Absence, or What Haven't I Had?

Soooo, several weeks have passed, and I've spent very little time at DG. First it was because M was still finishing trim, and it wasn't ready for taping, then I got caught up in Christmas baking (and looking for work), and then I got a cold. A mild one, but still. Then I noticed a pain under my right thumbnail. You know, like when you accidentally shove something under there, and then you keep bumping it? Don't remember what started it but after an afternoon where I made Fleur de Sel Caramels (Barefoot Contessa recipe--a success!) and got some salt in there, and then banged it again, hard, it started swelling and throbbing. Woke me up in the night. (this was about 11 days ago). So off to the Dr. who prescribed antibiotics. 2 days later, it was still really bothering me, so off to the urgent care, where they scared me about MRSA and threatened IV antibiotics (seriously?). In the end, they doubled my dose of antibiotics, and sent me on my way.

I felt ok for the next few days, then after our 3rd Christmas (on the 26th, with M's family) I came home with a terrible headache. I woke up feeling like I had the flu. Weathered it for a day and then went back to the Dr. Long story short (or at least, less long), it's either flu or a flu-like virus. All I know is that I've felt crappy, and have had such swollen glands it hurts to put my head on a pillow, and you can see the glands protrude. GROSS! Oh yeah, and I get a flu shot every year. This year included.

I'm finally starting to feel like I might live (though now I have what I think is an antibiotic-induced rash that's prickly and itchy). Though she's spent a lot of the last 2 weeks taking care of me, M has still managed to do some good work at the house: today she worked on cabinetry for the laundry room, yesterday cased out the windows between the bedrooms, and transformed the garage from a wood shop (think sawdust everywhere) back to a tidy garage. I'm hoping that in the next couple days I can get back in the groove and get to work. If not at a paying job (still working on that) then at least at the house. We both feel like moving in is so imminent, and yet there are so so so many things still to finish.

Next up: I have photos of the kitchen! With cabinets! And, yes, with counters (love!)

Rolling with the punches

I've been trying for a week now to figure out how to write this post. I got laid off last Friday, and am still in a bit of shock. I could say lots about the situation (how I feel, what I think will happen next, what my prospects are, whether I saw it coming, etc, etc.) but I won't. It's not helpful.

Instead,  I'll tell you how I've been rather distracted for the last week, unable to sit down and really accomplish any tasks. I have some things looming that I must take care of and will have to start tackling them. I keep thinking I'll do it tomorrow. So this is my first (and actually, one of the most pleasant) step.

The good news is that this will afford us more labor (at least in the short term) to work on the house: i.e. Me. My next task will be to save the nearly $3000 estimate for painting all the interior trim. And while this will be a huge savings, do you remember the details about my painting skill? Remember here? I think I will learn to love tape.

On the progress front, we made a purchase a couple nights ago that will be the beginning of the kitchen island. And the floors are complete in the office, and really, everywhere downstairs with a couple of closet exceptions. As soon as that damn trim is painted, we can install the sink and toilet in the powder room. The heating guy is coming Monday to hook everything up. Our hot water heater was installed last week. We have propane and a new tank. The countertops are not in yet, but I'm hopeful for next week.

So, on the bright side, we get to focus on the house and try to get ourselves MOVED IN. If only I could get a regular paycheck to do that work!

December plans

Sorry for the lapse in posts, folks. Thanksgiving, rain, etc. There's still been progress, and there will soon be more. I'm off for a much-needed weekend in San Francisco. I'll post early next week with the new updates and why we might just get to move in sooner rather than later. Maybe.

Where we'll cook the bird

Remember last week when I was so excited about the countertop decision (and payment)? Well, today the fellow came to measure the countertop "deck" and make the template for the actual quartz countertop. I haven't gotten the report from M yet about how it went, or how long he thinks the fabrication will take. I can't wait to find out!

We had a BIG DISCUSSION this weekend about when we actually think we'll need to move in. Those of you who know my work background won't be surprised to find out that I'd like to have a date. I'd like to see milestones. I'd like to have a written plan for crying out loud. But we're very different, M and I, and she's still hoping we can move in before Thanksgiving. Well, in all seriousness, she knows we can't but can't abandon that as a goal as it's helped her stay motivated. So we do not have a date, and I'm planning to cook one of the two Thanksgiving dinners we'll have (the second one will follow our first by about 4 hours and be at M's Brother and Sis-in-Law's house) at our current house. It's ok. We'll get there soon--we can both agree that we're DYING to move in!

