Kitchen & Mudroom

Oh my, the kitchen layout! It was a struggle to decide whether to do the L-shaped layout (see pic below), or go with the huge center island layout. I knew I wanted the center island, its drawback tho was how it ate into my mudroom in order to have enough walking space all around the island.

L-shaped Kitchen Layout!

In the end, the center island layout won! And I am super excited to see how it turns out! The island ended up being 8'7.5" X 42"...its huge! I will have seating along 2 sides with an 18" overhang. I envision lots of sharing in snacks and lunches around this island, as well as school work being done, and some baking too!

I will hang 3 schoolhouse pendant lights above the island and one over my sink.

LOVE me some Schoolhouse light fixtures!

So hoping for a farmhouse sink...it has been the *only* thing my husband has said we can go over our kitchen budget on, if I really want one...and I really, really want one!

So back to the layout, I will have a 'command center' to the left of the frig, the counter will be standing height (like 39 inches), with the upper cabinet resting on top with doors that will open up and roll into the cabinet. It will store my laptop, along with all mail, office type stuff, and cookbooks. There will be roll out drawers below where I can store my printer and filing tote. I am super excited about this space and hoping it will keep me organized and the dreaded paper clutter that piles up under control!

I will have a 6.5' X 3'4" walk-in pantry. I have requested that the light automatically comes on every time I open the door...I also want plugins in there, and one specifically for my hand held vacuum.

As far as cabinets, I have picked out white shaker style, flush inset cabinets. Hardware will be brushed nickel cup handles. I am still deciding between which 'white' to go with...who would have ever thought picking a white would be so tough! I am going with stainless steel appliances, granite counter tops and hardwood Oak floors in a chocolate stain. I am still deciding on wall colors. My back splash will be a glass 3X6 subway tile, the color is called 'mulberry', but it is a chocolate brown.

My glass tile backsplash!

White cabinet color options: Polar on left, Arctic on right.

 

The mudroom is 8'10.5" X 6'5". My washer/dryer will sit on one end with a 'locker style' cabinet on the other. There will be a pocket door that goes between the mudroom and kitchen. 

 

Example of the set up I am going for. I will have enough space for an 18" cabinet beside the washer/dryer to hold a laundry basket and small trash can. I also want to put a bar between the 2 upper cabinets to hang wet clothes. Am thinking I will go with a shade of orange in the mudroom!

Example of built-in locker system I am wanting.

 

First Floor Plan

First Floor Plan - 1406 square feet
On the first floor we have a living room with fireplace, dining room, kitchen, mudroom, master bedroom and bathroom, and 1 more bedroom and full bath. So all in all, it is a 4 bed/3 bath house with an unfinished basement (which will be where Shane's workshop is, and eventually we will finish the rest for a large family room, 2 more bedrooms and a full bath. I will also have a nice sized storage room.) We will have 9ft ceilings on both the main floor and in the basement. The trim will 7.5 inch base board painted white. (Would love to go stained wood, but was a budget breaker if we wanted the base boards to be tall, plus secretively, I wanted white and Shane wanted stained wood!)

The only drawback I had with the first floor was the size of the living room. Its on the smaller size, but once we have a large family room in the basement, it will be a great size to have for that space. The living room is 13' X 14'11", which sounds large, but the way it is laid out, I cannot put my couch against the wall, but will need to leave at least a 3ft walkway behind it, so the space I have to fit furniture is more like 13' X 12', plus the fireplace will stick out some and into the 12ft length. Eventually, I think we will purchase an L-shaped sectional and it will fit nicely.
We also want some separation between the living room and dining room, so are working on some ideas to incorporate some craftsman pillars similar to these:

 

I also would like some board and batten in the dining room!

I will also be getting a built-in hutch in the dining room...thinking something like this:

It will be white to match trim.

Main Floor Bedrooms

The master bedroom is 14'1.5" X 11'8" and the walk-in closet is  9.5' X 5'. I had a hard time trying to decide where to place the windows on the wall were the bed will sit or even have any windows at all on that wall. So far the decision is to do 2 windows, one on each side. I am going for a look similar to the picture below (not the decor or colors, just the idea of framing the bed with curtains). I really have no vision for the master bedroom and bath for colors, etc! Please share if you do!!!

