[CaptJohn]

Originally Posted by Happinow

For all of you who follow my days, I thank you and hope I'm helping. For those who are bored and are sick of my posts....sorry! I hope I'm doing more good than bad. Thanks for listening and if anyone has any questions about our journey thus far, please ask and I'll be happy to help!

Those of us interested will keep the pages going and those bored need to be reading somewhere else and keeping their thoughts to themselves. You'll be another valuable asset in the future with your newly gained, recent, state of the art knowledge.

[graciegirl]

Originally Posted by keithwand

OK, I'm missing something. What is Boy howdy?

You aren't quite old enough to know .....yet.






Oh alright. It is Ohioese for Wow!! and Hotdamn! and REALLY?????

[keithwand]

Originally Posted by graciegirl

You aren't quite old enough to know .....yet.






Oh alright. It is Ohioese for Wow!! and Hotdamn! and REALLY?????

Guess in Michigan we just said cool.

I thought maybe it had to do with Howdy Doody.

[Happinow]

Hi everyone. Another update, ready or not. As I write this I only have one eye open because we were so excited for this day to come we slept about 3 hours last night. Kept thinking about what we could expect. Once again we hit the ground running this morning with an appointment at 9:00 in a model gardenia, the one we are building. Heres what we did and picked out today....flooring, kitchen cabinets but not fixtures, added or subtracted lights and outlets, added a room to the garage, added French doors to the master to lead out to the pool, added two windows to the master, stretched the garage 4 feet by 2 feet, stretched the guest bedroom and bath, changed out the guest tub to only a shower, put recessed lighting in the master, put pendant lighting in kitchen as well as under cabinet lighting, added pullout drawers to cabinets, changed golf cart driveway, changed cubbyhole in both showers to the opposite end of shower, added a shower cubby hole in each shower and went to the granite yard to look at granite. Just so everyone knows, when going to pick out granite you must pick out all the slabs required to complete your house. We had an appointment at the granite yard but there was only one guy working there and he never spent any time with us even though we had an appointment. He was with another couple who took up our appt. How frustrating! Bill and I ended up going through the granite ourselves and picking one slab for our home. When we got back to the office our designerSTOLd us that we were supposed to have help and pick out all slabs for our home, not just one. Our home will require 3-4 slabs of granite and they want you to pick all of them due to granite having so many imperfections. They want to make sure you approve of all slabs. So now we have to go back to the granite yard to pick more out. Our designer wasn't happy with the granite people for not honoring our appointment. (i'm taking a breath). Tonight, I have to look at a book to narrow down fixture and lighting choices if I'm not too tired, but I am! You get to go in person to see the choices you make for flooring, paint,cabinets, etc. All of the choices are in the models which is extremely helpful. We also bought the bedroom furniture for the master and guest bedrooms at Southern lifestyles. It's such a fun process and I can hardly believe we are at this point. Tomorrow will finish up the home and meet with the pool people. We will again hit the ground running! Now I must try to relax and get some sleep so more to come tomorrow! Thanks for listening....

[angiefox10]

