But What do you do with the Toddler?

When we first began the design process, our meetings were scheduled out in advance and we made sure that our daughter was with a babysitter for all of them.  It was simply impossible for both of us to focus on what the designers were saying and make the best decisions while simultaneously entertaining a toddler.  I will say now that there were some meetings that did not get our full attention because of the child care issue.  When this process began in January, our daughter was only 20 months old.  A lot has happened since then.
We cleared out the garage so that there's actually room to move and we're not afraid of her touching something dangerous.  She's been in the space more and is accustomed to our expectations.  She also loves going 'uppy' and allows me to wear her.  Now that there are workers in the space, she watches them and helps 'supervise'.

It's still difficult to give full attention to a conversation happening, but since we're over there so much more now for shorter periods of time, getting a babysitter isn't an option.
Another huge time consumer is all the shopping we need to do.  Recently, we had to get some doors and wanted to stop at several second-hand places to make sure we were getting the  best deal we could.  It's a lot of bucking and unbuckling the car seat and lots of looking through big racks of things.  I will say this: NEVER UNDERESTIMATE THE POWER OF A TAPE MEASURE.  That is one of our huge secrets.  Little Miss loves measuring things and making sure they'll fit.

She does a great job and stays with us of the most part.  I'd also like to give two thumbs up to Home Depot for the awesome kiddie shopping carts.  She sat in that thing playing happily for the better part of an hour while we (finally) put in the order for some doors.  And when you're all tuckered out from the shopping and there's one more store to see, never underestimate the power of Daddy's arms.

There are times when my Mommy guilt kicks in because our normal flow is so interrupted by contractor meetings, and shopping and swinging by places to check things out.  But then I remember that in less than two months we'll be in our space and it'll feel like the blink of an eye.  At the very least, we're giving her lots of opportunities to practice patience.

Does size really matter?

Last year when I agreed to move my family into the garage I had so many conditions.  One condition was that we would have designers help us.  We got that figured out pretty quickly.  Another condition was that I wanted bifold windows.  Having lived in New Zealand where this is relatively common, I was dreaming of one day having a kitchen like this:

There is not one thing I don't love about this kitchen, with the possible exception of the hardware, but I'm sure that we could all live together quite happily.  Unfortunately, once we started actually pricing bifold windows, the cost put them out of reach.  (In one estimate, the screen alone was $1700!) So the challenge then became mimicking this feel without the hefty price tag.  I settled on 3 casement windows with a transom over the top for extra light:

When closed they'll look similar, but open they won't be quite the statement.  Our builder recommended a french casement window as a possiblity:

When closed they look just like casement windows, but when open, they don't have the center bar and will have the feel of a bifold window.  We had two great options for alternatives, even if not quite the grandeur of the real thing.  The downside of the french casement is that it's only made in wood, which would mean much more maintenance for us long-term. It didn't knock it totally out of contention, but we wanted to see what the prices were in relation to our current 'opening' of 76"wide x 58" tall. Here's a picture to jog your memory.

It turns out that the french casement windows were only 58"x58".  I wasn't willing to lose over a foot of light and thought that sidelight windows would look stupid.
This brings me back to my initial query: does size really matter?  It turns out that when it comes to windows, it really does.  76" wide is a non-standard size and that made the windows almost $1000 more than if we went with a 72" width.  I wasn't willing to lose 18" of width for the french casement, but I am willing to lose 4" of width for the 3 casements in order to save that extra money.
This entire build has been about eeking out savings where we can while trying to save the design intent.  The only reason I found out about this potential cost savings was because I happened to have a quote from another company that was significantly cheaper than the one my builder gave me- but it was initially set with a 72" opening.  When I called and gave them the corrected measurements their estimate also shot up.  We've been doing a great job of finding savings and ways to cut where we can, we just wish that our builder would've helped us out a bit on this one.  I find that I'm walking a tight line between trying to stay out of the builder's way and not pissing him off, and getting myself involved in every detail so that I can try to save as much money as possible, seeing that Scott and I keep finding cost savings.  Fingers crossed by the end of this he still takes my calls.

Decisions, Decisions

Probably like most construction projects, everything needs to happen within a tight timeline and budget for this to work.  When we initially lost our builder the timeline part got shot to hell, but now that we've started for reals we need to get out by December 5 to avoid having to pay another month's rent (which is, of course, now the most expensive month-to-month rate).  That gives us a few months to recover before property taxes are due on both houses at the end of February- oh, and they're reassessing our city house's rate this year so we expect them to go up significantly.  In the midst of all this we need to start finishing out the bonus room at our suburban house so it will be 500 sq ft larger when we list it next Spring.  So you see, it's especially important that our budget stay in check so that we can make all this happen.  Once the suburban house gets sold (and we expect a decent profit), the family is heading for a European vacation to celebrate this phase of our plans being complete.

