Looking to get started

Kim and I met with Wes on Saturday to discuss the interior finish and the status of the various bids out to contractors.  For the interior finish, we agreed the following:

• The ceilings in the Great Room, Kitchen and Front Entrance are going to be wood.
• The walls in the Great Room are also going to be wood, probably some type of stained Barn Siding.
• The window trim, where the walls are wood, will be minimal and flush.  Actually I don't know what I'm talking about here and we agreed we needed to see this as I couldn't wrap my mind around what it would look like.
• The other rooms of the house would have sheet rock walls and ceilings with normal window trim.
• The walls on the Screened porch will be the house siding.
• All the stairs will have the same tread as the floors, probably oak, with the main staircase will have oak risers.  For the balusters on the main staircase we would like wrought iron, but only if we can get a look similar to the picture below.  If that proves too expensive (which is a good possibility), then we will investigate a rustic wood style for the balusters or perhaps some simpler wrought iron ones.

After we completed discussing the inside finish, we went over the status of the various bids.  Our focus is to get the project going, so we agreed to accept bids for the site work and the septic as we're comfortable with them. Wes is going to do some comparative analysis with a few of the companies that bid on the excavation, foundation, framing, siding, exterior trim and roofing as we'd like closure on those within the next two weeks.

We also agreed with Wes that we should start the zoning and then building permit process.

Kim and I decided to ask Country Carpenters to build our barn.  The plan is to get in the ground during March and have foundations for the house and barn complete by early May.  Once that happens, the framing can start for the house and we can have the Barn constructed.  If that all works out the Barn would be finished by late June.