Still TWO more weeks?

Just a quick post to let all 2 of you who read this know that we had our first "Team Meeting" today with the builder. We walked through all of the blueprints in depth, added a few electrical outlets/switches etc, and walked our lot to make sure that all of our i's are dotted and t's are crossed. They told us that within the next two weeks or so we should finally start seeing some progress on the lot! For whatever reason I had it in my head that after we signed the papers today they would literally run out to our lot and start digging (or whatever action is taken first), but apparently it doesn't work that way. Oh well... guess we'll just be waiting a couple weeks... stay tuned!

Finally Finalized

Well we actually finalized everything last week, but I am just now getting around to posting this. I'm pretty opinionated, but it was so much harder than I thought it would be to finalize all of our selections! Since I already posted below about the flooring, cabinets, back splash, and granite, I'll try and share a few of the other details.

First off - this is a house that has the brick we chose, so you can see better than that piece of cardboard they expect you to choose from. ... seriously, if you have ever tried to pick out brick based off how eight pieces look together on a wall...inside...let's just say I made quite a few phone calls to the brick companies themselves to get addresses of where they had built. This house is actually in our neighborhood a block or two away from ours.
This next picture is another house in the neighborhood that has our stone, as well as our front door...
This next picture is a collage of the bathroom faucets/hardware we chose. The master will be brushed nickel and the guest bath will be in chrome.

The next picture is of our fireplace. We originally wanted to do a full stone fireplace - but after realizing how expensive everything was, we decided to go with the next best (read:cheaper) option - a cast stone fireplace. p.s. this isn't our exact fireplace - just the closest picture I could find.

Ok I guess that's enough pictures for now. We scheduled our first team meeting - which is where we meet with the builder and our sales rep to finalize everything else (electrical outlets, flat work, etc) before they break ground. Hopefully the next house pictures I post will actually show some progress!

buttah-fwys! and a wedding

Most might call them Monarch Butterflies, but to my 4 year olds, they are buttah-fwys, and they have taken over our playground. The past week or so we've noticed a huge increase in the amount of butterflies outside (supposedly they are supposed to be migrating to Mexico for mating season, but they seem to be getting pretty comfortable at the Park Cities Baptist Church playground. It's the funniest thing to watch the kids when they find one; it's like watching a game of pickle in the middle - only there is no ball, and really no one on either side of the kids - just a group of 8 or 9 4 year olds running back and forth, back and forth across the playground chasing the butterfly who just happens to fly above their heads, just out of reach. After today, however, they may decide to pack up and move out. Two of our kids (who happen to be twins) caught butterflies today while we were outside - and seeing their little faces light up when they came running up to show me the poor, frightened, slightly squished buttah-fwys they had caught made my day. Here's a couple pictures of the two who caught them.

Don't worry - we let them go so they could continue on to mating season...


On another note - I wanted to share a few pictures from the wedding we went to in Austin last weekend. This was quite possibly the most extravagant, beautiful wedding I have ever been to! Congratulations to TJ and Becky!
The ceremony was held outside on the shores of Town Lake (or ladybird lake as it is now supposedly called...I'm not into that name so I'm not going to call it that) right at sunset at the Four Seasons. (longest run-on sentence ever).

Martini ice bar/sculpture - shaken... not stirred.Enjoying the private fireworks show just for the newlyweds

Hanging out with friends outside of the photo booth

Our table
The largest cake I have ever seen!All these pictures were taken with my shiny new camera! What do you think??
Thanks dad! :)

Design Group Appointments #1 and #2

We had our first and second appointments at the design center on Monday and yesterday evenings. It was actually a lot tougher to select everything than I thought it would be. Don't get me wrong - if you know me, you know I can be fairly opinionated and I typically know what I like. I've also always known that I have an uncanny ability to walk into a store and like a magnet, I am drawn to the most expensive ____ (fill in the blank) in the whole store. This was especially true in the "house store" also known as the design center. I have to constantly remind myself that this is our first home - not a mansion we are building to retire in someday.

Anyways - here is a picture of what we've chosen so far. We still have one more appointment left next Tuesday where we will finalize everything. Ignore the manila folder in the top left corner. The top picture of stone and brick are *almost* finalized, we're pretty sure that's what they will be. The tile on the left will be in the bathrooms and utility room. The hardwoods next to the tile will be in the entry, hallways, dining room, kitchen and breakfast area. The carpet on the right will be in the family room and the carpet on the left is what will go in all the bedrooms and the study. The far left tile is a tumbled marble that will be our back splash, and the cabinets and granite are in the middle.

