Pair Street Home

Christmas come early

2009-12-17T09:59:00.002-05:00

It's done.

When I say it's done, I mean we're actually done. It's crazy to be at this point. There are only a couple of loose ends; we're still waiting on a shower door (next Wednesday) from Kennesaw Glass and Julio is coming back on Friday to seal the grout in the new bathroom. That and lighting (just two cans) which will be put in tomorrow as well.

The contractors worked until 8:30pm last night, which made it a 12 hour day for them. As the evening set in, there was a palpable sense of excitement around the place; maybe it was me projecting, but everyone seemed to be happy that the job was wrapping up and that we'd finally made it through the finish line. Everyone seemed to be genuinely happy with their work, with what they did, and with what we did. It kinda felt like Christmas. And they do have reason to be happy with their work, the house looks absolutely amazing.

And they cleaned. Oh did they clean. I even got them to vacuum out the inside of the cabinets since many of them had debris in them. You can actually see the tile now, although it probably needs a good wet mop to really bring out the color. Hell the house is almost party ready as it stands now and we haven't even brought our stuff out from the Pod yet.

I think after the party is over we'll have a detailed post-mortem of everything we've done and a lot of pictures with a real, non-iphone camera.

Closing the door

2009-12-14T13:50:00.004-05:00

Today we close on the mortgage at 4pm, provided there's no problems. I got my cashiers check and drivers license ready! Here's to hoping we get a big novelty check.

The past week has been nuts, hence the lack of updates. Things are taking form as we set up the new stuff. Last night Jesse helped me hang the tv and cut a couple holes in the drywall for the cabling, and with the sofa/coffee table set up it actually looks like we have a living room. We also set up our guest bedroom and stayed in there last night since the master bedroom is still a mess due to the bathroom renovation. The bathroom so far looks amazing; most of the tile is up on the wall. It should probably be done by tomorrow at the latest. I think I'm most excited about that bathroom; it's tiled top to bottom and we have dual shower heads.

The french doors got put in yesterday as well, laundry room door will probably go in today.

With that, we are just about finished. After the bathroom is done there is just a few odds and ends as well as paint touchups and then we're done, done, done. And just in time for our party, I might add. It's definitely a race to the finish line but it will definitely be worth it in the end.

Yesterday

2009-12-09T09:45:00.000-05:00

What I did yesterday:

sold our couch for asking price on craigslist
returned giant bags of things to Home Depot that had been sitting around cluttering up the kitchen and living room, and both of these things gave me the funds to:
buy more organizational crap at Home Depot AND:
go to Kennesaw and buy the rest of the tile for our master bath remodel
drive to Dallas (where I have never, never been before) to buy end tables for $15!
brought all that crap back to the house
taped and painted a chalkboard on the cabinet panel beside the fridge
spray painted our end tables b-l-a-c-k from the orangey pine color they were originally (before and after pic of that is on Nate's phone)
cleared out the entire living room and kitchen (which was a big feat, trust me)
swept the entire living room and kitchen

The end. Nate put together some furniture while I did that stuff. Our remaining tile and wallpaper (short by two feet on both counts originally) showed up, so the guys are starting work again today. This round, they're doing the following:

exterior paint (which I need to go buy ASAP because they decided the conditions were right for that today) - pressure wash, trim, shutters, etc.
installing a new door from the laundry room to the patio and cutting out/installing a dog door for that
installing french doors to the patio
putting in the final toekick (goes around the island in the kitchen)
shelves for my bathroom
finishing the wallpaper and backsplash
demolishing the tiny master bath
tiling it and installing new fixtures

When that's done, the only things we'll have left to do are the basement refinishing and adding a garage instead of the car port that's currently there.

Think we'll save those for the new year.

I was working on this stuff from 9 am to 11 pm yesterday, and I'm worn. out. The days before that had me on my feet on that porcelain floor for hours and in the car port painting more furniture for hours and all I know is that my hamstrings SCREAM every time I sit down. It's strange.

There aren't updates right now 'cause we're in the serious final push; I'm really looking forward, though, to having some time just before Christmas to sit down and write about everything that's been happening in the last month or so. And BeforeAndAfters. Ohhhh my goodness, can't wait to do BeforeAndAfters.

Quick pic of the tile for the master bath:

The marble mosaic at the top will be a 4-inch border that spans the room around chest height, the poorly-lit porcelain 8x12 underneath it (which is the same marble color as the broken mosaic) will be laid in a subway pattern around the entire room and shower stall, the dark grey mosaic will be a 4-inch border on the floor on all sides, and the cracked/broken mosaic will be the rest of our floor. The whole room will be tiled and level, no divider between it and the shower stall. We're installing a seamless glass door as the only divider.

