Yesterday, today, what will tomorrow hold?

It turns out that the "race to the finish," when building a house is just that.  The house hasn't really been this busy in quite a while, and there is a lot more busy to go.
Yesterday was tiles and continued work on the drywall.  By the end of the day yesterday, we had more tiles, a bench in our shower, and most surprisingly, a new storage room!

One of the plaster guys installing drywall around the air filtration pipes in Erbse's room.

The biggest deal of the day was of course the storage room in the cellar.  I don't know if I mentioned our decision before, that we would put a wall in at the end of the media room, making the media room a little smaller, but allowing us to have a sizeable storage space in the cellar.  This was a big deal to me because the cellar is so big, but so open that we had little space available for pure storage.  Sure, we could use cabinets here and there, but for a good old-fashioned storage room, we had nothing available.  Adding this wall, and creating a room that linked Joern's garage to the cellar also solved another problem: the wastewater pipe running down the middle of the wall in the media room.  We have now a very large storage space, that does not disturb the media room.

Of course, knowing this was coming could not prepare me for the feeling of bounding down the cellar stairs, and getting "lost" when I was headed towards Joern's garage.  Honestly, it took me a minute to realize where I was.  Yes, this was my house, but when a room exists that wasn't there 24 hours beforehand is a little shock to the system.

I love the storage space!

Here's a view from Joern's garage heading into the house.

And this is our slightly smaller, but still super-cool media room!

We also met with Mr Plaster-Guy last night.  He met us at one of his construction sites to show us our options for finishing the ceilings.  There are two options here for our concrete ceilings: 

1) Spackle- the ceiling would be sanded down, spackled, sanded again, spackled again, and then painted

OR

2) Vliestapete- a type of wallpaper made from cellulose and textile fibers.  

Mr Plaster-Guy showed us both types of celings, as one of his current construction sites has the Vliestapete in the top three floors and spackled ceilings in the cellar.  According to Mr. Plaster-Guy, a positive of the Vliestapete is that it will cover any small cracks that may appear in the ceiling.  We also saw that the light reflects differently on the spackled ceiling versus the wallpapered ceiling.  In the end, we decided for the wallpapered ceilings.  

On Thursday, the plaster guys also got to work on our ceilings.  They taped over all the joints in the ceiling:

And Cute Tile Guy was also rather busy.  He properly installed a backsplash (after a fit of passive agression,) in the pantry behind the utility sink:

And he got started installing tile on the shower walls, as well as mosaic on the shower bench:

Well, there you have it.  Tile Guy didn't come on Friday, but the plaster guys continued to work on the ceiling.  But, it isn't really photo worthy.
I will have to update though with some pictures from the front of our house: the electric company came today to dig out a hole for our electrity connection, we should have electricity next week!  We're coming up on a three day weekend, so we have to wait for Tuesday for people to come back to the house.

Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, *Saturday,* and Tuesday

We had a lot of progress again on the house over the past few days.  Wednesday brought with it the very cool ability to walk on our tiled cellar stairs:

And he tiled the floors in the powder room and the pantry:

By the time I got home, Tile Guy had made considerable progress on the shower in the childrens' bath too (even though it wasn't right.)





Of course, it was on Wednesday that I realized that the subway tiles were incorrectly installed.  Almost a week later, I still haven't decided if I want the shower tiles redone, or just the powder room. 

On Thursday, Tile Guy completed the shower:

And, he installed the tile on the floor of the children's bath:

I know that the floor is totally dirty here in this picture, but the floor is so cool looking!  Here is a slightly less dirty corner:


Friday, was completion of the floor in the chidren's bath, and the backsplash behind the oven:

Joern was also super busy on Friday evening, he was installing the speakers in the office and Erbse's room:

Surprisingly, Tile Guy was back on Saturday, to build the wall around the bathtub:





Sadly, no Tile Guy on Monday.  We've started to realize that he simply may not work on Mondays.  But, we were surprised on Monday morning, by a visit from the EnBW, the electricity company.  They came to tell us that they will begin digging a new electrical line for us next week.  Evidently, the original plan was that we would share a line with the building lot next door, but the people from the electric company didn't feel comfortable with this decision, so they will be giving us a new line.  But, the good news is that by the end of next week, or early the following week, we FINALLY should have our own electricity and phone lines!

