However, the basement was poured and the basement slab was finished earlier this week. On Wednesday the lumber package was delivered and the framing crew was able to get started. Talk about fast work! They had the basement walls all framed out by 3 pm on Wednesday and the lumber package had gotten delivered that day. Yes, you read that right, a WHOLE basement framed out in just a few hours! It is finally getting real. Silly, I know, but until you start to see the bones of the house coming together, it is still just a concept. Wednesday when we arrived at the site really seemed like this "concept" was quickly becoming a reality. I got butterflies in my stomach just approaching the site but they were the good kind :)
Greg and I walked in through the basement garage door and were impressed to see they had the garage bay, the bathroom and main living area all framed in correctly. However, we had asked for another area in the basement to be open concept with a large beam and this section was not done right. Talk about angry. Greg was super upset! Our real estate agent was with us and she told us to just keep calling our builder to get the issue addressed. Finally, Greg also went and talked with the crew leader and told him what we wanted. He said it would be no problem to address this and he would order the beam and have it next week to install. Whew! Crisis averted :)
Open concept living room in the basement.
Greg and I did not go out on Thursday since it rained a bit and they could not work. Then on Friday we had to go out of town with a group of his friends/co-workers. So we went to the site on Saturday evening on our way back into Knoxville. Boy were we surprised! They had accomplished tons but to our chagrin there were several mistakes! Isn't the reason we have a general contractor, so that mistakes are kept to a minimum? Especially considering he gave us plans last week and asked us to put all of our framing changes etc. on the plans and then get them back to him. We did just that and it was like he didn't even look at them or come out and let the framers know. No fault of the framers, they are just going off the original plans and the house they just did for our builder on Wallace Rd. A blessing and a curse that is turning out to be for us. Blessing because we got to see their build pretty much start to finish but a curse because we have made changes and it seems our builder has not told his subs yet. Well that sucks for him, because they sure will have to fix it. Some of the changes are actually contractual and others are what he actually bid on when he quoted us for the house. Greg was beyond angry when he saw the mistakes. Mainly the mistakes were in the kitchen and the laundry room. However, they were big mistakes and we did let the builder know that we needed to meet with him this week to address these. We knew there would arise some issues, but we didn't expect them right out the gate. So fingers crossed we can get them fixed this week. Otherwise I am going to have one upset hubby on my hands! I have faith though, its all going to work out just fine. Sometimes in order to know how lucky you are, you do have to have a few problems. The problems let you appreciate how truly fortunate you are. I am going to see these problems as a reminder to be grateful. We after all are building the dream and should be reminded of that :)