It's gonna look like the tiniest freaking Roman spa you've ever seen.

Two weeks.

2009-12-01T17:10:00.002-05:00

A crowning achievement

2009-11-22T00:09:00.003-05:00

Today was a pretty good day. A REALLY good day, actually.

We found a contractor named Jose from Golden Touch Painting through our dear friend Ashley, who could not speak highly enough about him. We met with Jose a couple times last week, and he was a really cool guy. He's just one of those people that you instantly like when you meet him. The best part of the whole thing is, they have a crew. Which is pretty freaking thrilling, considering that Andrea and I are used to one guy puttering around the place doing what he can or what he feels like doing. Those days are now over.

Jose and his crew are completing everything that isn't electrical. Finishing up the kitchen, hooking up the disposal, doing the backsplash, finishing the bathroom, doing all the trim for the entire house. They started this morning at around 9am. We came back at around 5 and pretty much all the crown molding, baseboard, quarter round, and beadboard trim is in place. Doors too. It looks absolutely amazing. I can't tell you how much better crown makes a room look. So, I'll show you. They say they are going to be done by Tuesday, which totally blows my mind. Given the amount of progress they made today, I have no choice but to believe them.

Meanwhile, Waylyn Morgan is doing the electrical for the whole house (probably a familiar name for those of us who are South Cobb alumni.) He's been pretty great so far, and I'm really glad we got an actual electrician to redo our old wiring. There were a lot of potential pitfalls we could have fallen into and never known about. There was a lot of incorrect wire that had been run (thanks, former contractor!), oven wire was too small for current appliances, two prong outlets everywhere, not to mention the fuse box itself was both too small and a complete mess. All of that is fixed now, and he's also doing the rest of our lighting for us. So far we have recessed cans up in the master bedroom now, kitchen is coming soon. I really can't wait to see what the kitchen will look like all lit up; we'll have four different kinds of lighting in there. Recessed cans, pendant lights over the island and sink, under-cabinet lights, and LED strips just under the toekick.

So, we're busting our budget for labor like whoa. But I think it's worth it, since this thing is actually going to be finished next week before Thanksgiving. I don't think that has quite sunk in yet.

Here comes the BACKspLASH. Was that a good one, Nate?

2009-11-13T13:10:00.002-05:00

So the team of three contractors we brought in for an estimate gave us the estimate. Steep. Lots steep. We're gonna try with a couple other folks that friends have referred to us, but time is such a stressful factor here. Couple days to get somebody in there, an hour of eating crow while we look over HOW MUCH was left unfinished, and then a day or two to wait for an estimate. Assuming they can start right away.
So we're also going to go over the list and see if we can bring these guys in to do the jobs they gave us fair prices on and find others to do the rest. Scrambling for solutions, that's the phrase I'm gonna use.
They quoted us $380 to install the backsplash. This backsplash right here.

Hot secks, right?
And while I'm DYING to see this stuff actually up on the wall, for $380 . . . I can distinctly remember Nathan talking about how he was so excited to install it himself. Yep, definitely remember that.

I hit a high point yesterday with the stress. Today's a lot better. I'm starting to really adjust to the fact that, at best, we'll be moving IN around Thanksgiving. Not exactly settled or cooking dinner for anyone just yet.

But this year will be the happiest Christmas party we've ever thrown. And in the meantime, I'm gonna try and enjoy the holidays no matter what else gets chucked at us.

"For next time."

2009-11-11T20:33:00.000-05:00

Hah, Nathan. Right.
I'm about convinced that I'm gonna have babies in this house just so I won't have to move and do this all over again any time soon.

Don't believe that though, Clay and Paula. We still want y'all to come over sometime before Christmas and look this place up and down.

Square one

2009-11-11T16:03:00.003-05:00

Although I couldn't be there this morning due to work-related reasons, Andrea met with a contractor this morning and we are now waiting on a quote. The guy has a crew and would be able to pretty much finish everything in less than two weeks starting Monday: that's including the kitchen, bathroom, and all the trim. Not sure when we're going to have a chance to tackle the master bathroom, because that will be a huge task in and of itself.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the quote will come in around what I am thinking it will. It will definitely be way more than what we planned to spend on labor, but at this point we are simply out of time and are going to pay if we're going to get to live there in any reasonable timeframe. But hopefully the promise of future jobs and/or paying in cash will help us negotiate a good deal.

In any case, there's a deceptively large amount of work to be done because there are simply so many loose ends. The more I think about it, the more I realize that Jeff never actually finished anything. Definitely a lesson to keep in mind for next time.

