We are finally at a point in our lives that we are ready to build a new home. We started out years ago in an apartment garage, moved up to one of those small ranch house plans and are now ready to take the leap and build a new home design. With all the buzz about building green and our responsibility to lessen our ecological footprint we have decided to build one of the beautiful log home plans available out there today. We recently attended a local home show and found an abundance of information regarding this style of home.

Building the perfect home for us means carefully planning it inside and out. Not just thinking about the bedrooms, baths, home office, kitchen layout and storage spaces but how the home will be finished on the exterior, from roofing all the way down to the foundation wall.

Not too long ago log and country home plans were considered simplistic and unappealing. Today they are at the cutting edge of style, creativity and technology. Log homes are the only self-renewing building resource found in nature today. The logs have a thermal mass that creates a higher R-value. R-value is an insulation’s resistance to heat flow, the higher the R-value, the greater the insulating effectiveness. This style of home will save us when it comes to heating and cooling bills.

Because it is a different style of building it is important to find an experienced builder that is familiar with all the nuances of building a log home. The logs are very strong and can bear the entire weight of the home so that we can have a very open floor plan. The logs will need to be treated properly so that they are durable against weather damage. Log homes “breathe” keeping moisture and mildew away.

Another great thing we found out at the home show is that because of their strength and durability finding financing and insuring our new log home will not be a problem.

We also found many great tips when it comes to landscaping our new home. The natural beauty of a log home makes landscaping a breeze. Plants and hardscapes need to blend in with the exterior, not overpower it. We also visited our local nursery to find out what type of native plants grow well in the area, what type of blossoms are blooms are produced during certain seasons and what type of plants are low maintenance.

We know we want to add some hardscape objects such as a wooden bench, a birdbath and a stone path leading to the side of the house. We also want to accent our landscaping with some container gardening using large jugs and cans that add to the natural landscape of the home. The nursery told us to carefully place these items before planting anything so they can be easily moved around since they will be hard to move once plants and vines start to grow.

I know we won’t begin building for a couple of months but I feel we have done the research and are going to take an active role in managing and reducing our energy cost while building a truly unique home in the process. I can already picture my family sitting on our porch of our log home enjoying the outdoors. I can see my parents walking through the front door at holidays and being amazed at how we turned our dream into reality.