Long time

Sorry it's been such a long time. Things came to a boring halt when everything got taped and covered for painting. Not a lot else was going on while the paint was happening, except they cleaned and re-sealed our roof, and started some of the outside landscape work.

Then I blinked. All the painting was done and things jumped back in gear. 2 weeks later everything had changed, so I have lots of updates.

Lets start with that landscaping. We had some drainage issues when we were buying the house. Most of the issues had been fixed before we even closed on the house, but we still had to do some grading of the land, drainage pipe replacement, and we needed to have a pad put in for our hot tub.

Here's an "almost before" picture. They haven't done much work yet, just loaded some materials. Notice the slope kind of heads towards the house at the bottom of the slope. And you can't really see it, but the dirt actually touches the siding, which makes rot more likely. This pic is looking up the slope next to our house.

This pic is taken after the hot tub pad was put in, and it's taken from the pad looking down the slope. Notice the slope has been changed, and river rock has been put in to move water away from the house, and to displace the dirt that causes rot. Also, it looks really cool!

And finally, here's the pad on which the hot tub will sit. There's still some work to be done here, we aren't fans of the wall on the left. It just looks like a pile of blocks.

OK, and now on to the inside. The biggest changes are the floor going in and the kitchen getting closer to finished. First the floor.

Here's the living room.



And a close up of the flooring.

Here's a view from the dining room out to the living room.

The flooring looks so awesome! I really love the bamboo, but as you can see it's not typical bamboo. It's woven bamboo, so it doesn't look like stalks, it's more random. Having the flooring in makes the house look so much more complete. And it's "green" too!

And now, the kitchen.

Here it is covered up for painting.

Here's the dishwasher in, but still covered up.


And here is the kitchen uncovered. Notice the trim around the windows is painted white now. And you can see the handles are all on the cabinets.


And here's the countertop installed! This was one of the biggest expenses in the house, so we were SO excited to see it go in. And we LOVE it. The installers (Nuance Stoneworks) did such an awesome job matching the one seam we have. They connected two veins of quartz together, you almost can't tell it's two different slabs.


Here's the dishwasher installed with the countertop on top.


Here's another view of the countertop. The seam is just to the right of the sink.


And a close up of all the veining.


Here's the new stove going in. It's dual fuel, gas on top and electric oven.

And, the painting is mostly done. Here's the house getting ready to be painted.

Here's the house covered and taped for painting. Plus it has some primer.


Here's Jessi playing the painted trim Xlyophone.


Here's the house after painting. Notice all the trim around the doors upstairs, and the railing caps, and the closet trim is all white now. We decided to leave all of the exposed beams and posts their natural color. It adds some more warmth, and since they are natural wood, they look good.

And finally some more details.

The toilets are all in. Here's the main bathroom toilet. It's an ultra low flush, ADA height, Toto EcoDrake. At first I was a little scared of the Ultra Low flow, but since we are trying to be "green" we decided to go for it. I tell you, this thing flushes like a jet and only uses 1.28 gallons per flush! Also you can see the sink sitting on the floor waiting for the countertops.

And our master closet built in has been built in. Here it is. It's pretty simple, but it really gives the closet a walk in feel.

Whew.

Well, there you have it. The major things left are the bathroom countertops, the master bath shower glass, the wood burning stove, the bannister, hanging the doors, the new front door, the new stairs... I think two to three weeks and we'll be moving in!

-Tom

More Progress

Here's another update on the home remodel front:

The kitchen is beginning to come together. The cabinets are in...










Also the fixtures are beginning to go in everywhere.

The main bath light.


The new bath shower fixtures and sink.




The Master bath lights and shower fixtures.



The master fan. It turns out none of the bath fans vented anywhere. They just blew into the ceiling. So our contractors put ducting and vents to outside. Hooray!


And on every fan we put a timer. Supposedly it's a lot better for mold and mildew control to run a fan for a while after you shower, so we added these to make it easier.


Also we've put down more slate.

In the front entry way


And in the garage entryway. This picture is taken from the main entry landing looking down the stairs.