This is making us think about what is essential to do now and what can wait until we've been in the garage for a little bit.  One area that caught our attention as a potential budget saver is the upstairs loft area.  While not codes approved, we were thinking to put our bed up there so we would have our own 'room' of sorts.  Because the space would never pass inspection as a bedroom, the space will need to remain in stud form without the window and barrier wall to the mechanicals for the certificate of occupancy inspection.  The builder was always going to have to come in after and finish.  We decided that since we cosleep with our daughter now, we would just go ahead and do it a few more months until we're able to finish out the space.  This will save on the cost of finishing the upstairs space, as well as almost $1000 for the sliding ladder to access the space.  (Did you have any idea they were that expensive?  I didn't.)

A friend of mine also recommended waiting on the shower door and just using a shower curtain for a while.  Our shower is not a spacious one, measuring at just 56" long.  I should mention that the 56" is from stud to stud.  Once you put on the backer board and then add the tile, it will be smaller, knocking it out of contention for an off-the-shelf shower door.  We really love the frameless look and they clock in at around $1000.  Again, it's logical to wait on getting that ordered so that we can put the money elsewhere.  The answer isn't no, it's just not now.

One of the things that's tough about these decisions is that we won't be moving into a 'finished' space and I want to have everything complete, just like the designers drew.  However, it will be finished by this time next year and that's what's important.  Any other ideas for how to economize now?  Luckily, we haven't had to sacrifice any function at this point (I will literally cry if I'm told we can't build our storage wall now), but in trying to have our cake and eat it, too, we're having to be really strategic at this point.

We Passed!

I went to check on the garage today and found a shiny new approval tag for our plumbing.  Woo hoo! HVAC starts going in tomorrow.  Onward and upward!

So Many Compromises

Way back when we hired the designers they had this project broken into three phases- 1.  Schematic Design (basic floorplan and layout) 2. Design Development (Finishes, fixtures, furniture, etc.) and 3.  Construction (a few hours were set aside to consult for changes during the construction phase so the design intent would stay intact).  This was a very good way to break it down and would have worked really nicely....if we had hired a good builder on the front end.  Since we lost the builder but still tried to proceed with the design, some things got lost along the way.  Essentially, all the stuff I hate, like picking out faucets and doors, and paint colors, etc is now left to me.  The pragmatist in me understands that as long as everything is functional it really doesn't matter.  But of course, when you're putting it together and spending all this time and energy, you want it to look good at the end.  Therein lies the struggle.  

With the sobering HVAC quote and the knowledge that other large expenses lie ahead, sourcing things on the cheap has become really important.  Since the interior doors we wanted needed to be ordered, our contractor wanted that to be done soon so they'll be ready to install in time. Unfortunately, those doors aren't yet common.  Many places we called didn't have them, some weren't available yet, and we had a difficult time finding someone that really knew what they were talking about at HD.  Even though the weather is absolutely gorgeous, we spent our Saturday morning as a family looking for 2 matching doors on the cheap.  We went to the Habitat Restore.  They had millions of doors, but many 6 panels and many too large.  We went to a salvage store, but they didn't have any either.  Scott called an antique place and they had one door for $55, but we have to have 2.  Finally we wound up back at the trusty HD.  This time we lucked out with a guy who really knew what he was talking about.  He was able to get the door that we wanted (yay!) but it was going to be $250 each (boo!).  He also pointed out that if we were looking for a solid door to really block sound (which we are) that we would be much better off with a raised panel.  The raised panels in the middle allow for a thicker sound dampening.  When he told us that a 2 raised panel door was only $100 each we knew what we had to do.  So....I spent all that time researching, calling around, searching online, agonizing, and in the end it didn't matter anyway.  Frustrating.

Right now we're at the point that compromises like these are happening all the time.  I find a bathroom faucet I love for $160, but this one is ok and only $80 so we go with the cheaper one.  There was this super cool exterior lock that is sleek, can be unlocked with just a fingertip, takes a picture of anyone who comes within 6 ft of your door, can be programmed to let in plumbers and then quickly relocked, etc, but it was over $300.  We found a simpler Kwikset lock that was just a keypad for under $100 and decided to go with that since we'll have security cameras to perform some of the other features.  

