Today Janice and I picked up the sink and counter tops for the bathrooms.  They came out beautiful.  I can’t believe that they were done in one week.
We’ve been sanding the interior trim work.  We’ll finish tomorrow.  I hope to take and download pictures of the bathroom counter tops on the bath cabinets this week.  I’m sure they’ll look great.

We've been getting phone calls and emails from folks thinking that the house is finished. Well, it's not finished. I believe that we are about two months past our scheduled finish date. The problem has been getting contractors over here to do or finish their jobs. We've had delays for a number of reasons, one is that this is a custom design, second is the distance most contractors have to travel to get to us, and third, probably the most important, we've watched every penny we've spent on the house. We've always had a budget for the house and as the end of the project nears we are monitoring the expended and remaining funds closely to ensure we have enough to finish.  We wanted to build this house and not have a mortgage payment at the end.  We may make it.

We are so close. Once the painters have finished we will be able to start moving in. The only things left to purchase are the water heater and two toilets. The rest of the stuff is mostly fittings that will be needed to connect the sink water lines, refrigerator ice maker, and the dishwasher. We’ll also need plumbing fixtures for all the drains. The electrical also has to be totally finished as soon as I can them out here to finish it. The electrical has taken a pretty long time.

Stay with us, we’re almost finished.

Our neighbor and his wife arrived at about 8:30 this morning. He had called this past weekend to tell me that he was going to take the day off to come help me get his bull off my land. The bull has been here for about a month. He's been troubling for us because he kept opening the water faucets and using the faucet's PVC pipe to scratch his underbelly, basically walking over and bending it all to hell. I was sure he was going to break one of the water pipes.

I directed my neighbor to our stock trailer and helped him hook up. I then started up the tractor and Janice put a bag and a half of cattle cubes in the bucket. Janice jumped on the tractor's side step and off we went to round up the bunch and lead them to our corral. Once they saw that we had cubes we easily got them moving towards the corral pulling the bull with them. As we got close Janice got off and opened the gate. I continued on and they all filed into the corral along with the damned bull. After Janice closed the gate I directed my neighbor and we got his truck with the stock trailer positioned at the end of our chute. With Janice at the gate and me moving cattle in the corral, we were soon able to get some of our cattle out. I got the bull into the chute and pushed it on into the stock trailer. It took about 15 to 20 minutes for Janice and I to herd, separate, and load that bull. I didn't think much of it until I noticed my neighbor and his wife watching Janice and I do our work.

My neighbor and his wife watched in disbelief. I think they thought "damned, these senior citizens know what the hell they’re doing!” Although Janice and I have herded, separated, and loaded cattle before, it was our loading the last bull that gave us the experience for this one. The last bull we loaded was my neighbor's bull’s brother. They almost look identical, big, powerful, and stubborn. We got almost $1000.00 for him at the Lampasas Cattle Auction Company. My neighbor and his wife are headed to Lampasas right now.  I'm sure they’ll get about the same for theirs.

 

Our faucets are now safe, I hope.

Yesterday I received the bids for the bathroom counter tops with sinks.  It was a real good bid.  I paid for half and told them to go forward.  She told me it would take a week.
Today the guy that installed the kitchen counters returned.  He had been down with the flu.  They kept cancelling his scheduled time to finish the installation.  He installed the doors to the lazy Susan (one had been back ordered) and all the knobs and drawer pulls.  It looks pretty good.
I also had a painting contractor come by today.  He walked the inside of the house and gave me a bid.  His bid was about $4500.00 less than the first bid I got.  I have one more painting bid to go.

The bathroom cabinets have been installed.  They look pretty good and they go well with the look of the ranch house.  The only problem that I saw was that there isn't a toe kick.  I think it was my mistake when I sent the guy the drawings I created showing what I wanted.  I only drew front elevations and didn't call out the toe area.
I'm waiting for a firm bid on the counter tops with sinks right now.  When it comes in we'll review it and if it's within our budget we'll have them go forward and let them make them.  They told us that it would take about a week.  I couldn't believe the short timeline.

Bath 2

Bath 2

Master Bath


 

Master Bath over the toilet.

Master Bath.  The bottom cabinet is for dirty clothes,
the largest middle cabinet is for towels and such, and
the top cabinet is for storage.

 

 

Drain in Mudroom.  This is around the Washer-Dryer area.
Once the concrete dries around the drain I'll stain and seal it so it will
match the rest of the floor.  I plan on caulking the baseboard in the
mudroom real good so if there is ever a problem with the washer
and it leaks water all over the place it will be contained in the mudroom.
What water the drain doesn't get we'll sweep to the drain.

We have light!  Although not finished we at least have most of the electricity going.  The bathroom cabinets are supposed to arrive today (he called and cancelled the Thursday or Friday delivery, the Saturday delivery, and yesterday, the Sunday delivery).  We'll believe it when they arrive at our gate.
They called this morning and cancelled the cabinet installation guy scheduled to finish the doors to the lazy Susan part of the kitchen cabinets (one of the doors was on back order).  Dang, we even bought all the door and drawer knobs he was going to install as well.  He woke up with a fever.
I also have to get the baseboards finished, and the yada, yada, yada, aaaaaaaahhhhhhh!!!

From Eric's iPhone

The baseboards were installed yesterday.  I haven't seen it complete but did get to see the baseboards in the Master Bedroom when they finished the room.  They looked pretty nice.  Tomorrow, if I can get to the house ok with all the mud, I'll take some pictures.
Today we had to cancel the installation of the dishwasher and range hood and microwave oven.  The electricity and plumbing aren't quite ready for these two appliances.  Instead, we'll pick up the two appliances at Sears and put them in the house.  Our contractor told us that he would install the dishwasher, range hood and microwave oven, and connect the line to the refrigerator ice maker.  The Propane folks will be changing the range and oven from natural gas to propane and finish the installation.