Small steps forward

After my midweek visit, we had pretty low expectations for our trip up to Breckenridge on Saturday on Memorial Day Weekend.  There was actually a fair bit of work done and we're really excited to be so close to the finish line.


On the front of the house, we finally have all the cedar siding installed on the second story.  This was held up waiting for the flashing to be installed between the front wall of the house and the shed roof over the front porch.  Now Bob's team will come back and stain the new siding to match the rest of the siding that was already stained.

Around the back, the deck is almost complete.  The railing is just about done and Mark was working on the stairs that will lead from the deck down to the concrete patio below.

In our master bath, we brought lightbulbs with us and were able to put them in and also attach the lamp shades on each of the bulbs.  We hope to order the custom mirror on Tuesday and get it installed sometime in the next week or so.

Bob's guy also got the rest of the interior staining done.  The catwalk and stairs now pretty much look as they will when we move into the house.

But does the carpet match the drapes?

Well...not really because we don't have any drapes.  In fact we don't have any window covering of any sort.  We do, however, have carpet as of a couple of days ago.

Here's a picture of the carpet in our master bedroom.

This one shows the transition between the hardwood in the hall / great room and the carpet in the master bedroom.

Carpet in the girls' room :

The guys finally got the flashing installed properly between the house and the shed roof which means that Mark can get back to work on the siding.  He got four or five courses installed and we expect the rest to be done before the weekend.  Hopefully the roofers will also get the galvanized metal on the shed roof as well this week.

Finally, the lighting is working in the roof overhang of the garage :

You light up my life

It's been a couple of weeks since I've updated the web site.  Last week the painters finished all the interior stain and painted all the walls & ceilings.  At the end of the week, we met with the painter and confirmed colors for the exterior stain.

This week, we visited the house on Saturday and were really happy with the progress.  Believe it or not, it was hailing little tiny "dippin' dots" when we got to the house although it had been 85 in Denver on Friday.  Two weeks in a row, we've had bad luck with weather on our site visits.

This first picture, through the hail, shows the finished stain on the garage.  We have a natural stain on the cedar shingles and cedar siding and a darker stain to accent on the garage door cross members and facia boards.

Around back, you can see that same dark stain on the trim around the doors and windows.  We also chose to keep the timbers natural colored to better show the wood grain.  Here you can see the roofers finishing up their work on the shingles.  They expect to have the roof complete in about another week or so.

The deck railing came out great - below is a detail picture of what the railing looks like up close.  The grid is called 'cattle fencing' and the railing is similar to what we used inside the house on the railing for the stairs & catwalk.

Inside the house, we were happy to see how great the hardwood floor is looking.  Roughly 1/2 of the main level is now covered in the hardwood flooring and we expect that to be completed this week before we visit again.  We used a 7" wide, hand scraped product which gives the floor a very rich feel and will hopefully be very durable.

The lighting is also mostly complete.  Here in this picture you can see all the cans in the kitchen plus the fixture over the breakfast area and the pendants over the eating bar.

Up the staircase, these sconces look really great - a nice mixture of modern & mountain feel.

Looking up at the roof peak in the great room you can also see the finished catwalk railing and some of the lighting way high up in the ceiling.  The ceiling fan also made it into this picture as well as the chandelier in the entry way.

Finally, the finish plumbing is complete.  This picture below is the second shower head (handheld) in our master shower.

No pain, some stain.

Bob and his guys finished staining the interior woodwork before we went up to have a quick visit this morning.  He wanted us to confirm we liked the color before he did the 'finish' coats that will make the wood look more glossy.

This first picture shows the build in cabinet in the mudroom next to the doorway into the kitchen.

Here's the underside of the catwalk.  The pine took the stain very nicely as did the fir (timbers) and the alder (trim).  

This next shot shows the built in cabinet to the left of the stone fireplace in the great room.  This is where we'll have the audio / video gear as well as games and other fun family stuff.

This view of the catwalk shows how the finished stair rail looks as it leads into the catwalk.

We were really happy with the way the built in benches in the kitchen eating area look.  The alder looks just beautiful with the stain on it and will look even better after it's been lacquered with the finish coats.

