Floors and furniture

The floors were finished by Friday, the 21st.  Unfortunately, I wasn't quite quick enough to snap a bunch of pictures before Joern started covering the floor for protection, but I was able to get a picture of the kitchen:

And, as soon as the floor guys left, Joern started measuring out the baseboard for the living room :

On the following Monday, the 24th, the floor guys were back to oil the floor.  We weren't allowed to walk on the floors for two full days following the oiling. So, the earliest we were able to get back into the house was Thursday.  It looks wonderful!

Here are two views of the master bedroom:

Joern also was working hard on his baseboard project.  He set up a little workshop in his garage, and has been busy with his mitre saw for days now:

And while we were wating for the floors to dry, our garage doors were installed!

Joern also decided to take advantage of Marcel's visit this past weekend.  Joern, Marcel, our neighbor Torsten, and Joern's dad started moving in some of the heavy furniture and the vanities.  Seeing our furniture in the house really made the whole thing feel real!  Only a few more weeks, and we'll be in the house!

That's our refrigerator under the black wrapping.

We now have one comfy chair in the house!

 The rugs are all waiting in the guest room.

Erbse's vanity!

The super, ridiculously heavy dresser in our bedroom.

We lit a fire on Saturday afternoon. So cozy!

The vanity and storage cabinet in the master bath.

                                                         The boys after a long day of moving!

Joern has been working hard on the baseboard and last night, we installed medicine cabinets.  We hit a snag in Erbse's bathroom, the hole for the medicine cabinet is too large, and we need to get the plaster guys to come back to help us fix the problem.  Unfortunately, we can't install the beadboard until the medicine cabinet is installed, and we can't have the plumbers install the fixtures in Erbse's bathroom until the beadboard is in and painted.  Good thing this isn't the only bathroom in the house!

I can't wait to see where we are by this Friday, as this is supposed to be a big week.  Of course, it is a very short week, because Tuesday was a holiday, and no one came to the house on Monday.  But, this week should include the completion of the wood floors, installation of the kitchen, installation of interior doors, installation of the exterior blinds, and plumbing fixture installation.  Of course, we'll see if this all really happens in the next three days.  And, we have no idea when the electricians plan on returning to finish up the electrical. Oh well, the good news is that we'll be in by the end of the month, at the latest!   This is fantastic!  Now, its time to get to work with the bittersweet job of packing up our apartment!

