A Soft Close

Surprisingly enough (to us), we've heard from quite a few people about our lack of blog posts. So it's time to ring in the new year by (once again) reviewing our original "to do's" from the first post in 2010.

1. Build house (sub-categories: choose architect, builder, go through committees, move out, tear down pre-existing, non-conforming (PENC) structure, build a new one that might be slightly less non-conforming but at least will have insulation, move back in.)
2. Buy a car.
3. Find out if I still have a job next year. (Would greatly help with #s 1 and 2)
4. Have a baby!!
5. Get my dog to stop barking randomly.
6. Figure out all the sub-categories for #s 2-5.
7. Start blog to help organize the chaos that is rapidly descending on our lives.

I really love crossing out items on my "to do" lists, so this was quite satisfying. Unfortunately Zippy hasn’t stepped up to help out with number 5 yet, and after our recent trip to NY, his "needs improvement" list is growing. It now also includes, “Get my dog to not chase snowplows.”

Zippy and Sophie frolicking in the snow, 

right before the snowplow came by and added another element to their playing.

Actually, we could revamp the whole list with new goals in almost all the categories.

1. Landscaping and smart interior decorating and storage.
2. Figure out how to get our other vehicles (bikes) easily in and out of the house in all types of weather (see #1).
3. Aim for success and happiness at our jobs and our job/home balance.
4. Make our million daily decisions in raising our happy, healthy toddler.
5. Yep, see above for the same old dog goal. Sigh, Zippy...

He looks innocent enough.

It's always about the journey, right?  

Housewise, we still attempt a project here and a project there... 

Books for bookshelves

But overall it's now in a state that is allowing us to live. So consider the goals of 2010 closed out, and the blog itself on "a soft closed/semi-sporadic" mode as we leave more time for other adventures. (see #4)!

Anthony and Natalie

Race Point Beach on New Year's Day

-J

Realizations

We haven't felt the need to blog lately because, well, the house building is pretty uneventful right now. We're mostly just getting settled and waiting for some key professional landscaping ingredients. However, inside we have realized a couple of things:

a. Despite being 20 feet wide, there's a lot of open space in the house. Or maybe it's just that we don't have very much furniture. This is proving to be a positive in Natalie's book- especially as she learns to walk with her little car back and forth and back and forth and back and forth (and back and forth). Plus we have plenty of room for a tent and tunnel in our living room- and isn't that just every child's dream? Twenty feet wide is proving to be plenty big so far.

...and back and forth

b. Our shiny new house makes the furniture we do have look ugly.

Like maybe it came from the streets of Boston on "big trash day" or the "as is" section of Ikea or something. We've been taking what we have and all the little things we saved and trying to give it all a place in our new life. We certainly don't *need* new stuff, we're living comfortably and fine with what we have. Paint can do wonders. Fabric can be reused. Hardware is available on something your husband called trash three days ago.

No, I'm not going to show you a picture of our ugly furniture.

I'm going with these cute window treatments instead.

My mother was intrigued by the challenge of creating roman shades for Natalie's room by taking apart old venetian blinds from our last house to use as parts.

c. We're too afraid to commit to hanging pictures and other things that require holes in our pretty new walls. Heck, we're too afraid to commit to buying floor mats for the front door and that certainly doesn't require holes. I think this drove my parents crazy last week during their visit. How many times did we hear, "You know, you should really put something to hang towels on in the bathroom." or "You really should get a mat for the front door." After rushing to commit and decide so much in the past year we have now slowed down considerably. Yes we know things like this can be changed, but knowing us, once we've committed $12.99 to a floor mat, it's not going to be changed until it literally falls apart. Therein lies the fear of commitment.

Note the artwork resting on the repainted shelf in the background.

Feel free to come over and vote where you think it should be hung.

-J

The Kitchen Sink is Our Fat Lady

I think with house building it can't be over until the kitchen sink is in and plumbed, and ours is sure toying with us enough! Let's recap yesterday (Thursday 6/23):

This is where we left off two days ago.

The stairs are stained and ready for their railings and balusters.

Again the day started promising enough with a truck in the driveway. Rob, our contractor's "guy", was supposedly in the house doing his work on the stairs. Then *poof* he was gone by 9:30, although he did leave all the lights on. (Apparently he didn't have my parents growing up-always asking who pays the electric bills and reminding him to turn the lights off.)

So nothing happened for a while and then he came back an hour or so later, turned off the lights and left again. We later found out that he was taking himself to the ER because he hurt his ribs.

