In early fall of last year we randomly sold our house. When I shared our master bedroom makeover I mentioned that we are always toying around with the idea of listing our house and building on our land. Well as it turns out a realtor contacted us to see if we would sell our home to some of her clients that were interested. We entertained the idea and it quickly led to us closing on our home and moving into a two-bedroom apt while we build.
It was a shocking transition to say the least, especially with two toddlers, but I was thankful for the opportunity to take our time packing and savor the last month in our first home that held so many sweet memories. We got engaged in this house, brought home our babies in this house, watched them take their first steps and on and on. In fact, on the last night we were there I had Kat come take photos of us in an effort to document this season of our lives. How cute are the girls in these Roller Rabbit dresses?
While the process of building a home is new for us, construction is not. Zach is a general contractor that specializes in commercial construction by day and is an expert in the industry to say the least. He will be acting as the contractor for our house and I’ll be tag-teaming from an aesthetics, interiors, fixtures and unwanted opinions perspective. I briefly majored in architecture and fan-girl over interiors so I’m basically his worst nightmare. I do however work part time at the company doing marketing so at least we are used to working with each other.
While we might be great at communicating, we are not great at agreeing on architecture and decor. Zach is from the mountains and loves modern design and rustic elements. I’m from small town South Carolina and love all things southern, traditional and cozy. Together we are going to attempt to agree on at least one thing while we build a rustic, refined farmhouse in the mountains on the NC/SC border.
The good thing is we already owned some property and were able to get started surveying it pretty quickly. It’s in the woods so there was a good amount of walking to and fro while Zach pointed out property lines, survey results and where he thought our house would sit. The picture of the girls is where we decided would be the best site location once we took into account property lines, topography, etc.
Shortly after we sold our house we started the design process with Shamburger Architecture Group and let me tell you they are amazing! Wayland is a friend of Zach’s and he works with their firm constantly on commercial projects. I honestly couldn’t recommend him and Shamburger Architecture Group enough! I joked with Wayland because while he is an incredible architect he could have also had a stellar career as a therapist. One meeting of sitting around a table with him asking questions and us answering and he essentially read our minds and drafted up a dream of a house plan. We had one or two rounds of minor revisions and we were moving on to the next stage, grading. Also before you ask, no I won’t be sharing our house plans because a) that’s creepy to me to put it on the internet and b) they were custom designed so I wouldn’t want to just put Shamburger Architecture Group’s intellectual property out there for all the world to rip off.
A picture of us during one of at least a trillion “site visits”. The crews have been busy clearing trees, making roads, building retaining walls and grading, grading and more grading. All the girls want to do is go out there and climb on the machines, watch all the work being done and stomp around with dad like they own the place.
Below is a picture of the property. In the foreground of the photo is our driveway running right to left. Up at the top where the orange equipment is will be the turn-around, garages and front door. Where the yellow equipment is is where the actual house will sit and the flat area to the right is the back yard.
I’ll be sharing frequent posts throughout the process as we pick out colors, fixtures, appliances, etc here. You can also follow along on my Cooper @ Home Instagram account.? If you have any questions about the process of building a home or about what you would like to know more about please leave in the comments below. I’ll be talking about our floorplan concept, the design style, kitchen and bath designs, living room layout and features and more. I’m really looking forward to sharing this process with you all and I hope you enjoy following along! Thanks for stopping by!