Kitchen and tiles

Thursday afternoon, we had an appointment with the kitchen studio.  It was to finalize our decisions- we didn't really finalize anything, and after 3 1/2 hours, decided that 8:00 pm was time to call it quits for the night.  We have to finalize next week.
We were assigned to a new designer, as our original designer retired in August.  I really liked our old designer, but after a few hours with our new guy, I realized that the original guy was ready to retire.  This new guy had so many fantastic ideas. 
He started out by informing us that the kitchen company we are going with changed the drawer size. This means reconfiguring the set ups of the drawers.  Joern and I have quite a bit of homework here, trying to decide how to best utilize the space for our needs.  He showed us a lot of options for things we can put inside the drawers to better organize everything.  Wow!
We also discussed the countertop.  Our new kitchen guy showed us a honed granite countertop, which we really loved.  It works nicely for both of us, because Joern was never a fan of the high polish, and I was never a fan of high polished black, because I heard that they are a total pain to keep streak-free. 
It is still black, but with a slightly uneven surface.  I really love it!  Of course, it is more expensive than our orignal choice, but it is about 100 Euro per sq. meter more expesnive, and in reality, we don't have that many square meters of countertop space. 
We also discussed our range hood. We have a unique, but growingly more common, problem with our range hood: because we have an air filtration system and our high efficiency air-heat pump, our range-hood cannot vent outside.  Our air has to be filtered, and recycled into the house.  We're fairly certain that the air-filtration system will deal with the damp, but Joern was so worried about the smells.   Joern brought up his concern with the new kitchen guy, who promptly had a solution- an active charcoal filter that can be installed in any range hood.  The filter is HUGE and heavy. It is refillable, and the kitchen guy suggested that since we like to cook, we refill the charcoal once a year.  The packets are about 40 Euro, which seems like a good investment if we're considering keeping smells out of our living area!  The kitchen guy also made a few modifications in the range hood, so that the air can be properly exhausted. 
From range hood, we went over all the rest of the appliances.  We flip-flopped the dish sink and dishwasher, because even though the designers agree that the dishwasher should be on the left of the sink if you are right-handed, ours is currently on the right side of the sink, and I love it there!  The designer also has to play a bit with the location of the dish sink along the wall, as well as the cabinets.  I guess there was a little poor planning involved, one of our dining room outlets will endup being covered by the kitchen cabinets.  Hmmm....
Then, it was on to the microwave.  Joern brought up that the interior space of the microwave was really bothering him.  We microwave a lot, and usually use our lovely, gigantic Pfaltgraff plates.  Joern was really concerned that for us, going from our countertop microwave with tons of space to a built-in tiny microwave was going to be miserable.  New kitchen guy had a solution- which excites me :)  He suggested a combination oven / microwave.  Since its an oven, it has much larger capacity than a traditional built-in microwave.  Plus, I was already worried about Thanksgiving, when we usually use our oven, my mother-in-law's oven, plus a tiny countertop oven.  This way, I am getting THREE ovens for our Thanksgiving party! 
From there, it was on to the prep sink.  We need to look at a bunch of prep sinks and decide which we like the best.
New kitchen guy also asked us about solutions for the garbage.  Joern really wanted a hole in the island, this way he could just sweep the scraps from the veggies away.  So, New kitchen guy showed us a system, basically a hole in the countertop, you just pull up the cover, and the scraps go into a little bin underneath the countertop, which you then empty out.  He also suggested an alternative, an electrically supported drawer underneath the prep sink.  You just bump on the drawer and it opens!  So, you can have your hands full of veggie scraps, and bump the drawer with your knee, and the door opens like magic! We decided for the drawer, as it was cheaper, and for me, who empties the garbage, the better choice.
The final discussion focused on the cabinet doors.  The doors we origianlly chose is no longer in production, so we had to chose new doors.  Our original plan was a white, high-gloss, mission style door, but the new version had slightly more undefined lines.  New kitchen guy showed us few other white door options.  I pointed to a matte finish beaded cabinet, saying that those are the doors I usually like best.  But, when we took out the two door samples and held them together, we both decided we liked the high-gloss one much better.  The color was just a lot nicer.  Well, thank you very much, New kitchen guy, because he suggested we take the door samples home over the weekend to decide.  There is a HUGE difference between seeing something in a showroom and seeing it in your home.  We placed them in the kitchen, so that the light would hit them the way it will when the kitchen is installed.

It isn't so easy to tell how much better the one on the left looks in real life, but believe me, it looks significantly better!  Its something about the color of white.  The door on the right looks so much more yellowish in our house, and the one on the left, which looked almost gray in the showroom, looked to be a lot more of a true white in the house.I want to return to the house with some paint samples, and I really wish we could have had a sample of the granite, but there is almost no argument. Plus, even Joern agreed that the beaded doors fit in with the decor of the house much better than the mission style cabinet. 
New kitchen guy had to pretty much redraw the kitchen, because it didn't transfer properly into his software program when he inherited our kitchen.  So, the plan is that he'll finish the drawings in the upcoming few days, and we'll go back to finalize the decision, so that the kitchen can be ordered.

In other house news, "Cute Tile Guy," was back yesterday.  Yesterday's job was to grind down the surface of the "Estrich," or that concreteish substance above the radiant heating.  He did this in the cellar.  The other job was to paint on a waterproofing layer on the floors and on the shower walls, and surrounding the bathtub. 

