We have floors!

So awesome! And I think Zoe agrees:

Our floors (laminate wood-look primarily, with linoleum in the laundry) have been installed, and the house trimmed out. Painting soon, then plumbing fixtures installed. I am SO RIDICULOUSLY HAPPY to have that awful carpet gone. It's been in the house since we purchased it 7 or so years ago, we've power-cleaned it probably three or four times, but it was still so disgusting. You just can't keep that stuff clean with animals around. I'd much rather have area rugs that I can remove from the house to have professionally cleaned, or, worst case, gotten rid of if need be.

You may notice spots for TVs -

care to donate one?

Just kidding, of course.

Maybe.

Insulation, breaking through, and sheetrock

We finally have one big connected house. The exterior doors arrived, allowing us to insulate and put up sheetrock, as well as bust a whole through Zoe's old bedroom and into the new hallway. The 'new house' has heating piped to it, but the ducts are closed off right now to (supposedly - ha!) prevent too much dust from getting into the 'old house.' In reality, there is dust everywhere: our couches need constant vacuuming, floors dusting, return air filters changing. Soon, though, the new floor will be in place, which should cut down on the dust drastically. Looking forward to that point, when this will really start to feel like a complete house, instead of two different parts.

Windows and Exterior Painting

yes, it looks like a cedar log cabin right now, but just wait...

Construction continues! Windows arrived, just in time for installation before a small bit of rain. Electrical, plumbing, and HVAC rough-ins, as well as framing, are all complete, primarily awaiting inspections (boy, does Austin have a crazy amount of inspections!). Exterior painting; we chose not to choose, and just matched the existing color. So goes it. Exterior doors should be finished soon, and then we can make that break through to the existing house and insulation and sheetrock can begin!

Ta-da! No more log cabin

Framing! Sheathing! Skylights! Oh my!

Well, we left to celebrate (next post).
When we came back, someone had dropped a house in our backyard!
Zoe was thoroughly confused as to where the slab went, but now she's climbing through walls like they've always been there. This is of course the part that seems to happen the quickest, magnified by the fact that we were out of town. It's pretty much slow-going from here on out, with small things that are hard to actually see. The next big jump will be the sheetrock on the inside - we're all looking forward to that.

checking out the shower, just like last time

What we're not looking forward to: the actual connection with the existing house. So far we've been relatively lucky as there's been little impact on the interior of the home; we've just been reduced to a 2-1 with no study (or, the study has been moved to the kitchen table). Once the connection happens, though, our other rooms will get tighter as we have to shift items back and forth to allow for finish materials in the new portion, as well as in the existing. Not to mention dust, dust, and more dust. But, all towards a goal, I keep reminding myself...

Plumbing prep, slab pour

our new vehicle?

As part of the addition work, we're replacing our sewer line. Since we moved into the house, the sewer line has backed up/overflowed into our bathroom twice. That stuff is gross. This was in thanks to it's make-up (yup, that's basically glorified cardboard) and the proximity to the large pecan tree in our front yard.

swinging in a construction zone

a construction find - an old Coors pull-tab can

Since then the beams for the new slab have been dug, the slab was framed out, rebar placed, plumbing roughed in, and Monday this past week concrete was poured. Zoe usually asks where the workers have gone, and we have to explain that they have to go home to see their own families and sleep in their own beds. She thinks they should bring their beds here and sleep in the new house. I'm not so sure they would agree, what with there being no walls or roof.

Zoe checking out the shower with Dad

we'll have some grading to do...

Pre-Construction

good bye spa
you were great except for that whole
harboring-dead-animals thing

This post is longer overdue.

cutting sheet rock to install piping for the new water heater -
you really don't want to know what's in a plumbing wall from the '50s

This summer we started our 'pre-construction' phase on the house. In part this was jump-started by the Texas Trade Up appliance rebate program (which ended up being this total debacle for the state in terms of organization, which was eventually all blamed on the consulting company they/we hired). I sat in front of the computer for hours while various websites crashed, all while continuously re-dialing two different phone numbers (yes, this was the strategy for a state with nearly 25 million residents) until I reached a live person. I did this twice so we could get some rebate money back on 'trading up' our water heater to a tankless unit

sayonara, you old clunker

and our a/c unit to one that wasn't 15 to 20 years old.

there was barely enough space in the attic for the ultra-efficient a/c unit,
that there are actually two guys standing on this ladder

Both are so much more efficient than our old units, are sized for the square footage of the 'new' house, and our utility usage has gone down. We also took advantage of rebates provided through the City of Austin for the a/c and the Texas Gas Service for the tankless. We are so thankful for all of the rebates. But really, I'm especially thankful for instant hot showers and the extra 16 sf in our (soon to be old) laundry room.

look! actual side-by-side machines!
and space for a person to stand in front of them!

look what fits in our car!
(child not included)

At this time we also went ahead and changed our den (back) into a bedroom, so currently we technically have a 3-1. Zoe's old room (yes, the one we labored over) was turned into storage + some friends have temporary custody of a single bed and living room chairs + the den received some flowers courtesy of Dr. Seuss = Zoe has a new room.

funky flowers where French doors once were

And so it begins....

!!