Parade home update

Well I thought I would let you know what is going on at the parade of home that we are building in the beautiful Stone Mill addition in Yukon Oklahoma. But before I do that I have to talk about our cruise to Alaska last week aboard the Golden Princess Cruise Line. Those of you that have been before know what I mean when I say WOW. That is the most beautiful area I have ever seen. We left Seattle and headed out for Juneau as our first stop as we took the Inside Passage tour. If you have never been on a cruise, in my estimation it is one of the best vacations dollar for dollar you can take. All the details are taken care of for you. You just show up and start eating. They have food 24/7 so you do have to do some exercise if you can or you will pack it on.  I guess this is part of vacation though huh.  Temperatures about 50 for the high and probably in the 30’s sailing on the water, and for those of us that live in a hot climate that was a nice relief. So we will definitely go back and explore some more of Alaska, so if any of you have been to some good places up there let me know. Okay back at the house. the painting crew has started and he will be applying some nice furniture look finishes and some glazed wall treatments.  I met with the landscape contractor and we went over the design and he will begin to implement that this week. The underground sprinkler crew will be in this week to install the irrigation system, so we are moving towards a completion outside here in a couple of weeks.  My wife and I will be selecting the light fixtures with our lighting consultant as we begin to pull all the interior details that have been ordered together to complete this project. We are going to talk to our furniture source and see about staging the house with furniture.  So stop on by and see us or send us a comment as we would like to be your builder on your next house.

Spring time

Well I think spring has finally sprung here in the central part of Oklahoma that is.  The grass is beginning to green up the trees and landscaping are coming out of hibernation and things are starting to look real good. I really like when all the Bradford pear trees bloom out as this is one of my favorites.  I am seeing people out in their yards and bed areas working them over.  This is a great time of year.  Well a little bit of update on the show home we are constructing in the beautiful Stone Mill subdivision in Yukon Oklahoma, on Thursday of last week the framing crew showed up and started laying out where the walls will go.  This sounds probably trivial but it is at this stage right here where you house gets squared up so that they are level and in correct relation with each other.  If a framer lays out the walls out of square it makes the sheetrock stage hard to do, it will make tile floors grout lines not be parallel with the walls in other words nothing good will take place.  I find as a contractor this is a great time to spend at the job site because some times walls have to be shifted a little bit to make a plumbing line work properly or maybe make cabinets and trim fit into corners like they should.  After walls are chalked out on the slab the framers go to work putting down the 2 x 4 sill plate and we like to use  liquid nail under all the sill plates for a good bond to the slab.  By the end of the day of Friday about 2/3’s of the walls were framed up with window and door openings in them.  This next week I will be meeting with my cast stone contractor and we will be discussing cast stone mantles, hood surrounds and some details possibly for the exterior fascade.  The framers will continue on with the walls and on up from there.  Brick will be ordered this week and the windows are on order. We will continue to press on from here.

Landscaping

Well spring is in the air or I should say in the area of central Oklahoma where I build new homes. Some of you may have snow on the ground but you know spring is not to far away.With this time of year it makes ones thoughts turn to the outdoors and specifically a landscaping project that you have had in mind all winter. Landscaping can have a large impact on the appearance of your house.  Sometimes the only difference in having it done professionally and doing it yourself can be performance and speed of which the job might get done.  Thinking from the point of saving money may or may not be the right way to look at it after all if the job does not look right and enhance your home what good is it any way right?  Sodding a yard, planting trees, and building flower beds is no doubt back breaking and tiring work but certainly doable.  Sodding a new yard it is very important to get the ground level and the drainage correct and then lay your new sod in.  In my experience of building new homes, especially if a client puts in a sprinkler system, you will always have some ditch settling so make sure your ditched are compacted as well as you can. This will minimize the amount of leveling you do after your sod is installed.  If you are going to plant trees make sure you know what kind of trees are best suited for your climate and what time of year is best to plant them and how much water is needed to get them started.  Building a flower bed area can be as simple as using a steel edging to separate your bed from your sod area to as elaborate as brick or stone walls.  Many clients that we have like to have these bed area incorporated into the building process so that the materials can match their house, but you can also use decorative concrete blocks for a very nice look.  Talk to the people at your local nursery as they will be able to give you some pointers on what type of plants will work well in your bed areas, depending on soil type and sun light exposure among the things to take into consideration.  So if you are going to take on a landscaping project make sure you do your homework, because after all a shoddy landscape job in my opinion is worse than no landscaping at all.