Vanity

As in, the bathroom sink kind, not the concern about how we look.

M is still down with her bad back. VERY slow progress. Our goal is for her to be able to tie her own shoes by March 31 when I leave for 6 days. I am cautiously optimistic. As for me, I'm trying to talk myself down from feeling like the next handful of days are my last days ever to work on the house, and the time is wasted because M is not up to working, yet. This is all a result of starting a new job next week, and knowing that with a fair amount of travel in my immediate future, my time to contribute anything substantial to the house will be minimal.

But onward! We have been making progress on our guest bath vanity. We started it BBB (before bad back) and have continued a bit while M has been hurting. And by continue I mean that she's been standing beside me with her umbrella cane (she calls it Mr. Peanut) and coaching me through what to do. For some reason, though, she seems to not want me to use the chop or table saw. Hmmmm. Anyway, here are the beginning stages of the vanity construction.

First M built a basic box. Then we started with our cladding materials:

Yes, those are pallets.

We disassembled them (read: cut through the screws holding them together) to get our planks.

The leftover pile.

Then I made five "washes" of paint (from interior leftovers we had on hand). I just watered it down in: pale green (white + guest bath green), guest bath green, powder room dark gray, laundry floor light gray and some random medium blue we had a tester for. Here I am painting. Yes, it looks like an animal living on my head (trying to grow my hair out a bit).

The finished planks drying. The colors are more intense than shown here, but because of the late day sun they look washed out.

One side attached, mostly. This is still in progress, so more to come. Again, colors are a bit brighter in person, but still subtle. This is the "public" side that will be next to the toilet. The left side will be nearly against the wall. We're considering a tin top with an overmount sink.

Another (slightly different) view. We have a few more steps to finish and may get to do that today depending on how well I take direction from M, and whether she can trust my measurements (I hate measuring tiny increments with a tape measure--I'm always 1/8 inch off!).






Stay tuned for more progress. Oh yeah, and that white stuff that's all over the driveway? Well, when we tore the original house down, we had a lot of old stucco (backed by chicken wire-like backing) and so to keep our driveway from getting too muddy or weed infested, we laid it down there (as a maybe temporary measure). It helps, but it uneven and I've nearly tripped so many times!

Back in black

Ok, not an AC/DC reference, but a reference to M's back, which is still in a terrible way. Also, though, a reference to my new employment gig.

I start my new job on the 27th, and make a trip to NJ on the 31st. So kinda back. In black. Yah, I know it's not exactly the correct reference. Whatever.

We've tried to work, and I do have some photos to show of the vanity we've been constructing for the guest bathroom. Plus today we did some plumbing (very cool, one of my favorite jobs so far) though it was not a good level, angle, or job for M to be involved with.

I promise to be back with photos soon. But I need to find a way to convince M to take a few more days off to heal her back. It's so hard to lie around, and so frustrating to everyone, but it's important.

Meanwhile, I'm assessing my work wardrobe, and hoping that my new (consulting) gig will afford me the opportunity to get to see all my east coast peeps in the upcoming weeks, as it seems I will be making multiple trips to my old stomping grounds. If you are there in earshot of NJ, send me an email at karensedmonds@yahoo.com and let's coordinate! : )

Deck railings and continuing down time

It's been a bit of a mixed bag, here at Chez DG. We made some good progress on deck railings over the weekend, though took Sunday off to go to the Sacramento Antique Fair.

Here's the railing panel construction in progress:

Panel cut to size. "Sandwich" boards cut to size, primed and painted in 3 coats of paint.

 One panel, almost ready to be placed between posts. There was lots of back and forth about spacing, evenness (side to side between the posts) and general design. It took a long time to come to the plan, but now we're on our way.

Small panel awaiting placement between two posts.

Large panels leaned against their posts. I think we've figured out the clip/attach system now, and are about ready to place them, except, in other news, M's back has gone out.

She has a bulging disk, and she's been in a bad way all week. Like a can-hardly-walk-and-sitting-in-the-car-is-super-painful way. Poor thing.

Just when one of us gets well, the other seems to get worse. In good news, though, I got results of a thyroid biopsy this week: benign! Yipee! That was a bit of a scare.

And in other mixed news, I have a potential short-term job on the horizon. The good news is it's a job I'm excited about. The not as great news is that it means I would start in about 2 weeks. So, I want to get as much of my personal contribution of work (read: work I can actually do vs. work I am not qualified for) done before I have to start spending time at an actual job (and one which will likely require a bit of travel, meaning no weekends to moonlight at the house). But it's a great opportunity, and the house will be finished sooner or later.

