Bathroom Tile / Grout Needed

Both of our bathrooms got their tile work completed this past weekend. We are all extremely pleased with the work. The pictures do not do it justice without the grout as it's really unfinished but we couldn't wait to show everyone what it looked like so far!!! That niche is really orange by the way. It appears to be almost red in the pictures.

Stairs Removal

We removed those horrible stairs that went up to the deck over the weekend. Except for the dirty brick it exposed, I think it makes the house look much better. These pictures also show the final stage of the porch that is ready now (well besides the fascia and ice/water shield that needs to be installed) for the standing seam metal roof. Hopefully that will happen soon.

All things considering, I think this is a wonderful shot of the house, you can really start seeing the new shape of exterior things to come. Or at least I can...

Framing up Porch

As mentioned in previous posts the porch idea was an idea of my father's as we brain stormed of ways to correct the problems with the original construction of the house.
Due to the fact that on two sides of the house the second story did not extend over the first story and this caused all kinds of water intrusion issues. He came up with the idea as opposed to framing out of the second story's exterior walls to extend the proper distance over the bottom story. I really liked his idea as I saw it as another opportunity to add some character to a once bland and traditional designed house. In retrospect (even though it has pretty much doubled in the effort we thought it would take, and quadrupled in what we thought it would cost) I like my father's idea much better than the orginal plan. It has added so much to the house, but boy has it been a PITA!!!

Well look who it is!! Myself helping my Father (finally got someone else to take some pictures for a change! I think everyone was starting to wonder If I actually do work or just sit around bossing Dad around!!

My friend Mettler helping my Dad out, thanks again Mettler for all the help!!
Another late night shift. I sure hope the neighbors don't mind!
One side finished and ready for the standing seam roof, well the little side.. HAHA

So after 2 months...

As you can see its a good thing we do not work at the same pace for which I blog. Quite a few projects have been "almost" completed over the last two two months. We are almost done with installing the Range Hood (www.zephyronline.com), almost finished with all of the duct work, and we are actually completely done with the living room ceiling fan (modernfan.com) install.

Awesome story about the range hood, being that I am a eBay fiend and all. I found the hood over a year ago and couldn't find it any cheaper than $1,100ish. Well I saved a search on eBay to notify me if any popped up and VOILA, almost an entire year later I found this one. Brand new, for only $600!!! Another eBay story coming up about the kitchen sink soon!!!

Tile Work Underway

The tile work got underway at the house. I think honestly this might be one of the most exciting milestones when we finish. There is going to be so much tile that it will make an enormous impact when complete. I will be updating as much as I can to show the progress! to be continued.....

Kitchen Cabinets Installed

We got our kitchen cabinets installed. We still have to have to have all of the drawers adjusted as well as the glass doors put on. Honestly we haven't decided on any of the pulls yet either. I just had to get this far so tile work could get started. I will admit it is nice to see them hung and anchored to the wall finally!!!

Ikea Cabinet Assembly

Well we started assembling the the Ikea Cabinets. I am hoping to have all the cabinets installed this week or next. I am leaving the doors up to the cabinet install guys. I figure they do it all day everyday. I'd rather save my stress..

Drywall Complete

You hear countless times that once you have drywall, the house starts looking complete. I agree completely until I drive up and see the progress of the exterior. Being that the weather has basically made it impossible (especially with me having like 0% "meat on my bones") we have switched our focus to the interior.

My father and I can't take the credit for hanging, taping, or floating the drywall as we contracted that out. My father DID do most of the final finishing on the drywall which I can't give him enough credit for. Don't get me wrong, it was miserable as it took an entire week of him sanding, me pointing out imperfections, him sanding, calling the crew the crap we found, him sanding, me pointing, wash, rinse, repeat..etc... I am sure he hated doing it, but at the end of the day I think he and I were both pleased with the outcome.