Room and BOARD? HUH? HUH???

2009-11-09T17:46:00.000-05:00

A few quick pictures of the baseboards - the bits that are up, anyway. Nate can talk about the installation process; all I know is that it required a bunch of trips to Home Depot.

Little sneak peek at the floors, too - though they're dusty at the moment from cutting all that trim.

Backsplash pictures soon. It's not tiled, but we got all the tiles in and I stuck a couple up against the wall to see what it'll look like.

Prettttttty excited about that one.

So. Where to begin?

2009-11-09T13:01:00.000-05:00

Nate was right, that was the worst move ever. A weekend of 10-13 hour days. I'm really proud of us, we DID IT. But I never want to do it again. Hah.

The real story, for now (and then I'll follow with some happy updates about doors and paint and floors and trim and backsplashes), is our contractor. He's now our former contractor.
And let's discuss why.

This is our first experience with renovation, obviously. And on the whole, we've been pretty damn lucky. I'm just beginning to believe that contractors are a headache no matter who you deal with - and it's making HGTV painful to watch at the moment.

Our guy was really affable, pleasant, blah blah blah. In the beginning, we were completely grateful for the work he was doing, the advice he was giving, and the price he was charging.
And then that changed.
A favor is a favor when it's actually done. And we started demolition in, what, August? The bulk of construction was in the kitchen and the main bathroom. And guess what? The kitchen's not finished, and the bathroom's not finished. The fact that any work is done in the bathroom at all was thanks to me, Nathan, Jerry, and Nate's mama. Jerry tiled that gorgeous floor. That's about all that's done.
And we're bitter.
The guy obviously had other jobs he was working, and when they slowed down he gave us priority. When there was other work, nothing got done over here. Nothing. We'd ask for timelines or dates, we'd get "oh yeah sure, no problem"s at every question. Then those changed into "well, we'll see"s.
It started to get tense a week or two ago, and then it came to a head last Friday when we went to the house and saw that drawers weren't in some cabinets (excuses), HANDLES weren't put on cabinets or drawers (no excuse), the sink wasn't connected (excuses, if I remember right), and there was an insane amount of clutter and mess everywhere.

We'd spent a full day moving that clutter and mess out of the living room so the flooring guys could get in to sand and stain the hardwoods. And they did! They did it quickly, they did it correctly, they did it nicely, and they worked hard. For a VERY fair price.
You get frustrated when you see what you CAN have from vendors.

Nate called our GC and kept asking when we would have a finished kitchen. Evasive answers every time. So we kept asking. Finally the dude says, "are you really asking me that again?"

Oh yes. Yes we are.
Because you SAID it would be done by the end of the week. It's Friday. It ain't done.
And then he tells us that we should be "doing handsprings" over the fact that he's coming over on Sunday to do work.

Long story short, he didn't come over on Sunday. When I started telling him that we're not ungrateful, we're just following through on previously set expectations, he plays that "favor" card again. Listen.
HE quoted us a price, HE knew (despite all the wonderful little ways he found to stall) the work that needed to be done in there MUCH better than we did, and HE said we'd be wrapping up at the end of October. You can equivocate as much as you want, but it's BS. If you wanted to get the work done, it'd be done. Like my pop says - work at 1 am on a Tuesday, work at 9 am on a Friday, work whenever - just WORK. It's amazing how much we got done when we worked in there with Jerry and Lisa in just a couple DAYS.

So no, no favor has been done here. Quite the opposite - now we get to scramble to find a contractor who will finish the mess that's been left for us in a couple weeks. Because I don't want to spend Thanksgiving living in limbo.
He got pissy and said, "well when you're ready to talk to me like I'm somebody, you can give me a call."
The SUPER FUNNY thing is, we WERE talking to him like he was somebody. Like an adult. Like a contractor. Like someone who does this for a living. Like a professional.

So. No more calls. We're going to bring other folks in, and we're going to get it done. And I'm going to eventually let go of being angry. Eventually.
Assuming it's par for the course when you're dealing with GCs, but it's still absolutely no fun. Though I have to say, a giant weight's been lifted off our shoulders just by knowing we don't have to put up with the condescension and the stalling any longer.

Looking ahead, moving forward, yadda yadda. Next updates will be happy ones.

Trimming your expectations

2009-11-09T11:48:00.003-05:00

Things have taken a turn for the worse, or better, depending on your perspective.

