To the front!

So, sure I was exhausted from going to the Husky Olympics with the pack yesterday but I really felt like designing some rooms last night after we had dinner... or lunch? I'm not sure where our day went but it was fun. 

Finally I have my full sized floor plan views to share with everyone! I learned from my mother how to try out some color with these and will be doing that in a few days after I get some copies made. We still aren't decided on what our outside color will look like but I think I will pick up some color options for The Hubs later today and then draw up some mocks. As you can see we will be doing a rock accent on the front of the house. We are hoping to carry this back to the back wall of the house as well. I am super excited about the natural look and thankfully so is The Hubs. 

We went to a new antique/ estate house the other weekend and found some amazing things for the house... as much as the hubs wants this crazy red cabinet we just dont have the place for that to go... but its nice to see that he is suggesting colors! We then headed into the back room of this place and found the Venetian mirror mecca.... boxes and boxes and boxes of them in all sizes and shapes! I cant even tell you how excited I was to see this!!!! And for once they didnt cost an arm and a leg for a bigger one. We had found a smaller one that was kinda pretty but not everything that I ever dreamed of at the same place where we found the overpriced table... for about $1100. yes. gross. No thanks. This new place had the large ones for $350. yep. I'll take them all thank you. :) I kid I kid! 

We then found a ton of cast iron in that same back room! Oh so exciting! I cant wait to bring some of this to the new home and get to decorating. 

I am more than excited to do that part of it all, I know it will be overwhelming but I am ready for it. We have a very different style and its exciting to know that when we have people over there will be something different and weird to look at and something that really can tell about our adventures :)   

still just dirt.

Well not too much going on here on the "Home Front" :( sadly we are still waiting on the bank to get back to us, we heard from a little birdy that the appraisal was to be turned in by tomorrow... so we might just bug our friend at the bank.

The land is finally cleared... a 4 day job took about 2 weeks to be complete.... yes I am making this face right now { :|  } 

Some damage was done to the neighbors fence.... This is not entirely our land clearing people fault. These trees have been growing wild for years and when they went to take out the trees next to it on our side of the fence the roots were tangled and took down the fence.... when I went out there today all of this was on the ground, I'm thinking we have had some visitors out there lately being hoodlums. Grrreeeaat. 

Had to do a little land owner up-keep myself while I was out there. We lost our some of our property lines with all the dust and dirt flying around so I picked up this cute little can of spray paint (at the craft store) and made my lines appear again! 

The Hubs assigned me the task of finding quotes for our fencing we need to have while we build and afterwards for the pups... I lined up about 5 quotes and met with 2 of them in person. Since Todd gave me all the measurements we needed and told me the lingo I needed to use when talking to these guys I thought that it was going to be a walk in the park. 

No. Not true. Clearly some of these men take me for a fool... or just a typical woman. Not happy. I told one guy that I needed 450ft of fence and 20 of that was going to be a large gate (which is do-able) he called me back and told me that I actually needed 554ft of fence and that didnt include the gate.... where in the world did he get over 100ft MORE than what I was asking for?! I had to go over everything with him and he was pulling some huge numbers out of his ass and I decided to just let him talk and then threw out his quote. 

Another one of my quotes I got was WAAAY too low... but he was a nice man and just did it over the phone... I think he might have missed some numbers and I cant fault him for that. 

The quote I got today I think I told the guy probably 20 times that I needed 8ft high fence in the back and I needed a quote for temporary fencing and also a separate one for the repairs on the neighbors fence (we will only be paying half) when I got the quote today it didnt have any of this included. 

Are you kidding me?! Maybe I am not speaking clearly... nope that cant be it I went to speech therapy for 3 years! 

As for our rental.... oh man. This place is a hot mess fo-real. So currently we have at least 4 outlets that do not work. This includes the one and only outlet in the master bath... and the guest bath. I have been curling my hair while sitting on the floor in the middle of the bedroom. <heavy blinks> I also had to blow some leaves with this miniature leaf blower that our landlord left us and found out that the only outlet outside doesnt work either. 