Since the house was empty I spent part of the day moving kitchen wares over to our new cabinets so that I could reset the rental kitchen to the way it was. That's the hard part about renting this "summer house". It came furnished and we had moved all of "their stuff" out of the way to use "our stuff". Resetting it involves studying the pictures I took when we moved in and trying to return it to its original state.

The DPW guys came back in the early afternoon and told me they'd pave their patch of torn up sidewalk/driveway near the street today or tomorrow. That would just leave another little patch that we would be responsible for repaving. I shared some brownies with them.

Anthony had some phone conversations and discovered that the kitchen sink and faucet had indeed not been ordered by anyone and that the upstairs bathroom faucet had been ordered with the wrong finish. Yes, we have tried to let other people take on tasks and do their own jobs, but really it comes down to if we want it our way we should just do it. Sooooo off I went to pick up the kitchen sink and faucet.

This picture was taken today (Friday 6/24/11).

Our new classy driveway.We are thankful for the whole thing being patched.

Yes, there are workers at our right now, including a plumber! Rob is also back to work.

Lots of activity over there, so although this post may be dismal, we can sill be hopeful.

We returned home to the entire hole in the driveway repaved and some pinkish floor stain around the edge of the utility room on the basement floor. It wasn't supposed to be pink. It was supposed to be tannish-gray. Also, concrete floor stain is nothing like wood stain apparently. It went on more like paint. It was not what we had intended at all. So we back-pedaled and went back to the idea of just sealing it and calling it done. Anyone need two cans of concrete floor stain?

Note the stain around the edge of the utility room. Even Natalie looks bewildered.

We spent the evening both moving things over and prepping the sinks and counter holes for the plumber. The first sink (a round one for the basement bathroom) went together so nice and easy. (That's why we were doomed...)

Round sink for downstairs bathroom/laundry area

Our just-purchased kitchen sink of course couldn't be simple. It was going to be really big in the space. Do-able? Probably. Ideal? Of course not. So we decided that a tomorrow morning run to Lowe's (they open at 6!) was in the works to try to find a more suitable fit, while still holding onto our criteria of me being able to hide dishes in a deep sink.

So with exactly one week before we have to move out of our rental house, I feel great strides were not made yesterday. Perhaps I should head to the basement of the rental house and see if I can find our tent so we'll have somewhere to live.

-J

Water Valve Wednesday

Somehow I knew in the back of my mind that ending the previous blog post with "full speed ahead" would just make us come to a screeching halt. You know, the kind where you're frowning at a huge hole saying to yourself, "I thought I was done staring at holes on this property" and wondering if it would make more sense to just go get what's left of your money, toss it in the hole, cover it up with dirt and call it all done. I don't think that would help get us any closer to actually getting into the house though.

The day started off promising enough. The stairs had been stained yesterday and there were floor people milling about this morning, although they weren't here long and I'm not really sure what they did. Then the Department of Public Works (DPW) came by to switch out the water valve, and that's where things got more complicated.

A full driveway first thing in the morning always holds such promise.

Apparently, a lazy predecessor neglected to follow the rules and bring their line the entire length under the driveway as everyone previously assumed. (Huh- more corners cut in the previous shack- imagine that!) Options were discussed, sympathies expressed, but really the only choice in doing it right was to call back our faithful excavator, George, to dig up more of the paved driveway to find where the other guys left off and correctly tie into that, so that the entire run would be the proper one inch plastic pipe.

At one point there were no fewer than 9 of us staring at the hole: the DPW guys, George's guy Mike, myself, John the contractor, and a couple of neighbors.

Fortunately George was just around the corner and was over within the hour with his cute red "digger".

George in the hole. John and 2 DPW guys look on. The blue is the new 1 inch pipe we're supposed to have (and thought we had), as opposed to the copper 3/4 inch one that's hidden under part of the driveway.

As our contractor, John, said today, "Nothing's ever easy." Not when you want it to be anyway.

Apparently the DPW guys will be back on Friday to pave their section over the sidewalk. I'm not quite sure what that means for the other section. To think, we had originally debated about moving the driveway, but changed our minds because it was fine and in good shape.

So that's that. It's switched. We've now got what the town considers a proper water line and a more-current-than-1940 valve, so we're ready to go. If there is a plumber at our house tomorrow, I will be very happy.

-J

Who's Choreographing this Dance Anyway?

I was on the T last year when it was stopped for quite a while underground. I kept thinking I should've just gotten off at the last stop and walked a little farther (you gotta love hindsight- the only time I can claim perfect vision). The frustrating part was that I was in the front car and I could see the light at the end of the tunnel, but I couldn't do anything about the delay to help us get moving and on our way. Such are our feelings about our house right now. There are little things that are happening, but then there are things that we want to happen that aren't. We just need to get all our ducks in a row.

