Much Ado About Something...

Wow. To those faithful few who have logged in and checked this blog frequently; always in anticipation of seeing a new photo or hearing about something great; I apologize. There has been SO much going on with the house that I've not taken the time to update the blog. Sorry.

But here goes...

This photo was taken on Thursday, Sept 19th; as we headed to the coast for our 3-day Disney Cruise. As you can see, they had just poured the concrete for the sidewalk, frontwalk and driveway. Thankfully they accepted our request to have the driveway poured as wide as possible. It's 17' wide, which is large enough for two cars parked side by side. Phew! (Because every home has a side-entry garage, some of the driveways are very narrow in this community, some barely wide enough for one car. Not sure how some of these home owners can make the turn into/out of their garage. With ours being so wide, we can use the garage for storage, instead of the cars... at least for awhile.)

Not too much different here, as this photo was taken just a few days later on Sunday, Sept 23rd. The final grading was done to the property, to prepare it for sod and landscaping. Still some exterior painting to be done (see the shutters). The big to-do here was that the house still needed lots of work on the inside on Thursday, and we were told by KB what parts of that should be done by Sunday (the day of this photo). 4 days later, and not a single thing had been done.

Well, we threw a fit. We were enraged because KB was telling us to be prepared to close on October 5th. With the amount of work to be done on our home, there was NO WAY it was going to close on time. I told our sales rep, "The only way I could see this house being ready to close on time, is if KB puts an inspector in the house for 10-12 hours a day while a crew of 8 to 20 'elves' come in and work like crazy, everyday between now and October 5th!" I was pissed.

The next morning I receive a call from a senior construction manager from KB who apologized for the lack of work being done on our home, and insisted that they will get the house ready to close on October 5th, still. He explained to me that they are putting one of their inspectors in our home all day, everyday between now and closing, while he inspects multiple crews working in the home each day. So it wasn't elves, but they pretty much did as I said they'd have to do.

Since that call, progress has been moving much faster in our house. It will be really close, but if they can continue their current pace, our home should be ready to close this coming Friday, October 5th.

Noel and I are continually making trips out to the home, and KB is having their inspector call me daily to let me know what's being done, and not being done in our home.

Here's a photo from this past Thursday, Sept 27th. As you can see, the landscaping has been added to the home. Basic package. Maybe if we can convince my Uncle Steve to come to Florida, he could come up with some good ideas to enhance our yard!

Here's some photos taken yesterday morning, Saturday, September 29th. The exterior:

And an image of the carpet. The carpet was installed on Friday. The power also was just turned on to the home on Friday as well. The A/C was powered up for the first time on Saturday. When we head out there again tomorrow, we'll let you know how that's going.

The house is gorgeous. We're both really excited and anxious to move-in and finally call it ours. Noel and I are also both really hoping that we can play host to all of our out-of-town friends and family sometime soon, too!

With all the stress involved in the home, I've barely had time to cry over all the pain caused to me by my Mets. But much like KB, they too are trying to swoop in at the last minute and get things done right for me. They need a win today... So wherever you are, enjoy this clip and keep your fingers crossed for a Mets win and a Philly loss:

Spend A Lot, Save a Little

Not many changes to the house in the last week. Not much to show you anyway.

But here's how the house looked as we pulled up to it this afternoon:

With not too much to share about the house, instead we'll tell you about our new appliances! Sound thrilling? Well its not. But at least its a story to share.

Going back to Labor Day Weekend, Noel and I were celebrating our first anniversary by searching out the best deal on appliances for the new home. The kitchen is almost complete, just needs a fridge/freezer. We also wanted to purchase new washer and dryer, as our current ones are nothing special and 5 years old.

Noel found that Best Buy was running a sale on LG appliances, offering 10% off the sale price. So we rush out there to take advantage of the deal, after figuring out which items we wanted online. Turns out the price online is not the same as the price in store on some items (a fridge for example). We got them to match their own online price (saving us about $500) on the one item! We also pick up the washer and dryer we wanted, at the price we expected.

The next morning, Noel insists on checking out the Sunday paper to see what new deals are available. Well I'm glad she did. She found that Home Depot had a better deal on the washer. It also said that they would price match anyone else AND give an add'l 10% off the price match.

We leave first thing that morning to go straight back to Best Buy to return the appliances we purchased just the night before. This is, by the way, a brand new Best Buy store, and apparently they're trying hard to get some business as they refused to let us return the items, instead insisting that they not only match the deal we could have received at Home Depot, but give us an ADDITIONAL 10% off their reduction on the price match. Saving us an additional $400!!! Woo hoo!!

