Still hunting for the backsplash subway tile...

Sometimes I wish I hadn't found this picture of the kitchen I love. Because if I hadn't found it, I would probably be OK with the more standard white or off-white subway tile for our kitchen backsplash. Now thanks to the Spring 2007 edition of Renovation Style (a magazine I no longer have), I'm on the hunt for this tile. I love the warmth and depth of the tile pictured and wish, oh I wish, that I had saved the sources list at the back of the magazine. Lesson learned--ALWAYS check the sources list at the back of magazines if you see something you like!

That all said, I did find a very close runner-up for the tile this weekend while my husband and I enjoyed a little mini vacation from the kids. This tile is over a century old, however, so who knows where it was made.

And where did I see it? Oh...only at the largest private residence in the United States, the Biltmore House. This tile was used in the stable/barn to the right of the house (where the present day gift shops are). Hmm...

Friday morning we swung by Home Depot and picked up two boxes of subway tile they had in stock. One was this marble looking one. Ashley said we would probably be happy with this one because it is classic. And he's right...so if I don't find a tile that I can purchase that looks like the one in the magazine, we'll probably go with this marble one or just use beadboard as the backsplash (which would be nice because we can paint it whenever we want to change the look of the kitchen). I said from the beginning, we were making decisions and moving forward. But this backsplash is getting the best of me! Oh and we're going with Black Impala granite for our countertops (and a pecan topped island).

Stylish Blog Award

Well, this is fun. I've been given the Stylish Blogger Award by southbel at Southern Style.  We share the Palmetto State as our home and she's thinking about building a Moser Design Group plan. Blogging about building our house has connected me to all sorts of folks so this little award is a pyramid scheme that is neat to take part in!

As part of this award, I have to share seven things about myself:

1- I'm currently a stay-at-home mama but before my 2 1/2 year old was born, I was an academic advisor at the University of South Carolina. I hope to return to higher education in some form once my boys are older.

2- I love to cook. I grew up with a mama who loved to bake and then I married Ashley who appreciated good food. With his encouragement, my interest in preparing delicious meals has grown. Although trying new recipes comes in spurts for me, I get a lot of satisfaction when a meal turns out well.

3- I was a journalism major in undergrad at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. I never actually worked for a newspaper (my original plan) but my degree has served me well in so many other ways, such as working on my four blogs and reviewing bid proposals for my husband's landscape maintenance company.

4- I grew up in North Carolina and never imagined I would live in our southern neighbor. But I'm so happy to call South Carolina home. It's a different state from North Carolina but it has so much to offer, too!

5- My favorite thing to do as a little girl was play at the waterfall near my parents' house with my brother. We spent hours developing our world there and I'm excited about my boys growing up on our land and having the same magical experience (though sans waterfall!). 

6- I'm taking a beginner's sewing class right now. I've been sewing for a while but I've never branched out from aprons and pillows. Learning more of the basics is increasing my confidence and I hope to eventually be able to sew some simple clothes and bags. 

7- As much as I love keeping with friends and family via the Internet, I really love a handwritten letter in my mailbox. My friend Nikki from grad school and I are penpals and try to write each other a "real" letter every month or so. What a treat!

Another part of this award is I have the opportunity to award up to seven other blogs with the Stylish Blog Award. For this, I'm choosing the four blogs I read the most (the first two are house blogs; the second two are food blogs):

Life in a Little Red Farmhouse

The Inspired Room
Confabulation in the Kitchen
Skinny Taste

Please check them out when you have a chance. 

Happy blogging!

Stylish Blogger Award....

Rules

-Thank the person who gave you the award and link back to them in your post.

--Share seven things about yourself.

--Award up to seven recently discovered new blogs.--Contact these bloggers and let them know they've received the award

Putting on its winter whites!

When I drove up and saw the house dressed sharply in white this afternoon, I was so happy with our decision to go with Pure White by Sherwin Williams. Some people may look at a white house and think, "ho hum" but to us, it says FARMHOUSE and classic! Throughout this process of choosing a plan and building, we have been inspired by the book, The Farmhouse: New Inspiration for the Classic American Home. Today our house made me think of the book's cover (and many photos inside). If you're thinking about farmhouse design, this book is worth buying (or at least checking out from the library).

I told Ashley I wish our contractor's dump truck wasn't always parked in the front. He joked and recommended that I put it in neutral and roll it down the hill...but for some reason, I don't think Perry would like that I moved his dumpster. So it stays!

On to the inside (more outside in a bit). Here's the wainscoting going up the stairs and the trim. 

Ah....kitchen!!! This is the right side where my desk will be with an open bookshelf above and then a closed cabinet. Freddy put beadboard in the open front areas of cabinets. Love it!

Freddy and his helper placing the cabinet unit that will house the sink, etc. All of the cabinets are site built. Where the saw table sits is where the island will be, fyi.

The master bathroom. All of the bathrooms and laundry room have beadboard running halfway up. Our original plan was the have beadboard covering the entire wall but because beadboard comes in 8 ft sheets instead of 9, we adjusted our plan. I like this look even better.