The 2nd bedroom on the first floor is 14'8.5" X 10'4.5", with a walk-in closet 7'10.5" X 6'6"!!! This is a huge blessing (ended up that way when we changed up the plans by moving the garage to side of house, so had to move the entrance from garage around and kinda shifted some spaces).

We will use the bedroom for the next baby, but its main purpose for the room and especially the closet will be for homeschooling! It will make such a great space to have, and the closet will offer lots of storage!

Eventually, I would like Shane to build something like this in the room!

The main bathroom will have a built-in looking linen closet, pocket door, pedestal sink with matching toilet, built-in medicine cabinet, and thinking of the Octagon & Dot tile for flooring. Paint color will be a deep purple plum color. Here are some of my inspiration pictures:

Sink and Medicine Cabinet Idea

Linen Closet Example

Octagon & Dot Tile Idea

I will discuss the kitchen and mudroom in a post of its own!

Second Floor

Second Floor Plan - 627 square feet

Since the house is a 1 1/2 Story, the upstairs bedrooms will have sloped ceilings with 5ft sidewalls on the sloped sides. I love this feature...I grew up in a 1 1/2 story house and my room had sloped walls! Upstairs we will have 2 bedrooms and 1 bathroom. While we were deciding on whether to build and if this house made sense for us, my biggest draw back was the second floor. I was worried one of the bedrooms was going to be too small because we wanted to add a bathroom. Seriously, it was like 7.5' X 9' for functional floor space. As I tried to 'plan' how we could use that space, God would just whisper to my heart that He had it under control. So I trusted that He knew how the space would work for our family and tried not to fret over it. It was difficult to envision the space since I couldn't 'see' it in real life. Below is a picture of the old second floor plan:

Old Second Floor Plan: Girls Bedroom - 11'7"X9'11" with 3'X5' walk-in closet, Other Bedroom - 7.5'X9'

The night we went to sign papers and put the deposits down, God had a big surprise for us! The builders had talked to the truss manufacturers and found out that they could use a different pitch ratio for the truss (I could totally be explaining that wrong!) and they were able to enlarge the space significantly! Emma and Bree's room (I circled it in pink) was now 16'7"X15'2.5", and the other bedroom was now 16'7"X11'5" (that's more than double the old size!), both having 7'X3'4" walk-in closets!!! Plus the bathroom was 2 feet longer too! I am so amazed at God's faithfulness! We can totally fit 4 kids upstairs!

Second Floor Plan

If you look at the plan, you will see a 9'X10' room at the front of the house marked 'unfinished space', that is the room that was created by adding the new dormer on the front of the house (that we did during the exterior design approval process). I wanted to be able to clean the 3 small windows, so needed a way to get to them. The builders will put up the walls, but leave the space unfinished since according to code they cannot finish it without it meeting certain code requirements. We will finish off the room ourselves and turn it into a neat little play nook for the girls! To access the room, there will be a door in the girls' room, but can only be 5' tall. I am so excited for this unique little room and the possibilities it has!

I am hoping to take advantage of the attic space behind the bedroom sidewalls and do some built-in drawers and cubes! I also plan to do a built-in looking linen closet in the hallway instead of your standard linen closet with one door.

Example of Bedroom Built-ins

Example of Built-in Linen Closet

Design Process

 The design approval for our house was an interesting process. We had to be approved by the developer, and he didn't like the first option our builder submitted. We planned a month for this process and it took the entire month! The developer wasn't crazy about how much roof was seen from the front (it was a hesitation of mine too). 

I will be honest, I didn't realize exactly how much we could change. We decided on our builder because they had done a house like the one we are building, so it helped keep the cost down instead of going fully custom on the design and layout. They made some changes to make it different, which included centering the front porch instead of placing it to one side. We also enlarged the footprint of it some to meet the 1700 sq feet minimum to build on a standard lot in the development, and we also swung the garage to the side, versus being in the back as it was on the initial house (it sits on a new urban lot, where all garages sit behind the house with alley access). Also, the initial house only had half the upper 1/2 story finished, we ended up raising the trusses and finishing the full length of the house. 

