We brought in the big guns...

...a professional landscape architect to draw up a plan for our yard.

We are hoping to do a lot of the work ourselves but will need to have a landscaper do the retaining wall and patio etc. We will also scale back on the plants since I am a "less is more" type of decorator. The top of the drawing shows the patio on the east side of the house which will give it great shade. The west side will have concrete until after the garage...afterall you gotta have a place of tricycles, sidewalk chalk, hoops, and the trash can. The back will have a 2-3' retaining wall to level the yard and the ditch it forms will hold a line of trees that will block the road. The far corner is a little garden for raspberries, tomatoes, and squash.

It'll be a long time before this is all complete since we can't even start until the spring. Hopefully if we can get the retaining wall and grass done quickly the rest can get done when we have the time to do it ourselves.

Here is what it looks like on the inside.

(Here is the outside with the roof complete)

(This is the garage and the garage entrance to the house)

(The small space in the foreground is the coat closet)

(Next to the coat closet is the powder room)

(Our big laundry room...woohoo)

(The stairs going down to the basement)

(Both of the boys rooms)

(The boys' bathroom)

(The kitchen. You can see the pantry and the walls will have counter along with a large island)

(The dining room and large hole where the doors to the backyard will be)

(View straight out from the living room)

(View to the left)

(Master bedroom)

(Master bath)

(Master closet...nice and big!)

(Basement rec room)

(Basement bath room and two out of three bedrooms)

(Vaulted ceiling in the family room/kitchen/dining room)

(Front patio)

Now it REALLY looks like a house!

The roof peaks make the house look so much nicer!

I can't believe how fast its going up. I'm ready to move in!

Now for the exciting part...
The actual house!

They started framing this week and will be mostly finished on Friday. Woohoo! We also got to walk through the house and see the rooms. Pretty exciting!

Here is a close up of the freshly poured entry.

We also met with a landscape architect this morning who drew up a great plan for the backyard. We will be able to flatten the lawn and maximize the playing space. There will also be a big, 1/2 shaded patio and room for a garden. How much of the backyard will be diy is still to be determined lol.

Things are moving right along!

Things have been moving really quickly with the house. Its great because I don't feel like I have to keep nagging the builders.

Above you can see that they poured the floor for the garage.

They also poured the floor in the basement. That means it is time for framing! They even delivered the wood and trusses already, so the framing can start asap.

Our concerns over the yard continue. The slope is still really steep and fairly unusable for things like soccer. The builder is helping to fix the problem by having extra dirt brought in. In the pic above you can see the grade on the left side is much better than the grade on the right where you can see a gap under the fence. They are in the process of filling a ravine back there. We still think we are going to have to have a landscape architect come give a plan for a retaining wall/flower bed near the house that will allow us to level out the yard below it. Turns out most problems can be solved......for more $$, lol.

The wise man built his house upon the rock....

In other words....we have a foundation!

Above is a picture looking into the basement. The far corner will be the rec room, the black pipe in the foreground is the bathroom and on either side of the bathroom are bedrooms (which will be unfinished for the time being). The rec room and bathroom took priority.

Here is a picture from the back corner of the house looking at our backyard and the view from our backyard. We were worried the yard wouldn't be big enough for the boys but after they agreed to move the house forward and flatten the backyard we aren't too worried anymore. The view is incredible as well and there won't be anything obstructing it.

Lastly, a picture of the 3 car garage. They laid down gravel and then they will pour cement when they do the basement floors. After that its framing!!!