The master bathroom has two separate vanities. Mine will be here, to the right of the window (water closet to the right of the vanity).

Another view of the kitchen. Notice the small inspector to the lower right!

View of the house from the back (the boys and I played in the sandpile for a while this afternoon--enjoying this perfect weather!). The gas tank will be buried at some point.

Another view from the front.

This morning Ashley and I went back to confirm our carpet choice and try to narrow down the tile I want to use for the kitchen backsplash. I'm still on the hunt for it (wish I would have saved the source info from the Renovation Style magazine from 2007 that is my inspiration!). After that appointment, we went to the lighting store and picked out the majority of our lights. We still have a few decisions such as the dining room fixture and the lights at our front door.

A slice of blue heaven!

I lost my camera last week so I haven't been able to take pictures of the progress on the house. And a lot has been going on! Most notably exterior paint. Here's a glimpse of our blue porch ceiling (Ashley sent me this one from his phone a few minutes ago). He reported that he doesn't think the color is exactly right--in his words, "It looks like Carolina blue." He wanted a deeper blue but since I'm a UNC grad, the recommendation to use Atmospheric by Sherwin Williams looked perfect to me. I can't wait to see it in person tomorrow. And I really can't wait to sit on this porch!

Oh and I found my camera: it was in the passenger door of my car. Why? I don't know!

A meeting with Fast Freddy

Yesterday Ashley and I met with Fast Freddy (how Perry, our contractor, introduced him) who would be creating all the trim for the house. This includes crown molding, baseboards, closet bars and shelves, bathroom vanities, living room and upstairs landing entertainment built-in, laundry storage, dining room chair rail, and my favorite--the kitchen! To prep for this meeting, I quickly sketched out the layout I wanted for the kitchen, as it's the most detailed space.

General notes about the kitchen--we're painting the cabinets an off white, our granite countertops will be black (probably Black Impala...going to pick that out this Thursday), and an off-white subway tile backsplash. The floor is wood and the island top will be made out of pecan. 

About my sketches (Fast Freddy was happy I made these by the way--I wasn't sure if they would be annoying or not but he said it was a lot more useful than me just telling him what I wanted). The windows will be framed by open shelves and the other cabinets will reach to the 9 feet ceilings. I'm not a huge fan of cabinets that go all the way to the ceiling but I know my housekeeping style doesn't include dusting on top of high spaces. Why let dust bunnies accumulate when I can have more storage?

In between the fridge and range I want a space in the lower cabinet that has a divider that can help my cutting boards stand upright. I hate having to store them laying flat--it seems like a waste of space. I thought I wanted a lazy-Susan feature in the corner lower cabinet but nixed that idea when FF told me it would eliminate my two drawers. Nope! I want my drawers and I think I'll have plenty of storage in this kitchen without being able to fully access the very far back of the corner.

I love that this house has a pantry beneath the stairs. And I love that I'm going to have a desk area in the kitchen. Really, there's a lot I love about this house!

Here's the look of the kitchen, ripped from a magazine.

And work has already started on the trim. FF and his assistant are trimming out the doors. We're going with flat wood trim (really MDF) instead of the more traditional beveled trim. Because of that, all of the doors have to be trimmed out (otherwise the doors would have come with their casings and trim ready to go.

Here's one of our doors. I'm really pleased with the two-panel design. This looks more like a farmhouse than the 6-panel doors we've had in our other two houses. You can see the flat trim here. Ashley commented how in our first house we replaced all the flat trim with the fancier stuff and now we're building a new house with the old stuff. Ha!

The kitchen. Note where the sawhorse table is...that's approximately where the island will be--and how it will be positioned.

Perry told us that the trim part is his favorite piece of building a house. I can see why after spending an hour and half walking through our house and deciding how we want everything, even down to some open shelves in the laundry room (due to the window taking up so much space we can't run the cabinets wall-to-wall--but gosh, sunlight in a laundry room? I'm not complaining!).

When I asked Fast Freddy how long all of this would take he said two to the three weeks. Seems fast to me!

PickleBush and Other Names for our 'Stead

We've been thinking of names for our land for a while now. Our oldest son shouts out "Pickle Bush" when we're driving there and we've finally realized that he thinks these pines look like pickles. So funny! Ashley said Pickle Bush Farms doesn't have quite the ring to it so we're still thinking. Naming land is a family tradition, especially on Ashley's side where they actually have farms (Hickory Knoll Farms and Arrowhead Farms). My parents named their little mountain Mitchell's Fief to go with our Scottish heritage.

Other names we're considering for our homestead: Hickory Hill, Pine Ridge, Sparkleberry Farm, Persimmon Hill Farm, Sandclay Hill and Hilltop Farm. The first four have to do with what is already growing on the property; Sandclay represents the soil composition (Gilbert sits on the division of where South Carolina's soil is sandy and clay); and Hilltop...well, we are building a house on the hill! 

We welcome your thoughts!