We'll start with the bright side for a run-down of the latest...

The view came into greater focus when the plastic came off the windows and the screens were put on.

Master Bedroom

The plumber has been in hooking up a jumble of pipes in the basement. I think Anthony's glad his part of the plumbing is over.

Stair parts are finally in and scheduled for the middle of this week. We've been told that part will go quickly, but we were told that about the trim which took FOR EV ER.

We've spent our time doing what we can to get things done. My favorite Anthony-project was crafting a stand for our vessel sink and faucet for the "Kamp bathroom". (Yes, if you give us things for our house we will name a room after you too.) I absolutely love how it turned out. The top is actually the old floorboards from the basement of the house we tore down.

View of mudroom entrance and "Kamp bathroom" with homemade vanity.

Our GE (plug for Jason) range and microwave arrived for the kitchen and Anthony is finishing the cabinet trim and toe kicks and getting things ready so that they can be installed. Apparently this will involve changing the plug on the microwave so it can go into Massachusetts' fancy outlets.

There is still one piece of missing temporary countertop. Remember about two weeks ago when I said the missing piece would be in stock in a week? Yeah, that didn't happen, and like a comedy show we have been running ourselves mad trying to figure out a temporary solution for our temporary top. We were set to go check out a craigslist option tomorrow when Ikea called and CONFIRMED (whatever that means) that it would definitely be in by next weekend. So we're taking our chances and waiting it out again. Which holds up the sink/faucet... But that's okay because it's already held up by the water issue.

Ahh, the water issue. The town won't let us have water until they change a valve. Apparently we're in the "queue" for this. I wonder when that will happen. Therefore we have toilets both in our dining room and our shed waiting to be installed as well.

Dining room with toilet parts and stair parts

It's okay, we can't really put the one in the shed in yet since the basement floor has not been etched or sealed yet anyway. That's why the vanity and washer/dryer for that bathroom are still in the rental house.

I'd be lying if I said we weren't getting anxious.

-J

The Beginning of the End

As both of our readers must surely know by now, we've had some issues with our floor. Over the past 4 months these issues have at times prevented us from knowing what types of wood floors could be installed over radiant heating, prevented us from planning the stairs and stair railings, and preventing us, our builder, the stair guy, the floor guy, the other floor guy, and the other floor guy's installer from having an enjoyable time talking about this process. I've not even mentioned the poor girl from Home Depot that we put through the ringer.

So, when a pallet of boxes containing 1400 square feet of lightly-stained, eco-core, engineered tongue and groove hickory arrived at the house yesterday morning and were quickly opened and utilized...it was very exciting.

Thankfully, the flooring installers did a great job: showing up early, leaving late, finishing a floor a day. Below are some pictures of the job in process and finished.

The Night Job

Oceanographer by day, amateur homebuilder by night, and enough grace and stamina leftover to take a time-out and care for Natalie when she pulls her first fever (no worries- she's better now). The glow next door reflects the many nights spent working next door (and highlights the need for shades/curtains).

Sometime in the middle of the night

On Thursday most of our light fixtures were installed by the electricians. Apparently we had lost count of how many lights we actually had, as we ended up being short three fixtures...the master bedroom closet, the washer/dryer area, and the mudroom (after all the problems it's caused us, we just forgot all about it). A few others, like the ones over the island, were deferred until the island was actually secured in place with a countertop. Still, it was fun to see some of the rooms take shape with the trim work nearly complete and the lights up...some of the lights even have temporary bulbs.

Anthony and Natalie checking out the sconce in the bathroom.

We are striving for a Energy Star HERS rating that will require at least 80% of the lights to be something other than incandescent. As most electricians and 'lighting experts' abhor CF or similar energy efficient bulbs because of their un-incandescentness, most of our bulbs will be supplied by a energy rating company (the same people who will pressure test our whole house), and are yet to come in. So the electricians left a skeleton crew of bulbs in place, perhaps to show us that they all actually worked. Again, much of the house, really just the simple rooms, feels like it is almost there...and just waiting for the floor.

These little button lights are our go-to easy fix for many areas of the house.

Which brings me to the rest of the weekend - after another trip to our Swedish hardware/furniture/solution store - we came home with the three remaining lights as well as our temporary solution to a kitchen countertop. Sunday, Anthony finished putting together and securing the cabinets and placed the temporary countertop. There is still one piece of the temporary top that we'll have to pick up, but it was on back order until this coming week. We're using temporary tops in the kitchen and bathrooms so that we can complete the project enough to move in and then focus on making the real ones at our leisure.

