It's Been a Long Road

[LJ3]

I've traveled a sometimes very bumpy road over the last 3 years, learning from mistakes, working hard to repair things I had broken, making new mistakes and trying to recover some significant losses. I've done a pretty fair job of it, I think.

A house is just a pile of materials and isn't a measure of success or failure but... it is a little metaphorical in a way.

Settling next week and hopefully moving things forward to even better times.

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Oh and... all 6 of us have been living in a small apartment while construction is finished so there's that :)

[Bwana]

Don't know what all you have been through but glad to hear that things are looking up for you and yours. (The fact that all 6 of you are still alive after the past 6 months in an apartment is quite an accomplishment itself. Congrats ;) )

As for the house, that is one fine looking dwelling and I have no doubt you guys will turn it into a very fine HOME in no time. Enjoy sir!

[Chicken Dinner]

If you can survive the apartment, you can survive anything. Nice looping homestead!

[LJ3]

I didn't mean that to sound as "woe is me" as it did :)

It's all good. I know the builder will be glad to get rid of my ass. I been up in their bidness since they poured the foundation. Going by every night to see what had been done and letting them know what needed to be corrected :) I actually saved them a good chunk of money by pointing out things that were much less expensive to correct at the time, instead of when we were supposed to actually inspect.

[Buckrub]

Congrats bud. Very nice house and better news.

[BarryBobPosthole]

Nice job! congrats! On ALL fronts!

BKB

[Arty]

Good on you LJ!

[Hombre]

Congrats - that is a really nice looking place. We did the same thing and stayed in an apartment when we made the move to Seattle. It sure makes you appreciate a house.

[Egghead]

Does this mean we can go fishing again soon? :)

You know I know how cool this is - and I'm mighty happy for ya!

You know I'm not far if you need a hand moving your crap!

[BarryBobPosthole]

In the immortal words of George Carlin, 'One person's shit is another person's stuff.'

BKB

[jb]

Nice looking digs', enjoy

[BarryBobPosthole]

Len, what type of roofing material is that?

BKB

[Buckrub]

Those are shingles.

You're welcome.

[Thumper]

Look at the far left corner in pic #2 P-hole (where the sun hits it) ... looks like shingles to me.

[BarryBobPosthole]

Well, I know they're shingles. I was wondering if they were asphault composition shingles or if they were maybe made out of rubber. Lots of builders using it nowadays and its supposed to last forever. MY house is 17 years old almost so I probably have a roof in my relatively near future.

BKB

[Buckrub]

You're so much smarter'n me.

[Captain]

Nice looking digs LJ. You got a spare room for an out of town Ribber fishing guest? ;)

Sent from my iPhone using Forum Runner

[Sunshine]

Really nice house!!
Sure do put those houses close together.

I've gotta have space between my house and the others.

Right now I have lots on each side of mine.
Will never build on them as long as I live here, which is about 7 more years.

Then gunna sell the whole thing and move to eastern wa.
Going to buy at least ten acres, for the new place.

Sure is nice though!!
Hope your family makes wonderful memories and enjoys it for years. :)

[LJ3]

Shingles are asphalt but composite, too. They look like asphalt up close and but kinda rubbery as well. They're way thinner so I was dubious until I picked one up and started working it, seems pretty durable.

Yes, we gots plenty-o-room. You can't tell from the front but it's a 4 level house, We got a loft option that has a full bath, bedroom and little side room up there. So yes on fishing lodge accommodations or any other accommodations.

George Carlin was a geenus. I have 15X25 and a 15x30 storage units that are packed top to bottom all the way back that I'm moving this weekend. Then we're getting movers to move the apartment stuff to the house.

Egg, hopefully I can wet a line very soon! We're right up against best fishing of the year round these here parts!

[Niner]

Looks like some nice digs, my man.

Izzat on a basement? What kind of siding?

[LJ3]

Yeah, concrete foundation and a slab. Vinyl siding. It's a cool gray color but you can't really tell from the iphone pics.

[jb]

Now I have to ask how a slab house can have four levels, I can see three, but 4?
Unless there is a room behind the garage that's on the same level as the garage floor then I guess you can say 4.
Why no basements or crawl space down there?

[LJ3]

JB, it's a finished basement. Poured concrete foundation. Maybe I'm not using the right terminology. They pour concrete in to the forms for all the basement walls, then once that cures they pour the slab, then finish it with normal stud and drywall work. It's a walk out basement. In the front you enter on the 2nd level. then 3rd level is all the BRs, then the loft runs across the "rear-middle" of the house, left to right.

