Drees Homes Update: Early August

The last time I updated you all on our house progress, we were meeting with our builder for the pre-drywall consultation, and the house had been framed and roughed in. Here’s a photo to jog your memory!

When we finished up our pre-drywall consultation with the Drees Market Manager and the builder’s assistant for our neighborhood, we were told that roughing in, bricking, insulating, and drywall would have to be finished before we would know our intended closing date. It seemed like a pretty huge list, so when we went back a week later to check up on things, we were amazed by the progress!

First Week of August — Drywall

Hello, drywall! Doesn’t it make such a difference? You cannot imagine our surprise when we walked through the garage and were greeted with this!

They’d also sanded down the flooring and cut out the area around the fireplace in the living room.

This view is from just in front of the fireplace. You can see our kitchen area, the formal dining room at the front of the house, and the stairs that lead down to the basement. Oh, and you might have noticed the outlets cut out of the drywall. There are just a few in the kitchen…

Oh hey, front door. And here are the stairs leading up to the second floor. Any ideas for what to do with that awkward little space between the two stairwells would be greatly appreciated.

Apologies for how dark this photo is; it’s nearly impossible to get good photos of some of these spaces. Case in point: the hall bathroom on the second floor. I just thought it was actually worth photographing with the rough ins finished and the drywall going up.

Here’s a little peek at our master bedroom, complete with drywall and the framing for the tray ceiling. Still not sure how I feel about it, but I do have to admit that it looks pretty cool!

And here’s a shot of the tub in the master bedroom. I mostly included this photo when I noticed the smiley face that had been nailed into the framing. 🙂

Last but certainly not least is your first look at the basement! Without the drywall it was way too dark and confusing to include a picture, but now it looks like your run-of-the-mill basement. That area that Spencer is checking out will be storage, but don’t worry, we already know where the pool table and bar will fit.

Second Week of August — Paint and Trim

We missed one weekend for my cousin’s going-away party, but we were back that next Saturday to see how things were progressing. Also, Sarah was in town for a quick visit, and you know I can’t have someone come to Cincinnati without taking them to the house, Graeter’s, and Rhinegeist. Typically in that order.

I will admit that the front yard looked like a complete mess when we pulled up. I got over it once I saw 1) our driveway, 2) the sidewalk, and 3) the bricks stacked up near the front door, ready to be placed all around the exterior.

They’d even begun putting them up on the far side from the garage! Soon the entire front of the house will be bricked over, and then we’ll have a brick wrap that goes around both sides and the back on the first floor. The second floor will have siding because Spencer wasn’t too keen on my Georgian-style dreams.

The front porch was also beginning to take shape. Just so you know, those columns are far from finished, but it was still nice to get an idea of what it would look like completed.

And we had a garage door! It’s kind of a bummer because now we won’t be able to get into the house whenever we please, but Drees is good about staying at the model late and leaving keys for us to use whenever we ask for them.

The powder room right off of the garage had cabinetry, which made us think that just maybe…

… our kitchen cabinets would be in, too! I was ecstatic. During this whole process, the kitchen has been the hardest thing for me to visualize. It’s much easier when I can go back to a photo instead of a blueprint. As you can see, our microwave has already been installed above what will be the stove. The fridge will chill over in the corner (bad pun, I know), and the dishwasher will be in the island on the right, next to the sink.

Please take a moment to ooh and ahh over the glass-paned cabinet in the corner. It might just be my favorite thing in the house so far.

The windows had been framed out, and they had also installed most of the baseboards throughout the house. Spencer thought I was crazy when I wanted to upgrade us to the higher baseboards, but I grew up in an older home, and you just can’t beat it. They look so much better than the short, stubby ones that are included with the house.

Okay, maybe the French doors leading into our study off the front of the house are my other favorite things. Our house is going to be so bright and open, and I love it!

I hadn’t included a picture of the game room in a while, so here it is all drywalled. I also wanted to point out the doors that are leaning up against the wall. We decided to stay with the standard six-panel doors throughout the house because if it’s not broke…

We had one final treat when we visited the house with Sarah: Our floor tile was being installed in the master bathroom. You might recall that Spencer and I splurged a bit and decided to do a marble style tile on the floor in the bathrooms, but then we also chose to have it tiled up the walls in the shower and around the framing of the tub. I think it’s going to look fantastic, especially since our awesome tile guy made sure the veins in the marble were all running the same way. Thank God for Type A people like me.

As you can see, things are coming along nicely. Actually, they’re going incredibly quickly. When we first started this journey with Drees Homes, they told us it would take about 4 months to build the house, from foundation to finished product. If everything goes according to schedule, the house will be completed on September 14. That’s only three and a half months!

We should close on the house on September 28, and then start moving in that next week. We could even be in by my birthday, which would basically be the best present imaginable!

Don’t forget to leave some comments and questions below. I obviously enjoy chatting about our new house and how wonderful Drees Homes has been through the entire process!

P.S. In case you missed any posts about building our dream home with Drees Homes, I would seriously check out a few of these posts.