We did discover a tile problem though, which made us both quite mad, and was probably a poor way to start off the weekend.  Joern picked me up from coffee (okay, bubbly apple juice,) with a friend, and on the car ride home, he said to me, "did you know your mosaic tiles cost 2/3 the price of the entire tile bill?"  I said I knew they were expensive, but didn't think they would cost that much.  Then, Joern told me, well it was 17 sq. meters of mosaic, for the master shower, and for the bathtub surround.  It was at that moment, I realized that there was an error, that the mosaic was ordered for the entire shower, including the walls.  This was NOT our plan!  We wanted the travertine mosaic tiles on the shower floor and as a border on the shower walls, the rest of the shower walls were going to the the same tile as the floor in the master bath.  Turns out that Mr.B called Joern when I was in the States to finalize the order for the tiles, and Joern said something like, "I don't feel comfortable doing this without Allison being here," to which Mr. B said something about time not being on our side, and that the order needed to be placed.  So, when Mr. B asked Joern about the mosaic covered shower walls, Joern was uncertain, but agreed that this was correct.  It was NOT!  So, at 7 pm on a Friday, Joern called Mr. B.  Obviously, we are most upset with that annoying lady at the tile showroom, Ms. Gray, who had no problem insulting me and my home country, but couldn't even get our tile order correct.  But, Joern was also upset with Mr. B, who kept putting off the tiles, which left us in the unfortunate spot that the tiles needed to be ordered, and I wasn't there.  Mr. B managed to calm down Joern a little, by saying that despite the fact that it says on the order form that the mosiac tiles are not returnable, he will fix it.  But we are still so angry with the annoying lady at the tile place.  We've even decided that the final tile order we need to make, for the shower in the cellar, will be done through another tile showroom, the one "Cute Tile Guy" works with, because we do not want to run the risk of having to deal with Ms. Gray again!  I am only hoping that this doesn't mess us up too much time-wise, as cute tile guy wants to be done by the end of next week. 

Well, that's all the news for right now.  I'm sure this upcoming week will be full of updates!

Surprise!

I called Joern during my lunch break today to ask him for a house status update.  This has become a lunch break ritual since the beginning of this school year, it provides me a little "pick-me-up" during the school day, plus, it helps calm my deep desire to be home watching the house change daily.  At 12:00 today, Joern told me that the builders were working today, installing steel mesh.  We discussed that this stage could last a few days, and we both hoped that the weather stay above freezing until the ceiling could be poured.  I hung up the phone satisfied that the house just may be completed by the end of the week.
Imagine my surprise when my phone rang just as we started "quiet time," with the kids around 1:15, and Joern told me that the concrete for the ceiling was on it's way to the house!
The builders started pouring around 1:30 this afternoon, and were finished by 3:30.

Mr. Builder arrived to take some photos.  You can also see the orange air filtrationon tubes under his feet.

Joern got a little "artistic" with the photography.

                                         

                                                              

                                                             

The last batch of concrete.

And now, the exterior of our house stands, completed. 

Obviously, we had quite a reason to celebrate today!  Mr. B also called Joern to tell him that the carpenter, who will do the roof, will be coming in 2 weeks!

THEY'RE DONE!

Well, there you have it!  The exterior walls are complete!  The builders started reinforcing the window openings in preparation for the ceiling, which is obviously on its way next week.  I stopped by the house this afternoon at 4:30, and since the builders had already gone home for the day, so I decided to check out the house in the daylight.
I probably spent an easy hour in the house.  Which is crazy, as I was all by myself.  But, first I checked out all the walls of the house.

The front window of bedroom #1, supported and waiting for the ceiling.

Standing on the balcony!

After checking everything out, I walked down and looked at the first floor.  As I  toured the first floor, I realized that the builders installed special brackets for attaching the interior walls.  That was a big "ah-ha" moment for me, because I realized that you can really get an idea of the rooms now.  Woah!

Please join me on my little "home tour of the second floor." 

If you look really hard, you can almost make out a little line, it is about 2 block witdths from the left.  That's where the master shower ends, and bedroom #2 begins.

You can see the brackets better in this picture, they are on the left, very close to the edge of the picture.  See, they form a line.  That's the wall between the walk-in closet and the master-bath.  The window is in the master bath.

The brackets are visible on both sides of the window here.  These are the walls of the walk-in closet.

The brackets for the walls of the master bedroom are visible at the right and left of this picture.

And here is the completed house:

And here is the current view of the next door neighbor's house, with the exteior plaster (Außenputz.)

It has been an incredibly exciting week.  If the weather holds out, it is almost certain that next week will be just as exciting!

And, it's a wrap!

Literally.  Day 6 of excavation complete, and the end of the day brought the end of the excavation phase!  We're done.  The ground was smoothed out, all piles of dirt were removed.  The garages and foyer are very clearly lower than the house now.  The corners of the house were marked out with wood, and the walls for my garage were also marked out.  The sides of the hole were also covered with a plastic covering, to help prevent a dangerous situation from arising in case of a mudslide. 

Joern in his garage

Northeast corner of houe.  Standing in the future mechanical room.

