Decisions, decisions…and not the fun kind.
Good morning everyone! Why it is a good morning? Well this week we heard from our bank that we will have our mortgage with–what this really means is we no longer have to deal with a few people and boy are we glad to have that in our past. Our contact at the bank sent us a check list, and BOY DO I LOVE CHECKLISTS. Such a simple concept, but bulleted written checklists are pretty much my favorite thing in the world.
Can you sense the calm in my voice already? Om!
“Om” in yoga means “word of power” and with a good list of to-dos and rules I feel so powerful.
We also had a big meeting with our contactor. I had to miss it because of work but Sam went and handled it very well, he returned with a bulleted list of talking points. Good boy! He walked me through the following notes:
Requirements of things we have to do that were not in our original work bid
1) Radiator lines in kitchen need to be moved – $2900
Highly recommend
1) bathroom plumbing – $900
Could be swapped with skylight (bye bye skylight, sad face)
Ewww. We shall replace with shiny new ones.
2) Upgrade electrical upstairs – $3500
This is making electrical flush with the walls and not the lovely wired boxes they are now.
Tape and exposed wiring…not so good.
3) quarter inch drywall for ceiling in office – $350
This is to patch up where the ceiling tiles were removed.
$300 to fix that, not a bad deal!
One wall of drywall is included in change order – no charge on others
Gee 4 walls fell down and we’re only being charged for one, score.
See the wall to the left in the closet, that one fell down too, opps.
4) Justin is going to rough-in plumbing in bathroom for future work (no charge)
We are setting it up to someday create a larger master suite.
5) back square from tub – we have a foot to play with 1 foot by 30 inches (will be 5 inches higher than tub) (no charge)
Possibly reconfigure the bathroom to move the toilet next to the sink (no charge)
Create built-in shelving to store towels etc. Score.
6)Pantry needs to be expanded (12″) to make room for the cabinets – Saskia’s drawings were off by a bit (no charge)
Score!
Other issues
–Back door – going to reframe the door and remove the transom 28×80 right hand door
UGH we bought the wrong size door and had to return it.
–Kitchen needs to be hardwood and the hardwood is salvageable!
I’ve been dreaming of hardwood there, and I know Sam’s mom will be happy.
–Justin will get price for outside front light
Will swap out backlights for floodlights (no charge)
Went up on Sunday, and lots more done– like AC holes cut out. Also the back sun porch has been leveled and the wall knocked down between rooms:
All one room now!
This is the sun room off our master bedroom, I can see a couch for reading and maybe a TV up there for when we have coffee and watch Sunday morning.
Hole for AC!
Not sure what’s going in there, but it must be for the AC?
So our first official draw will be on the 24th, gulp! So many little things to get done before then, and oh joy tons of papper work. Here’s hoping we can do it!
I’m starting to picture our furniture in the house, and actually living there. That was a first, and a good feeling!
We talked to our interesting neighbor for a while, the one who is unemployed and sits on his porch watching Judge Judy on a flat screen while drinking beer. He told Sam that we owed him money for cutting our grass (which I cut last weekend). He said he felt bad I cut it with a weed whacker. We’ll revisit that if he does it again, for now I’m too busy to argue so we paid him $15.