On Friday night we decided that we had had enough with our contractor's runarounds. He would never give us a firm date on anything. On Tuesday when he got back in town he said he could finish the kitchen and bathroom by the end of next week "no problem". That forecast got less and less optimistic with each day, with "no problem" being replaced with, "we'll see" "let's see what happens". This is after he said he was going to come over and work all day Friday, but somehow only managed to get water lines to the fridge and dishwasher hooked up. Then he even said that we ought to be doing back flips because he was going to come over Sunday and work all day. When Andrea pointed out that he hadn't finished what he said he was going to finish yet, he got offended and basically said that he was done until we can talk to him like he's somebody.

Somebody. Somebody we're paying to do work for us, supposedly as a favor. It's not exactly a favor if the work isn't getting done. We are just in need of some honesty; if you can't get the work done, then let us know so we can find someone who will. We're already behind schedule, this thing was supposed to be done two weeks ago. So, we're done with him and there is not even a need for a final confrontation since we're paid up to this point already. I feel like a call to him at this point would be akin to surrender, and it's not as if there aren't plenty of people out there looking for work.

So now we're left with a mostly-finished kitchen minus a functioning sink and a few cabinet doors, and a bathroom with no plumbing (but a very nice tile floor.) We've got some leads, so hopefully some of them will bear some fruit soon. We were hoping that the house would be move-in ready by the end of the week, and that prospect is now looking pretty uncertain. If we can find someone in the next day or so, we should be fine. All it really needs is someone working there 8 hours a day until the end of the week. I'm feeling somewhat optimistic about it at this point, but I'm trying to try to look at our situation in a day to day sense to not get overwhelmed. This was a pretty tough pill to swallow so late in the game; I wish things had come to a head earlier, but there is nothing we can do about it now.

Meanwhile, we're doing what we can. We've officially started doing trim, and we're gonna order doors today. We splurged and bought really tall 7.25" baseboards and we're really excited about it. We started putting some down yesterday but couldn't really do much of it since we're going to have to wait and see how big the door casings are. But so far it looks absolutely fantastic. I'll try to have a man update about that at some point, time permitting.

That's it for now. Hopefully things will look a lot different by the end of the week than they do at the moment.

Worst move ever.

2009-11-03T09:02:00.002-05:00

Sorry we've gone dark lately. We just finished dealing with a hellish move over the weekend, but now it's finally finished. Well, the packing the POD part at least. It took three days, which clocked in around 12-13 hours apiece. Not the best weekend we've ever had.

Next on the agenda is getting settled at our temporary home in the in-law suite at mom's house, processing everything that's happened, and finishing the house hopefully in the next couple weeks. The hardwoods are getting refinished as we speak and so far they look fantastic. We chose "coffee brown" for the stain. It's amazing how much it brings out the wood grain. I can't wait to see the final result.

The mortgage is almost ready too. Once the kitchen and bathroom are finished we can get the appraiser out and close very shortly thereafter.

So hopefully everything will get knocked out soon and we can get out of this holding pattern. We'll have a more substantive update later.

Stainless steel backsplash is the winner.

2009-10-25T23:21:00.000-04:00

Just bought our backsplash from cooltiles.com. 5% off with coupon code "KnobCust101." We bought the stainless steel penny rounds and the decision is OVERWITH, DONE.

I'm breathing a sigh of relief and I'm a little surprised at how fast I dropped thoughts of a glass subway tile. I found exactly what had mesmerized me in a Modwalls picture for HALF the price. So I need to settle in and enjoy that I got my fantasy backsplash - but right now I'm just glad a decision's been made and we don't have to go back and forth and worry about it anymore.

Shipping in a few days, up on our walls soon!

PS hardwoods are getting sanded and then stained later this week. Pretty excited about that.

How shoddy Photoshop skills help you make decisions.

2009-10-25T15:57:00.000-04:00

So we narrowed the backsplash down to either the stainless penny round tile or the 1x2 glass subway tile in "Morning Mist," a gray-green.

And we really like either one. A lot. And the difference in price is about a dollar or two a square foot.

So this was what we resorted to in a state of desperate indecision:

The glass tile doesn't have any white grout, something it WOULD have if we put it up, but . . .

Pretty much sold on the stainless penny rounds now.
I'm still scared to place an order.
I don't know why this decision was so tough - I think it's because I've always wanted a really pretty backsplash and I've wanted glass tile on it forever, so it's hard to let go of that. But the stainless is really cool . . .

Yeah?

Sigh.

2009-10-24T13:48:00.000-04:00

Calmer now. A little. But still feeling pretty powerless about this stuff, and it's frustrating. There's a huge push to get things done and get in there, but we're just bumping up against a wall when it comes to the stuff we're not skilled enough to do.

