The Wilson's Build Their Dream House Update

Changes are being made little by little to our house, but they're not quite as dramatic as previous weeks. We're down to the nitty gritty stage, and it feels like our punch list is a mile long; however, it's nice to know that at the end of that list is the reality of us being able to move in...FINALLY!!

Our tile guys finished our backsplash this week, minus grouting, and I LOVE it. It's exactly how I pictured it would be in my mind.

They did grout the tile around my tub in the master bathroom and I love how that turned out as well.

I managed to write a few more scripture verses on the floor. These verses were written on our patio in the backyard where I can already foresee lots of nights just sitting and watching the sunset. I can't wait!

Nicki helped me find a scripture verse for my kitchen so I made sure to write it down.

Our tile guys also laid the slate tiles on our patio in the back. I LOVE LOVE LOVE how this turned out. All the different colors in the slate bring out all the colors in our brick. We originally had planned to do brick pavers, but switched to the slate and I'm glad we did. I love how rustic it looks, which is exactly what I was going for out here.

Saturday morning was a work day for my hubby and our builders. They brought their tractor so they could help us pick up all the debris laying around the house. It took all morning and most of the afternoon but they did it. All three of them worked so hard and now our house doesn't look like a construction site anymore! Our dumpster in the back is completely full, but I'm so thankful the trash is all gone!

Our tile guys also finished the slate on the back patio. Now all they have left to do there is grout it and it'll be complete!

Eli and I drove down to the house so I could start painting the upstairs (we're doing those rooms ourselves) but it ended up not working. Josh was so busy helping the guys and I couldn't watch Eli and keep him from going down the stairs and paint at the same time, so I scrapped that idea. We ended up watching the guys and running errands for them by going to the hardware stores in town to get things they needed. I'm glad we got to help a little...

I'm sure you noticed in previous pictures, but the HUGE mound of dirt that was in our front yard is gone now. Heath, the head builder guy (you can tell I really know my construction terms can't you???) moved all that dirt to different areas in the yard. By doing that, he made my little boy very very happy. He had instant access to lots of dirt the rest of the afternoon and he played in it as much as he could.

Eli's friend, Walker, even came by and played in the dirt for a little while. They both loved getting dirty!

We also discovered that we have an abundance of frogs and crickets in our yard. Eli, Josh, and I caught three frogs that morning and that afternoon Eli met a nice cricket. I took the first picture, but HE had to take the next one. He kept telling the cricket to stay still so he could take it's picture :)

The last major thing that the guys did before leaving was they built the forms for the sidewalk that is going to go from the front door to the driveway. They'll be back sometime soon to pour the concrete for it. YAY!

I can't end the post without including this picture of Rusty, one of the guys that's been building our house. He and Josh bonded Saturday and became best buds. HAHAHA! Rusty is a pretty big fan of Rusty if you can't tell. He thought he was superman this particular day :) In all seriousness though, he's been a big help and he definitely knows what he's doing. We're very thankful to have conscientious builders working on our house!

There'll be more to come this next week. Our hardwood floors are finally here! YAY!!! We've only been waiting for them to get here for the past 3 weeks...no thanks to the hurricane that battered the east coast (our floors shipped out of Virginia). Josh went and picked them up this past week and they've been acclimating ever since. Our floors guys should start laying them tomorrow (Monday). I can't wait!!

PreK-3 Update

Eli is really enjoying PreK-3 and is learning a lot. I love picking him up every day and hearing all about his day at school. I also always enjoy seeing what he ate for lunch just by looking at his white polo shirt. Ugh! Oxi-Clean, Shout, and Spray-n-Wash are my close friends now when it comes to laundry. He's getting better, but spaghetti day was NOT fun ;)

I think one of the reasons I love him being in school is that we get to do "assignments" together. His first assignment was to find something red for the Red Book his class was making. He, of course, chose Lightning McQueen :) That same week he had to find a picture of some environmental print that he recognized. The teacher suggested McDonald's or some place like that, but we hardly ever eat fast food so we went with the Goldfish label. He and his Daddy had lots of fun looking through all our magazines for his pictures.

This past week I was THRILLED when I picked Eli up from school and discovered that he had received an award for eating EVERYTHING on his plate. WHOA! My non-eater got an award for eating! WOO HOO! I found out later from his Daddy that he hadn't eaten all of his breakfast that morning, so my baby was HONGRY (that's really really hungry for those of you that don't know). But later that week I talked to Mrs. J, his teacher's aide, and she said that he's been eating like that everyday. YAY! Way to go, Eli :)

Two days later I looked in his backpack and found another award! This time it was for getting a green dot every day for the month of August. Every day on his calendar in his folder, his teacher marks it with a colored dot. Green is GOOD, Yellow is a WARNING, and Red means he had a TIME-OUT. I'm so proud of my little boy and his great behavior! Keep it up, sweetie!

On Friday, Eli had his first BIG project due at school. He had to make an "All About Me" poster. Considering he's only two and isn't exactly adept at cutting and pasting yet, this momma took it upon herself to make the poster. I did get his input for his favorite pictures though. I thought his project turned out super cute, even if I had to stay up until 11:00 at night doing it (Procrastinate, much?)

PreK-3 is going great and I can't wait to see what else my little boy learns! I also can't wait for more fun projects :)

The Wilson's Build Their Dream House Update

This week at the Wilson's house was exciting because A LOT of things were checked off the forever long list of things that have to be completed before we can move in. First, our granite was installed. Hooray!! It was actually a little darker than I remembered it being when I picked it out, but I still love it and think it's going to work perfectly in the house and with our colors. Our friends at Twin City Granite were awesome and did a fantastic job installing our granite. Thanks, Joe and Faith!

Josh's cousin Jeff and his buddy Foley also started working on installing our tile in the bathrooms and the kitchen. It was so nice to unload all the tile from Josh's truck so they could finally begin installing it. He's been carrying it with him ever since we bought it three weeks ago. This was the design I wanted for the backsplash behind my stove, but Foley informed me that you wouldn't be able to see the decorative tiles because of the height of the cabinet above, which meant I had to go back to the drawing board.

Tile in the guest bathroom (Eli's bathroom)

Granite in the guest bathroom

Tile around my tub in the master bathroom

Granite countertops in the master bathroom

Thursday it was so exciting to drive to the house and see that we had lights everywhere! Our electrician installed all of our lighting fixtures! The good news is that I loved every single one of them! Whew!

Jeff and Foley, our tile guys, continued working on the bathrooms and finished except for grouting.

I managed to write some more verses around the house. I'm almost finished covering our floors with scripture :)

By Friday the guys were working on the backsplash in the kitchen. Josh and I both LOVE the subway tile we picked out for the backsplash. Jeff and Foley are doing an INCREDIBLE job installing all the tile.

Josh also got the lights and the heat turned on at the house. Now our workers can work in the comfort of air conditioning!

 

All my new appliances were delivered, but we're waiting on the plumber to install them.

That's all there is to update for now. Our tile guys are going to continue working on installing all the tile. On Monday we'll get our hardwood floors and after a couple of days of acclimation to the house, Jeff and Foley will begin installing those for us. We plan to buy all our knobs and pulls for the cabinets this weekend and we also might start painting the rooms upstairs. Josh also got another dumpster delivered to the house so we'll start cleaning up the yard and making it look neat. Until then....