Being born and raaaised (say it with a southern accent) in Florida, I know that there is a very likely chance I will encounter bugs from time to time... more specifically roaches and I have recently taught myself to not scream bloody murder and now have resorted to calling The Hubs. When I am alone depending on the size of the bug I will sometimes sacrifice one of my dogs and use a paw. The larger ones sometimes get hairspray or windex.... or the tried and true shoe if it is around. This house though.... ((shivvers))  when we moved in I saw no signs of bugs at all... now its like a breeding ground. Okay so with the help of Todd's son and a trip to Lowes we have controlled the masses. I can now walk into the kitchen at midnight and not have to worry about anything under my feet but a dog or two. :) The kitchen sink is leaking... seems to have been like this for a while and our landlord doesnt really care so I have decided to throw an air freshener under there and call it a day. Rot or not I dont care enough to try and get this fixed. 

We still are not using any of the cabinets or drawers, I have my pots and pans I use on the daily out and on a shelf that used to live in my craft room this is also my make-shift pantry. Its working for me for now. I was going to just live out of boxes till the house was complete but The Hubs wanted some artwork on the walls. 

so I gave him this option.... I think its actually going to stick around. :) 

We got busy at work and I packed up at the end of the day and didnt complete this post so I will give you this mornings updates:

The bank called us and we were sent to underwriting! YAY! We asked what our timeframe was looking like and she said it was looking good for being done soon! Yes.... I almost cried. Its like music to our ears right now! We want this sooo bad! 

I also got an email back from the fence guy I met with yesterday... he thinks I just dont understand his email.... uh hello. yes I did and clearly you weren't listening to me when I was talking to you! Stupid men! 

On a good note we found a beaut of a path to take the dogs to the park. This park is amazing too! So many pathways to bike the dogs! We headed out on sunday and did our first treck with them and then biked through the local art show afterwards... We are quite a site too haha I think one day we are going to cause an accident. 

Back to work I go... I'll keep you updated on what happens :) 

Fence Companies Used: Arrow, H&Y, Johns Fencing, some other guy, and USA Fence. 

Seeing dirt

We had a meeting this morning with our (hopefully) lending bank... Mary has made the process super easy for us and has really put in a substantial amount of time to make all this work. We were prepared to come out of pocket for some things but she is working on it so we dont have to come out all the way... just peeking :) ha! We also started our account moving process to get the hell out of Dodge (or the bank that needs to suck my.... never mind)  :) I have really surprised myself lately with just letting life happen around us. I want to look back on all this and think 'when can we start the next one'! Besides fighting for my huge kitchen and huge pantry I think I wont need to fight for much more.

Todd has put in some of his own fight lately and thankfully not with us. Our glorious front door:

...has decided to make us jump a few more hurdles than your average door. First you have to take into account that Florida has to have Impact rated doors... due to our below sea level life and our hurricane attraction! This company is out of Georgia and hasnt completed its full range of impact testing but is ALMOST complete and they have all the paperwork in order. Bummer news is that it was denied to begin with but once they sent over their testing info we became a little bit closer to closing the door on this chapter! (you see what I did there?!) 

Why are we fighting for this door you ask?! Well... is your door made of complete steel? Can your door withstand some of the most extreme weather testing? Does your door have impact glass panels that open to let the ocean breeze in? and finally.... does your door need a fork lift to move it from point a to point b? Well... our door is, has, and does. :) (hopefully OUR door, keep your fingers crossed for us) 

Mary said she cant wait to see this door on the house! 

That is our land as of 2 hours ago. I stopped by our PO Box and came to see this in the day time for the first time since saturday. Huge change from this...

We can see the main road from our private road finally! Yes. Scary. Very very scary. Shit just got real. 

Here you can see the man in the bull dozer peeking out. I found out today that this is a husband and wife team and thats pretty cool! I love being able to say that I do that too with The Hubs. 