We also had a surprise visit with Mr. B.  I had the day off of work as a preventative measure (the doctor wrote me out sick,)  so I was able to be at the house when Mr. B came.  Mr. B came to check on the progress of the house.  He checked if we had ordered the interior doors, and also told us that someone would be coming to install the waterproofing on top of the garages.  Wahoo!

Today, Tile Guy was busy again.  He finished the backsplash in the kitchen:

And he started the master bath:

The plaster guys also started today.  They spent the day covering over the pipes:

Pantry

Erbse's room

Its really starting to look like the tiles, without the changes, will be finished by Friday!  I'm interested to see how long the plaster guys need.  Once the plaster guys are done, then it is time for the floors!

It looks like we're having a good week!





Some updates

Well, since it has been almost 3 weeks with no post, I'm sure you have all figured out that Joern did not update while I was gone :(
But, at least I'm back now, and realtively over my jet lag and heat-induced pregnancy miserableness. 
There was actually quite a bit of work completed in the house while I was gone.  I guess the best way to go over everything is to break up the descriptions by trades.

Electrical:
The electricians started back last week to work on connecting the electrical panel. 

And thanks to a good organization system:

it went from looking like this last week:



to this today:

They also installed more in our "command center":

Don't ask me to explain much, but one is for the radiant heat and one is for the fireplace.

Builders:
One of the interior guys from Mr. Builder's crew was back last week to build walls.  I know, our walls were built long ago, but we still needed a few things:

A little hard to see, but they built a wall around our wall-mount toilet in the cellar.

More walls in the master bath because we have a wall-mount toilet, and a mini-wall around the toilet would look dumb.

A wall around the built in parts for the bathtub faucet.

A wall between the shower and washer/dryer in the kids' bath.

Plumbers:

Not too much right now with the plumbers.  But, the heat pump has been working to dry the flooring, and the air filtration system has been working for a few weeks too.  The air filtration sounds like a very distant airplane in our rooms.  Interesting. 

One thing the plumbers did was to finish off the mechanical room.  They labeled all of the pipes:







Plaster/ Stucco guys:

Probably the biggest deal was that first layer of stucco was applied to the outside of the house two weeks ago. 

                                Its a little hard to tell, but the house looks lovely now with one continual surface

instead of being broken up by the joints of all the bricks.

Those are the latest updates from the house.  We met with Mr. B the day I got back from the US.  He walked through and measured the moisture of the floors.  It is imperative that the floors are dry by the beginning of September, which is when "Cute Tile Guy," is set to begin tiling.  Mr. B also informed us that the tiles will be delivered this upcoming Friday- wahoo!  We discussed the status of the parquett flooring, which is turning into a major production.  Most excitingly though, he proposed a TIMELINE!!!!!!

So, we're looking at about 2 weeks for the tiles, which will bring us to late September.  Then, the plaster guys will come in to do the second layer of plaster, and paint.  This brings us to early October.  The parquett will be installed in early October.  Then, the plumbers will come in to install the fixtures, and the electricians will come in to install switches and lights.  We should let the kitchen company know that we're looking at mid to late October for the kitchen installation.  And then, he told us the most exciting news- the kitchen is pretty much the final thing before moving in.  This means that there is a light at the end of the tunnel.  That light will appear in NOVEMBER!  We really should be in before Christmas and the baby!  Hooray!



Quite a bit of progress in the past, oh, month or so

Okay, so I realize that my last post about the house was one month ago, to the day, but I think I have some fairly good excuses.  Once the Richtfest was finished, we had two weeks to prepare the apartment for our visit:  my cousin, Elizabeth, and her friend, Carla, came to us at the last stop of their whirlwind European tour.  Also, the last 2 weeks of work were really crazy, and invovled a couple of late-nighters for me.  Then, Carla and Elizabeth arrived.  We've been having lots of fun, and have done quite a bit of exploring in Germany.  Of course, I should not forget the most important reason though:

Yup, this is ours!  Joern and I are having a baby, who we have named, "Erbse" (German for pea.) A baby who I happen to think is the absolute most adorable baby in the world! 

