And Then There Were Two

Floors, that is! When we went to Blowing Rock for the 4th of July several weeks ago, the contractor (Clint) had nearly finished the first floor. Stuart and I made another trip to the mountains yesterday and the house now has a roof and a second floor! Progress continues to be so quick and he will start sheetrocking the interior walls next week. On the second floor, Clint still has to finish nailing boards for the floor and erect the interiors walls, but I have no doubt that will be done the next time we are up there. He also still has to build the stairs--he was there on Saturday when we went to check on things and let us climb a ladder to the second floor. We are nearing the end of the actual construction process--next will be electricity, plumbing, flooring, cabintry, etc.

Stuart and I attended the annual HOA meeting on Saturday and it was fun to meet all of the "neighbors"--only 4 out of 25 families live up there year round and the rest are vacationers like us. They told us that there were 41 inches of snow last year in the month of December alone! We are 45 minutes down the mountain in Hickory and only got about 8 inches in December, so the weather can be drastically different. We're already ready to dust off the ski gear and have some fun this winter! Anyways, here are some progress pictures:

Front of the house--the two eaves on either side will have windows--they just haven't been cut out yet. We are starting to think about what color shingles we would like and we have decided on an exterior stain color. So many decisions when you are building from the ground up!

View from back of house

View from side of house with cut out for balcony door

The 2nd floor! Bedroom #1 (I think the bedrooms are approx. 11' X 24'ish--hard to capture with a picture.

And what will be the loft and bedroom #2 beyond it with its own balcony. Clint is nailing the floors in this picture.

View down into the great room from the loft

So that's all for now--thanks for stopping by to see how the progress is coming along!

Mull Mountain House

Hello everyone! While I usually blog about all of the things going on in our fixer upper, we also have another house project going on right now. We are building a mountain house in Blowing Rock, NC with my husband Stuart's 3 sisters and his mom. Stuart's mom and dad bought the land that we are building on many years ago. The house has been a family dream ever since and everyone has finally saved enough for it to become a reality. Stuart's dad passed away while we were in college, but we know he is having fun watching the progress from above. So welcome to our journey of simultaneously renovating our old house while building a new house!

The house will be 3 bedrooms/2.5 baths and about 1800 square feet. I wish I could figure out a way to upload the plans to the blog, but they are in PDF format and I have no clue how to get that to translate here. The house is being built with forest fire logs from Yellowstone--how neat is that?? Downstairs will be the living room, kitchen, eating area, and master bedroom. Upstairs will house the other 2 bedrooms and a loft. Both bedrooms upstairs will have their own balconies. The downstairs bedroom will have glass doors that extend onto the large back porch. Here are some pictures of the progress so far:

View of lot from the road after trees have been cleared and driveway has been made

Foundation

Front of house

View walking in the front door

Front of house close up--there will be large eaves coming out on the 2nd floor where the bedroom windows will be

Living room that opens to the loft with large windows and french doors onto the back porch

Eating area with sliding glass doors onto the back porch

Kitchen

Master bedroom

What will be the loft when the 2nd floor construction starts

Porch space off of the eating area

Porch space off of the living room--just waiting for some rocking chairs!

Original Mulls!

View of back of the house from the backyard

Side of the house with supports on the 2nd floor for balcony

Progress is happening so fast! The framework for the first floor was constructed in less than 3 weeks. I know the next time we are able to go to Blowing Rock the house will have completely changed! Our contractor says they will be done in October and they are moving along right on track!