Doing that thing where you remind yourself about letting go of what you can't control . . .
It's just hard when that involves where you live. Hot button issue to say the least.

Anyway, gonna spend today focusing on what I CAN control - packing this apartment. Lord.

PPS

2009-10-19T22:29:00.004-04:00

This (these) is (are) the face(s) of doggy daycare.
I'm officially a fan. And so is he.

A quickie: granite edition.

2009-10-19T22:08:00.007-04:00

I was going to write the big WE GOT OUR COUNTERTOPS! post tonight, but it's way past my bedtime and there's a warm, sleeping dog on me and I'm just not feeling it.
BUT.

I DO want to post just one lil' baby pic right quick.

Freshly mopped floors (probably need one more cleaning to get rid of the rest of the grout haze), a newly mounted apron sink, and frigging MIRROR-LIKE ubatuba granite countertops.
There's so much there in that picture that makes me happy.

Jeff's putting on cabinet fronts and installing the stove and microwave tonight/tomorrow, I believe.

I keep thinking about the different stages this room has gone through in the past couple of months and I'm kind of floored that it's really starting to look like our kitchen now.

Can't wait to post before and afters, oh my gosh.

Anyway. More tomorrow.
Tonight, bed.

PS:

Ahhhh that sink and faucet are so hot.

Enter the tile gauntlet.

2009-10-16T18:50:00.012-04:00

So I'm finally getting around to updating about the tile we laid on Monday.

I took the day off work and we started at 8am. By the end of the day, I had pretty much learned the entire process. I'll recount it here for those who have never done this. If I sound like I know what I'm talking about, it's all a charade.

So to start off we made the mortar (obviously) and cut the first three tiles to start off in the corner and also integrate with the transition. Mixing the mortar struck me as being really similar to making cake batter: you throw the stuff in the bucket, add some water, mix it up with a drill attachment that's basically a huge whisk, and add more water and/or mortar as needed until it has the consistency of cool whip. On the first round, Jerry mixed up a bit too much and almost burned up his drill.
Spreading mortar properly is also an art that's not nearly as easy as it looks. First you scoop it out of a bucket and slap it onto the floor. We used a big rectangular trowel that has two smooth sides and two notched sides. With that, you spread it with the smooth edge as if it was butter on toast, and you go back with the notched side and make even grooves in it. The lines help make contact with the underside of the tile. It's also really important that the amount of mortar you use for each tile is homogeneous, because a tile can sit too high or too low and that's just not something you want (we had a pull up a few tiles throughout the day and add or take away mortar depending on its level.)

After my first few ham-handed attempts to spread it evenly, we fell into a fairly efficient process of Jerry spreading mortar ahead of me as I went from behind and laid each tile. The process for laying the tile itself is pretty simple; you just lay it on the mortar and wiggle it a bit, then scoot it into place. We used 1/8" spacers to make sure everything stayed even, two for each side. That way everything stays nice and straight, because you don't want to lay a whole row and then realize that it's all wrong.

It took about an hour just to get the first row laid, because this is a really big room. In total, we have at least 300-350 square feet. Since we were laying the tile in a brick pattern, we had to cut the first one of the second row in half to stagger the pattern. Jerry told me that I should cut the tile, so it was time for me to learn how to use the wet saw.

A wet saw is a special type of saw used to cut various types of tile, including porcelain. It's just a stationary saw that sprays water on its blade while cutting. They usually have various types of guards to help you cut straight, but Jerry of course did not bring them so I had to figure out how to cut straight on my own, which is basically just a matter of pushing the tile straight through and not letting it get off track. As the picture to the right shows, we just measured what we needed, and drew a line. Not exactly rocket science. But it was my first time using a wet saw, so I figured it was worth at least a little documentation. I was ok at it, my first cut was good but I ended up psyching myself out on later ones so a few subsequent ones were a little crooked near the end. Those edges went against the wall, so getting them completely exact wasn't super necessary. Towards the end of the day I was comfortable enough to do all the cutting and they all came out ok.

It was a long job. We only had about four complete rows done by lunchtime, when we took a short break for lunch after my mom was gracious enough to bring us some pizza. We stood around and ate for a bit, then got back to work.

Once we got towards the wall there was a bit of strategery involved, since it had to be done in a way that wouldn't block us into a corner or a narrow space since you can't walk on the tile for 24 hours once it's been laid. So we laid just a few tiles for the subsequent rows and began to work outwards from the wall, whereas before we were going straight out from the corner. I think this was where I started to reach my limit, because at this point we had been at it for a really long time. We thought about quitting around 5pm, but since were so close to being done we pressed on. Originally I had thought we would just tile underneath the cabinets, but eventually we decided just to cut around them, because it wouldn't have been good to let the cabinets sit there on wet mortar.

