December 1st = the new September 1st

It's official - the house is habitable!!! We have finally joined the felines and have moved into our house, a day after Corey's back surgery. He's doing great (see rare picture for proof), but is sad that he can't help Anne move all of our stuff. But not as sad as Anne is about that. Luckily we have friends. Angela helped move in a bunch of stuff and Eric, JT, and John came this past weekend to help insulate the crawlspace. Sadly, Corey decided to save money and get the fiberglass insulation for the crawlspace, thereby sacrificing Anne's lungs. From that exercise Anne also learned that sunglasses are not a good substitute for safety goggles. Luckily, we are surrounded by plenty of outdoors, so fresh-ish air is not a problem.



And the recent snowstorm has transformed our home into a beautiful winter wonderland:







Shanks has a most ideal life here. His favorite activities include romping around the neighborhood with Daisy and eating copious amounts of snow.

Thanksgiving is Thursday?!

Well we are very close now and getting ready for Paul and Eliza's trip up for Thanksgiving. Unfortunately my camera battery is dead and I can't find the charger at the moment (somewhere between here and there) so no pictures to post. But here's where we are:

1. Light monitor is all clad in Galvalume;
2. Heat is up and running and working nicely;
3. Plumbing is all in place with only the kitchen sink remaining to be hooked up;
4. All appliances operational except the oven which will be hooked up tomorrow;
5. Kitchen cabinets essentially finished.

Of course the more we get done the longer the punch list seems to grow. We had a scare with the refrigerator two weeks ago. When we tried to move it off the palette a panel was loose and caused a crimp in one of the lines running from the compressor. I had many long and painful calls to Fisher & Paykel but in the end Brown's Appliances was able to fix it and it is running nicely.

The kitchen cabinets took much longer than anticipated. They are finally all leveled, screwed together and attached to the walls. All hardware is in place. The upper cabinets are all in as well. There are a few minor issues left and some undercabinet lighting but otherwise it is good to finally have that behind us. We have set some particleboard countertops which will serve as a base for the concrete countertops we intend to create.

We actually spent the night there last night and it was like sleeping in the trees. The only problem was the cats. They got a little restless in the night and nearly drove me crazy. They need to stay inside for a few more days to adjust to their new home but I can't wait to let them out.

So we are getting ready for Thanksgiving dinner. Paul and Eliza will be here Wednesday night and this will be the 6th Thanksgiving for Paul and me. I hope to be baking the lasagna in the oven soon. Oh and I think since I will have them trapped up here we can eliminate a few of the items on that punch list...

Are we getting closer or running in place?

It seems like we are getting closer but that only seems to emphasize the that which we still have left to do. The Galvalume is nearly complete on the light monitor and should be wrapped up this week. We have attached the base cabinets to the wall but need to exchange some upper cabinets for wider units. Another trip to IKEA, sigh. The plaster in the bathroom is finished and we sealed it this weekend. It is ready for plumbing. Theoretically, by the end of this week we should have the following complete:

1. Electrical devices in;
2. Plumbing hooked up;
3. Heat;
4. Sub-tops on cabinets with sink and cooktop set, ready to receive concrete;
5. Galvalume completed on the light monitor;
6. Tall cabinets in place.

We'll see how we do. My back made it hard to work this weekend so Anne did all the heavy lifting.

The bathroom is rather difficult to photograph.

Still nice light in late afternoon.

It felt good to rip the plastic off.

Cabinets

Well we got all the base cabinets together this weekend and one upper cabinet. All in all the installation was relatively easy, if you follow the directions. The directions tend to be diagrammatic and so you have to read ahead to make sure you get the various pieces in the right locations. Other than that they go together fairly easily. We did find that they sent us the wrong panels for the corner unit which is frustrating as it has to be re-ordered. Oh well.

Plaster finishes up today so we should hopefully be able to seal it this weekend. We should have the semblances of a bathroom next week. Not too many pictures to add as the camera battery died. We'll try and get some more up as the plaster finishes and the cabinetry progresses.

The protective plastic is still on the cabinets so they look darker than they actually are.

This is a tough space to photograph, especially when the scaffolding is in the way. We were contemplating leaving the scaffolding. It could become a nice steam room when someone is taking a hot shower down below. The skylight still needs finish paint.

The photos don't quite do justice to the skill of Peter and Jamie. The work is very nice.

