Power AND Air Conditioning!

This past Saturday, JEA turned on our power AND we got our mechanical equipment started up . . . WE HAVE AIR CONDITIONING!! As you can tell, we’re just a little excited. We are very happy that everything worked out this weekend and we didn’t have to delay things further.

Over the last couple weeks, we finished installing the rest of the electrical fixtures, outlets and switches. They are ALL complete and we passed our Temp Electrical Final last week. This meant we could get the power turned on. Here are some of the last fixtures in place . . .

The light in the foyer.

The chandelier in the Dining Room. This has glass covering the lights that matches the glass in the foyer fixture – we’ll install that later to protect the glass.

The lights on the front porch. It’s so great to look at these lights on at night!

Here’s a picture of the cabinets in the Jack and Jill Bathroom. We installed the medicine cabinet mirror yesterday – but didn’t get a picture.

We installed all but three interior doors. The doors to the upstairs attic spaces and garage are particularly important because they separate conditioned space from non-conditioned space.

The wall in the attic area containing the dormers – the outlets and switches are active on this wall.

Our meter in place – it’s at zero . . . but not for long . . .

The thermostat in the Living Room. We have a zoned system that includes three thermostats – so we can have different temperature set points in different areas in the house. We’re keeping it at 80 during construction.

Here are the lights in the kitchen, shining brightly. You can also see the newly painted walls. We did a final coat in preparation for installing the cabinets.

Here is our condensing unit. It’s working wonderfully in the 100-degree heat.

We installed the fan blades and lights since we have the air conditioner getting all the humidity out of the air. Here’s the one in the Living Room.

This fan is in one of the bedrooms. Also, notice the newly installed double swinging closet doors.

In other news, we started tiling the shower in the master bathroom. We only have one wall done so far, but ain’t it pretty?

In order to pass the Electrical Final Inspection, we just have to have the water heater installed. That should happen shortly. Our Mechanical Final Inspection is scheduled for tomorrow. The kitchen cabinets should be installed this weekend. Things are going great and really moving along.

Now, it’s looking like a house . . .

The past several weeks have been overwhelming at times, from the loss of our baby to the business of the house. But, our God is faithful and is carrying us through our grief and easing the pressure of our construction schedule.

To catch you up on all of the work completed on our house, there is no better way that pictures . . .

Our cabinets were delivered mid-May and they look great! Here’s an example of what is going in the kitchen and master bathroom.

The garage door opener was installed; it’ll even work right now if you use an extension cord.

We installed a built in ironing board in the laundry room. A cabinet door was installed over it.

We have been working hard to install the light fixtures, switches and outlets. Here’s a light and exhaust fan in the master bathroom.

Lights in the hall. These have a glass globe that we will install after we get bunches of light bulbs.

Jeff came over one day to install our ceiling fans (Thanks, Jeff!). We will install the blades and light kits after the air conditioning turns on – we don’t want our blades wilting in this heat.

Adam bought a wet saw to cut tile and has been working hard on installing the tile floors in the bathrooms and laundry room. We subbed out the tile in the kitchen and entry area off the garage.

The tile looks great in the guest bath.

The cabinet is installed in this bathroom, along with the light fixture. Now, we just need a marble countertop and toilet.

The Jack and Jill Bathroom also has completed tile. Here you can see the tub/shower after I cleaned up all the drywall mess covering it. The cabinets and light fixtures are also installed in this room.

The tile in the kitchen is set on a diagonal brick pattern. It really makes the room look nice, we can’t wait to install these cabinets!

The faucet in the Roman tub is installed in the master bath. The tile floor is mostly installed in this room as well, but we need to do the tile along the tub and shower walls before finishing the floor and installing the cabinets.

Here you can see several outlets, speaker outlets and low voltage wires behind our entertainment area. All of the low voltage, outlets and 99% of the switches are complete!

Our dining room chandelier in front of my favorite wall.

The ceiling fan on the back porch – wish we could turn it on.

We also had gutters installed, so we don’t have a crazy waterfall eroding our dirt anymore.

The gutters look pretty discrete along the roof line.

Back porch gutters.

Our interior doors are mostly installed. I have been caulking around the trim and they are nearly ready for paint.

We chose a larger trim that what is standard and will have a larger baseboard as well. This will make the house look really nice.

The smoke detectors are installed. The red plastic is just a little dust protection.

Adam worked hard to wire the panels. This is Panel-2, the smaller one. We have a transfer switch to this in case we ever get a generator.

Here is our low voltage wire box – it has our phone, coax, internet and security wires. Adam’s dad put this one together.

Here is the big one, Panel-1, in case you ever wondered what the inside of an electrical panel looked like.

This has the first part of the cover installed.

We placed the concrete for the condensing unit pad this past weekend. We are getting close to having air conditioning in the house!

Our mechanical room in the closet upstairs is a bit crowded, but it all fits. You can see two zoning dampers (blue boxes) that will help make the temperature in the house more comfortable. The air handler is installed, we just need to set the condensing unit and finish a few remaining connections.

Our goal right now is to get our electrical inspection; we are very close to being ready. Then, we can get power turned on and the mechanical guys can finish up and get the air conditioning running! Then, we’ll finish up the cabinets and tile . . . along with all the rest of the finishes inside and the landscaping and concrete outside. Our current goal is to finish at the end of July. We are getting close now!