Wood Floor - Finish Coat #1

They'll be putting 3 coats of varnish on the floor. They just finished the first coat.

Formal dining through the window.

Type 2 Hickory

They finished laying the wood floor on Friday. I am really excited about the way it turned out. We decided to do Hickory instead of Mahogany because it is lighter and more varied in color. We are not going to stain it, but only put a polyurethane coat on it. They will sand and varnish towards the end of the process, but they needed the floor in so they could set cabinets, I suppose. Not sure what's next. I know the painter will be staining trim and I think the tile people will start next week too.

I need to meet with the trim carpenter on Monday and Miles is meeting with the excavator for the septic on Wednesday.

Countertops & Other

I met with the granite fabricator to find a remnant that we can use in the Powder bath and the Master bath. I found a great one that we think is big enough for both bathrooms. We had to buy 2 full slabs for the kitchen and butler's pantry. I'm hoping we have enough left over so that we can use it for the bench in the master shower. If not, we'll likely go with some kind of Corian product for that. I'm hoping we can use as much of the granite as possible. We bought it, I'd hate for him to get to resell the remnant for $19/sq.ft.

Other news from today:

1. They delivered the cabinets and are storing them in the garage. We opened a few boxes to take a peak at the Alder and the Cherry - they look great and we can't wait to see them installed!
2. They delivered the Hickory flooring today too. We got 3", 4", 5" random mix to vary the widths. It's going to look so good!
3. They also delivered all of the Alder trim today. The painter will stain the trim to match the cabinets.
4. We met with the indoor railing person and finally decided on a solution for the railing. We're going to do wrought iron with Alder newell posts.
5. We finalized the tile and carpet and stayed close to budget.
6. They finished connecting the water line and installing the water meter last week, so today they also finished grading the road and adding road base.

Things are coming together fast now, we just can't imagine why all this finish work will take 2 months to finish. Seems like they're close. They will have the Hickory floors laid by Friday (no varnish or finish yet). Then I guess they'll set cabinets, then varnish the floor - we're doing a natural finish on the wood.

Interior Fun Stuff

After insulating the house, they cleaned it up very nicely. All of the sawdust, extra cables and other construction debris was swept up and taken out. I was very impressed!

Miles and I spent 4 hours with the carpet, tile, wood floor, granite, etc. person last Friday, then I met Jamie and the flooring designer again on Wednesday for another 2 hours. I am very happy with the tile and flooring decisions we've made. I'm very excited about the tile for the fireplace and the way we tied it into a decorative insert piece above the range - very cool.

We also pretty much settled on the granite for the kitchen, but need to see if the fabricator has a remnant piece for the powder bath and the master bathroom. We may go with something simpler for the master bath. Then we'll need to decide about what we want to do for the backsplash - tile or a piece of the granite. I sort of prefer tile, but I want to see what kind of remnant piece or other we decide for the master bath.

I think we've also settled on Hickory for the floors. I was hoping/wanting to go with something darker like Mahogany, but I was talked out of it because a dark floor will show all the dirt and animal hair that we will have living out on the farm. I like the variation in Hickory, though, and am starting to like the lighter color. We've got a lot of dark colors in the kitchen, so it will be better probably.

We also decided not to do a wood hallway upstairs, we'll carpet that. We were also contemplating a tile entryway, but because of the way the floor and stairs and rooms came together, we couldn't get a good spot for that. We decided to keep it all wood and I think we'll be happy with that. We'll define the dining room floor with a big area rug. Cost us less money as well, so Miles is happy. Sounds like we might be at or under budget, so that's good!