So we don't have a plan, and we'll likely push out our appliance delivery (they were supposed to come on the rescheduled date of Friday after Thanksgiving. But since warranties (etc) start at delivery, there's no reason to rush them.) I'm DYING to see them in the space, but the smart thing to do is to wait and postpone them a bit longer. Sigh. It's ok though.

I promise a post soon about the following:

Vanities (there was some small progress on these this weekend!)
Kitchen cabinets
Sink selection

This week, with the decking 90% done on the outside, M and her dad have built the scaffolding on top of the deck and so she's back on finishing up siding. We believe all our neighbors are tired of seeing TYVEK in big bold blue letters (back of the house) so getting this done will be a nice accomplishment! More rain predicted this week, so some work will likely switch back to in the house. Stay tuned!

And back to your regular deck coverage

So, back to the deck progress after yesterday's counter-top-ordering-excitement. (Sidebar: have I mentioned how much I hate seeing the totals of all these materials add up? Geez, the counter top was bad enough, but composite decking is EX-PEN-SIVE!)

So let's cut to the chase and show those photos! I was able to get to DG a few minutes before the sun went down on Wednesday and snap these:

M giving the royal "I built this" wave

Still a few more cuts to do at the one end, but very much progress. Easier to see in the middle photo, the small blocks (a few inches high and a foot or so high) represent the railing supports (the little ones) and the pergola supports (the big ones). Yes, we're planning a pergola that has some kind of panels that can be retracted. This deck faces west, and in the summer this side of the house bakes. We could use a few more trees, but as it is, we had to carefully maneuver around the septic hatches (we're just far enough out of town that we don't have city sewer). Notice on that middle photo how the footings are not even? That's because the long stretch is straddling the septic tank. That's part of why those beams had to be so large and strong, because we had to bridge a long gap for that dumb tank. I guess it's not dumb, it just limits the construction and tree location in the back yard.

Yes, it's a pretty big deck. We have a deck just almost this size at our current house (albeit a much shadier one) and we LOVE it in the warm weather. With the west facing exposure here, we hope to be able to enjoy it much of the year. Yes it's big. But in a good way.

In other news, M and her dad installed the "ceiling" for our front porch. Kinda hard to see here (and still needs trim and paint) but more progress.

See, underneath there?

Happy weekend, everyone. It's supposed to rain here all weekend, so we hope to move back inside to vanity sanding and maybe painting. And then next week, there's lots happening. Yes, it's Thanksgiving, and NO we will not be in. But it's ok. It's getting closer every day.

We interrupt this deck post . . .

With exciting news: we ordered our counters! The guy comes out to make the template Monday! We think they'll take a couple weeks! I am so excited.

You might remember here where we thought we had our counter plans made. Well, we think on stuff long and hard here at chez DG, and that plan was modified. First we thought Quartz. Then decided too expensive. Then we came up with the concrete plan, then decided maybe it was too rustic, even though it would save $$. Then we thought we could use 24" x 24" tiles with tiny grout joins (I happen to have an in with a tilesetter) but then I hated the counter edge options (few and all icky).

So we went back to Quartz. We had a color in mind (Caesarstone Raven) but then got swayed by another manufacturer's color Ural Gray. Slightly cheaper. Maybe. It's difficult because each situation seems different: some suppliers sell only the slab (pre-determined sizes, created by the manufacturer) and some also include fabrication (making the edges, sizing, and cutting out any necessary holes--like for the sink). Some suppliers give you a list of names for the fabricators and you have to figure it out with them yourselves. Sigh. It's hard to compare apples to apples.

In the end, we went with the best deal we could find (Costco, of all places) that also has my #1 color pick: Raven. It's dark gray. But not black. It looks pretty with cararra marble, which is what the Island will be. The Quartz is a big expense, but it's what I really, really wanted. We've tried all along to choose more economical choices whenever possible to save up for the big splurges. This is one.

