 1/4" finishing nails

* Just needs to be a little bit smaller than the screw

First Andy and I measured and cut all the wood, (yes I used the saw and I was proud). 

Then we arranged the 24" 2x4's and the 21" 2x4's like so: 

Basically, we created a box out of the 4 pieces and then added a brace in between to stabilize the table top.
Andy then used the drill bit to drill a guide hole for the screw, used the counter sink so the screw head would sit flush with the table, then actually screwed it in. He repeated this process two times at each of the four corners and also two times on each side of the brace beam.

You can see the counter sink next to where he is drilling. 

Actually screwing the pieces together.

Once that was completed we had to nail the table top on. With this portion we just laid out the nine 24" 1x3's across the table and arranged them so that the spaces were even. This was, for us, just a trial and error process. We could have used less 1x3's and had bigger spaces in the table top or we could have used more and had zero spaces in the table top. It's really whatever you prefer. We preferred something like this:

Once we figured out how we wanted the spaces we made a little mark on each side of the base where we wanted each piece of wood, this made it easier when we started nailing them all. We just nailed each piece three times. Once on either side and one in the middle where the support beam is. We used finishing nails because it gave it a cleaner look but you could also use standard nails to make it more pallet like.

Voila we had a table top. Which is where this project stops. See, we want these to be our end tables but we don't have a couch for our great room yet, so we really want them to sit flush (or at least) close to our couch so we are waiting on the leg portion of this project until we figure out what size our couch is going to be. I promise to post a link to the leg portion of this project when we get to it.

The Poll Results

Alright readers, our poll closed down a few days ago so here are the final results.

• 3 of you (or 30%)  voted before Thanksgiving
• 3 votes (30%) for the week of December 18-24
• 2 votes (20%) for the week of December 4-10
• 1 vote (10%) for the week of Thanksgiving November 20-26
• 1 vote (10%) for the week of December 11-17

So the majority of you think we will be in either before Thanksgiving or just before Christmas. While I hope that the Thanksgiving people are right I have a feeling it will be a little later. We are just going to have to wait and see.

Also Andy and I are working on revamping the blog a little bit. Keep an eye out and let me know what you think. 

NaBloPoMo Revisted

I tried to do NaBloPoMo last year and failed so I really thought that this year I would just continue to blog as usual which is about 2-3 times per week. However, the more I think about it the more I think maybe I should challenge myself to write every day for a month. I have a lot of projects that I would like to get done and this could help met be accountable for it. It would also make me feel accomplished to write every day for a month. However, I have one worry, when I hit my NaBloPoMo wall last year I became really frustrated with blogging and didn't want to do it anymore. This caused my posts to become more and more spaced out (well that and working two jobs but I'd like to think I could do anything if I had the motivation and drive) and eventually I had a 3 months gap in posting which I would like to avoid ever happening again. Regardless, I'm torn, to NaBloPoMo or to not NaBloPoMo that is the question? Any fellow bloggers participating in NaBloPoMo this year?

P.S. I am already two days in, which is a positive.

Building Progress: Eeeeee!

I'm so excited! I went out to the house yesterday and saw this:

Check out that siding! Woot! I'm hoping they will be back to finish the front between today and tomorrow since the weather is going to be nice. Moving on to the inside:

 

Top picture: Master bedroom/Middle picture: Master bath/Bottom Picture: Foyer

We have drywall y'all! We have finally moved out of framing. I'm excited mostly because our contractor (many moons ago) told us that from drywall the house will take about 6 to 8 weeks to finish, leaning more towards 6. Given his determination and some discussion reassurance from some folks that live in the neighborhood we will be in before the end of the year. Let me get a wahoo!

P.S. Happy NaBloPoMo! Good luck to anyone attempting it, you are a better blogger than me.

The Pros and Cons of Building

We have found there are certain pros and cons to building with a company like M/I Homes (versus building on your own, or even just buying).