Thinking about landscaping

Right now the bulk of our landscaping is done by our 2 1/2 year old who keeps his John Deere truck and shovel handy to work while we're inspecting the house.

He has focused his efforts on the large sand pile, grooming it as a preschooler would see fit.

On the larger scale, Ashley has been thinking about the landscaping for our yard. Even though designing an outdoor space is part of his profession, Ashley says our house stumps him. We had a breakthrough on Sunday,however, when we decided where we would park our cars. From the very beginning, I've been committed to using our front door to enter our house and using the "pretty" driveway.

A few weeks ago Ashley's mom and I looked at the house and she had an idea to create a parking space for us in the back against our master bathroom . This would cut down on the distance to walk to the house, especially with groceries. I was sold on the idea but Ashley was firmly against it, especially because it would require us going through two doors (the screen door and the back door). And he (and his cousin's wife Kristin) reminded me of my insistence that we use the front door. I want friends and family to enjoy our front porch and use that as the transition to the inside of our house because we don't have a formal foyer. I love a front door that is used!

So Ashley and I debated what to do. Ultimately I saw his point (and remembered my own) so we're going to park in the front to the right of the house. Where Ashley is standing in this picture (below) will be where our cars will park, running parallel to the house. Our visitors will be able to park behind us or in area that we'll use for our backing space. A sidewalk will lead along the front of the house to the front steps.

To help with the distance between the parking area and the front door, we're going to add a second set of (smaller) steps on the side porch area. This will allow us to get in quickly out of the rain and will also make it easier to put wood on the porch for our wood stove.

I'm fine with our visitors using the smaller set of front steps just not the back door (sorry, y'all!). I think this arrangement will be the best of both worlds. If we decide later on that we need to park in the back (say, when we're much older and climbing steps is harder), we can rearrange the landscaping. That's the beauty of being in this business!

More sheetrock!

We now have a fully sheetrocked house! Here's a house tour. Not in the best order but you'll get a feel for the space, I hope.

This is the master bathroom. The clawfoot tub will sit beneath these windows.

Guest bedroom. We'll probably put a window seat beneath the front windows if our budget allows.

Our oldest son's room upstairs. I still can't get over how big this space is. Our contractor "found" a few feet of wasted space and made the room even larger.

Our younger son's bedroom upstairs.

The landing upstairs. Notice the small cutout on the left--this is another wasted space area--we had these two spaces framed up to be closets (perfect for storing luggage).

Downstairs--the view you'll have standing at the front door--fireplace on right, dining room in middle (leading to master bedroom) and kitchen is to your left.

Another view of downstairs, this time with more kitchen and dining room. I love the amount of light this house gets in the afternoon!

Looking directly at the kitchen. Guest bedroom is to your left and back hallway to your right.

Like I noted earlier..these pictures aren't in the best order...I apologize! This is the boys' bathroom upstairs. One of the neatest features in the house is this window that looks out from the boys' room. Even though it isn't on an exterior wall (it overlooks the stairs), natural light streams in the bathroom thanks to this design feature. We made the window smaller to accommodate a towel bar beneath it.

Our master bedroom--the little nook will be a sitting area? Door leads to dining room.

Master closets and bathroom. Note the "no door" sign on one of the closet doors--we're opting to leave these doors off because we tend to leave our closet door open. There is a pocket door that closes the bathroom and closets off from the master bedroom.

That's all for now!

Stilts and sheetrock

Exciting trip out to the house today--it's sheetrocking time! Notice the truck bed is  full of scrap sheetrock.

HUGE pieces of sheetrock...4.5x12 feet!

Our Jotul is protected from the massive amounts of dust that will soon be coating the inside of our house.

The guys on stilts amaze me. And the speed at which they're putting up the sheetrock is equally amazing. The upstairs was done by 4:30 and the downstairs was at least halfway there. Wow!

Side note...our porch ceilings are up! Beadboard will be painted Atmospheric blue. I love the extra trim around the ceiling--it became necessary when the boards weren't quite long enough to fit. The trim is hiding the seam on one side and is a decorative touch on the other. Nice work, guys!

The porch floors won't be installed until after the house's exterior is painted. So hang on for that!

Our floors are harder now

The hardwood floor was installed last week. We chose a 3 1/2 inch red oak board, which is probably one of the most common flooring choices. The jury is still out on the stain (glad that decision doesn't have to made yet!). Although the MDG plan called for the majority of the house to have hardwood flooring, we opted to carpet our bedrooms and the upstairs landing and tile the bathrooms and laundry room.

Here's a view of the kitchen. Originally we were going to tile the kitchen floor but I'm glad we changed our minds because having hardwood run throughout the main living space makes the area seem more warm and united.

The living room.

Dining room.

Looking down the stairs to the dining room. The stairs will also be hardwood.

Ashley and I went to Creative Tile again today to nail down our tile decisions. We actually changed our main tile choice to one that looks more like slate (bluer/greener in tone) but we're sticking with the white subway tile in the master shower. The decisions are coming fast now as we're getting closer to the house being completed!