From Hole to Home!: June 2012

Wednesday, June 20, 2012

Bye Bye Hole...Hello Home!

Okay, I have been a HUGE slacker about posting to the blog. And I have also not taken any pictures. I keep meaning to, but then the pile of boxes and stuff all over the place distracts me, and then I forget.

Everything went great with the walk thru and settlement. The walk thru was very informative and it was great to know how the house "worked." We used an outside settlement company (non-NVR) and NVR FedExed all of the resale packet to them with the paperwork and keys. This whole process was surprisingly smooth and painless, much to our relief!

I swear it took the movers forever to move us. There were 4 of them and they were very good and professional, but it took 11.5 hours (and a couple 4-packs of Red Bull) when all said and done. They scuffed the walls in a few places, but nothing major. Ryan Homes said that they could touch that up for us after our 3-week visit, which is awesome! They also gave us a coupon to get a free quart of the wall and ceiling paint, so we plan to do that since we probably won't be painting the house anytime soon. I must say that I don't mind the wall color...it has a nice contrast with the white. That being said, I definitely cannot wait to throw some real color on the walls!

Best Buy delivered our fridge on time and the delivery men were friendly and helpful. We LOVE the fridge! It's just too cool...literally and figuratively.

Sears delivered our washer/dryer. We paid for delivery but not set-up. My hubby bought the dryer vent attachment and cord on amazon, so he planned to do the install himself. However, the delivery guys accidentally nicked the door jam and felt horrible, so they gave us free hoses for the washer and hooked both the washer/dryer up and tested them out.

One thing for sure is that the delivery and moving guys were excellent in all cases. It makes a big difference when you work with nice, helpful people. It's sad that our society is surprised when someone does a good job and is friendly...we should be surprised when they are not. Okay, stepping back down off my soapbox and back to the house.

Now, for a sore subject. Freakin' Comcast. They came out last Thursday to install the tv and internet. The tech said something about the street line not being run to our house and assured us his supervisor would follow up and they would send a survey crew out on Friday. NADA. No call. No crew. I start to stalk them via the phone and IMing on the internet. I literally talked to 8 reps who either made empty promises, had no clue what they were talking about, or disconnected me while I was put on hold to wait for them to talk to a supervisor. Yesterday, 5 days after the initial install was scheduled, I was hell bent on getting to the right person. After talking to a sales rep, the customer service center, and the tech support service center, we got someone scheduled to come out this morning. My hubby gets a follow up call saying that they have to do something with the lines from the street and it can take up to 10-14 days for them to come out if the technician cannot fix it today. Whatever. All of our neighbors have it. How are they so clueless? 8 AM this morning, they call again saying the technician won't be coming since they have this issue with the line and promised to send a crew out by the end of the week. I will believe it when I see it. So, no tv or internet now day 6. Luckily, our super generous new neighbors gave us their password to their wifi so my hubby can use it during the day since he works from home and must be connected all of the time. Ugh. I have the radio on a LOT now...getting a chance to catch up on the latest country music since that is pretty much all we get in the house. Too much to do to make up playlists on my ipod!

I am sure some of you (well, at least the few people that actually read this blog!) are wondering why we are bothering with Comcast. Verizon isn't active in our new neighborhood yet and my hubby needs reliable internet service. (HA!) Our only other option for tv is DirecTV, but again, doesn't solve the internet problem. So, we are stuck right now, at least until Verizon is up and running.

Ryan put sod on our 1/3 of an acre. Most of it has survived, but it needs a LOT of watering and attention right now. It looks great overall though... We bought a Craftsman Self Propelled rear wheel drive lawn mower the other day that we plan to put to work over the next few days. We have a pretty steep hill, so research showed that the rear wheel drive is the way to go. The mower also has the feature of disengaging the blades without cutting the motor off so you aren't constantly stopping and starting.

Next time I will post pictures. I must say that I LOVE OUR NEW HOUSE! It's beautiful and so very livable and I know we will have a happy life in it!

Wednesday, June 6, 2012

Now Introducing our Red Door!

I wasn't certain I would like the color door that we choose (since there were so few choices with the siding we chose), but I think it looks nice! Well, at least from the picture that my sister sent us yesterday below...

We head up there tonight to take another look around. 8 days till it's all ours (and the bank's)! So excited!

Monday, June 4, 2012

Roses are red, Violets are blue, We have new sod, Trees and bushes, too!

We are coming down the backstretch! 7 days till the final walk-thru and 10 days till settlement! Crazy how time has flown towards the end. On Friday, they layed the sod and planted some shrubs and trees. My hubby has a tree-identifier app and he took a picture of each tree leaf. It appears we have 1 oak tree and 3 types of birch trees. I am not a fan of the bush selection, so I have a feeling those will be changed shortly after moving in. But they did a nice job cutting out the beds and laying the sod.

When we snuck in yesterday to look around, they had pulled up the floor coverings and we got the full effect of the carpet, wood and ceramic. All and all, the choices we made turned out terrific! It all flows nicely and the colors compliment each other. Since we picked mostly neutrals with dark woods, we are going to have furniture and decor that make the rooms pop with color. (Our big red couch, for example.) I have also been looking at area rugs for our living/lounge room. There are so many nice ones out there but I just cannot decide on the final color scheme.

One odd thing is that our shower was on when we snuck into the house. Not fully on, but like at 50%. The knob was clearly out of whack because it took me a lot of tries to get it to turn off. Now either we have a squatter in our house who enjoys a hot shower, or it is just faulty. On a positive note, the hubby decided to christen the toilet and it flushes quite nicely (oh, and I took a picture to use as blackmail later on if he annoys me. Consider yourself warned, Pete!)

We changed our Verizon service to transfer to the new house, but saw they didn't offer FIOS TV yet, only internet and phone. So, we decided to do Comcast month by month till the FIOS TV was available. After much confusion (and 44 minutes on hold), we found out that the FIOS internet & phone won't be active until a minimum of 2 weeks AFTER we move in. The hubby works for home, so that is a no-go for that! So, we will have to Comcast Triple Play it until FIOS has their act together. I will very, very much miss the FIOS! It's been awesome... Adios FIOS.

This week is the final touch-ups, front door painting, foundation painting, & garage door opener installation. We are pretty sure the humidifier slipped thru the cracks because it's not there and when I mentioned it, they said it was on it's way the next day. That was like 4 days ago and still isn't in.

We are just so excited to move into our new home! I just wish I could snap my fingers and have everything all packed up and ready to move. I have tried and tried with no success...

Here are some pics of the almost final product...