Cara texted this past weekend and wants to meet to show us the concept plan for the landscaping at Mar Azul this coming weekend.
YEAH! That will be super fun and something exciting.
In the meantime, I took pix of the exterior and the lot so she can see how things are progressing and look at them against her concepts before we meet. Can’t wait to see what she’s put together and if we can do it ?
I’ve written this post 3x now and every time I mess up adding the pix and I lose the post. I’m all out of witty comments because I’ve forgotten what I originally wrote ???
Every step of the way of building a house from scratch has sure been interesting. I don’t think Craig or I were prepared for how SMALL it would seem while we are building it. Sure hope it all works out once its all finished. Craig did make a good point though, at least we won’t have to buy tons of things to furnish a gigantic house!
I’ve learned on this project (even moreso than all the house + condo renovations we’ve done in the past) that finding simple, modern things to put into a new home is amazingly difficult.
Finding large format, matte, white tile for the house was crazy to locate even a few that could work!
The cabinets however have proven to be another challenge I didn’t expect. To find something modern, sleek, European style — they are all thermofoil or laminate. Lots of research has gone into us understanding what that means and if that’s something we want + will do OK in Florida, next to the ocean.
From day one, this kind of look was the inspiration for the house. White Quartz. Mix of Glossy White + High Contrast Wood Cabinets. White Large Format Tile.
Now to find this look its either crazy expensive….or seems to be crazy cheap. All wood would be awesome, except to track down the Zebrawood or Macassar Ebony that we LOVE, well that’s not super reasonable and fitting in the budget either.
A few places have them, but its still pretty spendy. So the hunt continues for the perfect cabinets that have that right look + the right price!
Saturday I met with a cabinet company in Daytona who sells Wellborn Cabinets. They do an all wood box ? + they have a new (1 year old) line called Aspire that offers frameless, European style cabinets. They are laminate (no Thermofoil), so we think that’s probably the right choice, but who knows.
With words like “Aspire” and “Luxe” — super budget friendly doesn’t seem in the cards. The cabinet guy promises me the pricing is mid-tier and not going to make me cry when I see the estimate. We’ll see! In the meantime, I’m just waiting on the samples of the doors we like to come in, so we can get a good real-life look at them vs. a catalog. ???
They also offer some super cool textured laminates that look like wood with a bit of a bumpy texture to them and they are super neat too. Hoping he will order some samples of those too!
Friday we did our usual drive by the lot after the school bus comes and this week it was FUNNNNNNY. Normally nobody working says anything to us. We pull up and take a pix and go on our way. But on Friday one of the guys walked over to the car window and stared at me.
I rolled down the window and he said “Can I help you?”
I let him know I was the owner and just driving by to see what was happening.
He proceeded to tell me a hysterical story about him and his guys building the keystone wall and how he built it wrong and Jack yelled at him, so he had to fix it all that morning, but that it was OK because it was really his fault and Jack just called him out. He promised he would have it all complete by end of day. No biggie to me, I have no idea what the schedule is, or who this guy is, or what he’s supposed to be doing. But it sure was funny how worked up he was + kept on talking!!!
The girls were all bored out, so we cruised on home.
Then we came back Saturday late afternoon so we could take a quick walk around and look at the wall up close + walk more around the house and see all the block going up. Its finally resembling a house!! The backyard still looks a little sketchy like there’s too much dirt and we’re going to have a mudslide if it rains. The side with the keystone wall looks awesome, except we stare straight into our neighbors back yard and house — SORRY REGGIE + MELISSA!!
Super curious how this will all look when its finished and ready to move in. Only about 12 more months to go. ?
Hmmm….so all this gray block sure does make our new house look a little like a prison. Craig is concerned it will be dark and gloomy inside and we don’t have enough windows. I’m keeping my fingers crossed?that we are good to go and it won’t be a dungeon.
Getting SO excited to see the 2nd story built up in block too!
A sneaky peaky of the Atlantic Ocean!
Craig climbed up on the scaffolding and took a pix of the view from where our first floor will be. And lookie there, you can see the ocean!
Now the funny part is that we don’t have any windows anywhere near there so once the house is built, bye bye!
McKenna wanted to see how the house was doing too since she missed it yesterday so we ran by quickly after we dropped Sierra at school.
Looking Good! Still rainy and junky weather, but progress is always so fun to see. Can’t wait to see what comes next.
Luckily there’s still mounds of dirt and sand and SHELLS to find!
Oh good grief, we missed it. We totally missed the slab being poured. How did this happen? We stalked the lot all day Tuesday….but the wind and nasty weather were horrible so we figured it was a no go after our last visit about 3pm.
Today the weather is horrible again. Crazy gusts of wind + rain + freezing cold. For fun, Sierra and I drove by after we dropped McK at her after school activity. We expected to see nothing. And then we came around the corner and there were dudes everywhere. Cars all around. And they had poured the slab and were making sure it was all even and smooth.
Hysterical. Still cannot believe we missed it.
Best part was the guy who caught me taking pix, walked in front of me and said “You better not post this on Facebook. I’m wanted by the FBI.” ?
Okie dokie friend in yellow.
More fun at the lot + playing in the dirt + digging up shells with the neighbors. All the neighbors are so awesome we really can’t wait to finish the house and move in!
Our neighbors across the street have an awesome balcony that looks out over the ocean + our lot. I’ve been so worried we are building a tiny house, that the neighbors said I should take a peek from above because it looks much larger from a different perspective. So I went up and took a pix from above.
Totally true! It looks way different up there and so cool. Can’t wait to see more from this view as the block starts going up too. The gigantic front yard on this house is pretty funny. Fingers crossed we find a good landscape company to help us keep all the grass and trees and plants alive that we have to put in!!!
More Dirt. More Shells. More Fun @ 9 Mar Azul.
After riding bikes to a lemonade stand in the neighborhood yesterday, we headed off to check out what was happening at the lot.
The girls found more shells again and had a blast playing in the dirt!
Looks like they are still excited about the house finally being built and hopefully moving into it in a little over a year!!! ?