Island with butcher block top

We also finalized our door hardware on Friday, which took a dramatic switcheroo right at the end. Many of our selection 'issues' seem to occur when we have some entrenched design preference or idea or concept fixed in our heads that, over time, becomes untenable. Of course once you've decided to go a certain direction, it takes so much longer and so much more effort to change to a direction you'd previously discounted for some, previously iron-clad reason. (Perhaps this is what our builder was going through with our stairs). We were originally heading in one direction with cool handlesets and deadbolts and fancy rectangular rosettes from Emtek, when it occurred to us we wouldn't be able to leave and lock our doors without a key (which in hindsight, everyone should be able to do). After a too-long struggle to find a workable option with Emtek, we ended up changing lock and lever style as well as manufacturers completely. Writing this, it sounds like trivial issue, which I totally agree with, but for 'frugal wafflers' this is a bad scene.

Finally, it's felt like we've been hemorrhaging monopoly money for the past few months, but we think we now have everything ordered, planned out, or waiting to be installed. Everything, that is, except the kitchen sink. We'll have to get on that.

-J

Something Under Our Feet

Our tile is in and finished: the mudroom floor, the wall around the tub, and the bathroom floor.

Mudroom tile- It's called "Ayers Rock Cobalto Blue", which I find funny. I've been to Ayers Rock (yes, I did just work that in) and nothing about it reminds me of this tile, nor do I think that the tile or Ayers Rock have much to do with "blue". Maybe that's why we got a sweet discount on it.

Upstairs bathroom: "Stoney Point Grigio" on the floor and white subway tile around the tub.

The floor in the rest of the house was scheduled to be installed Monday, but now that's pushed back until Wednesday. Why? It's complicated. It involves stair guys, floor guys, us, "experts" on the phone in Georgia and the whole-like. What it comes down to is that our people here have been doing things a certain way for thirty years and if we throw them even the smallest design curve ball they balk and spend their time and energy trying to get us to change our minds rather than spending their time and energy embracing the new challenge (even if we're trying to get them to do something that's actually pictured in their own catalog). You would also think stair guys and floor guys had worked with each other before. This does not seem to be the case. This is difficult for Anthony and I to deal with, and I think it's because we both work in professions where learning something new (and collaborating) is celebrated.

So I'm holding my breath until Wednesday now.

-J

Anthony the Scandinavian Carpenter

Cost-saving measures require that we acquire new personas. Ikea requires that we find some freetime in the middle of the night for a few weeks and can understand diagrams with little quizzical cartoon guys.

Anthony has been putting cabinets together whenever he has a "bit" of time since we picked them up flatpacked back in April. Last weekend we also started to install them so that they'll be in place before the floor goes in. There was some initial worry about making sure we were certain where the studs and a pipe were hidden, but the purchase of a stud finder confirmed our measurements and we were set to drill into our new walls and start hanging.

Cabinet One (note the daylight)

Two

Three

Four... right side uppers all hung (while the rest of the world sleeps)

Of course, even with all the planning and measuring and wall moving, Anthony discovered that the architect had not accounted for picky little things like the width of the window trim, or at least the window trim that the builder had put on, and so we had to rethink how we were going to handle our new odd-sized space on the left side of the window. I think we've figured out a new plan that should work. We shall see as the installation continues...

-J

Shim the Trim, Paint the Shelf

The past week or so, John's workers have been busy finishing up the trim around the window, doors, and closets. Painters have been appearing randomly to prime the trim that is done, and returning again later to prime others. I think it is safe to say that we are starting to get close to the end...of what seems like the long, twisty path to completion. It's been interesting to see each of our decisions come to fruition.

Basement trim completed. We love the shelves that resulted from our thick walls.

Along the way we have turned to various people for advice. Sometimes it just happens to be an innocent friend/family member/acquaintance/random person on the street who was unfortunate to offer us a polite, "hey, how's your house coming along?" and sometimes it's people we actively seek out in the middle of decision-making panic attacks. I guess we figure that if we follow their advice and don't like it we can blame someone besides ourselves. However, in other cases we have to give credit where credit is due.

Windows at the top of the stairwell

Jamey got the window trim phone call late one night. He has art degrees and Urban Outfitters cred so we figured he knew what he was doing. His design input was to look at white like the matte of a framed picture. Now that the white (which is way cheaper) trim is in we can really see what he means. Especially when that "picture" is of the pond or the trees. Bright, clean, pretty...

Living room windows

There are other parts of the house that have turned out surprisingly nice, especially those that we didn't really think about ahead of time. Along the edges of the thick basement walls, we let the sash of the window extend and create a shelf. For many of these items, it's been a struggle to get our builder to find the joy in doing something creative and unique, so when we end up with something like this it's extra exciting.

