I think this container thing is giving me my headaches!

We're going home in 9 days. Once we are home, we have 9 days to pack and prepare everything. On the 15th, the container will be delivered to Dad's house. We have 2 hours to pack the container, every hour after that, we'll be charged $120- yikes!
I feel like we have so much accomplished. We purchased so much. But, there's still more I need. Here's what I need to order still:
-bar stools for the kitchen
-the rugs for the dining room and bedrooms

I'm feeling so conflicted about the rest of the shopping. We stilI need a vanity for the chidren's bathroom, and mirrors for each bathroom. Ideally, we can pick these up at the outlets, but if not, I hope Pottery Barn can deliver mirrors quickly, and I hope that we can find a good vanity somewhere. I am also putting the guest bed into the hands of fate. All you guests of ours, as of now, your bed is as much of a surprise to you as it is to us. I am hoping beyond hope that we can find a nice guest bed at the PB or Restoration Hardware outlets.

I've woken up at 3 am every night for the past week with thoughts of furniture. I hope that I haven't messed up anything. I am so happy with all of our funiture, and can't wait to see it in our house. Honestly though, this experience has been incredibly stressful. I will be so happy when the container pulls up to Joern's parents' house, because then I will know we're done.

Please forward our mail to...

As of sometime next year, all mail will need to be forwarded to our new address!

We received a letter in the mail last week with the addressess on our new private road! We are 20, and sadly (for our new neighbors), the other houses on our street are all parts of our number x (x/1, x/2, etc.) It is so exciting to have an address now! I have 3 weeks to get a mailbox now! HOORAY

A very quick update

Since I have a lot of laundry to do, and some vaccuuming, I will just write a quick update on the house. I will do a more thorough job in writing about it hopefully during the week.
Since receiving the building permit, we are now waiting for the "Rote Punkt," or Red Point which allows us to actually start building. Mr. B needs to register himself as our project manager, which will allow us to receive the Rote Punkt. We've also met twice again since the beginning of the month with Mr. B. We've worked on optimizing the design of the house. We've moved around a few walls. In the cellar, we've enlarged the rooms, and reduced a little width in the hallway. We also enlarged the mechanical room by removing the wall to the toilet room. It may seem odd to have a toilet and shower (for rinsing purposes,) in the mechanical room, but Mr. B suggested that we place our heat pump and water tank in a way that it can be covered by a curtain most of the time.
On the first floor, we've added one meter to the dining room, and removed the shower from the first floor bath. Although it would have been nice, it will give the bathroom a much more airy feeling, as the shower really made this bathroom cramped! We also changed the design of the window in the kitchen and widened the door from the kitchen to the side terrace.
Upstairs, we redesigned the children's bath, optimizing the space, which will also give me room for my Pottery Barn sink console and some shelving space for the laundry supplies. We also worked on the design of the master bath. Mr. B gave us a few suggestions for the bathtub. He did talk us out of making the shower too big, but I'm not totally convinced on that one either. We also made the hallway in the master suite a bit smaller, which gave more space in the walk-in closet. We eliminated two windows, one in the bedroom behind the bed, and one in the bathroom. It is fine.

The blueprints are complete, and Mr. B has started the paperwork for estimates. The paperwork is huge, he fills out an enormous booklet with explicit details on the house to send to builders, excavators, etc. This way, all contractors give us an estimate on exactly the same terms, which allows for a fair comparission.

We've also booked our container. We are going with a US shipping company. Turns out, summer is high season for shipping, thus, not the cheapest time to ship. We've chosen to self-pack our container, and have two hours to pack the container, before incurring an hourly rate for packing. Ugh!

Lastly, we also booked our tickets- hooray! We'll be home from July 5th to the 20th. A nice long time!

Permission GRANTED!

We went to the town hall today to do something most exciting, yet slightly anti-climactical. We picked up our building permit!
Getting a building permit in Neckartailfingen involves going up to the second floor of the town hall. You need to bring not only the invitation to come pick up the permit, but proof that you actually electronically transmitted the 2900 Euro to the town government. We also had to sign another bunch of plans on the house, as we had made a change to the roof overhang. The whole process took about 5 minutes, and ended with a handshake, a congratulations, and a bunch of cheesy smiles.

