We have a Foundation!

All day Friday was spent pouring the concrete, finishing the foundation for the house. Hopefully later this week the framing process will begin. 

Another weekend shopping for materials for the house. This time for brick. I think we have found a color we both like (finally, my wife is picky when it comes to brick!...haha)

DKC

Here Comes the Concrete!

We now have the plumbing roughed in and the foundation prepped for concrete which will begin tomorrow (Friday). The plumbers were very quick in roughing in the house yesterday and today the contractors finished all the prep work for concrete. The concrete will have the weekend to set and then they will begin the beginning stages of framing the house. Everyone tells me that this portion of the construction process will go by quickly, so I am excited to see what develops in the coming weeks. As promised, I have included several pictures below of the progess from the last few days. Maybe I can post tomorrow (Friday) with pictures of the concrete.

These were taken Tuesday, after fill sand was in:

Standing at front door looking toward master suite

Garage

Looking from front yard to house

These are just after plumbing was roughed in on Wednesday:

Standing at our master bath looking South toward rest of house

From front yard

Taken tonight after mesh wire and plastic sheeting was laid:

At garage

At Piano room (Dining room) looking toward back of house

Blocks laid, fill dirt spread, plumbing tomorrow!

We are movin' on up! Our construction guys (so far) have been 'on the ball' and have not missed a day yet. The blocks have been laid (Friday) and today they are finishing 'packing' the fill dirt to make way for the plumbing to be laid starting tomorrow! If this first week and a half is any indication of the whole construction progress, we will be moving in before we know it! Once the plumbing is set, the concrete for the foundation won't be far behind!

Emily and I spent Saturday morning selecting our interior and exterior doors. We really like the front doors we picked out. They are double french doors that will be stained a chocolate brown color. We also looked at tubs, windows, door knobs :-), etc. You know the usual house stuff...

I promise to take more pics of the progress next time I post...

DKC

Footers Poured, Blocks to Come Today

We have progressed quite nicely this week! Excavation has been completed and footings were poured Tuesday. Sunny skies have made it easy for work to be completed. Hope it keeps up!

Beginning today, they will start laying blocks for foundation and hope to finish tomorrow (Friday).

The foundation process is time consuming, but I think we are coming along just fine. Below is a pic of the property from the road as it looks right now.

DKC

Moving Dirt, Construction Under Way!

Well, there is finally progress out on the lot! Saturday, the dirt movers came out and began work on house footprint and driveway. They should be back today to bring more dirt for the driveway. It was rather wet out there Saturday, so they only brought two loads. The good news is, we won't be needing much dirt other than for the driveway since it is a decently level lot.

My contractor and his guys (Garrison Construction - Blue Mountain, MS) were out on the lot bright and early this morning preparing the forms for the concrete footers. Weather wise, it looks like a fairly nice week, so maybe they can get a good start on prep work for foundation.

We spent yesterday afternoon visiting several open houses in Tupelo. They were all new construction homes, and we basically went just to get some ideas for our home. One of the decisions we have been discussing this weekend is whether we should go Granite or Corian for the counter tops in the kitchen. We have heard pros and cons on both.

I will update more as the week progresses.

Darren

Below are a few pics from Saturday as they were "scraping" the driveway and house footprint:

The Waiting Game

Well is seems like it's been forever since I last posted (almost two weeks), but nothing much has been happening other than WAITING! I HATE WAITING! Our appraisal, which normally only takes 2-3 days to get back, took us two weeks. We just received the appraisal tonight after daily calls and emails to the bank and appraiser. We are headed to the bank tomorrow afternoon to finish up the paperwork for the loan, and ( I know I have said this before) we hope to have our contractor and his team on the lot by early next week, or not??? Who knows! I am just ready to seem some progress after two weeks of nothing.

We went this weekend to shop for kitchen cabinets/counter tops. There are, as in everything else, a ton of choices, but I think we have narrowed it down to one or two.

That's all for now. Hopefully my next post will be about PROGRESS!

DKC

Getting closer to breaking ground!

Well, we finished the week a few steps closer to starting the construction of our new home! Reality has set in now - we own land and are about to build a house...and have a mortgage...WOW :-).

We went by the bank Thursday to get things rolling on our construction loan. Lisa Pennington and the people at BanCorpSouth have been really helpful in this whole process. We hope to get the appraisal back and finish the paper work this coming week.

Met with our contractor again Thursday night with a few questions and signed the builder's agreement. He is ready to begin just as soon as the bank finalizes the paperwork.

Electric service should be ran early next week to the property. We are still shopping rates on road boring to bring the water line over from the opposite side of the road. If you know of anyone with reasonable rates...let us know.

Here lately, I find myself wondering out on the land just looking it over. Nothing is really going on yet, it's just I am so excited about our dream that is about to become a reality!

We have already started picking out specifics for the house such as doors, windows, sinks, faucets, paint, flooring, brick...yadah, yadah, yadah. PHEW! Overwhelming at times...

I will try to post an image of the floor plans soon. Have a great weekend!

DKC

It's Official......WE OWN DIRT!!!

Well, I dreamed of this day for a while now! After almost 3 years of marriage, for the first time in my 24 years of living, I OWN A PIECE OF LAND! It's ours! It has our name on it! I actually own 1.5 acres of Mississippi dirt! I know what all you homeowners are thinking, "You kids wait 'til you pay taxes and mortgages and insurance." I know it's coming, just let me be excited about this pile of dirt I own for just a short while, then I'll come back to reality.

In case you guys haven't heard, we are building our first house! It's probably as close to our "Dream Home" as we will ever see. It's 4 bedroom, 2 bath, 2,300 heated square feet on the outskirts of New Albany (MS). We are both very excited and very nervous!

Construction should begin within the next few weeks! I will use this blog to keep all our friends and family up to date on the construction process. We will be posting plenty of pics as we progress toward completion.

Say a prayer for us that we keep our sanity!

DKC & EBC

Below are a few pics of the land we will be building on:

Looking from the road toward the spot where the house will sit.

From what will be our front door looking west toward the road.

Yah!!!!! They delivered my culvert. (They ran out of dirt, apparently)

Who am I kidding, I have no idea what I am doing!