Finally around 6pm our last bucket of mortar ran out and we decided that was a good stopping point. After cleaning up, I finally left for home around 7, so it was definitely a day on which I appreciated my white collar job. Jerry's role was crucial, so I'm also incredibly grateful that he helped so much.

But words cannot express how pleased I am with how it came out. Andrea really knocked the ball out of the park by picking out this design. I think with each successive row we put down, I fell in love with this tile more and more. Once it's all finished, I think it will look really sharp with our stainless appliances, white cabinets, and dark granite countertops. I can't wait to see the final result.

Just a quickie.

2009-10-14T22:26:00.002-04:00

Floor in the kitchen is done, and pictures will be coming soon. It looks pretty cool. Jerry came over there today and grouted it all without us even asking for help; that meant a LOT. Gotta think of a way to thank him.
Nate'll have a big tile post up shortly.

Our countertop folks have already templated and they're coming back to install on Friday. Ubatuba won, and we're getting it for $28/sq ft. Pretty amazing.

They tried to screw us on backsplash pricing, though. So we're back to the drawing board on that one. I just ordered some samples, 'cause we're pretty stumped on what to choose. Hopefully seeing them in person will help. ANNNNND I found stainless steel tiles in penny rounds, hexagonal rounds, and 1"x2" subway for HALF what Modwalls is charging.

Here the samples am:

Click 'em if you want to know more about 'em.

But yeah, hoping that we'll finally be able to make a decision on this soon - it's the one thing that's really been making me nuts.

And of course I went looking at more wallpapers. Speaking of decisions.
I'm gonna go with choice #1 from that other post though, I think. We'll see after the samples get here.

Buying and painting/installing beadboard this weekend in the dining room, bathroom, and hallways. If it's easy, I'm wanting to put it on our bedroom ceiling.
Need to buy our can lights, too.

Then doors.
Also, need to book our flooring dudes.

Ughhhh I hope I can switch my brain off and go to sleep soon.

Anyway - any thoughts on those backsplash choices?

Hooray IKEA!

2009-10-08T21:01:00.004-04:00

We're battling guilt today because Walt was in his crate for a ridiculous number of hours - work, haircuts, IKEA for both of us mean we got home at 9, with a half hour break in there from 3 - 3:30. Nate's dropping off the final cabinets at the house now. I came back to get the puppy out and try and cram a day's worth of playtime into the hour before bed. Sigh.

I love IKEA. And oh, I hate it.
They're having a kitchen sale - 10% off any purchase of $2500 or more, 15% off if you buy an appliance with that, 20% off if you buy (I think) 3 appliances.
We bought our stuff THE DAY BEFORE THE SALE BEGAN. Nobody said a word to us about it. Not exactly loving that, BUUUUT customer service went ahead and gave us the discount. So we just got $472 back on our kitchen!!
I love that. Love it. LOVE IT.

They also have exact, if not BETTER versions of all the mirrors I've been checking out on Pottery Barn lately. I got a great big huge etched glass antiquey mirror to go on the wall for my vanity desk for FIFTY DOLLARS. Matches the little one I got from Urban Outfitters for $24.99. I was shocked at that. These things are usually SEVERAL hundreds of dollars.

It's shaped a bit like the one on the right, but it's etched like the one on the left. Couldn't find the actual product online, but oh, it's perfect.

There's a long oval beveled mirror for the wall above the banquette seat in the dining room and that sucker's like $29.99. WHAT?

PB's selling something along the same lines for around 300 bucks. I'm gonna hang it horizontally like that, from a leather strap attached to each side. Stick it right up on a nail. ANOTHER element of my dream kitchen, NAILED! FOR CHEAP!!!!

They also have a couple models for floor lengths that we can use in the guest room and in ours.
The Jondal mirror is $49.99. Has the contrast stitching.

The next is the Mongstad, for $99.99.

Love them, want them. Bought that first one, waiting to get the other two.

Also, where can I put this?

Vanna, $29.99.

And here's a chandelier to go over our dining room table:

Kristaller, $39.99.

Mirror for the main bathroom I'd like to be the owner of:

The Frack mirror, $4.99.

Medicine cabinet maybe?

Fredden, $99.99.

or

Flaren, $99.99.

Anyway, we have our remaining cabinets taken care of and we have that etched mirror for my desk, and the rest . . . we have to go back for.