Even with all the injury going around, we've still made some progress on our guest room vanity. It's cool, and I'll share that soon.

It's electric!

I've done a bit of electrical work in my day. And by that I mean changing light switches, installing fixtures, dimmers and the like. I understand the basic concept of wiring and electricity (well, sort of) and maybe I got my no-fear attitude from my dad (He worked for the utility company, maintaining the powerhouses. He was an electrical machinist, not a licensed electrician, but he got it. And he taught me as long as I was very careful--both switch and breaker off--I could do it too).

But at DG, I've done nothing even close to electrician work, unless you count the installation of the face plates. Hardly professional grade.

M suggested I install the second master bathroom light (I'd done the first one months ago--we liked it, but weren't sure about the size since we were still debating the sizes/purchase of medicine cabinets to go over the vanities. We've since decided to start just with mirrors and upgrade to medicine cabinets later. Medicine cabinets couldn't be recessed, and so we weren't sure the light fixtures would come out from the wall far enough to adequately light a cabinet. With mirrors, they're fine). So I did.

We'd been kind of stuck on what fixtures we wanted for the guest bath. Then, Home Depot got in some new lighting options, and there were a couple possibilities that we liked. They were economical, small enough to fit the unique spot where they go (slanty ceiling), and they were cute and fit with our Craftsman theme. So a couple days ago, I got my toolbelt on (not really, though it would've been handy) and got them installed. I only had to ask M a couple questions!

One partially installed. Note the slant.

This corner is tight!

Close up (don't mind the poor green paint cut in! That was done before I was more experienced!)

Success!


















We debated a bit about whether to have shades up or shades down, and settled on this orientation, at least for now. Once we have a vanity and mirror, we'll revisit whether this was the right choice.

Appliances, or what are those huge boxes doing in the middle of the room?

Do you remember the appliance saga? We bought our refrigerator, stove, washer and dryer back in the summer. We thought we might take delivery in September, then we postponed it to October, then to December, and then to January.

Then they called us to tell us there was a delay with the dryer. Really? Ok, let's have them delivered in February. We might be close to moving in around the scheduled date, the 18th.

We purchased the warranty (what are you really supposed to do about all these warranties these days?) with the understanding that at 11 months into the purchase, we could call for service (maintenance) and then cancel the contract for the warranty (saves a lot of $$). But the clock would start ticking upon delivery, so we wanted that date to be as close to possible as our move in (and start using) date. Well, it's been 2 weeks, and here's where the appliances are:

 Yes, you're seeing that correctly. That's the washer and the dryer, sitting (still in boxes) in the laundry room.

Along with the refrigerator and stove, sitting in the living room, still in protective wrap. Yesterday we moved the 'fridge into place to check the fit, and then promptly moved it back to the center of the living room. After I took this photo, we even wrapped it's cardboard box back around it.

M had to fit some additional trim alongside the 'fridge, so we needed to see it in place. It's pretty. I can't wait to use it. I guess after the trim is painted, these babies can be installed. One step closer . . .


In other news, M was sent to the paint store to pick out our white for the trim this morning. And the report at mid-day is that the painters have most of the upstairs masked off. I can't wait to see it! I'll be out there painting deck railing trim in an hour or so. Rain is coming late tonight, so we're trying to get as much outdoor work done as possible pre-rain, and while the painters are in the house.

Well well well

When last I posted, we thought the painters (it was Levi and Antonio, not Fernando!) would have been back by now. The good news is that their business is booming! The bad news is that painting (actual painting) has yet to be begun. Today they'll come and do the last of the prep work, and I think tomorrow the actual painting will start.

In the meantime we've been working. On . . .well, everything. Too much to show in one post, so I'll focus today on trim finishing. Here's the beam that spans the living room and kitchen.

With preliminary "wrap."

Testing out trim sizes and shapes.

Now completely wrapped, but still not with all finish trim. (note: this is just primed trim, not final painted.)

The pillar cased in. Looking pretty

Another view.
























And upstairs, more trim going on. Here are a few shots from the "loft" area at the top of the stairs (it's not really a loft, hence the quotes. We're not really sure what to call it).

In progress

A close up of the trim in progress. M doesn't really have a pattern she follows, rather she tries to envision it and then plays around with it. Often she gives me several options to choose from. Luckily, we often chose the same option. I'm amazed at her ability to figure this stuff out without a pattern to follow!

Still in progress. Note that the stair skirts are in place. The stairs themselves, however are still waiting for their wood to be installed.

We're definitely getting close. Next up: photos of our appliances (delivered but not installed), my electrical work, and our deck railing progress.