I havent started my Cupcake bribery to finish faster yet... but I will. I mentioned it today in the bank to Mary and told her to pass the word on to everyone who will look over our paperwork. I know that this is a low tactic but I want my home and I will use all the sugar and cream I can to get moved into this dream house!  I need to go rest my eyes but I will write again in a bit about a few things I have in mind for the inside... I might even show you my completed plans for the house! 

Quick note: My pup decided to get himself and his ball stuck under the couch... when I tried to reach it I pulled something in my neck and have now put myself to bed while I wait for the muscle spasms and shooting pain to go away, and if my entry seems a little disjointed its because I took half of a muscle relaxer and I am a little spacey. See exhibit A. 

Exhibit A:

Look!

DO YOU SEE THIS?! 

Yes! This is our land getting cleared! I went out there this morning and saw... no work being done... but its saturday and it was only 9:30 but there was a large tree already down! How exciting!!!! 

It makes it look like the end is near! Just kidding! 

We signed our official contract with Todd the other day (I had yet another migraine and was trying to hold my stomach down the whole time) But we got it done. Yes it is a little odd that we have gotten this far before signing a contract with our builder but he is a family friend so he has been great working with us! We also went over everything with him (price wise) and came to the conclusion that our dreams are a lot bigger than we once thought. We are upping our loan amount to cover this since we had originally were looking to just stay on the lower end of it. Not a big deal we just dont want to have a huge mortgage for 30 years, so time to hustle at work! :) 

Speaking of loans... we headed to both banks we had 'pre-approvals' from yesterday to get our paperwork started and start comparing rates... well we found out that our actual bank wasted more of our time. Thankfully they gave us the wrong information for the second time and when the MLO FINALLY looked though our paperwork an hour and a half into our meeting he informed us that he was a liar. Okay so I am exaggerating a little bit... everyone knows people who work at banks wont ever admit to lying. ha! 

I think I did really good this time though, I didnt snap the paperwork together and attempt to walk out like I did with the last bank that did this to us. I sat there gritting my teeth... till the jerk had the balls to say "I see the frustration on your faces" to which I replied "Oh yea, thats correct I am more than frustraited that you have yet again wasted our time when we clearly asked this question once before to you and you gave us a completely different answer. So thankfully 3 of you here in this department have wasted our time." as we walked out I made it clear to say to The Hubs that it was time to pull all of our accounts out of this bank. This will be done within this next week. By the time we were back on the road heading back to work we were hungry and angry and I cried. Yes. I broke and I cried. No actual tears fell down but I got that burning / blurry sensation in my eyes. 

After eating we called our other bank to get a few things cleared up... she wasnt quite sure and had to call us back. When she called back with the answer we were looking for it was time to celebrate a small victory. 

This is then when we dusted off the Makers Mark that we had been saving for a special occasion. 

Some of the better whiskey I've had... but then again I havent had much because I dont really care for the taste. yuck. 

Good morning from the land of 'I'm only half an iced coffe in and I'm still a little grumpy'!!

This weekend my husband decided to gift me a sunday doing what I wanted to do because we went to the gun show for him... and spent a good 2 hours there (one of which was just waiting in line) So what did I pick to do?! FURNITURE SHOPPING! Yes when we went we didnt know the full size of the room but I am ready to get ideas and see some couches and such now so I can whip it out as soon as we move in!

This pretty baby is from Ashley Furniture. We found it a few weeks ago when we went shopping out of town. This is when we figured out that each couch needs to go through the test... 

((Step 1. Remove all unnecessary pillows. Step 2 Have The Hubs lay down. Step 3 lay down next to The Hubs and close eyes.)) Yes, we do get some strange looks but who really cares! If you invest money into something like furniture you need to know if it will be what you really want! 

This couch is a top contender! 