Which means hours of walking and waiting and figuring and choosing and finding the flat pack boxes in the giant warehouse below and standing in line for ages. 'Cause that's what we did this round. Plus dealing with the kitchen customer service people. Plus the regular customer service people. 2 and a half hours in IKEA makes me want to scream.

BUT. I'm really happy I found solutions to a couple things that were making me worry about compromising what I wanted in order to fit in the budget.

Now I just need to finish report cards and get a wedding gift framed correctly before tomorrow night . . .

I'm going to bed.
HOORAY $470!!

Goodbye linoleum.

2009-10-08T09:39:00.008-04:00

And now it's time to interrupt your inspiration pics for the real thing.

I laid down most of the hardie board yesterday, with the help of Jeff and Jerry. This is something that had been weighing on me considerably, because there were a lot of different ways to do it and even more ways to screw it up. The biggest problem was the old linoleum and what to do about it. In some places there were two layers of it: one brick pattern that was put down in the 90s, and underneath it was a bona-fide 60s style linoleum that probably came with the actual house. The second layer came up pretty easy, but the old stuff was apparently glued at every square inch. As we found with the bathroom tile, they really made this stuff to last back in the 60s. I was also worried about the unevenness, since there were gaps where there was no linoleum at all because cabinets previously occupied those spaces.

I gave up on pulling up the old stuff pretty quickly. That left us with the problem of how to get the hardie backer to bond to it. Jeff suggested that we use mastic glue and liberal amounts of screws, which would bond to the linoleum. Only problem is that that stuff is super expensive, and would take forever to do. And then a guy at Home Depot suggested that all you need is a little bit of liquid nail and some screws around the edge to make it bond. He was very adamant, pretty crazy, and fairly convincing. Jeff wasn't really a fan of this idea at all, and suggested the crazy guy did it that way because he wasn't actually living in the place in which he used this method. He thought that we'd eventually end up with cracked tile. Fair enough.

So we figured out a third and much more pleasing option: nails, nails, and more nails. We ended up getting a pack of 2000 barbed nails, and went to town on the boards with a nailgun. I put a nail in every space there was a cutout for one, and then some more in some spots where needed. Each board probably has at least 64 nails in it, so it's not going anywhere. For the spaces where there were gaps, we took pieces of the pulled up linoleum and put them underneath to even out the space.

Using a nailgun is pretty fun, I have to say. The work also went quickly - we were mostly done in about 90 minutes, plus around another 45 minutes just to make sure each board had enough nails in it (and waiting for the compressor to catch up, you can only put about nine nails in before it has to cut back on to catch up.)

In the pictures if you look closely, you can see the gridwork of nails. I have to say that I'm pretty pleased we came up with that solution. In the second picture, you can also see the tentative location of where the island will be (which is shorter than normal, since it doesn't have its legs on yet.) The cabinets are slowly making their way onto the walls, and tonight we'll have to go pick up a couple that were initially missing from our original order. So I'm thinking we will hopefully have all the cabinets up in the next few days. The fun part about this is that once the bottom ones are in we can have countertop people come out make a template. I am definitely looking forward to granite countertops.

But next up is tile, and I'm hoping we'll be able to pick that up from Floor & Decor sometime in the next few days. I'm actually looking forward to tackling that one, since I've been watching people lay tile on HGTV for about two months straight now. But at the same time I'm bracing myself for how much time it will take, since it is a really big space. It's times like these when life should be more like home improvement shows, where you see a person starting a job and moments later it is all finished.

Inspiration pictures, take II.

2009-10-07T12:38:00.011-04:00

Never say die, right?
Let's try this again.

Love a lot of elements in here that would work really well in our bedroom. The wall and flooring colors are really similar to the ones in ours, and I love the beadboard ceiling and natural fiber window treatments. Sconces on either side of the bed I could take or leave, but I'm interested enough to look around for some. Love the idea of a giant rug and the chair at the vanity's awfully cute.

Another beadboard ceiling. Hm.

I like this for living room ideas. Neutral furniture and walls with little pops of color/print/texture.

Do want. For the living room. I don't know when I went way overboard for anything geometric, but, uh . . . I did. For sure.

Aqua, orange, green, grey. Kind of a mishmash of all the colors we're using predominantly in the house. Wonder how I can divide some of these elements up amongst the rooms . . .

Blogger's being SUPER WEIRD today, so I'm leaving well enough alone and ending the inspiration pics right here. Time to go teach some math anyway.

Pictures = ideas = decor overload.

2009-10-07T11:11:00.007-04:00

This is a nursery, but the use of yellow and red with that wall color is making me wonder about how to handle the office . . .
They're so pretty and energizing in there. Black and white would be a little more masculine (which, since Nate's gonna be spending time in there, is important), but there's something REALLY charming about cute little prints with happy colors.