So that's how we did really well on our appliance shopping! Here's a bit about the items we purchased:

These are (obviously) not to scale.

But the washer and dryer are both large capacity! We're excited about all of the appliances as each is Energy Star certified, which means they are energy efficient. The washer uses much less water than a top loader. We're also excited as the washer has a 'Steam' cycle which is a quick 15 minutes to quick clean and wrinkle remover! Should be good for the work clothes, and a nice alternative to dry cleaning EVERYthing.

The fridge is a 'french door' style... or as they say in Paris: 'a door' style. There's a water/ice dispenser in the door, too. The black is to match all of the appliances that come with the house.

Coming up next:

Monday, September 17th: Pre-Carpet Inspection

Thursday, September 20th: Noel and Jeremy depart on 3-day cruise on the Disney Wonder

Friday, September 21st: Noel celebrates her b'day. I won't tell you which one, but its the last one that starts with a '2'

Friday, September 28th: Final Walk-thru of house

Friday, October 5th: Expected closing date

Saturday, October 6th: Everything arrives at house; and all hell breaks loose

Now In Color!

The new home is now in color! Noel and I stopped by for our weekly visit, hoping that at least the stucco was completed on the exterior. We were very surprised to see that not only was the stucco complete, but they had also painted the exterior!




And the interior was painted too!





We're very excited about the colors, too. They, coincidentally, happen to be the same colors on the house on lot 94 (the one we originally purchased). So that worked out really well!

Our next trip to the house, mom and dad Myerson will be with us! Stay tuned for those images, too!

We're Walking, We're Walking, We're Walking...

This week's update to the blog is a very special one. For the first time in our blog history, we feature the new technology of moving pictures (with synchronized sound!) to show you our new home.

First, here's the weekly photo update, taken from the fixed spot:

As you can tell, there hasn't been too many changes in the exterior of the home. They should be adding the stucco fairly soon. It takes about a week for the stucco to dry before they can paint it. Once painted, there will be very little progress to the exterior... just the occasional aesthetic feature.

Speaking of 'feature' presentations... we will bring you the movies soon. But for now, more still photos:

Here's a view from where the TV will be. You are looking through the nook into the Kitchen. The patio is to your left, the laundry, 1/2 bath, dining and living rooms are to your right.

Here's two views of the loft. It is huge! The first photo is taken from the top of the stairs.

This second one is taken from the loft, looking towards the double-door entry to the Master Suite.


And now... the moment you've been waiting for... Movies!!! These were taken on our digital camera, so please forgive some of the audio and lightening gaffes. The films are hosted by Noel. And if you watch closely, you can see how quickly I'm balding!

First Film (upstairs)
The Sequel (downstairs)

Enjoy!

We Frame, We Saw, We Concrete

Friday, August 3rd (this past Friday) was our fram walk for the new home. All went well! There were no real surprises and no big requests. Very well done.

Here's how the house looked on Friday...


They should be hanging the drywall up through the house this week. Once that is done they will start to place the stucco on the exterior, and internal hardware gets setup. These exterior shots will start to become much less dramatic, too. But we'll be sure to keep posting more and more photos!

Looks like we'll be closing on the house in early to mid October.

The only sorta neat thing we learned was that we are not the only new home owners in this community to have their family move in as well. Of course, you all know that Noel's parents will be moving into lot 92, near the front of the community. Our house is lot 154, towards the back. We found out that lot 155 (our next door neighbors) was purchased by a family, where the wife's sister owns at lot 91 (Vito and Anna's next door neighbors). Funny how things work out that way.

We have not yet met either of these families, we learned this from Mike, the project manager on our home.

Roof of Purchase

Okay, not much to report really. So here are the newest photos of the house.



The shingles have been placed. They are light in color, sort of like a sandy beach. But not a white sand beach. Or a black sand beach. Just a regular, sandy beach.



(Covered patio, from above)


(Cover over front porch)

The Frame Walk is this Friday. We'll be sure to update the blog again after the frame walk. We expect everything to go fine... there've been no challenges with the house so far.

More to come...

Lofty Ambitions

Another weekend has come and gone, which mean Noel and I made another trip out to St. Cloud to see the progress on our new home. Here's what we saw on Saturday morning:



It almost seems like KB is woking on getting this home up even faster than the previous one we purchased. That's great, too!

The framework is almost complete on the interior. This week they even had the stairs installed, so we could go up there and grab some pictures.


