Build - Day 143 - Lots 'o decisions

Today we finalized a lot items on the remaining parts of the house. We've decided on:

1. Our revised locker lay-out to better suit our need (and trim some cost)
2. Dropping down the niche in the front entry to make it a seat instead of a display niche
3. The 'trim' above the fireplace; basically making it an oversized window frame to be painted in an alternate color
4. The supplier for the non-kitchen cabinets; Carter Lumber with Merrilat maple cabinets in the same Shaker/Espresso finish as the kitchen
5. The layout of the in-law bath vanity wall
6. The countertops for the non-kitchen cabinets; all granite remnants except for...
7. A ... drumroll... remnant marble top for Jen's lowered baking center.

We also dropped off the lease for the corporate rental that we will use as our temporary housing in between the 6 to 8 weeks of the current house closing to the dream home completion. Pictures will follow later this week.

Tomorrow we'll pick up my mother-in-law who will stay for 8 days to occupy our son so my wife can focus on packing while I'm working. I'll have a long weekend the next weekend in which we'll load up the POD for conditioned storage (it's winter in Ohio...), the Penske truck for moving the non-critical boxes to our dream home garage and the suitcases for the corporate rental unit.

Here are a few pictures from our rock hunting expedition today. We had already decided on the Hanstone Speccio White quartz for our kitchen and command center.

We decided to go with granite in our master bathroom because it was a little cheaper than quartz. The challenge was finding something that wasn't too busy so it wouldn't trigger Jen's vertigo. The Kasmir White was just the ticket.

Our Kasmir White slab

Kinda fun to see our name in stone.

Kasmir White kitchen

We decided to shop the remnants for the other bathrooms. We don't need a lot of counter in those rooms, and we weren't married to any particular stone.

For Daniel's bath, we liked this one, with the bit of yellow, his favorite color. This is called Venetian Gold.

our Venetian Gold remnant

Venetian Gold

We chose this remnant for the powder room. Apparently we have excellent taste because it's a much higher level that we'd consider otherwise. It's called White Diamond.

our White Diamond remnant

White Diamond kitchen. I couldn't find a bath photo online. I don't think our slab is this busy.

We really like the gray lines in the River White remnant for the in-law bathroom:

our River White remnant

River White Bathroom. I kind wish there was a slab for us to have used in our bathroom. This is stunning!

Close up of River White

River White kitchen

The big surprise: Jen's marble slab. We had planned to eventually buy a nice marble slab from Williams Sonoma or someplace as a splurge for her baking center. The ones we looked at were small (but HEAVY) pieces of marble that she would take out when she baked. Since this Carrara marble remnant was EXACTLY the size we need for the baking center, we're saving money by using this instead of the quartz  for the permanent counter. Jen is so happy.

Our Carrara Marble Slab

Williams Sonoma Carrara Marble pastry board

Me at the Dutch kitchen showroom that inspired my  baking center. Ours will not be quite so big!

Lastly, we chose this Citadel Warp (5882) Formica laminate for the laundry room. It's the one room that has natural maple instead of espresso, so we went with a darker counter. Our quote was actually for the granite-looking laminate, but Jen likes this better, so we'll save a bit of money here, too.

 Getting closer... ;-)