Starting New House! Finally!

[WBWI]

Michael,

Congrats on passing inspection Your home looks great! Don't stress over the move. It will get done and pretty soon you'll be looking back in disbelief wondering how the first year in the house went so quickly.

 

[EddieWalker]

CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!

It sure is nice to see this through to the end and all your hard work and planning pay off for you. Thank you for posting and keeping us updated. It's been allot of fun for me.

Eddie

 

[Modus Man]

Wonderful looking house and congratulations on passing inspections. It took me a few re-inspections before I got my certificate of occupancy last month.

I really enjoy seeing somebody else going with nice bright colorful rooms. I was so sick of seeing beige, cream, and tan everything on tv and in the store that when we picked the colors for our house the only thing that could be cream colored were the ceilings and the hallways. We used the same color orange in our family room, a lime green in the kitchen, royal purple in the bedroom and turquoise in the bathroom just to name a few.

 

[UpstateSC_Papi]

Wonderful looking house and congratulations on passing inspections. It took me a few re-inspections before I got my certificate of occupancy last month.

I really enjoy seeing somebody else going with nice bright colorful rooms. I was so sick of seeing beige, cream, and tan everything on tv and in the store that when we picked the colors for our house the only thing that could be cream colored were the ceilings and the hallways. We used the same color orange in our family room, a lime green in the kitchen, royal purple in the bedroom and turquoise in the bathroom just to name a few.

Thanks Modus Man!

I'm very fortunate to have married my soul mate and we see eye to eye on most everything including color! I must say I have a question or two about the dining room, but will wait til the furniture gets moved in to make a final decision. And even then, it will NOT be white! Just a different shade of purple!

Do you have pics on the forum here? Would love to see some of your color choices!

 

[UpstateSC_Papi]

CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!

It sure is nice to see this through to the end and all your hard work and planning pay off for you. Thank you for posting and keeping us updated. It's been allot of fun for me.

Eddie

Thank you Eddie! Coming from YOU those words mean a lot. You are a wealth of knowledge/insight and every thread you start or post in ends up with a ton of information or at least enough to make it thought provoking.

Not that you are the only one! LOL Tony, Rob, Jonathan - wow, tons of great guys here!!

Thanks for all the support and now that we'll be out there more, I hope to continue to update things such as landscaping, garden, etc...

 

[UpstateSC_Papi]

Michael,

Congrats on passing inspection Your home looks great! Don't stress over the move. It will get done and pretty soon you'll be looking back in disbelief wondering how the first year in the house went so quickly.

Speaking of Jonathan! LOL (see previous post)

Thank you sir!! You too have been a great source of info and encouragement. Can the disbelief start this weekend, cuz I'm feeling it already!

 

[UpstateSC_Papi]

Hey Michael, CONGRATULATIONS man! You and your wife must be loving life right now.
Wow, those photos are really good. There is a lot to your place and the colors you chose are very cool. I was checking out the front porch stairway and then the interior stairways and the rest of those photos, and I got to thinking that your place is exactly like mine, only different.
You'll soon see why I haven't been posting much on my thread because of how busy we are ... still moving a few things and also doing a few things around the 26 acre yard. Landscaping, irrigation, grading and leveling etc, and none of it is done yet. Heck, I haven't even got my machines running yet in the shop ... I don't even have the 220v 3 phase system plumbed yet.
Anyway, congrats on the final and now you can start moving all that stuff you have.

Thanks Rob! Again, to you, for the kind words, words/posts of encouragement and thoughts throughout. And you are hilarious. I was reading about how you were checking out the pics and it's excactly like yours and then I get to the "only different". I laughed out loud.

26 acres??? I'm not sure I knew that or if I did it slipped my mind. Wow... We've got about 6 and looking forward to spending a few years playing with it.

 

[Modus Man]

Thanks Modus Man!

I'm very fortunate to have married my soul mate and we see eye to eye on most everything including color! I must say I have a question or two about the dining room, but will wait til the furniture gets moved in to make a final decision. And even then, it will NOT be white! Just a different shade of purple!

Do you have pics on the forum here? Would love to see some of your color choices!

Our dining room is open to the lime green kitchen and we just chose the same color but a much darker shade.

We are still moving things in and finishing the little things (they sure do add up) and I haven't even got internet access yet, i just browse forums at work. When we do get internet access I will probably make a quick thread highlighting all the work we did with my father in law's kubota 3710 (some probably belong in the Safety forum) and I will be sure to include some finished pictures of the house.

I always enjoyed reading your thread here and some others that were building houses at the same time I was building my own.