Originally Posted by Happinow

Hi everyone. Another update, ready or not. As I write this I only have one eye open because we were so excited for this day to come we slept about 3 hours last night. Kept thinking about what we could expect. Once again we hit the ground running this morning with an appointment at 9:00 in a model gardenia, the one we are building. Heres what we did and picked out today....flooring, kitchen cabinets but not fixtures, added or subtracted lights and outlets, added a room to the garage, added French doors to the master to lead out to the pool, added two windows to the master, stretched the garage 4 feet by 2 feet, stretched the guest bedroom and bath, changed out the guest tub to only a shower, put recessed lighting in the master, put pendant lighting in kitchen as well as under cabinet lighting, added pullout drawers to cabinets, changed golf cart driveway, changed cubbyhole in both showers to the opposite end of shower, added a shower cubby hole in each shower and went to the granite yard to look at granite. Just so everyone knows, when going to pick out granite you must pick out all the slabs required to complete your house. We had an appointment at the granite yard but there was only one guy working there and he never spent any time with us even though we had an appointment. He was with another couple who took up our appt. How frustrating! Bill and I ended up going through the granite ourselves and picking one slab for our home. When we got back to the office our designerSTOLd us that we were supposed to have help and pick out all slabs for our home, not just one. Our home will require 3-4 slabs of granite and they want you to pick all of them due to granite having so many imperfections. They want to make sure you approve of all slabs. So now we have to go back to the granite yard to pick more out. Our designer wasn't happy with the granite people for not honoring our appointment. (i'm taking a breath). Tonight, I have to look at a book to narrow down fixture and lighting choices if I'm not too tired, but I am! You get to go in person to see the choices you make for flooring, paint,cabinets, etc. All of the choices are in the models which is extremely helpful. We also bought the bedroom furniture for the master and guest bedrooms at Southern lifestyles. It's such a fun process and I can hardly believe we are at this point. Tomorrow will finish up the home and meet with the pool people. We will again hit the ground running! Now I must try to relax and get some sleep so more to come tomorrow! Thanks for listening....

This is very valuable information for people who are going to meet with the design team. Or even those who are not!

I'm glad you decided on the doors off the bedroom. Living on a golf course and waking up to a view.... Priceless!!!

[Cynbod]

All I can say is WOW!! Sleep tight, I cannot wait until tomorrow's post.

[2BNTV]

Originally Posted by Happinow

Hi everyone. Another update, ready or not. As I write this I only have one eye open because we were so excited for this day to come we slept about 3 hours last night. Kept thinking about what we could expect. Once again we hit the ground running this morning with an appointment at 9:00 in a model gardenia, the one we are building. Heres what we did and picked out today....flooring, kitchen cabinets but not fixtures, added or subtracted lights and outlets, added a room to the garage, added French doors to the master to lead out to the pool, added two windows to the master, stretched the garage 4 feet by 2 feet, stretched the guest bedroom and bath, changed out the guest tub to only a shower, put recessed lighting in the master, put pendant lighting in kitchen as well as under cabinet lighting, added pullout drawers to cabinets, changed golf cart driveway, changed cubbyhole in both showers to the opposite end of shower, added a shower cubby hole in each shower and went to the granite yard to look at granite. Just so everyone knows, when going to pick out granite you must pick out all the slabs required to complete your house. We had an appointment at the granite yard but there was only one guy working there and he never spent any time with us even though we had an appointment. He was with another couple who took up our appt. How frustrating! Bill and I ended up going through the granite ourselves and picking one slab for our home. When we got back to the office our designerSTOLd us that we were supposed to have help and pick out all slabs for our home, not just one. Our home will require 3-4 slabs of granite and they want you to pick all of them due to granite having so many imperfections. They want to make sure you approve of all slabs. So now we have to go back to the granite yard to pick more out. Our designer wasn't happy with the granite people for not honoring our appointment. (i'm taking a breath). Tonight, I have to look at a book to narrow down fixture and lighting choices if I'm not too tired, but I am! You get to go in person to see the choices you make for flooring, paint,cabinets, etc. All of the choices are in the models which is extremely helpful. We also bought the bedroom furniture for the master and guest bedrooms at Southern lifestyles. It's such a fun process and I can hardly believe we are at this point. Tomorrow will finish up the home and meet with the pool people. We will again hit the ground running! Now I must try to relax and get some sleep so more to come tomorrow! Thanks for listening....

Sounds like a good nights sleep will do you wonders. Three hours is not enough sleep for me to function well. Great info and useful to those who are planning to build a new home.

[keithwand]

I'm exhausted just reading this update and realizing we have to go through this too in March.
I'm having my wife read this as she too wants to eliminate the guest tub and make it a shower only.
What did you change to the golf cart driveway?