In case you're not familiar with Quartz countertops, here's the skinny: It's an engineered stone made from approximately 95% natural quartz and 5% polymer resins. It is priced in the range of Granite, but comes in more color choices, and is considered to be more durable and more scratch resistant than other natural stone choices. In the end, I just prefer it to Granite. And I'm really excited to see the new counters. Now if we could just get that large workbench (that's currently in Island position) out of the kitchen so I can show the cabinets. . .

This is not a truly representational image, but it gives you the gist.

Deck construction

Though I haven't seen it since the weekend, I understand deck construction is nearing completion. The actual decking part, that is. The railing is another story. As are the stairs. But real progress has been made on the deck itself. Here are some pix from a week ago--I hope to take some more tonight after work, though the sun goes down just about the time I get there, so I'm only cautiously optimistic I'll really be able to get decent pix in the dark . . .

Yes, it's gray. Eventually the house will be something other than this yellowish gold that it currently is. Something grayish or taupey. Then the decking will match.

You'd pay for this?

Last week, I was chatting with a friend who lives on the East Coast (we worked together for many years, and now keep in touch by phone). He's one of my biggest fans (thank you!) and talking to him always makes me smile. He was giving me the update on how he and his family fared during Super Storm Sandy (no damage, but now power for 10 days or so). He also wanted a house progress update, and we talked about how we both had childhoods that featured a lot of concrete pouring. And then he said the magic words "I love your posts, Karen. I'd pay to read them." Really? Nuh unh. Well, he did say it, but I think he's nuts. A fan, but nuts (in a good way). It really touched me, tough, as I started this whole Adventure 3-1/2 years ago when I left NJ and moved to Cali as a way to document the 2 week trip and keep in touch with my East Coast Peeps. I guess it worked. Smile.

So what's been happening at DG? A lot more, though we're still not really finished with any one thing. Most prominent in the last week has been continued Deck building. Thanks to M's "crew" (her dad, who's been spending at least part of every weekday helping), it's nearly complete. At least the decking part. But I get ahead of myself.

OOOOhhhh. Footings. With post brackets. Exciting.

After spending Saturday (over a week ago) pouring footings, M and I spent Sunday getting ready for her "crew" to start building the deck on Monday. While I weed whacked around our orchard, M got the footing area leveled out with the tractor, and then we moved on to moving the huge beams that were required for the deck structure. Yes, it's over engineered. The building codes are stupid. We devised an interesting way to move these big guys from the front driveway (where they were delivered) to the back. Think Egyptian.

Walking my Cart Buddy

See those bad boys to the right of me? BIG and heavy.

With a Big Guy loaded

Note, the "driveway paving." Our driveway area is sloped toward the house, and is dirt and gets really really muddy in the rainy season. When we tore the house down, we repurposed the stucco with it's wire backing as kind of an impromptu driveway. It's uneven and looks like a mess, but really keeps the surface from becoming a muddy mess.

Multiple medium size guys, successfully moved to the back yard. Isn't this exciting?

Big guys laid out next to their footing brackets, ready for Monday construction to begin.

Larger view, with string lines.

Ready to go!

Footing day!

Yesterday, we poured the 12 footings for the back deck, along with two small pier bases for the stairs that will come out from my office to the side patio. It was a VERY successful day in the end.

At about 8:30, M called the rental place to find out if they had any concrete "Pups." These are the tow-behind mixers that you can rent for the day. MUCH easier than mixing all the individual bags, and just about the same cost. Unfortunately the place that's about 2 miles from the house had some trouble with their concrete plant, so wouldn't have any Pup rentals for another few days. Plan B: luckily there's another place in Newcastle, about 5 miles away. They had some available, so we ran over to M's parents to borrow their Suburban, ran down, got the Pup and got him home to DG. It was exciting on the freeway!

Looking out the back window at the "Pup"

Are you as excited about this as I am?

We immediately started pouring. We got the hang of dumping a small load into the bucket of the tractor (that tractor has been a lifesaver. M has said over and over that she could've never built this house without it!) and then drove the tractor over to a form. Then we'd shovel the concrete into the holes, place the rebar, smooth it out, insert the post holder, and move onto another.