 

[UpstateSC_Papi]

Congrats! You are about to enter a very exciting time! Remember to take a weekend off now and then to enjoy the family. There will be so many projects for you in the next several years, that it will be easy to get lost in them all. Case in point, we're going out on Keowee this weekend.

When you have a chance, please post more photos of the red cabinets. I assume that is some sort of mud room cubby thingy. I have a foyer that could use that very thing, and I love what I see of yours.

Also, if you're doing any fescue seeding, remember we're about to enter the best window of the year for it.

Tony, Tony, Tony.. My "almost" neighbor! Thanks to you as well! I look forward to learning from your hobby garden and trying that myself in the next year or so. In fact, tho' very small, we are looking to plant some spinach, radishes, lettuce and some garlic (for harvest in the spring) over the next few weeks!

And yes to fescue. Not that I necessarily want it everywhere for always, but definetly want to get it down this fall to ease the mud/dirt/dust next spring...

I'll make a note to post some pics, dimensions of the cubby very soon.

Keowee?!?! Depending on where you get on and go to, you are only 20 minutes or so from me! Come help me move! Seriously - HAVE FUN!

 

[UpstateSC_Papi]

Our dining room is open to the lime green kitched and we just chose the same color but a much darker shade.

We are still moving things in and finishing the little things (they sure do add up) and I haven't even got internet access yet, i just browse forums at work. When we do get internet access I will probably make a quick thread highlighting all the work we did with my father in law's kubota 3710 and I will be sure to include some finished pictures of the house.

I always enjoyed reading your thread here and some others that were building houses at the same time I was building my own.

Yes - this place is great!

Same here on the 'Net. No DSL available there so heading to Verizon store at lunch tomorrow to get a card for now. Until then, it's surfing at work!

 

[PAGUY]

Michael - 8 pages back and no update post since August.

What's new?

 

[UpstateSC_Papi]

Wow! I really suck at this "keeping the thread updated" stuff!!

No new pics... sigh... have a few probably from Christmas I'll have to dig out (yes, ALREADY buried! LOL).

Over on David's thread, I mentioned having had a landscape design drawn up. I told him I would post it, so here it is...

Not going to do it all at one time... CHA-CHING! So looking to start around the driveway, house-front and work towards the back over the next few years...

We aren't dead set on the plants, tho' we do like the designer's choices for the most part so any thoughts are welcome!

One I do know we are changing will be the Barberry around the driveway. Deadly little thorns, especially for a 3 year old playing near the drive. Replacing it with the Arctic Fire Dogwood.

For those interested in this and have thoughts... only other thing I can think to add is the Sun rises over the front right corner of the house and sets over the back left corner... House faces, for the most part, SE.

Hope everyone is having a great '09 so far!

 

[hunterridgefarm]

THE THREAD HAS BEEN RE-BORN

Michael,

Nice plan and you are right $$$$$. We are trying to take a section of yard at a time and landscape. But due to winter it will be a couple of months before we get involved to the extent to post pics.

I do have Forsythia, Piones, Boxwood, Roses, Magnolia and misc shrubs already established that I will need to transplant. The only thing I have quantity of is boxwoods- old english around 600 and American 20-30. The American does not sale good so I don't plan on rooting any more of them. If you need some Old English boxwoods let me know, I'll make you a deal! They are very slow growers. I also have tons of red maple and dogwood trees on my property that I plan to transplant but failed to tag them this fall. I will try to do that this spring.

One thing I have done is get the word out " if you have shrubs you need removed or don't like I may remove them for you". So far I have gotton 45 clumps of monkey grass (liriope) and working on about 15 Nandina, and Burning Bush shrubs I may be able to get in the next few weeks. You would be surprise the number of people who want surbs removed from their yards. I have been offered several other things but they were too big for me to dig. I ask everybody I know..."'you have any srubs you want to get rid of" .
They are FREE and only cost me a little labor!!

On a side note, how is business in your area? I use to do a lot of work with Itron ( old Schumberger plant) but not much anymore. I am trying to work that aera more, do a little business in Duncan. We do CNC Machining, sheet metal fabrications, fixtures, and assemblies for aerospace, mass transit, electronics, etc.

David

 

[KentT]

Now that you have some kind of lanscaping plan to start following, the absolute VERY first thing I would do is put out shade trees in the intended permanent locations. Those things take a few years before they start making a difference -- and they can save you big $$ in both heating and A/C bills, based on your specific situation. Then, you can keep adding the other plants and ornamentals, over time.