We still need to finalize the stain for the shutters, front porch posts and front door, so I'll post those things after our last meeting next Tuesday.

On another note - we are headed to Austin this weekend for a wedding! The wedding is at the Four Seasons and rumor has it there will be a fireworks show (they are only the second couple to ever set off fireworks from here!). The bride is a wedding planner - so I can't wait to see how beautiful everything looks! Not sure if they read this - but congrats TJ and Becky!

We'll also get to see Matt's mom Maggy (or maggy-mom as she signs her emails to me) this weekend which we are super excited about! The timing worked out perfectly for us to get her opinion on our house design stuff before we have to finalize it all on Tuesday! I do have some more polyvore sets done too - but I'll save those for a later date :)

I'll leave you with a few quotes from my classroom this week.....

(when asked what it means to be brave...)
"Oh! Oh! I know! It's when yool wawking thwew a scaaawy fowest and you hear cweepy noises, but you keep wawking and you awen't scayrd!"

"Hey Jack - is this your drawing?"
"Um, lemme see..... oh no way! I draw waaaay better than that"

I love Saturdays

Matt and I got up and made french toast this morning and have been sitting on the couch watching college football all morning :) I love Saturday's during football season! This, however, really has nothing to do with this post...I just thought I'd give you a glimpse into our weekend.

In case my brief mention of the addicting qualities of polyvore wasn't enough for you in the last post, I've decided to add exhibits C & D to the blog (A & B were the laundry room and guest bathroom that I posted last time). I'm sure (read: praying and hoping) that the newness and magnetic draw of polyvore will wear off eventually, but in the meantime, I hope you enjoy the following room designs!

Since we'd ideally like to get a king size bedroom set when we move, I've been looking at new bedding sets - these are both master bedroom ideas, and both are pretty similar (same design, different colors) - but let me know what you think!

Master bedroom option 1

Leave me a comment and let me know which one you like best and why!

I've got 2 others just about done for the family room, I know you can't wait...

Happy weekend! :)

Polyvore!

So I just discovered the coolest new site and now I really don't know how I'm going to get anything done during the day. The site is www.polyvore.com and you can use it to make "design/inspiration boards" or really any type of photo collage imaginable! Since we're just starting to build our first house - obviously designing all of the rooms has been on my mind constantly. This site makes it so easy for me to keep all of my ideas for a particular room in one place! (This will, of course, be in addition to the binder that I started today for the house - which will have a tab/section for each room of the house where I will save magazine cut outs and make notes to keep each room organized.) Seriously... does anyone else have a case of OCD like this? Please say yes...

I thought I'd share the two boards that I worked on today - the guest bathroom and the laundry room. I know - most of you are probably thinking that I picked the two most boring rooms in the whole house to start with, but those were honestly the only ones that I had really decided on what I wanted them to look like! Let me know what you think!




Be careful - polyvore is addicting!

Weekend in Austin

Well, since there hasn't been much action on the house front yet, I thought I'd make a quick post from our weekend. We got back to Dallas late last night after a fun weekend with friends and family in Austin! Saturday - I baked all day long (with the help of my mom and sister) for a baby shower I was helping to host on Sunday. We then headed down to the stadium to tailgate with some friends and go to the UT game with my sister and her boyfriend Matt. That was the first time we had been inside the stadium since they built the addition on the north end-zone. I couldn't believe how much louder it gets in there now - and they were only playing Rice. I can't imagine the noise level when it's a big conference game! Here's some pics from the game...

Anyways - Sunday we got up and headed up to Cedar Park for a baby shower that a group of girls that I worked with at GSD&M and I were hosting. It was so fun to see everyone from work again - and eat some great food! Here are some pictures of the cookies I made, and the rest of the food/decorations/people from the shower.

The delicious food! Yummy cucumber sandwiches, red pepper hummus sandwiches and egg salad!
All the hostesses with the mommy to be - minus Danika!

The guest of honor!
Our first design meeting is next Monday - I'll keep you posted on how it goes! I'm also working on starting a binder for the house (if you knew me at all when I was planning our wedding, I can be a bit of an organization freak), so I'll try and post some of the design boards I'll be making for each of the rooms!

P.S. I love getting comments - leave me one so I know you stopped by!