We now need our architect, who will be our project manager as well, to formally list himself as the project manager, so that we receive our "Baufreigabe" or "Red Point," which gives us the allowance to build. Technically, we have the permisson of the town to build, now we need to prove to the county that the house has had a structural analysis completed, and that we have a qualified building project manager. It is all very confusing, and very German. I think it has something to do with fitting in the laws, and then proving that the house will be sound.

Once you have the building permit, you only have to complete a few more steps to receive the actual allowance to build the house. We're almost there!

What you get with one more meter of dining room

Well, its official, we are going to add the extra meter to the dining room. I feel really good about the decision, even if we have to wait longer now. If we looked at out dining room every day and said "its too small," for the next 20 years, deciding against adding the meter would be a mistake. Adding the meter makes life, and the dining room, beautiful. Plus, it gives us walls in the dining room! We will be building a small wall between the kitchen and the dining room, which would make a beautiful space for either a wine tower, or my subway sign.
But, the far more exciting fact is the wall space that will open up in the corner between the two sliders. I now have space for a china cabinet!
I was disappointed earlier, because it would really be helpful for storage. Yes, I know that the kitchen is huge, but storing the china in the kitchen cabinets would not be such a great choice for china. Well, that and with such an awesome house, a china cabinet would just be nice :)
On Friday night, we received the new plans with the extra meter, and I found the perfect place for a china cabinet. So, I began the search for the perfect cabinet. I had 62 inches of wall space to work with. After a few hours during Without a Trace, I found a beautiful cabinet:

I really liked the clean lines and the space between the cabinet and the hutch. I thought it would make an excellent space for serving drinks, or even food, when we have guests.
Amazingly enough, it is another piece from Bassett Furniture. I tried Pottery Barn, but their cabinet was too wide, as was the buffet from Restoration Hardware that matches our dining table. I looked everywhere, but kept coming back to the cabinet and hutch in the above picture. So, I called our Bassett designer yesterday. We had a good conversation, and I was so impressed how much she remembered, and how involved she was in the design of the house. I decided on a the cabinet in white.
I got an email this morning from the deisgner. The cabinet will take 5 weeks because it is a custom design. Hmm, that is okay, but cutting it so close. Then she also suggested that their white is not a stark white, like the kitchen cabinets are, and may end up looking "dirty," if it is so closely visible with the kitchen. She suggested a java finish, and also suggested another china cabinet, that is acutally part of the same set as our dining chairs.

True, it doesn't have space for serving, but it does match the chairs, so I wouldn't be adding another wood. And, I love the drawers, I have been pining for a china cabinet with a silver drawer, and now, I have one! Plus, I figure that if we desperately need a serving area when we entertain, I can always pull in a small table into the room. And of course, the best about this cabinet is that it will be delivered in two weeks! No worrying about meeting deadlines in order to make it in time for the container. So, I ordered cabinet #2. I am very excited!

And the money starts rolling out, rolling on out, rolling on out...

We received a letter from the Rathaus (Town Hall) yesterday. We are formally asked to come pick up our Building Permit (Baugehnemigung,) at the Town Hall. Good news! Bad news, along with the letter, we received another letter from the county building office. In that letter, was a lovely bill for 2,900 Euro! For what? Well, as far as we can figure, it is for the permission to build our house. Dear Lord, that is a pretty steep building permit fee! Of course, I have no idea how much a building permit costs in the States, but wow! The building is exciting, financial diarrhea, not so much.
I love the housebuilding process!

A detour on our trip home

We'll be going home in July to pack furniture and belongings that are still stored between my father's, stepmother's, and aunt's house.
Of course, I am quite excited about the fact that we'll be home for hopefully about two weeks. Since we'll be home for a little bit longer time, I'd like to at least squeeze in a little travel. One blogger I follow posted about the Brimfield Antique Show, which seems to me to be a fabulous time, and oh, so very American. As I was researching Brimfield, I found that the show actually occurs over 3 week long periods every year. Well, Brimfield is open from the 8-12 of July, exactly when we're planning on being home!
How exciting to include a little more house preparation in our trip to Connecticut!