If I had just went with the work of the contractor and his crew, it would have taken 3 times as long and I would have been absolutely unhappy. While my friend from work (who was actually a painter at one time) was painting our house he commented that the drywall in our house looked like what he had seen in million dollar homes. That sure made all that work seem worthwhile.

Here are some drywall pictures:

How many elbows are too many?

I thought I would give the Chuckster a challenge by asking him to mount my faucet spout and my valve/control lever in two totally different locations. Long story as to why this is a great idea, nonetheless it is. After calling Kohler, we discover they recommend 2-3 elbows maximum. We were at 6 before my Dad solved the riddle. Rolled Copper.

News Flash

I know I really suck at keeping this thing updated. I have so much on my plate that unfortunately this blog usually gets pushed to the back burner, then the stove gets turned off, then the bills don't get paid, then the stove gets repossessed, then the recession happens, then all the CEOS of big corporations get fat bonuses from the bailout..... my point is: I try, but cant seem to find time to keep this thing updated. I do apologize, please bear with me. (btw that was all just a carried away atempt at humor, nothing got repossesed)

Also I would like to add, Amanda and I each got an iphone so I will be mixing pictures from the new gadget with my regular digital camera pictures. I know the quality between the two is quite a bit different, but I always have my phone on me and seldom have the digital camera. End of story.

Square Bay Window Looking Thing

When we purchased our house we were well aware it was way to boxy looking (very traditional as well) with nothing to break up the lines. After careful consideration (and gallons of mt.dew) we decided on breaking up the corner with a "square bay window" looking thing. Forgive my lack of construction knowledge, I am sure there is this great way to describe that better but as usual I am blogging after 14 hours of work so I am running on fumes. As soon as someone is kind enough to tell me what to call it, I will edit my post. Well even though my name for the project isn't awesome, the outcome sure is!!!

Well, there it is 1/4 of the house wide open. I will admit, you have your moments of doubt about two people finishing this before the day's end..
This was at the end of the night, all buttoned up. Time to go home.... approximately 2am
The next day we begin on the other side. Last minute, (guilty as charged), I decided to add another window to this side. It turned out to be one of my favorite decisions so far as I felt this side of the house was looking a little bare. The window was just an extra we had, and didn't know where to use it.

We have Attic Space!! *Kinda

When we began re-modeling/building our house I was at time planning on redoing the roof in 1-2 years after completion as it was in decent shape. Our roof did have this completely ridiculous valley in it that I wanted taken out and a basic 4 hip roof framed out instead. After mulling this over, I decided it would be best to go ahead and have the roof re-framed out now as well as a new roof put on. Not much point in running a marathon with flip flops on. My father and I found a wonderful Hispanic crew who framed out the roof in one day and did a greatjob. I showed up to watch them hang off the side of the house like crazyed monkeys, drink unprecedented amounts of "Rockstar", jam Mexican Music, and laugh at my father completely butchering their language. Ironically they have been the fastest along with providing the best workmanship of any contractors we have used up to this point. I am hoping the contractors we use in the future are that good. We also had a tree removal company come out and remove two trees out of our back yard. I forgot to take pictures with the trees gone to show how much more of our house you can see from the road even though one tree was in the back, and one on the side. Honestly tree removal isn't the sexiest of remodeling, however it might prove to be the hottest..

As you can see we now have some attic space. Of course in the true fashion of how my father and I do things, we open up the roof and attic space AFTER we install the recessed lighting in the tightest and hardest places. I think we have a genetic defect that causes us to do things the hardest ways. I am assuming I inherited that from him. That and I am only 5'6", postitve he gave me that too..
The guys also replaced the fascia boards (which were rotten 1x8 and tilted about 30 degrees back) with a new 2x6 that is straight down without the angle (now they are like | as opposed to \ before). I am going to finish the fascia out with Hardie Trim that is 1x9.25. I always liked larger fascias and the cantilever fascia is going to be 1x9.25, so I really wanted them both to match.