Checking out the view from the room in the basement

In addition to the trim, the carpenter has been busy installing shelves and rods in the closets and pantry. We had to peer into the crystal ball of our future lives and try to figure out what belongings we were going to put where and what the arrangement of shelves and rods should be. We won't really know how we did on that until we move back in.

Upstairs linen closet with shelves

I guess if it doesn't all fit we can always store our extra stuff in my parents' barn or my in-laws' basement (just trying to see who's reading all the way to the end...).

-J

Resolved

In a flurry we were able to metaphorically nail down our floor. It's going to float, of course, so by that I mean we picked it out, half-paid for it, and arranged for it to be delivered and installed.

After the Great Floor Fiasco of last week we re-explored a couple more of our options until they either fell apart or panned out. In the end there was one business in town left standing when we told them our budget and our wishes. Now our only wonder is if we had told them a lower budget, would they have met us at that price-point as well?

The important thing is that we got the floor we want at a price we're comfortable with (as comfortable as two cheapskates can be...) and in the timeline we need.

Meanwhile, kitchen cabinets are beginning to take shape in the living room of our rental house, the trim and doors are being hung over at our new house, and our minds have moved on to trying to figure out what we want the stair railings and balusters to look like (or how to get them to look the way we want and still meet code).

A busy place

- J

Gas, Trim & the Great Floor Fiasco

I have to be honest. It's May and I'm starting to really feel the timeline slipping away. I think I'm nervous about it because of a few slightly major decisions that are still left in the "to do" column. One of these is the real floor that will go over the radiant panels . To our credit, we've been attempting to figure this out for months, but have been dancing in a "two steps forward- three steps back" kind of routine. Flooring people have either been decidedly unhelpful, unknowledgeable or just plain full of misinformation. For example, we thought we were close to choosing a certain floor this week. All along the representative had assured us it was okay to float over radiant. Today we learned that the company says that it's not. And so we start again.

As far as things that are getting done, we picked up the bathroom and mudroom tile and ordered two of our toilets on Saturday. Anthony also completed the rest of the radiant floor panel lay-out over the weekend.

Anthony's weekend project: Grand Central Station

The indoor trim is being installed and is really classing up the place.

This trimmed-out window currently has a view of the porta-potty.

Our gas line was also put in on Tuesday.

Things are happening, but figuring out that floor piece would really move everything along and make me feel like it would be possible to finish before the summer.

- J

What Two Can Do

The mom and dad crew continued to slave away yesterday on their own. They managed to complete all three bedrooms. So what if they can no longer stand up straight? At least they know that this winter they can come back and lie down on an all-house-heating-pad-of-a-floor.

My parents pressing and screwing aluminum panels into the plywood tracks.

Yes, we're putting even more metal into this house!

Anthony returned home in the late evening, and then sometime in the middle of the night got worried that it would rain on our plywood. He entered into a crazy can't-find-the-tarps-solution-seeking fiasco that eventually involved him single-handedly moving all the plywood and then covering it with shower curtains. He was quite disappointed when he woke up this morning and it wasn't raining yet. But then you could just hear his inner voice squeaking "I knew it" in delight when the rain started up mid-morning.

- J

Holes

Holes in the front yard.

Holes in the back yard.

Holes in our bank account...

On Friday we came home to a very large hole, a very big excavator, and a super huge lego brick in our front yard. Apparently it was time to move the septic tank back in.

It was also time to get our mitigation plantings in. Anthony went to two different nurseries on Saturday and filled the Rav 4 with native species. He then began digging...

We're coming down to crunch time here where all the things that make a home need to have been bought yesterday so that we don't slow the project down. This is especially hard on us frugal wafflers, but we're hanging in there the best we can. We keep reminding ourselves that the important items are done (like the insulation), and what we're choosing now can be more or less changed down the road if we can't find exactly what we want at our bare-bones budget right now.

- J

Caffeinated Results

The Mountain Dew and Red Bull seemed to work. The blueboard is all hung (shown below) and plastered (not shown here). No more walking through walls- the real house has taken its form.

Looking down the upstairs hallway from the Master Bedroom

In the Master bedroom, looking toward the closet

Main Floor- the ladder is in the kitchen

Main Floor, looking toward the stairs, dining room and front door

Office in the basement

The shelves below the windowsills are a remnant of the thicker concrete walls along the bottom part of the walk-out basement.

Meanwhile the decisions are still flying at us fast and furious. We're keeping up and trying to stay slightly ahead of the game the best we can!

- J