The builder and developer would meet and come up with an idea and send it to us, we didn't like it and felt like we weren't being heard. So finally asked for us ALL to meet.

First Submission

Developer suggests 'faux' dormers! I did not like them at all! I felt it was going away from the look of a traditional Arts & Crafts style.

Next was this idea, which I really like the idea of switching the garage roof line...its actually what I wanted all along, but didn't think you could just do that! Developer still wasn't happy with this.

Next option our builder and developer came up with and the point where Shane and I had decided to take design into our own hands!

 Shane and I scheduled a time to meet with our builder and developer and then spent a Saturday morning searching the internet for pictures of craftsman bungalows and sketching on paper. We really had to figure out what 'we' wanted and envisioned for this house. I finally found 2 houses I really liked and drew a rough sketch, then Shane drew a better one (he is better at it then me!)

Sketch Shane drew and we took to our meeting.

Ended up the developer was unable to make the meeting, crazy I know! But we had our builder draw up 'our' idea, we approved it and it was sent to the developer and guess what? He LOVED it!

Our Arts & Crafts Bungalow!

We actually ended up flipping the house after the lot was surveyed, one end was 4ft higher than the other. So the garage now sits on the right.

So the best part to all of that process was it was NO additional cost for us to make these changes since the developer required them in order to approve the design! It was a huge blessing and I am sooo excited about this design. I think there is no comparison in the first picture to the last in the character of the house! Plus, that added space from the new dormer on the front of the house, added a 10X9 room (I insisted on the ability to be able to wash those windows! We will finish it and turn it into a unique 'play' space for the girls! God is good and full of fun surprises!

Weekend of Shopping for the House...

Saturday we spent all day shopping for house stuff. Thankfully, the girls were able to spend the day playing with cousin Ryler at Aunt Lindsey and Uncle Jared's house. They had a blast and we soooo appreciated the opportunity to do some shopping kid-free!

Our first stop was to look at shingles and doors. We settled on our shingles. Didn't see anything we liked for doors tho. 

Next stop was to look at fireplaces, we also narrowed that down to 2 options. Then we swung into Lowe's for some tile I had seen that I liked so that we could use it as we shopped for tile to go with it. We enjoyed lunch at 5 Guys before we headed to Nebraska Furniture Mart.

Our list of what we needed to look at included: appliances, flooring (tile, carpet, wood floors), plumbing fixtures, lighting fixtures and tvs. We started with appliances, in which I was disappointed that I didn't see anything that I really loved for a stove or frig. Plus, they didn't have near the inventory I thought they would on hand, they could order it, but didn't have it there to see it. They also didn't carry the stove I saw at Lowe's and liked, nor able to order it. So we will do more shopping before we decide on appliances. We need all new appliances, including washer/dryer. I already have the washer/dryer picked out. We have a $3000 allowance from our builder, and will pay for the rest ourselves. I'm figuring it will be around $5000 for everything. 

We moved on to TV's, we pretty much already know what we want...46" Sony Smart TV, and the salesman already confirmed what we thought, Sony is releasing their new inventory starting in April, and prices will be lower...so we will wait til closing gets closer to buy. We are putting it over the fireplace mantel.

Next we looked at tile, and didn't have any luck. It doesn't help that we have NO real vision for what we what in our master bathroom, nor for flooring in the mudroom and girls' bathroom. I do know what I want in the main bathroom tho! I will share that vision in a later post! We checked out their wood flooring and found only one possible candidate, then moved on to carpet. By this time, I had migraine coming on (I think from carrying around my heavy bag with tile and cabinet door samples!). We met with a lady who handles account for new builds and she ordered us a few samples. We skipped looking at the plumbing and lighting fixtures and left. We were only in the car 10 minutes before I starting throwing up from the migraine. Thankfully, I was able to take something for it and sleep it off for about 45 minutes at Lindsey's house before we made the rest of the trip home.

All in all, it was just a strange day! Ha! It started out great, but didn't end as grand, but we did feel we got some things accomplished, and if nothing else, eliminated!

In the Beginning...

Well, here is the short version of what has brought us to where we are now!