Despite all the goings-on in our lives, we have finally seen progress with the house!  The plaster guys finally started on June 4, a Saturday.   They were able to complete plastering the walls on the top two floors, but not the staircase.  After the Richtfest, the guys came in and fninshed by the end of the following week.  So officially, the plaster guys finished on the 18th.  Of course, they are not completely finished, but they are finished with the first layer of plaster, which is quite thick.  They will be back after the Estrich (the cement-like material poured over the insulation, pipes, and radiant heating,) so probably in late August/ September.  The walls look incredible, and I really need to take pictures of how lovely our very finished-looking walls are!

Last week, the electricians were at the house again.  All of our alarm contact wires are installed, and they now installed all of the outlets, without their covers, of course. 
Here are a few pictures:

                                                      Three plug outlets in the kitchen.

Not sure what the four holes with wires are for, but the squares with arrows

are for our exterior metal blinds.  It feels like "command central."

And last week, someone from Mr. Builder came in to pour the foundation for the air heat pump.  The plumbers came and put up the air filtration machine, and worked some more on the pipes in the mechaical room.

Yesterday, the plumbers came, and put up the air-heat pump.  They connected the air intake and outake portion, but of course, there is no plumbing completed yet.  It looks amazing so far though!

Today, the plumbers installed the gas pipe for our stove.  You can also see how nice the plastered over walls look in this picture:

The blue along the wall is the protection between the walls and the poured concreteish floor covering. 

We were also surprised to discover that the plumbers started to lay the insulation that goes beneath the radiant heating.  They started in the Erbse's room:



So there you have it, a very brief update!  Hopefully, now that life is a little calmer, I will be able to update with much more frequency! 
Ciao!





Putting the squeeze on some of our workers

Joern and I reached our frustration limit with the house last week.  It probably came from our realization that the plaster guys were again no-shows on Friday.  We have been putting off the plaster work for 2 weeks now.  Ugh! 
After a little drama at home, Joern decided to call Mr B, and let him know that our frustration was reaching a peak (my frustration especially.)  Mr. B explained that builders and people in the construction field now have so much work to do, they are balancing many projects at once.  In doing this, they also have a little more strength and freedom to come and go from building sites as they please.  Our electrician did just this.  Because our electrical work put us behind by 3 weeks, the plaster guys could not start when they were scheduled to begin, and had other projects to do anyway.  He also appologized and admitted that he should have at least explained this to us.  He also promised to come by on Saturday morning. 
Yesterday morning, at 8:00. the first person to show up was the owner of the plastering company.  Wow.  Then, Mr. B showed up.  We walked around showing the plaster guy the house.  He had some questions and also had a few issues that Joern needed to clear up.  One thing I haven't posted about, mostly because I do not yet have pictures, are Joern's built-in speakers on the first floor and his installed HDMI cables for all three floors.  Joern got a few new jobs, to make the holes for the speakers a bit larger, and to move some of the HDMI outlets.  The first part of the job will focus on the wet plaster, which will cover all of our currently standing walls.  We then have some more walls that will need to be created with drywall, but this part comes later. 
We then met separately with Mr. B and asked him about the Richtfest.  The symbol of the Richtfest is a tree decorated with ribbons, set atop of the house.  We will need to ask the carpenter who is coming for the Richtfest to also bring a tree with him.  I'm just trying to figure out how to get the tree decorated before the tree goes up! We're also talking with my friend, Mandy, who has so very kindly agreed to sing a song for the Richtfest.  It just isn't so easy to find a home song that isn't sad!

While all this was happening, the owner of the plaster company left and showed up again, but with backup.  He and five plaster guys worked until 2:00 yesterday!  Very impressive!  They plan to work all though the next few weeks. 

The electricians are also headed back to the house tomorrow to install contacts for the alarm system, which should have been long-completed, by the way.  But, at least it seems that we are on the right track again.
Thank you, Mr. B!