• Pro: Plot is included with the price of the house
• Con: Because plot is included it isn't very big.
• Pro: Models are available in many communities to see what the house will actually look like.
• Con: Because there are limited amount of layouts to choose from, many houses look the same.
• Pro:Wonderful community feeling.
• Con: Communities are limited to where they build so you are limited in the choice of where you live.
• Pro: Selections are limited and streamlined so it is easier and less stressful.
• Cons: Limited selections means you may not get exactly what you want.

I could go on and on but I won't. Obviously we could find pros and cons whichever way we went housing wise but we found that the pros of building with M/I outweighed every other option we had at the time. Given the fact that we could get a brand new house for the same price as one on the market. Not only would it be brand new, we could get exactly (or at least pretty close to what we wanted) and also get more time to save  for closing and all the stuff that you need when you move into a new place. 

How did you select your first house?

Hockey!

'Tis the hockey season once more which is a big deal in the SalTal household. See Andy is a huge Red Wings fan, I mean huge, like he would attend every game if he could. When we met I knew very little about hockey, in fact when Andy asked what I knew about the sport I think I said something about the flying V in the Mighty Ducks. Anyway, we got to attend our first game of the season down here in Columbus on Tuesday. It was a belated birthday present to Andy.

This was our view of from our first set of seats. That's right, I said first. Andy got a call about 5 minutes after we sat down from his brother, who had scored some awesome seats through our incredibly generous sister-in-law and her friend. So our view went to this:

Yeah, Andy was over the moon excited. It was awesome. Andy a screen shot of us on TV the next day.

I suck at self phone pictures.

The Wings ended up losing the game, which wasn't good, but it was the first win  of the season for the Blue Jackets.  Either way, it was nice to go to a game, sort of felt like an official kick off to our holiday season. 

Building Progress: Slowly but surely.

It has been a slow week for progress on the house. We actually had a bit of a set back last Tuesday, someone broke into the new house and stripped the place of wire. Boo. Our contractor was really sweet, he had told us in an e-mail that only some of the wire was taken but we visited the site and all of it was gone. I think he didn't want us to worry, which was nice. Well that meant that the electrician had to re-wire the whole house, which is what was taking place last week. We did express to our contractor that we are a little nervous that we won't be done by the end of the year, but he assured us that it will be. Other than that little set back we have some other milestones:

If you can't see it, don't worry, I can barely see it too. I'll tell you for those of you as blind as I am, we have a front door, the cement has been poured for the front porch, the garage, and also in the basement. Not seen here but progress nonetheless, there is a furnace and some of the duct work! Woot! Not all that exciting but it's still something. Another picture for you before I sign off:

This is our beautiful park with downtown in the distant background. I love it! 

Happy 100th post!

I just looked at my post count and realized I made it to my 100th post! Yay me!

Let's take a look at what's happened since I started this blog, shall we?

• I graduated from college. 
• We decided to move to a new city. 
• We became an aunt and uncle.
• We both started new jobs.
• We brought home a new member of the family.
• I quit my job and got a new job.
• We went to Disney World. 
• I got a second job.
• Andy got a new but old job.
• We celebrated our first Valentine's Day as newlyweds.
• We decided to stay in Columbus for the foreseeable future.
• We decided to build a house.

So those are the highlights for the last year and a half! It makes me tired just reading it. By the way, Sunday marked a year and a half of marriage! Pretty sweet!

Target-0, Amanda-1

A little back story before I start my tale; I have been on a quest for a dressing table for some time. My makeup and beauty supplies have minds of their own, they spread out all over the counter. It drives Andy crazy. I don't blame him, I try to keep up with it but I have a lot of crap and storage in our bathroom is minimal. Anyway, I have been searching for a dressing table to organize my makeup and such and give me my own space to get ready. I have found several options, but haven't pulled the trigger on any until Saturday night.