Supposedly soon all the cabinet handles will go on, and after the trim gets painted our Bamboo floors start going in. So exciting!!!

-Tom

I Can't Leave

So, I go to the house probably 4 times a week on average. Sometimes I go to answer questions about what goes where, or ask questions about what's next... sometimes I just go to soak it all in. It doesn't matter if I go to the house for a couple quick questions or just for a quick peak, but I end up staying for half an hour or an hour. I walk from one room to the next, and back again. I'll just stand in the Master Bath with a huge grin on my face. I tell myself, "OK gotta go now" Then I end up standing in the main bath for 15 minutes. I'll stare at the slate, trying to find my favorite pieces, or just open and close the cabinet drawers. Then I'll shake myself free and say, "OK gotta go now." But I'll end up in the new bathroom upstairs touching the tiles...

I just can't leave. Good thing, cause we're moving there in a month!

OK, so here's an update since the last post. Most of the tile is in now, the bath vanities are in and there's paint going onto the doors and walls. Here's the pictorial history.

The master.

First, here's the floor tile. Still kind of messy with all the install dust.


Now it's cleaned up a little and the cabinets are installed. Also, the shower pan and curb is all tiled.

Here it is with the shower surround all complete. The accent tile will continue over the cabinets as the backsplash. All we need are countertops.


Here is a close up of the accent tile in the shower.


The new bath

First here's the floor tile. Again, it's messy due to being early in the process.



And here's a closer look.


Here's Chris the tile guy putting in the shower surround and accent.


And finally here's the tile all done. Still needs to be cleaned up a bit. But it gives a good idea of what the New Bathroom looks like.


Main Level Bath

They started here by putting up the shower surround.


Here's a close up. See the variation in the slate? We love our slate! See why I end up standing around choosing my favorite pieces... Also I love that Damon, our contractor, knows that we like unique tiles and tries to use the cool ones in highly visible places. Thanks!


Then they moved onto the floors. And dropped in the cabinets.


Then they did the grout and put all of the drawers and doors on the cabinets. Can't wait to see this one all done.


So this is really hard to describe, but here's a picture of where we are going to do a little tile inlay. See the "missing" tiles? There will be bamboo flooring there, and the tiles that are "supposed" to be there will be "drifting" away - inlaid into the bamboo down the hall towards the camera a little. If this doesn't make sense, just wait a few weeks and we'll show you the finished product.


OK, so that's all for now. More soon.

Tom

More Stuff!

So, they've basically finished all the drywall, taping and mudding now. And as the title indicates, we have received more stuff. Hooray! Here are our appliances...

OK, fine they are still in boxes so it's not THAT exciting... but it IS really exciting that the construction is pretty much done, and all the finishing touches are starting to arrive. Like our cabinets...



And our kitchen sink...



And some of our tiles...

Oh alright, so boxes really aren't that exciting. I'll give a you a peek inside. These are going in the master bath...


Since they are still in a construction zone I didn't want to totally take them out of the boxes, so please excuse the plastic and cardboard. But notice the silver trim that surrounds the "tigerwood" faces.

And then these go in the kitchen...


That's Alder Wood with an Autumn finish. And they haven't been field adjusted yet, so those doors will line up when done.

And these go in the main floor guest bath...


Sorry that's not the best pic. There's a lot of dust still in the air. They are the same style of cabinet as the kitchen, only much, much darker.

And then, not all the tiles got deliverd, but we do have the tiles for the new bath...


Now that was a really hard one to get a picture of. You can almost sort of tell, but that's a linen pattern on the tile. And here's the accent tile that's going with it...


Again, ignore the plastic. We will be using thin stripes of this to accent the new bath.

And finally, this combo will go in the master bath...


Again, we'll use small stripes of the mosaic tile. And the larger grey tile will be on the floor and shower surround, and the smaller darker tiles will be on the shower floor. The colors didn't quite come out right in the pic, but it looks really cool in person. Trust me.

Oh and perhaps the most exciting thing is that they will start laying this tile down later this week!!! Man it's going fast.

Tom

Back up

Ok, for you non-immediate family members, or for those of you who have made specific requests, I'm going to back up a touch. If you read the first post you have a general idea of what's going on, but were probably pretty lost by the last post. So here goes...

