Before we were strictly going to have a 28'x20' home with a loft over part of it. Included we were going to have a closet between the bathroom and the kitchen and the back part of the kitchen was going to have our washer/dryer, tankless water heater, and our pressure tanks.
We started thinking and realized the closet, based on it's size, was pretty much going to be useless. So we nixed that, rearranged our bathroom and kitchen ideas, and decided that we are going to add an 8'x12' room onto the back of the house that will be a walk in laundry room/mud room and will also house our tankless water heater, pressure tank and breaker box.
House Plan Details
In total, the down stairs will be 560 sq. ft. plus a 96 sq. ft. mudroom. The loft will be approximately 20'x14' or 280 sq. ft. An approximate total square footage of: 936 sq. ft.
Living Room
In one corner of the living room will be the wood burning stove. Otherwise, the area will be completely open with 10' walls and open to the vaulted ceiling.
Bathroom
We have designed the bathroom to be accessible, just in case. The shower is a walk-in-shower with 2 shower heads. At the entrance of the shower you will notice a squiggle on the wall part. This is actually Scott's genius idea! We love the idea of a towel warmer, but don't want to buy something that requires the use of electricity just to use to warm our towels (energy efficient is key). So Scott came up with the idea to expose a section of the hot water pipes in the form of a coil. This way, every time the shower is turned on, the hot water will run through the pipes and as a result automatically heat the towels on the towel rack. He is going to come up with a cover to go over the exposed pipes so that when we reach for a towel we don't burn ourselves.
It looks like we will finally get our double sink! I'm so excited about this. Somewhere in the bathroom (either sink or shower) we will have a faucet that uses a censor to turn on/off. We have a cat that only drinks water in the bathroom from the faucets and this will be a convenience thing for us. No more turning the water on and off for Tiger! Now he can do it himself!
Kitchen
Before we were going to take with us all our kitchen appliances. Now, we decided, for space reasons and for resale value of our current house, that it would just be easier to leave then in Ohio. This way, instead of making our appliances fit into our new house, we could get what we want/need for the space we have.
I do know that I want to do something different for the refrigerator. I have always wanted a Viking!!! But they are so expensive, I think we'd have to wait another year just to buy the refrigerator! So after going to look at some options and not liking the space on a side-by-side, not liking the freezer on a French door, and wanting an up-to-date style, we decided it would be best to get a full refrigerator next to a full freezer - basically like a commercial kitchen!! This makes total sense to me! We plan on buying meat to freeze and honestly I don't think we'd have the room to add a deep freeze in the house if it wasn't planned for in the kitchen.
So as of right now, this is what I think we'll be putting in our new kitchen:
As for all the rest of the appliances, I haven't decide yet what I'd like. I think I will go with stainless steel, but that's about all I know at this point.
On the drawing for the bar extension, you will notice that it says 'moveable'. This part is not going to be permanently affixed to the kitchen. It will be built on casters that way when we have guests over and we need more seating, we can pull it out from the kitchen and have a full table to seat up to 6 people. Or if I need more counter space in the kitchen I can wheel it in for an island. I can see this coming in handy when we have kids and they want to make Christmas cookies or have science experiments!
Part of the pantry nook I want to also make another moveable table that has a marble top. This will be perfect for making fudge, peanut brittle, or other special treats. I'm thinking that this moveable table will have shelving or cabinets below to store some of my cooking appliances.
Ladder/Door
We will have a ladder that is not quite as steep as a traditional ladder, but steeper than a stair case. This will take you to the loft and under it we will build more storage for cleaning supplies, the vacuum, etc.
The door to the bathroom will be on a pulley system and look like a barn door. It's something I always wanted to incorporate!
Since we don't plan to include any windows in the mudroom area (due to budget concerns), our door will be either an all-window door or be at least a half-window door.
The door in the living room area will be a French style door that is all windows - like a patio door. Our mountain view will be out these doors, so we want to take full advantage of them!
Loft
The loft will be above the kitchen and bathroom area encompassing approximately 20'x14' in space. This is where our bedroom will be. When we do have kids, we will be splitting the loft in half (with a temporary separation) with the kid(s) sharing one side and us the other. We are only bringing our queen size mattress with us and will build or buy furniture to fit our loft space.
Sewing Space
Those of you that know me know that I have to have a space to sew!! I think to start I'll be using one side of the loft. But when we do have kids and they take over part of the loft, I'll probably be bringing my sewing stuff down along the wall by the wood burning stove and kitchen.
Future Builds
We are building our house in stages, as we can afford them, with the purpose of not having a mortgage. After this first phase of the house is built, our next project will be a garage. We plan to build a 3+ car garage with a full loft above it. The loft above will be my sewing studio (YEAH!!!). We plan to either add onto this garage or build a separate garage/shop too. We want to build something similar to what my dad has, I believe it is a 50'x50' shop with a bathroom and attached office. However Scott's shop won't be completely open like my dads. Scott's will have at least 2 areas - a wood shop area and a car storage/repair area. If we are able to, we'd like to also have a designated paint booth area too, but that may just be wishful thinking.
When we do have kids, and they reach about the age of 8-10 years old, we do plan to add onto our house for phase 2. Phase 2 will be the same size as the first phase (20'x28') with a connecting hallway. This second phase will include a full master suite and another loft. At this time the kids will take over the entire loft in the main part of the house and we will move into the master suite part.
We are waiting until they are older so they can help be a part of the build and help! This is how Scott learned - his dad renovated their old farmhouse and Scott helped him out. This is one of those things we'd like to pass on down.
We hope to build some fun stuff too. Out the French doors of the living room (toward the mountains) we want to build a very large outdoor deck and living space that will wrap around both phase 1 and phase 2 builds.
On our land, we have these natural drainage ditches and for fun, we want to build a covered bridge over them! I can just imagine decorating it with Christmas lights!
Also, somewhere on our land we will be building a shooting range. This is less 'building' as it is earth-moving to create a safe barrier for the end of the range.
Scott also has a few other 'fun' builds up his sleeve, but I'll save those for later:)
We have changed our plans so much over the last 6 months that it wouldn't surprise me if we change them again before we actually start building. Here are a few of our past designs that were just slightly different from the current one:
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