M's dad came right after we started to help, so he and I were the manual labor. M drove the tractor and operated the mixer (which made for a loud morning as the mixer keeps mixing--loudly, and the tractor was running the whole time). We got a good system down, though I was so in the midst of my tasks I couldn't take any in progress photos. But we completed the task within about 2 hours. Here are the forms, ready to go:

gee, haven't you seen enough of these already?

And here are the finished footings:

It really was a great, satisfying (though exhausting) day. The weather was perfect--warm enough that all the water involved (constant spraying of the tools) didn't make us cold, and cool enough that we weren't drenched in sweat.

Up next: deck posts, beams and under structure. I'm sure we'll be tired again tonight.

As always, Willie supervises

Upcoming work day

So, footings are ready for concrete. M hoped to pour them Wednesday (when her Dad was available to help) but we got a fair amount of rain on Tuesday night, so it was too wet. Instead she's spent the the last couple days putting the finishing touches on our new "eclectic" fence and shoring up the old driveway gate so Willie can't escape the back yard.

Tomorrow, Saturday, is our new planned work day. I think both M's Mom and Dad are planning to come help. We'll rent a "pup" and hopefully need only one. It's exciting. When I was a kid my dad poured a lot of concrete, and though I doubt I'll get to press my hand print and scratch my name into these footings, it'll be fun to see the progress nevertheless.

Our decking is being delivered today. That's a big chunk of change. But it'll be nice to get it up (and it's not just a nice-to-have feature--since the slider drops off by about 4 feet, we have to have the deck and all it's stairs and railings complete before our CO/last inspection. Yesterday at lunchtime we took a drive to settle on what style of posts/railings we liked. SOOOoooo many decisions.

I took a photo last night of a framed footing, but it's totally boring. So I'll leave you with a pic of the house as it looked when we bought it:

And I guess I need to take a recent pic, because I can't find any that show the today. This sort of cute, sad little cottage-y house sure has had a transformation!

Inspection passed!

The footing inspection was a success yesterday! That leaves us with only the final inspection left--of course, it's not going to happen right away, but it's nice to know that there's only one left to schedule.

I visited the holes yesterday after work. Nothing exciting there, but while I was working away at my day job, M had built us a new fence. We think we should win the award for most eclectic fence in the neighborhood.

You may call it temporary, though M prefers to call it "Mock Up." We've had the house property for almost 3 years and it's been a completely fenced yard with a large gate across the driveway. The street is a dead end right where our house is, and so it means a lot of U turns, and also since our neighbors across the street park in front of their house (and have recently added some gravel to their side of the street to minimize the wet-weather mud), we've been wanting to more easily park in our driveway. The gate made it unappealing and a pain. But we needed fencing to keep Willie in the yard.

We have plans to install a more permanent fence in this general area, with a couple gates down the road, but for right now, we can access the driveway easily, and still have a fenced yard for Doggie! Yes, it's a bit unsightly but so far it works for a temporary measure. AND this means our decking can be easily delivered into our driveway! More on that in the next couple days. It's supposed to rain tomorrow, so work will probably shift back inside for at least a day.

Here's a shot of about 75% of the fence (there's more white picket to the left of the gates out of the photo) It's "eclectic" don'tcha think?

OH YAH! Good news, we ordered our kitchen sink this morning, so we're one step closer to ordering the counters!

Footings

Some exciting progress here, chez DG. The rain we got last week softened the ground significantly, and we were able to get the holes for the deck footings finished. That coupled with M's Dad's desire to spend a day as DG Helper means that we are on the schedule for a footing inspection this afternoon. If we pass (I guess I should say WHEN we pass) we can start pouring concrete over the next few days. And once the footings are complete, that means the deck construction can start, and once the deck is finished, the siding can be finished. Etc, etc.

View from back yard looking at back of house. Hard to see holes. Willie on right.

Though pictures of holes in the ground are not the most exciting fodder, in the interest of keeping you up to date, here are the 12 beauties! I should note that at 5:30 pm, we thought it was going to be a simple "place rebar into holes" task. But somehow, about 9 of the holes were a bit too small, so the manual labor (read: M and K) went to work. By dark (about 6:30) we were finished. Between the digging and the sledgehammering (to break up old concrete to be reused in the holes), I'm surprised I'm not sore!

