Driveways and Grass {Building Our Home}

Lots of things were happening outside too.

Lots of long, hot mornings spent at the worksite for the boys.

But at least they had entertaining things to watch.

Salt put on the wet concrete.

Pretty cool to have a cement truck in our back yard.

More handprints.  This time we did a better job.

 Next up was the landscaping, starting with grass.

One morning, huge piles of sod were lying around our lot.

It was nice to see the lot all cleared again.  

And then there was grass.

Next up is exterior paint and floor stain.

Tile

Tile.  Oh the tile.  Tile is very permanent.  While it's fun and pretty to look at pretty tile, it was NOT fun to coordinate tile for the whole house.  I solicited the help of several friends, one in particular (poor soul), who got the brunt of all of our tile angst.  I'm sooooooo glad all those choices are over and done.  The hardest part was not picking tiles that I liked, but coordinating them with the other features in the room.  I'm not good at picturing things that aren't 3D.  Friends were a big help in this department.

We were going with the themes of historical and timeless.  Tile is not fun to rip out.  I want to like it in 10 years.  If I used a trendier tile, I put it in a small area where it wouldn't be a big deal to change.

Carrara in the master shower.

A wet saw cut up in our bedroom.  

Subway tile for the boy's shower.

This tile for the boy's bathroom floor.

Small hexagon tile in the powder bath.  I LOVE this tile.  It was an easy decision.

This lantern tile for the guest bath.

This gray plank tile in the guest room.

Mudroom tile.

Living room fireplace.  This might be my favorite tile in the house.

Upstairs fireplace.

Subway tile backsplash.  I thought about doing something more fun, but I'm thrilled with how this looks.  It's a cheap and timeless option... the best of both worlds.

It's almost starting to look like a house now :)

Countertops

I'm going to finish these house posts.  Really.  I'm almost done.

Next up is counters.  If I remember correctly, counters were one of our easiest decisions.

We wanted to stay with historical materials.  And I wanted them to be timeless, because I didn't want to hate them in 5 years.  That narrowed down our choices considerably, making the decision-making easier.

So they came in the back of a pick-up truck.

Here they are:  Carrara, granite, and soapstone.

They cut them in our living room.

Measure twice, cut once :)

I wondered if they were nervous cutting such expensive stuff.  But they seemed just fine with it.

Soapstone in the kitchen.

Granite in the boy's bathroom, the color of toothpaste remnant.  How do they get so much toothpaste on the counter?  Seriously.

Carrara marble in the rest of the bathrooms.

Butcher block for the island.  Butcher block is one of the only materials that comes long enough to fit our island without having a seam.  So this choice was made for us.

Tile up next.

Interior Paint

I'm back (sort of) in the land of the living.  So I'm going to try to wrap up this house building thing.  Then maybe I'll share some pictures of the big mess we are living in now.  Imagine moving into a new house, unpacking for about 2 weeks (among which we had company most of the time) and then feeling  like you're going to throw up for 2 straight months.  Then picture what our new house looks like :)

But on to happier things.  Like paint.

By the time paint decisions came upon us, we were definitely out of steam.  After living in a dark beige rental for 2 1/2 years, I was ready for a change.  I wanted bright, white and cheery.  But I was nervous about it.  Chris and I have done a lot of painting in our day.  We remodeled our first 2 houses, and painted every piece of trim and wall.  But we did it slowly, taking weeks to analyze paint swatches we had up on our wall.  Our painters just wanted our paint colors.  There was no, "Hey, can you paint one wall so we can see if we like it?"  It was all or nothing.  Another thing that limited us was that it was around $300 every different color you picked.  That made me not want to change colors just for the heck of it. 

I did a lot of research on whites and grays, mostly on the internet.  How did people do things without design blogs and pinterest?  I also asked friends who had houses painted with colors that I liked.  Here are the links I found most helpful.

I Went White by The Nester 

The Best Off-White Paint by Apartment Therapy

The Best White Paint by The Inspired Room

Off White by Frugal Farmhouse Design

Here is a sample of our white swatches.

See how different they all are?  And they all look so DARK next to the stark white mudded walls.

See the grays.  Some are a true gray.  Some look so green.

Isn't it amazing how different they all look too?  All under the gray description?

And I wish I could remember the sites I looked at concerning grays.  There is so much written about the color gray.  And everyone has a different opinion.  We were looking for a gray that turned a little blue, but not too blue.  And NOT green.  My husband is not a fan of greens.  Enough blogs swore by Gray Owl by Benjamin Moore.  So we went with it.  And we love it.  It's a nice safe gray.  It's in the BM white's collection.  It's definitely a neutral, and very soothing, and not too masculine or too feminine.  That was perfect for us since it was going in the boys' rooms and our bedroom.  We also put it in our laundry room and the mudroom.

The white wall color we chose is Gorge Water by Kwal in eggshell.  Eggshell because we have 5 boys and our walls get very dirty.  I wanted to be able to wipe the walls down.  We had flat wall paint in our rental and the walls were dirty looking in months.  Our builder had used this color in the model home they had.  It's a great white.  It doesn't turn pink or yellow.  It's soothing.  It's not stark white.  It's a great color.  And I can say that because it's painted on nearly every wall in our whole house.

Our trim color is White Dove by Benjamin Moore in semi-gloss.

That's it.  Boring, huh?  

This was my first look at my all white house.  I was scared to death to see it.

This is at sunrise so the white looks a little different.  Depending on the time of day, the shade varies.

This is the kitchen in the morning.

The mudroom.

White, white everywhere.

This is our bedroom painted Gray Owl.

Such a great, soothing color.

The rest of these are just because my boys look cute next to white walls.  

Don't they?  Say cheese, Asher.

I love it when they all gather around, even if it's only because of technology.

I spent half my childhood playing puppy.  He likes to do it too.

And his brothers like to humor him.

That's the end.  Yay for white.  And gray.