Who wants Tab?

A couple quick things...I've added a "Progressive Pics" tab up top with my two spots, and I'll be updating them as I get them.  Still hoping to do the animated picture thing, but I don't know how yet.

I also updated the "Selections" tab to include our brick choice and the shingle color, in case anyone was interested in those.

There's now a tab that has "Rome Elevations" as well, all the variations I could find.  So far the only cottage elevations I have are the L and the N...seems pretty likely that elevations exist for J, K, and M, but nobody's posting them!  Maybe the cottage elevations are still pretty new?  Anyone know?

And if you find any new bloggers, please let me know so I can add them to my master list!  I'm keeping the tab updated just as soon as I find them.

I'm working on my "Helpful Links" tab as I find things, so right now it's pretty short, but if you have any recommendations let me know!


Since I'm here, how about a picture of our cleared lot?  :D

Clear!

We stopped by the lot this weekend, and it's been cleared!  When we got home I sent an email to my SR to find out if we had a start date, so fingers crossed that it's sometime this week!  It was also pretty cool to see how far along the other houses on our street are...there are a couple that look like they might be just about done.  From the looks of it we are probably the next one to get started.

I took some new pictures but need to download them and upload them (that seems so silly when said that way...).  Speaking of pictures, anybody out there able to walk me through the progressive-picture thingy?  Where it goes from picture to picture so you can see the changes over time? I'd like to do that rather than just a line of pictures.  Assuming it isn't TOO difficult.  :)

Formica laminate countertops

When we first priced out our house, we went with the laminate counters without thinking twice...we knew that the granite was an expense that we didn't really need, since we've always had laminate and were used to it anyways, and something that we could change down the road without too much drama.  Well, after reading some more blogs it occurred to me that perhaps a second thought might have been a good idea!  For some reason it never even crossed my mind that there were options within the options.  The first is that you can get "upgraded" laminate, which as far as I can tell just means a wider selection of faux granite patterns instead of the basic solid color or speckled looks.  We went ahead and did that, choosing the Blue Storm:

Pre-construction meeting

So!  We had our pre-construction meeting on Friday.  They told us it would take an hour and a half, and that was pretty much exactly how long it was.  It was a bummer for me, because Friday was my son's first real day of preschool...I left him crying his eyes out and had to have someone else pick him up.  :(  But it was the only time we could do the meeting because my husband has a lot of travel coming up.

There weren't too many surprises at this meeting, and since I was frazzled by the preschool problem I didn't have my punchlist with me.  Basically what happened was that we went through each line item one by one and made sure that we (PM, SR, my husband and I) were all on the same page.  All the non-standards were double-checked against our change order and the drawings we had made.  At the end he went through a checklist form to make sure he'd covered everything he was supposed to.  I was amused by two entries on there, and anyone else who has read a bunch of the other blogs probably will be, too:

Safety: A Ryan Homes Employee must accompany customers through homes under construction.

Outside Construction: Customers or their agents are not allowed to work in the home prior to settlement.

I wonder why they would have put those in there?  :D  I don't think either of those will be a problem, since I will almost always have a toddler with me and I wouldn't want to chance unsafe conditions, and we don't have any ninja garage-insulating plans!

Laminate counters - a request

I'm working on getting all my pictures from the Pre-construction meeting together, but in the meantime...any of you who has the Formica counters in the kitchen, did you get the contoured edge?  I've tried figuring it out  who has it by myself but I'm failing miserably.  I want to do a post on the subject because our SR recommended against it, and I need pictures so I can explain why.  My current bathroom has a pretty good example, but since I haven't seen the Ryan version I'm not sure if it's the same problem.

Thanks!

It's a small world, after all...

The model that we've been going to for the Rome doesn't have a basement, and we've had a hard time figuring out a master plan for that space.  Recently another Rome model opened with the walkout basement, so today when the toddler decided that napping in his crib wasn't happening we hopped in the car and trekked out to it.  After his usual 41 minute car nap we stopped at the new model and went on in.  The SR on duty welcomed me, and I told him right off the bat that we were there to scope out the basement.  When I told him where we were building, he said he lived there!  Howdy neighbor!  I find this especially amusing because the PM we have for our build lives in the neighborhood of this model.  I guess they all choose to work far away from where they live!

So we went on down to the basement and I took a bazillion pictures so we could reference them later.  I was especially interested in how the under-deck area would look, since we'll have a deck as well.  When I'd taken all the pictures I could think of, we went back upstairs where a couple people were talking, and I caught the tail-end of a "wall ovens in a Rome" conversation.  Being the nosy intrusive helpful person that I am, I mentioned that he could do what we're doing and put an oven in the island.  He just looked at me and said, "Are you Rome-ing in Richmond?"  Talk about shock!!  First time I've come across a reader face-to-face.  He called his wife in with their two boys and we laughed about it all.  I think their SR (I guess they were coming from a different neighborhood?) was a little weirded out by the blog talk, but it was actually pretty cool talking about the stuff we'd seen online.  So since I'm sure you're reading this, fellow Richmonders, it was nice to meet you and if you start a blog let me know!  :)

**edited to add:  they started a blog!  http://ourromesweethome.blogspot.com

Pre-construction meeting scheduled!

I'm happy to report that our pre-construction meeting has been scheduled for Friday morning!  They haven't yet given us a date for ground-breaking, but I'm hopeful that we'll be able to start next week.

Right now I'm a little unhappy with Ryan Homes...when we walked the lot with our SR, I was given to understand that we would have a good-sized back yard.  Stupid me, I didn't think to ask for a plat to see how our house is situated.  Well, due to the width of the lot and the width of the Rome, they had to make our side-entry driveway more narrow than usual, so they sent us a copy of the plat to sign off on the driveway change...and I was dismayed to see that there is only 17 feet from the back of our morning room to the property line!  The back yard is kind of a big deal to me, so I immediately called the SR to discuss.  Unfortunately there's not much that can be done due to minimum setbacks and a 20 foot power easement along the road.  To their credit we were offered the chance to switch to a different lot, but my husband talked me out of it.

On the plus side, now I have a one time use, "I gave up a big backyard for you!" card in my deck, to use the next time a big decision comes along and I want to win the discussion...  :)

Doo DOO Doo doo, Doo DOO Doo...

(that's supposed to be the Jeopardy music...I'd have kept going but three notes was all I could work with!)

We got a call from our SR today, apparently we've shown up on the schedule to tentatively have our pre-construction meeting next week!  Exciting stuff!  But that's all the news I've got.

Sorry about the silence over here...I've got a couple of posts planned, but time has been scarce here lately and it's going to be even scarcer until next week.  If I get a chance to put one up I will, but we're going out of town so internet access will be problematic!