The pink lines (pretty hard to make out) mark the placement for the pipes.

My garage.

That box behind the excavator contains the plans for the lot and the house.


And now for the facts.  Excavation took 6 days, 7:00 am to 5 pm daily. 
1,200 cubic meters (42,000 cubic feet) dirt removed by 80 double-trailered trucks.
Sadly, the dirt was brought all over the country, so we won't  be able to visit our dirt.

On Monday, they will begin digging for the pipes that will lay under the house.  I am so shocked and impressed that this giganitc excavation was completed so quickly!  Thank you Mr. Wolfram!!!

The Gemeinderatsitzung

I know, I know, I was supposed to blog about this as soon as we got back from the town council meeting, but I learned two lessons: 1) colds strike at the most inopportune times, and 2) lots, and I repeat, lots of Champagne (and probably at times much harder stuff,) will be consumed throughout the building process.
To begin the whole story, I confused the date of the town council meeting. I found out afterwards that Joern didn't want to correct me because he knew it would make me more nervous.
When I got home from work on Tuesday afternoon, Joern called me and told me to come to his parents' house. When I walked in, Joern said, "we have to run to the current owners of the building lot because we have to have the paper signed by tonight. Then, we have to be at the town hall by 7 tonight." Turns out that the town council meeting was not Wednesday night, as I had thought, but actually Tuesday night. Argh!!!
So, first we ran to the current owners of our lot. They are the parents of a friend of Joern. They are such kind people. As soon as we rang the doorbell, they quickly invited us insisde. We sat and chatted for a while. We found out that the duplex will be built by Joern's friend Markus on one side, and the other side will be someone whose brother works at the bank (since it is the only bank in the town, this means everyone knows him.) I'm excited because all of our neighbors will be around our age, except,of course, for Joern's parents and aunt. Then, we talked a bit about America. Like all good Germans, the land owners have traveled extensively through the USA, unlike me. And, they love to talk about their experiences! After our little chat, we showed them the paper that the town sent to us in response to the building permit application, the form for the approval of the land owners for us to build. They quickly signed our form, and sent us on our way to the town hall.

We got to the town hall a few minutes before 7 pm. The town council members sat in the front of the room in a circle, and there were two rows of chairs set up in the back for the public. We were not the only members of the public audience, there were 3 others. Joern's dad came as the mayor started with his opening comments.
First on hand was a discussion of road repairs that are set to begin in May. It was nice to know ahead of time that my route to work will be really difficult starting in a few months. They then discussed an "island" on the main street that holds a sign for local advertisments. Third on the docket was an item concerning another smaller street in the town that would be repaved.
Then came item number four, the planned building of a one family house by Herr and Frau Roesner. I'm pretty sure that my knuckles were white. I became instantly frozen in place, and could only stare at the overhead screen as pictures of our house came into view. The mayor of the town discussed our plan for two full floors above a cellar located on building lots 166 and 158/3, our two garages on both borders, and the size of the house. He then reminded the town council of the discussion about building with two full floors at the meeting on the 2nd of February. He then asked for a vote on the house. He asked first who was in approval: EVERYONE raised their hand! That means our house was unanimously approved by the town council! 3 minutes devoted solely to our house came and went, and pushed us one step closer to our goal.
They then discussed an addition to the parking lot for the school.
At 8 pm, the mayor announced that the public portion of the meeting had come to an end and announced a 15 minute break for town council members.
Mr. Builder came and shook our hand to congratulate us. And then we walked down the stairs. As we were leaving, Mr. Buiding Store Owner (another story for another day,) who is also a member of the town council came to congratulate us. As he and Joern finished their conversation, the man who had been sitting on the left side of the mayor at the meeting, one of the three people in suits at the meeting, came to talk to us. He started with "Herzlichen Gluckwunsch," and then turned to me and started speaking English to me. After congratulating us, he then asked where I was from, and if I was happy in Neckartailfingen, and then told me that he taught my husband how to deal with money (either because of Joern's teenage summer job, or because of their very lage fight a few years ago when the town fined Joern a large sum of money for paying his business tax late.) I later found out that he is the town's Fiscal Officer, and it was a really big deal that he came to us at all, and that he spoke English to me, was an even bigger deal.
From the meeting, we headed over to my in-law's house to rehash the entire night over a bottle of Champagne.