We've Got Mail

Well, after a week of wondering if the mail carrier even noticed the new mailbox as there aren't any houses immediately near us and we hadn't even gotten any junk mail, I finally mailed myself something. Got it the next day. Now I'm going to go ahead and have all our magazines and other things transferred to the new house. I've been avoiding having addresses changed because I didn't want to have to do it twice, so right now, we're still depending on the mail forwarding system. And I hate to think about how much mail we might be losing.

Paint....too purple?

Many of you were accosted by me and my paint swatches a few weeks ago as I contemplated cobblestone versus earl gray or purple surf versus whatever. Well, finally, the paint is on the walls. Yippee! I really like the darker paint we chose for the feature wall in the greatroom and the buff we chose as the standard (everywhere else) color. But I think Philip has some qualms about the purple surf in the master bedroom. I happen to like it, and it will be fine for a while. In the end, it's just paint, so if he can't live with it, we'll change it.

The cabinets are scheduled to go in next week and the flooring soon after. We had planned to get in there and paint the office and kids' rooms ourselves, partially to save some money and partially because we haven't committed to those colors yet. Well, if we are to get that done before the floor is done, then it looks like we'll have to get busy real soon.

I am incredibly excited, however, to once again see progress. We had a meeting with Brad today, and he assures us that things will progress fairly quickly in the coming weeks, with the interior getting largely finished out in the next two to three weeks. Plus, the brick is very close to being finished. We've got the quotes on exterior trim, and he should get that lined up very soon as well.

Meanwhile, I have been busy studying brick mailbox columns, choosing light fixtures, perusing faucets, etc. I have my assignments: finish purchasing light fixtures, begin picking out tile, paint any rooms I intend to paint myself, start calling and checking interest rates daily to begin thinking about locking in a rate. (That last one scares me a little because it is very much akin to gambling, and I really fear locking in too high or missing a low rate because of being afraid to lock in too high!) Anyway, I have some things to keep me busy for the next couple weeks myself, which might be good for all this nervous energy that seems to keep me awake at night.

It's getting good...stay tuned.

The Mailbox

I never really thought that putting up a mailbox would be a big deal. We went to the post office, got permission to just stick one up, so all we needed was to go to Lowes and get it. However, if you know me, then you probably could have told me that this was yet another little thing worthy of my obsession.

We did go to Lowes to check out mailboxes, and then to Home Depot, and then off to a different Lowes. After probably an hour of standing in the aisle debating all the pros and cons, we chose a black metal mailbox with some nickel trim....we decided that we could use that later when we brick the mailbox in, and we wouldn't waste money. But what about a post? In the end, we decided that probably would be money wasted, no matter how we did it, so we got this plain black metal post that we could just drive into the ground, thinking it would be nice and sturdy until the brick column gets built.

Well, as you can see, because of the slope of the ground, the mailbox arm had to be extended as far as possible to be the right height for delivery, which really looks stupid. What you can't see is how much the box wobbles, even with Mr. Philip behind the wrenches and ratchets.

Oh well, despite our best efforts and all the hours of agonizing over this one, it didn't turn out quite as expected. However, it is up, allowing me to begin changing my address on stuff now, instead of having to use the temporary address. I hated the idea of changing our address twice so close together. Now I'm going to send myself some mail to test it out. Maybe I'll send myself a birthday card. Happy birthday to me!

Between the Hurricanes

Wish me luck that we get a bit accomplished this week in between the hurricanes. I haven't even talked to my contractor in the last week because I know the deal. Waiting on the rain to clear. Well, I think it should be clear for a few days until the next hurricane....which is Hanna, with Ike close behind. I was really hoping to be done with this house by hurricane season. Oh well. Pretty soon these will all just be funny stories to recount in the future, right?

I hate hurricane season!

Yessir, I do.

Is there an end in sight?

Well, as you can tell, we're pretty much 3/4 of the way done with the brick. In fact, the back of the house is a straight run, and with the corners already set, that should only take a few days. But people are asking me daily when it will be done, and I truly have no idea. I know when it needs to be done, but that may not be the same thing. It is looking good though.

Keep your fingers crossed for me that painting begins this week. That will go quickly, and once that is done, the electricians can get back in and begin installing fixtures. I'm very excited about that. I had planned to start buying some fixtures this weekend, but we unexpectedly got offered Panthers tickets, so we did that this evening instead. Priorities, right?

We also got the go-ahead from the post office to install our mailbox, or at least a temporary one. I'd like to have a brick column made at some point, but I think that should wait until after the last of the big trucks has to get in there. Once the remaining concrete is poured, we might be safe, but I want to go ahead and start changing addresses permanently instead of having to do it twice, so we will probably stick some kind of mailbox up for now and change it out later.

That's the update for now. Stay tuned...

Decisions, decisions

Needless to say, after two weeks of apartment living, I am more than ready for this house adventure to be over! Check out my other blog for more details on my apartment adventure.

Slowly but surely the new house is coming together. We finally closed on the old house on Friday, and I have lots of decisions to make about the new house: cabinets, flooring, paint, interior door styles, etc. I'd like to do that in some type of order, but it really all has to be done at once because the paint color is going to be very dependent on flooring and cabinets, etc. Let's just say I'm not going to ever be known for my decorating sense, so I'm pretty sure I'm going to screw this up somehow. Look out to my friends at work--I'm bringing some of this stuff with me to work this week. You might want to hide if you hear me coming!