In April of 2012, Shane felt called to look into moving closer to home. We were quite happy and content in small town Iowa, had an incredible church and community of people we 'did life' with, and were happy to be raising our family there. But Shane felt God leading us closer to family and to where we grew up, so after a little job searching, some interviews and a couple of offers, with God's leading, Shane accepted a new job in Nebraska. He moved in June and the girls and I followed in mid-July. During this time, we put our first house on the market and waited for an offer, which came in August and we closed in September.

The first 4 months in our new city, we spent living in temp housing provided by Shane's new company...which happened to be a hotel with a small kitchenette. Thankfully, it had 2 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms, as well as, all the other accommodations found at a hotel, i.e. pool, hot tub, maid service, free breakfast, afternoon appetizers and unlimited coffee (not just coffee, but really good coffee). I never drank coffee, but after my stent at the hotel, I now enjoy a warm cup about every day, after hunting down the coffee that was served at the hotel, of course!

It would be dishonest to say that I was thrilled about moving. I wasn't looking forward at all to moving to a larger city and its traffic, and I had so many people I was leaving in our old town that I deeply miss, and hate not being a part of their everyday lives. The girls had incredible friends that would have been such a blessing to grow up with. Not to mention, that I find it hard to make friends and tend to shy away from social settings, so I wasn't looking forward to 'starting' that process all over again! Ha! Plus, we had an incredible church that we would miss! I guess I am trying to say, that I never could have been strong enough to make the decision to leave on my own, so I know what a hard decision it was for Shane, because it was left up to him to discern God's will for our family as the leader of our house. 

We spent several months house hunting, seeing in the range of 70+ houses, also while kinda pursuing what it would cost to build in a newer development that we fell in love with. Unfortunately to build, was more than what we wanted to spend. We decided to give house hunting our best shot, and if we didn't find anything then we would rent and go from there. Well, needless to say, we didn't find a house to buy. So we began digging more into building and crunched the numbers. We knew that was the neighborhood we wanted to be in long term, so if we did buy a house it would only be for a short while. With the relocation package Shane's new job offered (they paid closing costs on house we sold, and on new house we buy/build), it didn't make financial sense to wait to build, especially with as low as interest rates are.  

The development was more than we could have hoped for. It was the perfect location for us, nestled just on the outskirts of town, but close enough for Shane to still come home for lunch from either of the locations he works out of (all the other possible locations we looked at didn't offer that). It was also just 5 minutes from Shane's sister (the other locations would have put us 20 minutes away). The development is also like its own little community and offers a unique downtown area and a brand new grocery store, which will only be a 3 minute drive from my new house! There is also a YMCA and Middle School just a few blocks away. But what is most unique about this development is the houses!!! All houses are made up of 4 styles (arts & crafts, colonial, tudor and prairie). No house can look exactly alike on the same street, nor carry the same color scheme. Garages are also to be set back from the front (as opposed to most new developments the garage is the first thing you see!). There is even an area in the development that the garages all sit directly behind the house and have alley access. It is such a neat neighborhood...it looks like one you would have drove down 100 years ago! It embodies all the things we love architecturally about houses.
After much prayer, talking it over and over, and more prayer, we knew God was leading us down the road to building this house. He has been surprising us throughout this whole journey! Honestly, God whispered to my heart back in April, before we even decided to move, that we were going to build a house. I remember laughing, thinking that was crazy because I didn't see how that was even remotely possible, let alone I didn't want to move! And then the first time we drove through our new neighborhood, just dreaming about it, I knew that was where God was calling us. Then the first time we toured a house that our builder had just finished for someone else in the neighborhood, I knew that it was it. All the house hunting we did, was God just closing every other door.
It was a hard decision to make tho for Shane and I in that we are pretty conservative when it comes to what we spend our money on. This house is not a need, I didn't even ask for it. Honestly, I felt guilty even praying about it alot of the time. There is alot we could do to further God's kingdom if we didn't spend this much on a house...but then God reminded me, He doesn't NEED that money, He is God and His will will be done.
Why did God choose to bless us this way? I am not sure, other than He loves us. It has been a blessing to Shane and I's relationship, we have been able to dream together, grow together and enjoy being together as we go through this process.
How will we be able to bless others with this house and bring glory to God? That is what is exciting...we will soon find out!