Note siding above windows and on dormer that's still not installed.

See the ledger board that runs low on the Tyvek? That's for the deck. It will go from the living room end of the house to just past the laundry room (the greenhouse window is the laundry room, the two-panel window in the center of the photo is the kitchen, and the narrow window at the far right of the photo is one of the windows that flanks the slider in the living room. The dormer above is one of the bedrooms.

It's a hole!

Willie monitoring the four right-hand holes.















Poor lighting on this photo, but this is from the back of the house, looking from the living room corner toward the laundry room and garage. The slider at the right in the photo is the living room. the door facing the photographer is the laundry room door. The garage is just beyond the laundry room.

Recycled concrete rubble getting ready to help support rebar in holes.

Rebar all tied off and waiting to go into the holes. Fascinating stuff, huh?

This is about the point where we realized that about 9 of the 12 holes were a bit too small. Note how light it is here.

Holes made bigger, rubble in place, rebar positioned for inspection. Note how dark it is starting to look  (photo taken with flash). We nearly ran out of time.

It's dark, and we finished. WHEW!
Hopefully this afternoon's inspection will go off without a hitch and by the weekend we'll have 12 shiny new deck footings. Ah, the glamor of home building!


(Sorry for the spacing issues--I'd love to know more about Blogger and how to fix these, but I haven't been able to troubleshoot my way through it!)

Indoor plumbing, for real!

Work continues, though at another stalled pace as the weekend found M with a 3-day migrane and me with a stomach thing. In other words, we didn't make much progress. But I can show you what was installed a couple weeks ago, and has been much anticipated and much admired since installation:

Master Bath toilet, installed!

Lookey there! There's tile installed in the master bathroom, which allowed for baseboards to be installed (well mostly, don't look at the "cap" to the left--not quite finished there) which allowed for, YES! A working toilet! (forgive the Home Depot bag that's serving as a TP holder. Fancy, huh?)

Remember last August where I got a "present"? The original (read SKEEVY) toilet, cleaned up, installed (though you had to turn the hose on to flush) in the someday-to-be-a-powder-room area (defined and privatized by a blue tarp? Well, this is the day I've been waiting for. An actual toilet, that is connected to the water (NOT by a hose) that's new, clean, and private. And pretty to boot!

Here is a close up:

We picked out the toilets (all three of them) along with some of our fixtures (master bath and guest bath faucets) at least a year ago. I'm so relieved we still like them! Now to get running water (aka a sink) in so we don't have to use the hose to wash hands, paintbrushes and the like.

And meanwhile, floor installation continues this week (now that M's headache is gone) without me. She tells me she's finished the living room and is at work on the Powder Room (that's really exciting, because once the floor is complete, baseboards and wainscotting can be installed, then the pedestal sink and toilet, then it's nearly complete). She did get a new light fixture installed in there last week. Photos to follow in an upcoming post. And pix of the cabinets, I promise.

MORE FLOORS!

I got so excited about sharing hardwood floor photos yesterday, I thought I'd come back today (two days in a row? Amazing) and show you the floors (nearly finished) for the laundry room.

But first some background. Our laundry room is obscenely big (not to me, but to every person who visits our house). It kind of had to be (kind of). It was probably originally not even part of the house, then later converted to a breezeway between the garage and the end of the house. When we bought DG it was an enclosed laundry room (but oh so gross). The floor was concrete, as were the small porch and steps off the kitchen that are now the mudroom.

When M designed the house, she designed the floors for the laundry room and mudroom to be the same level as the house, and then step down into the garage. Fine. She then brought the new floors up to the level of the main house and back porch step, which is part of the mudroom square footage. She built framing under the laundry room and most of the mudroom, but that one (un-level, I might add) concrete step remained at new height in the mud room.

We talked long and hard about flooring options. Tile (easy to clean, but cold); wood (too risky since the washer is in this room, and the mudroom will be our entry from the garage); linoleum (could be retro and cool, but color choices left us too locked in). We thought we would do OSB (the super strong ply-woody product--Oriented Strand Board) with just a clear coat across the top. M had that in a previous house. But it was pretty rustic looking.

