After over a year of design work, including a set of plans that were too expensive to build, today we signed a construction contract! Our builder is Justin Sullivan from Impact Construction, and he has been FABULOUS so far. He worked extremely hard to help us design an addition that could be built within our budget. And then he negotiated tirelessly with subcontractors to get us a very competitive bid.

Here are the construction documents from the architect, John Spears from Sustainable Design Group. You'll see the four rooms of the original cottage that we're keeping on the left hand side of the first floor drawing. The new basement will connect to the existing cellar via a doorway.

Now that the contract is signed, we will have 45 days before the loan closing (John Yanetti from Wells Fargo has also been fabulous to work with) in which we'll have to obtain the building permits. Justin will start as soon as the loan is closed. Oh yeah, and we have to pack up our entire house, rent a storage unit, and move into our in-laws' place across town (the in-laws are in Maine for the next couple months).