One of the vanities I was looking at was on Target's website and the website was having a sale, if you spent $125 on furniture you got 15% off your purchase. The vanity was not that much so I looked at the matching stool for the vanity and added it to my cart to get the discount. The 15% off wasn't added to my purchase and I couldn't figure out why. The table had a little disclaimer next to it that said if you spent $125 on furniture you got 15% off but not the stool. I looked at other stools that had the disclaimer, but not the one that matched my vanity. So I decided to call the customer service line to see if they could explain it to me. When I finally got someone on the phone, she took a look at my cart and told me simply, well the offer isn't applied to the stool (which I could obviously see). I explained to her that I could see that but I wanted to know why since it was furniture and my purchase was over $125. She said the same thing, the stool just isn't included in the sale. After asking why three more times and getting the same answer (seriously, it was like an awful Abbott and Costello routine), I thanked her for her "help" and hung up. I was so mad about the whole thing that I ended up not purchasing the set that night.

On Sunday night I decided to see about another vanity but opened the Target vanity to compare styles only to see that both the table and the stool went on sale! The combined price of the two was less than the table's original price! Success! I win! I thank the customer service person for making me so mad that I didn't order the items on Saturday and ended up saving about $60 by waiting an extra day.

Pass it on

Something really strange happened to me yesterday and I can't stop thinking about it. Before I dive in, let me give you the story.

Yesterday I had to work and Andy was sick. On my way home I called and asked if he wanted anything, he requested broccoli cheddar soup. I decided to hit Panera on my way home for him and I would get Chipotle for myself. Panera was easy enough, but when I got to Chipotle the line was outrageously long and very slow going. It took almost 20 minutes to get through the line and as I was getting ready to pay the guy in front of me asks if I want chips or a drink, which seemed really strange to me. He then told the lady running the cash register that he was paying for both our orders. When I told him he didn't have to do that, he said that he knew he didn't, but the line was so long and he just wanted to do something nice. This really shocked me. This guy and I had shared no pleasantries, we had merely stood in line together for a time. Yet he paid for my meal. I thanked him and he walked out to his car and left. Some thoughts that ran through my mind were "Do I look poor?" "Do I look like I'm having a bad day?" "Was he trying to hit on me?" (I believe the answer is no to all three), I just had to wonder. I know that people do nice things, I realize that this happens, I just was surprised is all. I keep thinking about it and it makes me smile. What a wonderful random act of kindness, so simple but so sweet. It really makes me think about ways I could brighten someone's day with just a simple act. I'm looking forward to passing it on.

Have you ever been the recipient of a random act of kindness?

Keeping the spark alive

Last night Andy and I had a date night, it was the first one in a long time. I don't mean to say we are hermits by any stretch, we go out a bit, but we are on a budget and have been trying to limit our date nights to simple things like Chipotle/pizza and a rental movie. Last night we actually got dressed up and went out on the town like it was a first date. I must give Andy props because he planned an excellent date night.

First we went to The Candle Lab, which allows you to create your own candle scent. There are all these different scents to smell and you go around and choose two or three to blend together. It was a lot of fun and I would love to do it again. Then we went to dinner at a French restaurant nearby called La Chatelaine, which was tres magnifique (sorry, I just had to). Then finally out for some ice cream for dessert.

I was really happy we did this because lately we have been a little stressed out with all the stuff for the house. Plus I think it's important to help keep the spark alive, getting dressed up for your spouse and spending some uninterrupted time together. It was just a wonderful evening.

How do you keep the spark alive?

DIY: Book Mobile Part 2

If you missed it, see part one here.

Once we got the dowels into place we had to secure them somehow, we decided that Gorilla Glue was the best method. I don't have any pictures of this part, sorry (no cookie for the blogger). What we did was force the dowels through the holes and just before they hit the wood we wet both the bottom of the table and the dowel and put the glue down and forced the two together. We then just had to weight it down while it cured. We let this sit overnight so that it was fully cured before we filled the top of the dowel rod holes with wood putty but we could have moved into filling the holes after a few hours.

We just filled the holes with wood filler and a putty knife and just smoothed it out. We had to wait again to let that dry, then after several hours there were a couple holes we had to go over the holes again, then finally we had to sand the entire top of the table with some fine grit sand paper. 

Once that was done we I was too impatient to wait until I painted the whole thing and let it dry to add the casters so we just screwed those in before I painted it. Once that was done I painted the top, dowels, bottom and sides in Glidden Toasted White. 