We are renovating the house to do several things.

1) Reskin the whole thing. New paint, new cabinets, new countertops, new sinks, new floors etc... It used to be classic worn out 80's, and we want it to be contemporary/modern.

2) Turn the current upstairs bathroom into the ensuite master bath

3) Add a new bath upstairs (because we stole the only upstairs bath and donated it to the master).

So those were the goals. No walls were being moved downstairs, so I don't have drawings. But upstairs we were moving things about. Here was the plan...

First is my crappy initial drawing of the original layout.



You can click on it to make it bigger. And as you see you come up the stairs and there's a short hallway in front of you. If you take that hallway and turn left there's a guest room. And if you take that hallway and turn right, there's another short hallway. To the left from there is the bathroom, and to the right is the master bedroom.

And here's my projected drawing of what we were going to do.


Again, click to make bigger. We were going to take a little piece of the guest bedroom, and turn the hallway into a 3/4 bath. We were going to wall off the entrance to the master, and add a new one. Also we had to add another door to get you into the guest bedroom up there.

Then the contractors came and did a non-crappy drawing of the upstairs.


And when we saw their drawing with the measurements all drawn in we realized that we could fit a full tub up there. So I edited the drawing...


And that became the final plan!

So there you have it. Now you are all caught up.

Enjoy.

Tom

Progress

So we've made some pretty serious progress on the house. And when I say we, I mean our contractors Damon and Fred, of Quality Remodel. Although honestly with the amount of time we've put into designing the remodel, and coming up with all the finish and fixtures, it certainly feels like we are in it with them. I can't imagine how any sane person can put this much effort into choosing finishes, and then spend the time to install them all.

Anyway, the house is coming along nicely. Here are some before and "in progress" pictures for your enjoyment. I can't call them "after," because after isn't done yet.

Here's a picture of the kitchen before we did anything to it.Note that the fridge kind of juts out into the kitchen a little, which doesn't look so good, and kind of makes getting into the cabinets behind it a bit of a chore (click on the photo to enlarge). So we decided to bump that wall back a bit to make a little nook for our new fridge so it was nice and flush with the cabinets, making them easier to access.

Here's the back corner of the kitchen with the cabinets removed. You can see the spot where the fridge was just to the right of the cabinet outlines.

Here's the fridge nook being framed in. There used to be a closet behind the fridge that you'd access from the hallway. We donated half that closet to the fridge nook. And while we had all the framing open, we also decided to add a pocket door behind the fridge that would close off the guest area of the house. You can see the horizontal framing for the pocket in the picture. Also notice the stringer that's going over the hallway to the right of the fridge. That's where the door will cut off the guest area.


And here's the fridge nook all drywalled out. You can see we just bumped back the part where the fridge will be so that the cabinets above will also be flush with the fridge front.


Upstairs is where the big stuff is happening. We have changed a hallway into a bathroom, and created a master suite. Here's a picture of the hallway at the top of the stairs before anything was done. Straight ahead is the hall. Down that short hall and to the left is the entrance to the upstairs guest room. To the right is the Master Bedroom and the bathroom.

Here you can see the framing for the new bathroom. We took about 18 inches of the extra bedroom on the left and donated it to the bathroom. We also had to add a door to the extra bedroom to the left of the bathroom. And finally a door into the master bedroom, on the right.


You can see the tub being wedged into its spot. All the spots you see in the air are actually the flash reflecting off all of the dust in the air. Hooray lungs!!

And here's a pic of it all drywalled in. Again, the door on the left is to the extra bedroom, then the bathroom door is in the middle, and finally the door into the master is on the right.

And the interior of the new bath.


Also we are changing around the master bathroom. The biggest change in there is that we are making the shower larger. Here's a picture before.


And here's a pic mid destruction.

Since the shower is going to be all glass, we had to move all the plumbing. Here's the old plumbing hanging free. It used to be inside the wall that we took out.


Here's a pic of the framed in new shower. you can see we extended it out to where the vanity will go. I'm pretty sure that red stuff is water proofing.


