Stonework, fireplace, chimney, patio and more framing…

More pics from our last visit with comments:

Latest view of the house – see the stonework they’ve started

Chimney in the different colour brick which will hopefully match the grey siding we have planned

Kitchen space

Door into downstairs powder room

Looking into downstairs playroom

Start of the fireplace

Front porch

Close up of stone work

Internal framing

More internal framing

Even more internal framing…

Spray foam on floor before concrete floor is poured in the basement

Patio in rear of house

Beneath ground “tunnel” for electric wires

It’s started to take form…

We visited the site today to see how things were coming along. We also got an opportunity to meet our new neighbours and apologize for the recent noise!

The foundation and footing is almost complete. The town have approved the water proofing and footing drain inspections; and the builder is ready to start framing in just under a week’s time!

It’s incredible to see how the foundation having the “cut outs” for the intended doors and windows as we had designed with the architect.

See photos below for the current state. The pipes are to bring in the water from the drilled well.

We are trying to come to a decision on:
1. Patio – whether we stick with the standard pavers set in sand or upgrade to natural stone set in concrete – we are most likely going to go with the latter to hopefully prevent the stones moving and for weeds/grass growing in-between the stones.

2. What colour we want the chimney to be. The standard is a red brick chimney but we are hoping to use a different colour brick.

Broken ground!

My builder just told me he broke ground today!  He understands I am writing this blog so has kindly agreed to send me a photo tomorrow.  He didn’t think it was worth it today as the majority of time they spent cleaning up around the area they were going to dig.  Exciting nonetheless!

In the meantime we met with him last weekend to go over a number of choices.  Some of them are easy and some of them will take time to ponder over:

1. Stone – we are going with something called Westchester Blue
2. Doors – 8 ft tall or standard height; we are going to go for 8 ft in the basement entrance to the back yard/garden to let as much light in.  Need to decide for the rest of the house.
3. Windows – we need to decide how many small windows we want in the basement. This wont’ really let that much light in but some is better than none and it would be good to have some outlets for fresh air.
4. Door thresholds – plastic or aluminium?
5. Finishings – Chrome, Stainless Steel, Nickel?
6. Patio – do we stick with the Bluestone Patio as standard or go for Granite stone set on concrete?
7. Do we go for stone on the chimney at the rear or stick with the standard brick?
8. Siding colour. We have been trying to decide on this for a few weeks now without any luck.  Luckily a local hardware shop gave us some addresses of houses in the area that they have sold James Hardie siding to so we have started to visit these.

We are thinking of grey.  Either “Aged Pewter” like this:

James Hardie Aged Pewter

Or “Night Gray” like this:

Night Gray

The other major issue with the siding colour is that the town wants us to use a “tan” colour for the house despite the 2 neighbouring houses being almost tan in colour too.  So we are going to need to request them to change their minds about this and/or find out what their justification is!

Lots to think about!!