So basically overlay the loft piece right over the middle of the 3rd floor piece.

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[Buckrub]

That's a cool floor plan. If'n it were me though, I'd have to have a kitchen.

[LJ3]

I'm not sure how to count "floors". All I know is if you start in the basement, you have to walk up four full flights of stairs to get to the loft which pretty much sucks :)

The part I AM most excited about is the kitchen. It ROCKS. Man-o-man material things don't matter but the kitchen does :)

Granite counter tops, big eat-in island, all GE Profile Stainless appliances, gas cook top, double wall ovens (one is convection) and a refrigerator that seems to have a theme song :)

[Buckrub]

Got a 30 amp breaker I can plug to in the driveway? :)

[BarryBobPosthole]

Six bedrooms? What, you opening a whorehouse?

BKB

[Buckrub]

Orphanage.

[Niner]

Doggone buddy, now that you told a little bit more about it, it sounds nicer and nicer! I love that the laundry is on the same level as the bedrooms....and smack in the middle of them in fact. And, that Opt Retreat would make a killer sewing room for the ladies....unless it's slated for someone's bedroom.

Sounds like the basement is finished out into rooms, or at least the perimiter walls have sheetrock on them. You gonna make a workshop down there? I love having my workshop and storage down in the basement!

[BarryBobPosthole]

It has no parlour. How can it be a proper house without a parlour, or a billi-ard room with the fancy pot passers and such.


BKB

[LJ3]

It's REALLY not as big as all that. It's no McMansion. It's not 6BR. Just 4. We moved some stuff around with the floor plan to fit us a little better. The boy is making the finished den in the basement his BR and 3 girls bedrooms are up with ours and then the loft. Which will be half guest room half office.

I do love having the laundry on the same level as the BRs. Makes life way easier.

We don't have a parlour but I am trying to get everyone to call the living room the Conservatory. So far it's just me.

[Thumper]

Cool house! Congrats Ticboy.

That upstairs laundry is the tits ... until a hose or seal breaks! :hair

[BarryBobPosthole]

What room does the upstairs maid sleep in? and what does her uniform look like?

BKB

[Thumper]

Ummm, she IS a French maid .... correct? ;)

[LJ3]

She's brazillian and uniform is optional :) the washer is in a drainage tub to catch all leaks and I have usaa homeowners unsuraance so I ain't worried about jack shit :)

[Buckrub]

Yeah you are.

Mortgage.

[LJ3]

Well... theres' that :)

[Niner]

LOTS of stairs! Hell's Bells, there's even a set of stairs in the master bedroom. If yer not careful, on a late-nite trip to the bathroom, you could slip, trip, flip and bust yer lip!!!
:hair

[Sunshine]

My next home will have an elevator. :)

[Thumper]

The house we had in Mississippi when I was in high school had an elevator. It went from the downstairs to the master bedroom.

[BarryBobPosthole]

Having grown up in homes that were all one story ranch style, I always wanted a house with multi-stories. Now having lived in a multi story house for 16 years, I think if I ever build again it'll be a ranch-slit level lkind of on the design of Larke's house. If you ain't seen Larke's house, too bad loser.

Built in to a hillside type deal with a drive way in back that goes into a garage that's under the house and that's where his hidey hole/shop/man cave is/

BKB

[Chicken Dinner]

I was just thinking that with my creaky knees and my wife's MS, if I ever buy another house it'll be one level.

[Thumper]

I grew up in 2-story houses and have only owned two houses in my lifetime. The California house was a single-story 4br/2ba house that I owned for 10 years. I now have a 2-story that I've owned for 25+ years. I'll never own another 2-story.

You really need dual "everything" as far as HVAC is concerned or you just have to live with cool downstairs and hot upstairs ... or freezing downstairs and cool upstairs. Then there's the fun of an overflowing toilet that ends up meaning a new ceiling downstairs. And there's the stair part ... when I got out of the hospital, I couldn't go up and down stairs for about 6 months. That was NOT fun. I think I've had my fill of 2-story houses.

BTW ... I think the thought of a laundry room upstairs, although convenient, would give me nightmares ... whether the washer has a catch pan or not. Pop a supply hose when you're not home and that pan ain't gonna do nuttin'! :hair

[BarryBobPosthole]

I have a semi-annual chore of opening and closing registers upstairs and downstair every spring and fall in my house just to keep the temps semi-normal. And I have three air handlers. go figure. The people who designed the heat/AC must have been busy that day and let someone's three year old design it.

