Buying the Home

Last Sunday, April 29th, we put down “earnest money” on a house. Or, as Derek put it, we bought a whole lot of dirt. There is no house yet, and they won’t even start building it for about 90 days. But we won’t let that stop us from being really excited!

We get to pick from several floor plans, and we chose the “Dover” which is a one storey plan with two bathrooms and three bedrooms. It is 1447 square feet, not counting the garage, which is about twice as big as our apartment. There will be a little porch (4’ by 8’) on the front of the house. It will have a two car garage. The front bedroom we plan to use as an office, with the extra closet to be used for belly dance attire. (Clearly, I need to buy more costumes to fill it up, right?) There is a small bedroom we will use for an exercise room and guest bedroom. (Better save some room in that closet for guests, I suppose.) The front bathroom is a full bath, with a shower in the tub, so to speak. The master bedroom is really big, about 15’ by 15’ with its own bathroom. The bathroom there will have an extra large tub and a separate shower and two sinks. We hope separate sinks (and two bathrooms) will help us maintain marital harmony. There is also a walk in closet that is bigger than the one we have now. At the front of the house there is a small linen closet.

The kitchen is open to the “great room,” a combination kitchen/dining/living area. I wish the kitchen weren’t so visible from the rest of the house, because my kitchen is always messy. Oh, well, at least there is a little half wall to hide some of the mess. The kitchen has a cute little pantry. We are upgrading to 42” tall cabinets, ten inches taller than normal, so we can stash more stuff inside. The ceiling in the “great room” will be a cathedral ceiling, so there is plenty of room for tall cabinets. And they have a cute little crown molding around them. I will try to add a picture later.

A tiny laundry room is in between the kitchen and the garage. There is just room for the washer and dryer and the water heater and heater. I think we may try to hide the heater and water heater behind a curtain or something. They are hidden by the open door, but they are kind of ugly.

Off the kitchen is the “breakfast nook.” Also known as “dining room that is too small for a decent sized table.” So we plan to use it as an extension of the kitchen and put our baker’s rack and card catalog there, and maybe eventually have a cute little table for two and a chef’s cart. Someday when we can afford furniture for this house, that is.

The living room is so long we plan to use one end of it as the dining room and one end as the living room. There will be a wood-burning fireplace with tall, narrow windows on each side. We weren’t able to get a gas fireplace because there are no gas lines to this development. I think that is safer, but a wood fireplace is a lot more trouble. I think the mantle and fireplace surround will be polished oak with beige ceramic tiles for the hearth. And glass doors in front of the fire. I’m sure Derek can’t wait to play Boy Scout and start building fires. Safely, of course.