[buzzy]

Gee, we missed out on all of that work. We were visiting old friends in their new home. We picked a spec home of their model. Fortunately it had several stretches, and the exposure that we wanted, and a closeout price. We never even went through the model homes.

Keep the updates coming.

[Happinow]

Hi everyone. Here goes for my update. We hit the ground running once again, meeting with our designer Melissa. I must say she is wonderful to work with. Today was more nitty gritty than yesterday and required more memory than I have. Thanks to Melissa, she kept track of our likes and dislikes. We started off picking out faucets for kitchen and bathroom and then door handles and knobs for cabinets. We then went to kitchen, nook and foyer lighting. I had looked in a booklet she gave me last night to expedite things and it did help speed things along. This part for me was hard to keep track of. So many to choose from. I think this woman is a saint. I'd probably be saying "just pick one and let's get on with it!" But Melissa was so helpful and patient. We also picked tile and cabinetry for summer kitchen. we also picked the front door, interior doors and house color. That was about it for the house part of our design. We then went onto the pool. T&D Pools are the pool people you will work with. They are also wonderful. We ended up getting a 16x32 pool with 2 waterfalls, a beach area and we put concrete columns in for the birdcage. We also added a lot more pool deck and some ceramic fish and ocean scenery on the beach part of the pool to give it some flair. There are way too many pool shapes to pick from. They do not take you to physically see any pools so you may want to investigate some on your own to see what style you like. It will make it much easier. This process took 4 1/2 hours and we have to go back for about 1/2 tomorrow to finish up the paper work. This is a really fun process too! We are almost done with this project and I'm not sure what I'm going to do when I go back home. We've been on such a tight schedule so far and I think it will feel good to relax! I must say, you get run ragged! I think the best advice I can give anyone who is building, look at the model homes on The Villages site and narrow them down. Budget first, then pick from there. Read, read and then read some more on this forum because it is the key to making things go smoothly and faster. Ask all the questions you can think of because someone will have an answer...it's just a wealth of information on here. Seeing that I've just been through the process, I will be happy to answer what I can from my experience. This has been a time I'll never forget and the best is yet to come....when I fly down here for the last time and open the door to the home my husband and I have built will be probably overwhelming but one of the best times of my life. Once again, thank you all for your advice and most of all for listening.

[Happinow]

Originally Posted by keithwand

I'm exhausted just reading this update and realizing we have to go through this too in March.
I'm having my wife read this as she too wants to eliminate the guest tub and make it a shower only.
What did you change to the golf cart driveway?

Hi. We initially wanted to take the golf cart driveway all the way down to the road and take out the jog, however the front of our lot only allowed for modification of the jog. We could not take out the jog completely but straightened it out quite a bit. Easier to get cart in and out.

[jane032657]

Sounds wonderful, wow, what a home you will have! Love the pool with the beach an dthe summer kitchen. I think you have had a wonderful journey to this point and I truly believe you will have a lovely life in TV in your new home iwth new friends and a luxurioys place to hang your hat! I am so happy for you and your husband.

[Happinow]

Originally Posted by jane032657

Sounds wonderful, wow, what a home you will have! Love the pool with the beach an dthe summer kitchen. I think you have had a wonderful journey to this point and I truly believe you will have a lovely life in TV in your new home iwth new friends and a luxurioys place to hang your hat! I am so happy for you and your husband.

Thank you. We've worked so hard to get to this point. I can now say it's paying off in the form of a new home and new life.

[Cynbod]

I did not get to see your latest post last evening. Reading it now is a great way to start off the day.
Your home sounds delightful. You and your husband will definately be spending the next few weeks super excited.
Again, good luck with your new home.

[Pathel]

Originally Posted by Happinow

We've worked so hard to get to this point. I can now say it's paying off in the form of a new home and new life.

We have been following your posts and have a couple questions that I'm sure everyone would like to know. What did you both do for a profession? How old are you? In your photo, you appear to be a little younger than 55.