Looks pretty great, huh? Here is a shot with it holding some books.

I am thrilled with how this project turned out. I have some minor tweaks to work out (like getting the paint out of the metal pieces on the top) but over all it turned out great.

Now the break down of project cost and time:

Project Cost

• Spool- free thanks to Home Depot
• 3/4" dowels- 4 x $3.50 = $14
• Glidden Paint-1 Quart $7.00
• Casters- 3 x $6.00= $18.00
• Gorilla Glue, Paint Bushes, Wood putty and putty knife, sand paper, tools- free, we already had everything

Total Cost: $39.00

Not too shabby, but I must say, I was really picky about what casters I used, if I hadn't been the cost would have been a lot less.

Estimated Time of Project Completion

• Hammer down nails and filling with wood filler- 1/2 hour
• Measure and drill holes for dowels- 1/2 hour
• Cut dowels to size- 1/4 hour
• Secure dowels- 5 hours (this includes glue curing time)
• Fill tops of dowel rod holes- 4 hours (this includes dry time for wood putty)
• Sand top of table- 1/4 hour
• Secure Casters- 1/4 hour
• Paint- 1 hour

Total Time: 11 hours 45 minutes

There you have it, now I am ready to move on to the next project! Just have to figure out which one.

Building Progress: Interiors!

I have to break from our regularly scheduled blogging to bring you a progress report (I will post the Book Mobile Part 2 tomorrow). We have plumbing and electric going in! Woot woot! These shots are not as impressive as the exterior shots, I acknowledge that, but to Andy and me they are a thing of beauty!

Kitchen sink!

Hall bath!

Laundry Room!

Master bath tub!

Master bath shower!

So exciting, right? It is so much fun to walk through the house and see the changes daily. I'm fairly certain that we annoy the construction people what with our going around with our cameras taking pictures but oh well, I love being in our house!

DIY: Book Mobile Part 1

Remember this project:

Well I did it! I found my cable spool! I just have to say Home Depot rocks! We were wandering through the store the other day and I saw a cable spool that looked to be a good size for a coffee table. So I asked an associate if I could have one and after some chit chat we got to take it home for free! Woot! While we were there we picked up the rest of the supplies for the project, 4 dowel rods 3/4", 3 casters, and some paint.

Beautiful isn't it!

It's even better than I could have hoped for, I mean it's in great shape. So this weekend Andy and I decided to work on turning it to a table for the new house. First thing we had to do was try to pound  down the nails to make the top surface even. 

We tried a chisel and hammer but the wood was way tougher than we expected, so we ended up just using the hammer. After about fifty billion strikes we used some wood putty over the nails and over the jagged bits to give the surface a smoother texture. 

Before putty...

After putty!

Once the surface was looking like it wouldn't cut somebody it was time for measurements to figure out where to put the spokes. 

Andy is much better with measurements so he took over at this point (and yes that is my cup of coffee sitting on the spool, I was testing it out)

Andy thought that a clock pattern would be best for the placement of the dowel rods. He measured across the spool and marked about and inch in on either size at 12 and 6 then again at 9 and 3. Then he went around between 12-3, 3-6, 6-9, 9-12 and put two more marks in between each set roughly equal distance apart (I say roughly because there were a lot of nails and he was trying hard not to hit any of them when it came time to drill). 

Next Andy and I took the spool outside and used a 3/4" spade bit to drill the holes at the marks. There were some complications during this project as Andy hit nails in three different spots. To remedy this he simply used a chisel and hammer to hit the nails back and finished drilling. Once all the holes were complete we had to measure the dowel rods for sawing. 

Andy simply placed one into the hole and made a pen mark at the point where the dowel hit the table top. During the saw process he simply went a little under the mark so that the dowel wouldn't stick up out of the hole on the table. After sawing all the dowels we forced them through the holes on the spool and it's really starting to look like a book shelf table!

(Pardon the wonky dowel rod, it is a work in progress)

Stay tuned as tomorrow will unveil part two of this project!