Back and Forth

This weekend we spent most of our time finishing the floor. Unfortunately this was a come-and-go process. We put down three coats of Zip Guard (I'll post a link to the right) water-based "environmental" finish. It went on easily and dried very quickly. One end was starting to dry by the time we got to the other. We started out by sweeping off the wood and rubbing it down with alcohol to remove as much of the dust and footprints as possible. The first coat went on and we came back in an hour and it was dry. We sanded it down (by hand which made Anne wonder why we hadn't rented a machine) and then applied the second coat. We came back another hour later, sand and repeat. It was very low odor and on their website it claims that it out-wears "polyurethane, varnishes and lacquer finishes 2-1." I'm not sure I buy that and we will subject it to very heavy wear (i.e. Shanks) but the flooring is made to be replaced.


On Sunday we came back and sanded again and I put on a fourth coat. I let this one sit for a few hours this time (and the Patriots game was basically over by halftime) and then went back to finish putting in the screws. As there are about 50 screws per sheet it took a while. I put in all the fasteners but those along the edges which will require a 90-degree gun. We'll let the finish cure for a few days and start the cabinet installation this weekend.






Skylight ready for plaster.

Flooring and Plaster

Thought I'd post a couple of quick photos (not very good ones) of the flooring and the plaster. Peter St. Germain and his assistant Jamie have been laying up lath and KalKore for the plaster. Tobin, meanwhile, has been laying out the floor. For flooring we are using birch plywood just screwed down. The plywood is PureBond (click on the link to the right) and has no added formaldehyde. If we don't like it or if a sheet gets damaged (i.e. the dog destroys it) I figure we can easily replace it.



Shower niches.

Shades of Gray

Well the drywall was hung before lunch on Monday and the first coat of tape and mud on by the end of the day. It was sanded and primed by Friday afternoon. Anne and I struggled a bit with what colors to paint the wall and ceilings. Because the kitchen cabinets will be such a strong presence in the house as they will be a gloss red, we wanted something that would not compete with these. At the same time we felt that (Anne in particular) the walls did not need to be white. So we ended up moving towards a cool gray. We decided to keep the ceiling white to keep it as light as possible. We looked at numerous color chips and finally settled on one. The woman at the paint counter at EBS said that Benjamin Moore's Regal Matte in such a light color would probably cover in one coat over the primer. I decided to take her word for it, figuring we could always mix more if it felt too thin. In the end one coat was sufficient and gave us good coverage and the ceiling had been primed so thickly we felt it didn't need any more. We did not paint the doors as three of the panels need to be replaced and we want to wait until they have been replaced so we can paint them all at once.



After priming.


Window reveal.




Two gallons of paint later...

Denim-sulation

I hope that people are checking in still. There haven't been any comments in a while and we still haven't heard from Lucas. We hope he's alive - Tobin and Ander are looking for him. Something about rough openings??

So we finished up the insulation for the main space on Friday aside from a few bays requiring plumbing and electrical work. The cotton is great to work with in that you don't need gloves or masks; though when it gets torn apart I would definitely recommend wearing a mask. I nearly coughed up a sock when I was done. But otherwise great to work with. We shot down to Boston on Saturday to get the rest of the cabinet fronts and see Paul and Eliza. We returned Sunday after racing through a corn maze in Haverhill. The plumbing and electrical rough-in work was finished on Monday and the inspections for both on Monday afternoon. After we got the thumbs-up from Angie I proceeded to finish the insulation in the main space and move on to the skylight while Tobin did the rest of the prep work for the drywall crew. Anne showed up to prime the windows and hand (actually throw would be a better description) insulation up to me so I could finish insulating around the skylights.

Drywall started at 6 this morning and when I left at 8:30 they had all the walls and ceiling hung with the exception of the slots in the ceiling. They should have the first coat of mud on by the end of the day. Should look very different when we get home...





Monday night.


Shanks resting after a long day.

Last Week

Just another quick update. We now have a plumbing permit and this week we are planning on finishing rough-in work for both electrical and plumbing. We hope to have them inspected simultaneously. Drywall is slated to arrive on Friday and hanging start on Monday which means Anne and I will be busy insulating the walls this weekend. The cotton batts should be here on Wednesday. Ceiling framing is complete and otherwise we are in a holding pattern. So today I am just posting some exterior and interior shots from last week. We will probably not post anything further this week unless something major happens.

We had some issues with our sliding doors and had the Andersen rep out to take a look. It turns out that 3 panels will have to be replaced.

Wood stove framing with log storage below.

The bathroom gets light even on a foggy afternoon.