10 bucks says Nate will see this and say "NOPE!"

Another nursery (I swear I'm not pregnant), but wallpapering the ceiling is the coolest idea ever. It's ~~Sherwin Williams, I recognize it~~ Julia Rothman for Hygge & West. I've been looking at too much wallpaper lately, but Lexa holds it down for me.
They have it in a grey version . . .
But man. I have a feeling that wallpapering a ceiling is also the toughest, most tedious thing ever, too.

Ummmmmm speaking of tedious, I had a ton of pictures that followed these but when I tried to update, it gave me an error and this is all that auto-save kept.

Not gonna give up and scrap the rest, but I sure as crap ain't doing it all over again right this second.

Gr.

Progress pictures: bedrooms.

2009-10-06T21:55:00.009-04:00

Nate, his mama and Jerry painted the bedrooms and they're so lovely. They didn't need to cut in at the ceiling or floor because we're doing crown molding and baseboards. These are iPhone pics, so the lighting might not accurately reflect the colors, but everything's very beachy and peaceful. It's also pixelated a little 'cause I enlarged them after uploading . . . so lazy, I know. We'll get better pics soon.
Anyway, we're using Porter Paints for everything, since Cobb County Schools employees get a big discount. A gallon of flat for roughly 9 bucks, a gallon of semi-gloss for 10.

The master bedroom, in April Sky:

This is the wall where we're going to add larger windows.

The office, in Salty Sea. It's somewhere between aqua and Tiffany blue, and we're gonna play it down a little by keeping a black and white color scheme in the curtains, art, and organizational stuff.

The guest bedroom, in Grey Stone:

They'll all pop even more once the molding is up and the floors are stained that deep, deep brown we love.

We also decided that, since the master isn't as big as we'd like it to be, we're going to add IKEA wardrobes in the guest room along with my makeup vanity and treat it essentially as our giant walk-in closet. The closet in the master will be full of hampers for dirty laundry, and the clean stuff all goes in the closets in the guest bedroom.
Still gonna make sure it's cozy and comfy in case of overnight guests, though.

The next post will hopefully be pictures of the drywall and the cabinets, but for now, I have to end with a picture of my bathroom vanity with the vessel sink we'll attach to it. 'Cause I love it and can't help myself, even knowing that this isn't exactly a glamorous photo of it.

It's all coming together. That's one of the fun parts.

Things I bought.

2009-10-06T21:13:00.010-04:00

It's kind of hard to get used to the fact that we're spending real sums of money here. Like, hey, we just bought toilets for both bathrooms and we didn't have to hem and haw and stick it on some Buy It Later list - we put two in the lil' online cart and bought them. Done.

Today was a purchasey kind of day - lots of stuff taken care of.

I decided to get wallpaper samples, because I really just need to see them on the wall, in person, to make up my mind.

One:

Two:

Three:

Four:

Number one is the front runner.

Sconces for either side of the bathroom mirror:

Oil rubbed bronze strikes again.

Pottery Barn has some great apothecary accessory stuff for the bathroom:

Got the wastebasket, the soap dispenser, the tray, a toilet brush holder, and the small and medium canisters. So basically everything but the soap dish, toothbrush holder, and tissue box cover. (Found them cheaper on Amazon, PS.)

Toilets are both Toto Drake models.

I mean, it looks like a regular toilet. I know. But our contractor was telling us that these things can flush golf balls. Something about the flushing system having a valve that's twice as big as normal toilets?

Urban Outfitters was having a free shipping deal, so I checked out the sale section.

Silhouette hamper, $19.99. For paper/craft trash that'll be generated in the office.

Antiqued mirror tiebacks, $12. For the curtains in the living room.

Triple hook, $6. Got them for the backs of the bedroom doors.

Double hook, $6. For the backs of the bathroom doors.

Key-in-lock hooks, $28. Extra hooks/jewelry or headband holders for my bathroom.

Etched glass vanity mirror, $24.99. For my makeup vanity/desk. It's small though, so I think I'm gonna need to get a larger one for the wall.

Giant cable knit throw, $39.99. Our bedroom color scheme is light blue, dark brown, white and orange.

Velvet pouf pillow, $20.

So. Those are the latest little feathers we (. . . I . . .) bought for the nest.
We need to write a separate entry with pictures of the painted bedrooms, the drywall, and the cabinets that ARE NOW MOUNTED IN OUR KITCHEN!!!!!

Chugging along. Catching myself daydreaming about peaceful mornings in this new place, and chugging along.