This is the loft area. The half wall is the bannister around the stairs. It will really open up this (already) large space. Noel and I spend lots of time trying to figure out what furniture we can put up here!


This is the view from the loft of the Master Bedroom. There will be a set of double doors that lead into he Master Suite. Very nice!

I think, though, the coolest part about having stairs is that we get a small closet area underneath them. Noel and I have taken to calling this space the 'Harry Potter Room,' since this would be the space at 4 Privet Drive where the boy lived.

Speaking of Harry Potter, I finished Book 7 this weekend. Couldn't believe that the two characters Rowling killed off were Spiderman and Optimus Prime! I didn't think you were allowed to kill off characters that didn't belong to you!

Block Party? No, No, No... We Were Framed!

This is our (new) plot of land. I know what you are thinking... how could they possibly change in that gorgeous home for a piece of dirt. Easy! Less to clean! But then you have the whole, 'how do I know if dirt is clean cunundrum!' This is going to be a very gorgeous home, too... with much more to offer Noel and me, and all of our guests!



This photo was taken on July 7th, just 3 days after the previous photo. I've marked the spot where I was standing when I took this photo. The plan is to continue to take photos from this same exact spot. I hope that someone much more talented than I can help me organize those photos into an online slideshow to illustrate a 'time-elapsed' type construction show.



This photo, too, was taken from the same spot. This was taken today, July 15th. It doesn't take long to get to framing, huh? The house has some really awesome features that you can already start to see. The front door area has a nice porch (where the ladders are stacked just to the left of the door). It has a side entry garage, entering on the right side of the front door, as you face it.



This, too, was taken today. This is the back of the home. There's a 10x10 covered patio. We plan on building the typical Florida screen room off the back of the house. But that's much later...



Standing in the front door, you can see the half wall. On this side of the half wall will be the formal Dining room and Living room. On the other side is the Family room. That's where we'll put the nice Lazy Boy sofas and the big screen TV!



Standing in the aforementioned Family Room, you can see back to the Nook and Kitchen. Nice big space. You can tell from the half hieght wall that the Kitchen counters will wrap all the way around. The Kitchen will be a gourmet kitchen, which I think just means it has different appliances.

I apologize for the delay in posting, but I think this whopper of a post makes up for it! And this is how it all is today!

A Tale of Two Stories

Everything you think you knew about our new home is wrong.

Noel and I made a BIG change in our new home this afternoon. It actually started a few days ago...

KB started building the home on lot 93, the only house between her parents house and ours. Its some massive two story home. There must've been some miscalculation, because they started building this mammoth house only 8 feet from the wall of our home. We weren't too happy about that.

Noel's father said something to our sales lady, Sabrina. She said that she had two other homes in the same community still available, but both were larger. Noel and I love the house we bought SO much, and were willing to stay, even though the neighbor was on top of us... but thought there would be no harm in looking at these other two homes.

The first we saw was awful. Ugly home with some poor design choices. The 2nd home hasn't been built yet. But much to our surprise, it is an amazing floor plan! We liked it... a lot.

But the home was much larger than ours. My father-in-law says if we want the house, he can negotiate KB to give it to us for only $10,000 more than what we agreed on for our home. Son of a gun... he was right.

Noel and I went in to Sabrina's office today to sign the paper work and switch our home to the new one. Kind of a whirl-wind weekend for us. But here are the details on the two homes:

Old 'new' home:

• 2,159 sq ft
• One story
• 4 bedroom
• 2 bath
• Expected Closing: Late August

New 'new' home:

• 2,855 sq ft
• Two stories
• 3 bedroom + Loft
• 2.5 bath
• Expected Closing: Late September

The new home also has a formal dining room! Something we didn't have in the other home. Oh... and the slab is laid out for the neighbor (one neighbor is already built), we are 20' from one neighbor and 3x further from the other. PLENTY of room.

I've switched the rendering on the left side of the blog to the new elevation. I'll try and post some images of the floor plan as well. And the name of the blog is new, too. Keep checking back to read more, and see more of our New 'new' home!

Everything you think you knew about our new home is wrong.

Jeremy & Noel's Technicolor Dream Home

The exterior of our home is almost finished! As you can see the paint is now up. I've been told by Sabrina, our friendly KB Home Sales lady, that there are still some additional painting to be done on the outside, though.





You can also see that they're ready to pour the front walk, sidewalk and driveway.

This is the left side of the house (if you were facing the front). The A/C unit will be sitting right next to the garage door.


And here's a shot of what the interior drywall looks like from this past weekend. This is the view from standing in the front door of the house.