And from inside the master bedroom, The bedroom and bath used to be separate. Now there is a new door, and a short hallway created to the now ensuite bath. I don't have many shots of the master before. But here's the closest one. This is looking towards the detached bathroom. On the left you can see the beginnings of a new door. Just behind that is the original door, and then the bathroom.

Below you'll see the same scene with the new design fully drywalled in. The original door converted to a short hallway to the bath. And the original hall closed off to create the new bath.

And here's a better shot of the new hall.

Also we doubled the size of the master closet. I don't have before pictures, because it was just a 2 foot deep reach in closet. Now it's much larger, and the top of the closet can be used as a neat shelf on which we can put some art.


Finally here are some more random pictures of the goings on at the house.

Stuff piled up in the garage. We are going to use the old kitchen cabinets to create a bike shop area in the garage.
Here's a paint booth they've set up in the garage for painting all the doors and trim.

Here's a picture of all the trim pieces stacked and organized for painting and reinstallation.

Here's all the carpet and padding they pulled out.

And a bunch of other construction debris. Ready to be tossed.

The final before and after. And it's a bit of a stretch. But here's a shot of the upstairs hallway from below. Notice no doors, and the small hallway on the right.

Here's the upstairs hallway from upstairs. Notice the 3 new doors and the small hallway is covered up.

So this is it - about half way done. There will be more photos as the finishings start going in.

Tom

Catch Up

So, It's been a while. If you followed us at our Old Blog, you'll notice there's a bit of a time gap between the last post and the post before it. Well, without being too boring I'm going to try to catch you up.

First of all we bought a house and sold the boat.

Then Jessi got a new job.

Then we got married.

Then our house started feeling small. We knew when we bought the house it was probably a 2-3 year house MAX, but it got us of the boat and that was the important thing at the time.

But just 1 year later (since Jessi and I can't sit still) we started going to open houses and dreaming of our next house. Where would we live? How are the schools? What kind of neighborhood? How much room do we need? How much room do we want? So many questions, yet so much potential.

We'd drive around on Sudays, browsing the open houses thinking "someday." It was a blast.

One day, we followed some open house signs through one of our favorite "someday" neighborhoods right up to this amazing house. As we pulled up, we thought, "This has got to be over a million bucks. But what the hell, one can dream right?"

Much to our surprise, it was way less... in fact it wasn't too much more than our "someday" price. So we toured the house dragging our jaws on the ground. This thing blew all the others out of the water. Instant dreams of living there. I mean this was THE one. It was almost too good to be true.

So as a joke, Jessi called her parents and proposed a business deal. HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

Wait... what? Um, OK? Really? We can talk about this? Wow. And the idea was born.

So with some incredibly generous help from Jessi's parents we were able to move "someday" up a few years. We ended up making an offer on the house and after some serious negotiation got a contract signed. All we had to do was pass inspection, and hey, the house was built in 2002 - no problem... right?

Wrong.

First off we have the best inspector in the USA. If you need a home inspection in the Seattle Area, call Cambridge Home Inspections Julie Rocks!! As she says, her job is to take the romance out of buying a house. And does she ever.

Ever heard of EIFS? We hadn't but Julie had - Google it. It's terrible. Also, the house was built on a hill and all of the drainage appeared to either undercut the foundation or work its way into the garage. Sweet.

Talk about disappointing. We walked, actually ran. The house was too good to be true. Our hearts were broken, but our eyes had been opened. We weren't going to let this get in the way of our "someday" house. We started looking more in earnest to see what else was out there.

We found another house we loved, but just couldn't come to an agreement. By the way, 3 months later, as of the time of this posting this house is still on the market. Boooo sellers!

Finally, after looking at every other house on the market in our price range we decided to shift gears.

We decided to buy a house in our favorite neighborhood that had good bones and a mostly good layout, but was priced a lot lower - and throw some money into updating it and making it perfect. Of course, neither Jessi or I have the time or knowledge to do most of the work ourselves, so we did hire a contractor. But even with a contractor, there seems to be a lot of stressful work to do.

But we'll get to that soon.

-Tom