Ugh, I missed a week

Most often, I feel like I am a responsible blogger.  But, sometimes, you can let a few days get away from you.  The problem is that once you start letting one day pass, the thought of blogging gets harder and harder, because there is so much more to blog about and so many more photos to plow through.  Add to that a nasty head-cold/ virus thing, and well, its Monday again, and well, this is why my last post was seven days ago. 
Tuesday was a really busy day at the house.  Here is our driveway:

Yup, that is a plumber's van and an electrician's van!

The plumbers chisled out the wall in the powder room for the pedestal sink.

And the electricians chisled out the headboard wall in the master bedroom.

                                    The plumbers roughed out the master bath, and installed the tank for the toilet.
                                    The electricians roughed in the outlets in the master bath.

And our walls turned into graffitti cenral.  This is the wall in the children's bath (laundry on left/ shower on right.)

The drain system for the kitchen, powder room, and master bath (in the cellar.)

Drainage for the top of my garage.

Drain pipe for the children's bath. 

Wednesday was another busy day for the electricians and the plumbers, and we were welcomed the arrival of someone who will most definately become our friend:

Sorry its fuzzy, but that's our fireplace!

And, here is the inside of said fireplace.

The plumbers and electricians were really busy on Wednesday.  The electricians installed wire in most of the outlets and lighting connections in the second floor.  It was pretty amazing.  The plumbers did lots of drilling.

Thursday was our first big disappointment since the plumbers not arriving.  The electricians didn't show up.  No call, nothing.  No electricians.  But, the plumbers were there, and they worked like mad. No pictures though, because I was "making rather merry." (Oh my gosh, Mom, if you're reading, I do hope how you like how I was able to use your favorite Bob Crachit quote!)

Friday, more of same.  Hard working plumbers, and non-existent electricians. 

. 
Today, well, the plumbers have really earned back my love.  I finally got to run around with the camera to take lots and lots of pictures.  Here you go:

The water connection for the utility sink (pantry.)

                                      Water and drain connections in the powder room.  Warm water exchange pipes for
                                             radiant heat.

                                           Kitchen plumbing.  Prep sink water supply and drain, and
                                          water exchange pipes for radiant heat.

                                    The transportation holders for the windows are now gone from the terraces.

Wiring in the master closet.

Plumbing in master bath. 

                                                   Growing network on the second floor.  Both plumbing and
                                                       electricity.
Since we don't expect to see the electricians until the week after Easter, I guess there won't be any more electricity updates.  Plumbers will be back tomorrow.

This evening, we also met with our mortgage guy.  He had more papers for us to sign.  It turns out that for every bill sent to the bank, we need to sign off at the bank on the payment. 

Well, since this was a huge post, I should be going.  Hope you all enjoyed the update, and look forward to my being a better blogger this week!

Almost a week since my last post

I'm over stressing about time.  Our builders were busy during the past week working on a project for Ritter Sport.  And yes, I think its pretty cool that Ritter Sport, the makers of those fantastically yummy chocolate squares, are customers of our builder :)  But, S and a new guy came by the house at 2:00 to start working on our walls again.  I honestly don't have a problem with this, because not only does our builder have bigger customers than us, but it is damn cold again.  Poor guys. 
But, "S" and New Guy are both really nice and easy-going, and definately hardy too.  They focused on the master suite today, which turned out to be a big drama for quite a few hours. 
When I left work at 3:30, I gave Joern a call to let him know that I was on my way home.  He told me that the builders were there and needed my measurments for the master bath vanity.  The measurments were important in order to determine the placement of the cut-outs for our two recessed medicine cabinets.  Joern couldn't find what I had left for him, so I raced home as fast as I could.  Fortunately, I had another paper with my own measurments to give to Joern and "New Guy."  Adding to the fun, of course,was the fact that all of the paperwork from the Restoration Hardware, had measurments in inches.  Ugh, I hate when everything needs to be recalculated!  Somehow, I didn't totally trust my own measurments, so as soon as I got home, I ran off to print out a new set of detailed plans for the vanity. 
After a ton of measuring and calculation, and quite a bit of stress, Joern, "New Guy", and "S" all came to a consensus on where to squeeze in the medicine cabinets:

No worries, the medicine cabinets are actually espresso in the master bath.  This is just the one we chose

to use as the sample. 

Meanwhile, while Joern and "New Guy," continued to work on the medicine cabinet dilema, S worked diligently on the wall between the master bedroom and the closet. 

And, here is what we had by 5 pm today:



We're not sure if the builders will be back this week, or next.  Of course, it makes us a little sad to think that they may finish when we are in the US, but we can't change things. 

In other news, we received a letter from the town declaring that we, and the bank, are officially listed as owners of our property in the property register.  Yay?  Bleh that the bank is there too, but it  means that the bank is officially now our mortgage lender!

We are also expecting that our first checks will be cut to the workers tomorrow from our bank! It seems like this process has taken forever, but there were so many little details that had to fall into place before the bank could officially lend us the money. I  am so looking forward to actually being able to pay the bills that are sent to us from all of the people working on the house!

The end of week 6!

Week 6 of our building exprience has now come to an end.  Despite many people believing that this process is quite slow, I am so surprised when I think back to the fact that five weeks ago the end of the day brought some scratches to the topsoil. 
Just a quick recap of the past 6 weeks:

End of the day, August 27th.  The digging has started.

End of the  day, September 3, excavation is complete!

End of the day, September 10.  Gravel put down and footings installed.

End of day, September 17.  Slab completed for garages and foyer, preparations for slab for house.

September 24.  Concrete slab being poured for house.

October 1, exterior cellar walls are free standing!

Joern also met with a representative from Deutsche Bank.  They are one of two banks we are considering to be our mortgage lender.  What is so attractive about this bank is their ability to guarantee the interest rate for 25 years, which in Germany, is a big deal, as most mortgages last 10 years, and then you need to either pay off the mortgage or refinance.
Here's what Joern explained to me:
- despite locking in for 25 years, we are also allowed to leave the mortgage in 10 years.  We can either pay off the mortgage in 10 years, refinance if the interest rate is better, or stay with this mortgage.
-we are allowed to pay an extra 5% annually on the mortgage without any penalty.
- because we are locking in for 25 years, we will be paying a higher interest rate, 4%, but the positive is that if the interest rate has gone up in 10 years, we're still paying a low 4%.
- this mortgage is a simple, classsic mortgage.  The other bank is offering us a two-part mortgage, one half would be classic mortgage, the other half would be a building-savings contract, so this one is a little more transparent.