We reviewed the exterior colors with Bob today as well and he's going to work on some samples that we'll review when we're up next Friday.  By then, the rest of the interior painting will be completed.  We're closing in on a completed project and it's really getting exciting.  

We decided to have an excavator come back and do a little more dirt moving in front of the house.   We decided to flatten out the hill that sits right in front of the front door.  We weren't really happy with the drainage after the snow melted with the hill where it currently sits and it also blocks the view of the front of the house from the street.

Heavy Metal

We've had the design for our house since last winter when the architect finished her work.  It wasn't until today that we finally had a chance to get a sense of what the finished outside of the house will look like because the last piece of the puzzle - the galvanized metal siding is finally starting to be installed.

This first picture shows the metal installed on the front of the house under the shed room.  We're thinking that we will stain the trim around the door and windows roughly the same color as the front door.

Here's another picture of the front entry showing the finished timber framing, the tongue & groove cedar underneath the soffit and the metal down below.

This interior picture shows the finished stonework around the fireplace and the custom cabinet to the left.  The TV will hang on the stone to the right of the fireplace.

Here's a picture of the stonework around the gas fireplace in our master bedroom.

Our master bath is just about complete - this picture shows the tile on the floor and then the floor of the shower where it meets the floor to the left.

On the back of the house, the truss framing is complete as well as the tongue and groove cedar underneath.  In addition, you can see the chimney which has been covered in the same galvanized steel material we're using on the low part of the exterior.

This last picture shows Mark working his way around the garage installing more of the steel.  Hopefully next time we head up the hill we think the metal will be completely done.

They'll stone you just like they said they would

I wasn't entirely sure about heading up to the mountains today - I was afraid it might not be worth the drive if there wasn't a ton of progress.  Turns out I'm glad I made the trip - there was a lot more done than I had expected.

This first picture shows the progress that Brian made on the finished stairs.  He has the newel posts, balusters and railing up.  I was really happy with the way it looked.  We're waiting for the stair nosing from the hardwood flooring company that is backordered before the stairs will be completely finished but you get a pretty good sense of it based on the work he's done.

Around back, Mark finally declared victory over the rear gable truss that has been causing him to say a lot of bad words.  This week he'll be putting the exterior finish on the chimney then finishing the siding and the soffit tongue & groove under the gable.

In the kitchen, Al was hard at work on the tile backsplash behind where the hood is going to be.  He's going to run it all the way up to to the top of the cabinets.

In the great room, Pablo and his team were hard at work on the stone around the fireplace on the North wall.  They were probably 75% done today and expect to finish tomorrow.  The stone is quarried in Telluride, Colorado.

The raised hearth came out really nicely and is capped by a large piece of stone similar to what Pablo used for the mantle over the fireplace.

Countertops

Candice's brother Tom and his wife Anne are in town from Iowa and we took a quick drive up the hill yesterday to check on the house and show them around.  It was also good timing because the Breckenridge Brewing Company was sponsoring a "Beer Festival" with lots of other small breweries in and around Colorado.

Walking into the kitchen, I snapped this picture of the kitchen island.  The small, under-mount prep sink is installed and it looks really great.  The countertop has a slight 'veiny' look that you can't really seen in the pictures.

Across from the kitchen island is the space for the cooktop.

Separating the kitchen from the dining room are the long countertop that holds the kitchen sink as well as the breakfast bar top.  We were really happy to see the finished product here - we'd only seen it in drawings and are happy with the way the curve came out.  We figure we can fit four stools at this bar giving us plenty of casual eating space.

The sink looks really great - we made the decision to get a single bowl sink and are really glad that we did.

On the other side of the kitchen is the little 'bar' area.  Again, we're really happy with the way the curve looks at the edge of the countertop that faces back into the great room.

Brian has also been making fast progress on the finish carpentry.  He's finished with all the built ins downstairs and has started working on the stairs & catwalk.  As of Saturday, he had set all the large 8x8 newel posts up the stairs and on the catwalk.  This week he'll be working on the alder skirt boards and the iron balusters as well as the handrail.  The hardwood floor we chose is backordered so he's working around having access to that material for a couple of weeks.

After the house visit, we made time for a short stop at the beer festival.