BKB

[Thumper]

I have an older home and it just has a single a/c unit (heat pump). I play the "register game" constantly.

[LJ3]

Hehehe, I got news for you. Even the two system design requires some tweaking between seasons. In case you guys missed it, physics called and left a voicemail. Warm air still rises and cool air still sinks.

[Thumper]

Understood ... hence my comment above about cold downstairs, hot upstairs.

To compensate, I close the registers downstairs and open them upstairs when the temps are high during the day. Next thing I know, Lynn is cooking and has the oven going and it's a bazillion degrees downstairs and sub-freezing upstairs (the thermostat is in the frigging KITCHEN of all places). Start cooking and get the kitchen warmed up ... and ice cubes start spitting out of the upstairs registers. It's a constant game of catch-up.

[jb]

I design about an equal number of one story and two story homes. Majority of each have walk-out basements.
The house we built for ourselves about 28 years ago was a two story with walk-out. Four bedrooms 2 full baths and 2 half baths.
Now that we're here all alone you'd think it would be to big, but every room has it's purpose and just don't know how'd we downsize.
We both know we could be one day away from not doing stairs, but until that happens we're happy where we are.
As for a Len having a laundry on the bedroom level, that's very in right now, I'm also doing a lot of homes were there are two laundry areas,
a main one for the house then a stack w/d built in the master closet.
The design of Len's home would go well up here.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v460/jbmich/IMG_0907_zps42959b84.jpg

[Thumper]

Yeah, we went to the "Parade of Homes" a few months ago and the upstairs laundry room was prevalent in most of the 2-story homes we looked at. It does seem to be the "in" thing these days and couldn't be more convenient really. I've just had so many water leak disasters over the years that I'm a bit gun-shy with any extra plumbing above the main floor. Even an upstairs water heater makes me nervous. Maybe I'm stuck in the Dark Ages.

[BarryBobPosthole]

I've had one insurance claim from when my kids were teenagers and stopped up the toilet upstairs and the water ruined my kitchen ceiling. I kind of made the same vow that I'd never put another bathroom upstairs again. That's really not practical when you have upstairs masters and such though.

BKB

[jb]

With most upstairs laundry rooms, the good builders build the laundry room floor similar to a tile shower, rubber membrain covered with CT on the floor and about 6" up the wall and all sloped just a little to a floor drain. They will put a 3/4" marble sill under the laundry room door.
If done correctly there should be little concern is a leak occurs.

[Thumper]

Thanks JB ... that explains it. The only catch in your description are the words "good builders". Guess which one I'd prolly get stuck with! ;)

[jb]

With all the internet sites and the cable TV shows about building, flipping, decorating, etc, it's getting hard to find clients that do not know exactly what they want.
Some of them come to me with a portfolio in a three ring note book with pictures and spec's they want in their new home.
The builders I work with use their pictures to do the finish work, build their fireplace, or create their kitchen. All these pictures really make my job easier as I don't have to do much more than make the house look like the picture.
There are a few builders,even up here,that want to cut every corner they can, but they don't last long once the word gets out.

[LJ3]

With most upstairs laundry rooms, the good builders build the laundry room floor similar to a tile shower, rubber membrain covered with CT on the floor and about 6" up the wall and all sloped just a little to a floor drain. They will put a 3/4" marble sill under the laundry room door.
If done correctly there should be little concern is a leak occurs.

Perzackly how they did ours.

[Niner]

Ours is a 1.5 story.....at least that's what "they" say. Kitichen, great room, master + bath, laundry, and a half bath downstairs. Additional BRs, and a full bathroom upstairs. Two HVAC units (heat pump), and all sitting on a full ("unfinished") basement. The "great room" has a cathedral celing (I think that's what it's called) I can look out of the skylights from my easy chair. Ever since I got sick, I am SO glad the master is "on the main". It was a long time after I came home until I was able to climb stairs.....in fact, I rarely go upstairs nowadays.

Since we're empty-nesters, we keep the upstairs thermostat set pretty high during the summer,and low in the winter. My goal during the winter is to keep the fireplace instert/wood stove stoked up, so the heat pump doesn't turn on. :)

Also, we have a full length front porch and rear deck (with "deer stand" :biggrin)

[BarryBobPosthole]

I'm kind of like JB on the empty nest thing. We rattle around in here when its just the two of us but its usually like grand central station around here lately and getting readyto get even busier. Its nice to have the room when all the kids are home too.

BKB