Evergreen trees to the north can save you heating $$ and deciduous trees to the East, and more importantly the South and West can save you some serious A/C $$ in North Carolina...

I notice that he recommended maples -- they're beautiful trees, once mature, but grow relatively slowly. You may want to mix in a few of the new hybrid fast growers, specifically poplar or elm, that are bred specifically for fast shade. They'll grow 5-8 feet a year, and start providing some meaningful shade within about 5 years. Interplant a few of those maples or other slower-growing trees with them...

Do not get Lombardy poplars, but the new hybrid poplars for shade -- there's a different variety for screens and windbreaks...

Should you try to plant evergreens to the North, there's really only two fast-growing varieties for you area that I know of... White Pine (which is native, in the higher elevations of the Blue Ridge and Smokies) and the hybrid Thuja Greeen Giant arborvitae...

I'd focus on deciduous shade trees first... You may want to try a few fruit trees somewhere also -- kids really enjoy them.

 

[UpstateSC_Papi]

Maybe not re-born but at least poking its head out looking around!

You do get a little colder there then we do. I can pretty much plant all winter. DW and I are thinking we'll budget $50 bucks or so a month and then either go grab a plant here or there or just grab several come the fall. We don't plan on leaving this spot except in a hearse so we are gonna plant small (1-3 gallons) and watch them grow!

Shrubs you have sound great! Forsynthia is something we defintiely have to have somewhere (story here, wife/dad/war/etc) and is on the plan for up behind the garage.

He didn't draw in any roses, but my wife loves those so I'm thinking we'll just add a bed or 2 here and there.

I, in the past, have asked that same question of close friends/family - that is, anything they don't want. I'm about tapped out right now, so thinking of asking around church. It definitely saves you some $$$ and in some cases gets you very mature plants.

Not a big fan of boxwoods. Not sure why but that's just me. Do love maples and dogwoods so if you get those tagged and realize you have "too many", let me know!

Business, as you could probably guess, is slow. Several of the larger plants around supply automotive and have made big cuts. My wife being one of them around October. Sigh... Move into at MUCH bigger house payment and the income gets slashed! Not good! Ah, but I digress. I work over in Toccoa, GA at an Aerospace supplier and we are pretty steady right now. Sales are flat for the year but at least we aren't dropping off.

Michael

 

[WBWI]

Michael- Happy New Year to you and your family. Glad to see an update on your house. Being in WI I can't offer any suggestions on the plant selection but I love to see the use of Magnolia's, dogwoods and crepe myrtles. I miss having/seeing those.

We did a little landscaping last fall and you are correct. The cost adds up quickly! But it enhances the whole house when its done. Here are a couple of before and after shots.

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[UpstateSC_Papi]

KentT -

I agree totally, in fact we were looking to buy trees first! Great information on the maples vs hybrid elms/poplars, etc... I didn't realize much of that information and I will put it to use!

Love the Thujas! We've got 50-ish planted at the top/back corner of the property for a wind break.

Fruit trees - definitely! They are a must. We've got a spot we want to create our own little orchards. Probably 15-20 trees...

 

[scgargoyle]

We plane to use 'Divine landscaping'- whatever He thinks should grow there is fine with me! I also believe whoever drops the leaves should be responsible for clean-up. That's why we're moving to the country!

 

[Brokermike]

you might consider hybrid maples too. Varieties such as Blaze maples combine the beauty of red maples with the fast growth of silver maples

 

[patrick_g]

Terrific! A master plan that gives the BIG picture but can be accomplished in a stepwise manner is really the way to go for the best results on a budget that doesn't permit the BIG BANG approach where everything is done in one fell swoop.

All too often people stumble forward planting this and that because it seems like the right thing at the time and then may have to take it out years down the road to do something else they always wanted.

With a master plan you can treat the work like a jigsaw puzzle and do whichever pieces are your priority, with an eye to the slow growers getting an early start.

I have a relatively cheap computer program that is actually for designing a house but includes landscaping capabilities. It has an extensive library of different species of trees, shrubs, and so forth. You can "plant" whatever you want wherever you want and then advance the time forward several years and see how they look later on as they mature.

I have seen lots of shrubs planted too close to houses, especially the windows where they can be a nuisance or too close to a walkway where they look great for a year or two and then are a real PITA. Using this program and being able to see how the plantings will probably look years down the road can be a real plus. I don't recall the name of it right now as I used 3-4 different programs when I was designing our house. I had Punch and another one by Broderbund, and so on. I suppose there are others that do landscaping just fine.

I'm buried under projects and one of the ones I have let slide is landscaping. This thread has sort of rung a wake up bell.

Pat