We found this one this weekend. Sorry for the sucks picture but after searching 45 pages of couches I never found it on the website and just took a picture of a picture. I love this couch its great and even has  my decorative nail heads in it but I think the color is too light. Its also double the price of the couch above. It did pass the test though! As much as I want something with the decorative nail heads in it I think we are going to pass on this one. Sad to say its out since its the only thing so far The Hubs has liked with this detail but oh well! 

Found this little table as well. The sides fold up into it so its a perfect table to have behind a couch. Once you open it up that means you are having a cocktail party... or this is how I feel it would work. :) 

We are IN LOVE with this Ethan Allen coffee table... but as you all know that store most of it starts at like a million dollars... so we will wait on this guy. But the wood and metal together is a beautiful look!

This Chandelier. Oh. M. G. yea! So I originally found this same exact one online months ago and fell in love. I have actually been looking for a table to go under it for our dining room I love it that much. Well The Hubs got to see it first hand and he loved it as well. Of course we didnt even look at that price since we were still at EA but online its about $600 or so. It makes a huge statement and I am in lovvvveeee

We also dabbled in entertainment centers. This we liked (in a dark color) its the tallest and widest we have seen so far. We might have to make a custom piece later on. 

We decided to not make a ton of furniture choices until we are actually in the house for now... maybe its because the shock of using a tape measurer to see things is really hard. ha! A 22ft wall doesnt seem super huge.... till you use a tape measurer in a small-ish room. 

Celebration time!

The compound has an address folks! Praise the lord! Woo! The same day we filed for a building permit we found out that we needed to request an address before hand... oops... anywho our man Todd got. shit. done. I probably could have found a more eloquent way of saying that but hey... we are in construction mode now I'm going to talk like a construction worker!

We live off of a 'Place' WOOO I am super excited! Had a dark moment where we thought we were going to have an address off of a main road... and I was going to have to walk around the whole property to get my mail :(

The Tree Warden (yes, its a real title) signed off on us taking down the trees and clearing the property! Double WOOO! I wish they would start work tomorrow but hey... I guess Monday works too! Maybe if I mention to them that I am wasting so much water in the shower from the lack of pressure they will move a little faster... probably not so I think I will just make them cupcakes. My Michigan Brother, Sister, and kids got me a cupcake carrier for my birthday! Since it came to the house its not packed away and I can get to work on my sugary bribery!

We are headed downtown later tonight for a few drinks and we are starting a Fancy Friday tradition... dress to the 9s and we will see you there!

Impact fees

Oooh Gurl let me talk to you about a little thing we like to call Impact fees...

"Impact and capacity fees are charges on new development and increases in development intensity for the local government's cost associated with providing infrastructure to serve the new development.

The following impact and capacity fees are imposed by Sarasota County on new development in unincorporated areas of the county: potable water, wastewater, roads, park, library, fire/rescue, EMS, law enforcement, justice, general government, and education.

Municipalities charge some county impact fees, and municipalities and special districts may have their own fee systems for certain types of infrastructure."

So I pulled that right off the county website... a month or so ago we decided to run through every single article and section on that website and came up with a total $6429.00 not including potable water, road, and waste water. GROSS! Well I got a call back from someone in that department today who told me that my impact fees are going to be around 9 thousand. Yes. I pushed the right number. 9. I just threw up a little in my mouth. Let me be crystal clear when I tell you that we will be on septic and well for about 2 years max before we have to pay AGAIN to be hooked up to county... the septic and well is a cool 6k as well that we will get maybe 20% back from the county over a possible 20 years or so in our bill. What a joke! The county is also letting everyone know (who couldnt make it to the secret county hearing) that these fees are a deep discounted rates so that it will entice more people to build. 

Oh Sarasota County you are so silly! With your silly angry office employees and your silly impact fees! 

The only good news about the fees is that you dont have to pay them until you have your 'Certificate of occupancy' sooo.... we will part with this money when we move in. Bummer deal. Oh lawd. 

Guess this is the price you pay to live in paradise!