SO, on somewhat of a whim, we decided on smooth plywood, painted with a design. I'm not a big checkerboard fan, but these colors are subtle. Luckily for me, M is a geometry whiz, and whipped out the taping faster than I could say "where's the paintbrush?" She primed the floor, then painted a coat of white over it. Then started taping.

White primer, and a white coat of paint, then tape

It was a hot day, hence the fan

The green tape worked really well

Trying not to get the floors dirty was not all that fun. There was lots of dog hair, sawdust, etc no matter how hard we tried. One of the benefits of my worsening eyesight is that without glasses, the floor looks clean to me--whether it is or not. I like to imagine everyone else sees as little as I do. Please don't burst my bubble.

Pale gray goes down over white. That's not all though . . . 

We mixed the gray from the Powder Room paint (a dark color I have not shown yet) and white. Let's hope we never run out of touchup, because we'll never match it. 

Once the gray squares were dry, we thought we could put a coating of sealer on it, then paint the outlines (where the tape is) and the coating would act as a resist. It didn't work. So M re-taped the ENTIRE floor again, on each outside of each white and gray square so we could get our pale blue (it was either the master bath paint re-used, or the master bath paint mixed with white) outlines in place. 

Finished except for sealer (not a great photo)

You can see the imperfections here--we wanted it to look brushy

We still need to touch the white up in a few places (did I mention our dirt here is nearly red, and the dust this time of year is horrible--it's dry until our Autumn rains start, PLUS we have nothing but dirt and weeds in 80% of the yard) and then put several coats of sealer on it. I hope it holds up. It's pretty. It was inexpensive (and a fun project) so even if it doesn't last forever, it'll hopefully get us through the first couple years. Who knows, maybe we'll totally change our minds about what kind of flooring we really want in there. I do love the colors though. 

(with apologies for poor photos--all came from my phone).

And . . . the floors are revealed!

We've spent the last 4 days on flooring. Not literally 4 days, but we started on Saturday, made progress on Sunday, and resumed last night. It's so fun.

M thought the best place to start would be in front of the living room slider--since that's a place that won't have furniture in front of it, will be readily seen, etc. It took about 2 hours to get the first row laid. Turns out the walls in our house are not square (as is, I've been made to understand, typical) so we (she) had to account for that laying the first row. Apparently if the first row is off, it will get worse, or grow as the courses go down.

The first photo is last week--a shot of M trying to get the old, original floor level. Easier said than done. This is asphalt paper going down to help even it out. Then a couple shots of the first rows of progress!

Looks like fun, no? Thank goodnes for knee pads!

The first two rows.

Close up.

The second row going down, looking toward kitchen.

First we laid kraft paper under the flooring, but under that (the black above in the upper right corner) is asphalt paper used to help level the floor.

Saturday we ran out of time to do much more than those first two rows, but Sunday we were back at it and got about 9 more rows laid. It's slow going.

Mid way through Sunday

Mid way through Sunday, looking the other way

The flooring is Acacia. We both really like the variation and movement, though we know some people may not be a fan. It's funny because the house we're in now, built in the 50's, has it's original narrow oak hardwood. I always think of oak as very consistent, color wise. But ours really has a ton of variation if you really look at it. Though our new floors seem pretty busy, we think that once we get furniture in, it'll be appear less busy. The real test is that every time we walk in we are wowed by it. I'm so pleased with our choice.

We've gotten a system down, and M is waiting until evenings when I can come work after my day job to lay more. She does the down and dirty stuff, and has a sore back and knees to show for it. She nails and makes sure we're still straight, while I open boxes, plan color and length randomness (a bit more of a challenge than I might have imagined) and layout pieces for her. We're finding a lot of pieces that have more or more significant filler than I'd like, or look way too light or way too muddy, so we're saving those for under the appliances, in the closet, etc. I hope it comes out ok. It's been so fun to see it go down.

We worked again about 3 hours yesterday evening, and have about 18 courses down. We're about 2/5 across the living room.

The biggest challenge is keeping Willie off the floor. He loves to look out the slider (it's up about 4-5 feet from the ground below--deck still needs to be built) and we're trying to keep him off the new floor for the time being. I'd like to be the first one to scratch it, not the dog!

Willie trying to be a good boy and stay on the sub floor