We scoured the city and found that Lowe's had cheaper tile than Buy Floors Direct (even though we were told that BFD would have the best prices in town) and were able to save $500 that way.  It seems that we're scrambling to find the cheapest prices and yet I'm worried that we'll go over budget anyway.  Scott did remind me that we're getting radiant flooring that is a significant 'splurge' but I definitely think it will impact my enjoyment of the space when I'm not dealing with cold feet all winter.  

So now the 'give and take' officially begins.  Wish us luck making it through this phase with our sanity intact.

HVAC cost comparison

Two weeks ago I met a HVAC guy at the house for him to give me an estimate.  The space is small, but it is an intricate job because of the design.  We had a difficult time figuring out where everything should go.  When all was said and done we got an estimate for almost $6k.  Gulp.
Last week we met our contractor's HVAC guy.  He was an hour late for the meeting which was really unfortunate as Scott was taking a long lunch to make it happen.  When he did show up the meeting was productive and they determined what needed to happen quickly.  That evening we got an estimate for almost $11k.  Choke.  When I asked the contractor why his guy was almost double the quote we found from a recommended company he replied that he never said he had the cheapest people, but he did have the best that produced the highest quality work the most reliably.  I'm so glad that he wasn't at all offended about using the other company.  He just asked for their information so he could liase with them.  Our contractor came highly recommended and we're happy with him, but I'm so glad that Scott pursued someone else for this.  5k is a huge chunk of our budget (most of our kitchen) and we need that money for other spaces.
As of now, the plumbing inspection has been called in, the electricians are almost finished and the HVAC will go in on Thursday.  There should be no more major subs that need to be hired for this project.  The contractor will be able to fully get in the space and make his magic happen starting the 19th.  Fingers crossed.

HVAC

Things are starting to move pretty fast on the project now and it takes a lot of time to find, download, and then upload photos, so you may have to sit tight and bear with a few posts not having any photos in the interest of completion in a timely manner.

Last week Scott set up a meeting for me to attend with the HVAC guy.  It makes sense for me to be to take the meetings because I can go when little one is at Mother's Day Out and then Scott doesn't have to miss any work.  The downside is that I'm pretty much an idiot when it comes to technical things.  However, I was the good wifey and let the HVAC guy in.  We had a long discussion about what was going to go where and spent a lot of time brainstorming how the supply could get to the opposite side of the garage, how we were going to run ducts to the bedroom and where the lovely return grate was going to go.  Essentially, he wanted to run the ducts straight across the middle of the space to get the supply to the external wall, where it would best circulate air.  He then wanted to T out to get them to the corners.  I told him there was no world in which I could think of a way to make that look good.  We talked about how to run it across the wall of built-ins and hide it over there.  We talked about the possibility of a mini-split system that would require no ducts at all.  We talked about a lot of things and when we got the estimate, it was large.  Why are we scheduling with HVAC guys when we have a builder, you may be asking yourself.  That is an excellent question and one that I asked, too.  Scott wants to be sure that we're getting the most reasonable prices we can get.  I saw the builder last week at the garage and asked him about the HVAC.  He set up an appointment today with his guys.

When Scott debriefed me on last week's appointment and I said things like, 'I had no idea what size unit we needed,' or 'I think that the water heater has to go in a certain place because there's something about condensation,' or 'I think there's going to be a big soffit in our bedroom that may impact how we place furniture.' Scott decided that he needed to be present for the next meeting.  The meeting last week let me/us know enough to get us started thinking about some things- namely, we may have to actually tear up the drywall on the ceiling, which we were trying to avoid.  During the meeting today Scott talked his technical talk with the guys while I toddler-wrangled.  At a few points in injected my thoughts like, 'I can't imagine a world in which it would look good to have T shaped ductwork running across my ceiling.'  It was decided that we would for sure be ripping up the drywall once the electricians (who happened to be there) chimed in that they would also need to rip some out to get the zoning right for the existing lights.  Decisions were made quickly, we were able to get back to our day, and the estimate will arrive tonight.  Here's hoping that it's a bit lower.

One thing that we've constantly had to do during this project is redefine our expectations with respect to pricing.  Living in a hot market with construction everywhere we turn is creating the perfect storm for getting quality work at decent prices- we're learning we can get one or the other.  Either way, we think we know what we need to do and Scott ordered all the radiant heating stuff today which should be in by the end of the week.  Hopefully the contractor can get going on that early next week and things will really start moving for us.