Check back soon... there will be some updates on furniture and other interior features. We're also expecting that the interior walls will be painted and cabinets installed when we visit the house this coming weekend!

Its Got to be Better than Wet Wall

The drywall is on its way up! Last Friday (June 15th) Noel and I met with Mike, our friendly KB Project Manager. He's the foreman for the construction on the house. Very nice guy! He had no objections to moving outlets around to where we asked. He immediately took care of any request we had... which is awesome!

Here are some photos of the drywall going up inside the house:


(View from the front door.)



(View from the Kitchen into the living room. You can even see Noel smiling!)




(Inside the garage. The walls will be finished with drywall. Its just on its way up.)

Worst Clown Name Ever: Stucco

This is what our house looks like (as of Sunday, June 10th).

As you can see, the stucco work on the exterior has been completed. The house is really starting to take shape nicely! The interior framework has been completed, and we even have a front door now:

The electric and plumbing lines have been placed through the framework and the drywall has been ordered. Our next step is our Frame Walk with the foreman. His name is Mike.

Noel and I have already noticed a few things different than what we were expecting. Mostly just outlets and TV jacks in the wrong spots. I called Mike earlier this week, and he said we can move all that around pretty easily. The Frame Walk will be this Friday.

The other exciting news is that we received a letter from KB HOMES telling us that our expected closing date is between August 9th and September 9th... almost a month earlier than we first expected!!! Might even be in time for Mom and Dad's visit in late August. Wouldn't that be nice?

Long Time No Blog

Sorry about this, but I guess I've been a week behind in posting.

Noel and I have been pretty busy at work lately, and we've been using our free time on the weekends to help out her parents. We've been assisting them with getting their house ready to be sold, by doing some of the heavy cleaning and light painting.

But in all that craziness we did get a chance to visit our home last weekend. I'll share those pics with you here:

(As you can see, we now have walls, roof and a small front porch!)

(Here in the laundry room, we'll have the access to the A/C unit. The duct work is already set in the house.)

(This is the bath in the 2nd bathroom. We'll have to keep it cleaner than this, though.)

(This is the pass thru "window" in the living room. You can see straight through to the front door! There will be an electric fireplace under the half wall. No we did not want the fireplace, but because it was an inventory home, we couldn't get rid of it.)

There goes the neighborhood!

There are some really neat features about our new community. I've added a link to the sidebar on the left to the community's website. Stevens Plantation is the development, and Magnolia Green is the sub-development. Stevens Plantation boasts access to a beautiful public park, St. Cloud Elementary school, a corporate office park and (coming soon) a small shopping plaza.

But I think what might be the nicest feature of the community is the people. On Saturday my in-laws purchased the home being built 2 lots down from us! Noel and I are very excited to have her parents livnig so close! I just feel bad for the owner of the home between ours. :)

Here's a photo of the home site map. Noel and I own lot 94, and her parents have purchased lot 92.



Their house is 2,700+ sq feet and is a 3/3 with a den and a gourmet kitchen.

I know most people wouldn't be as excited as I am to have their in-laws moving in so close. But Noel and I discussed how wonderful it will be... and we also set the rule that they must call before coming over. Of course, we're the kids, so we can show up unannounced any time we want!

To give you an idea of just how close the homes are, here's a (bad) panoramic shot from my digital camera to show both homes. Ours is on the left, theirs is on the right.



And, yes, we now have roof trusses and interior wall framing. Here's a few more photos of the house Noel and I purchased and how it looks this weekend:

(Interior walls being framed. View from rear window.)

(Interior framing. View from garage.)

(Exterior shot. Day. A slow helicopter shot moves into the swamp to find a frog playing a banjo while sitting on a log...)

White Weeds (and more)

Noel and I have stopped by the home site to visit each weekend. Two weeks ago, we saw this as we approached the lot:



Noel exclaims, "Look! We've got white weeds growing out of the ground!" We were both very excited to see that the pvc pipes were all in place!


Of course, when you see the outline of the house laid out in front of you for the first time, 2,100 square feet looks very small. But there is no frame of reference, other than the vast sky and large conservation areas around us.

We received a call this past Wednesday from Sabrina to inform us that they had poured the slab that day. Noel and I didn't get a chance to head out there and visit until Sunday. When we arrived on Sunday, we saw that much more than the slab was in place:

The 9' block walls are all in place! Even the covered lanai is in place:
Below is the view from inside the house towards the garage.


It still looks small. Having been inside so many empty apartments before, I know that looks can be deceiving. I'm sure there will be PLENTY of space for all the cats and stuff we have.