Insulation and More Windows

Its funny how everything moves so fast when you first start a remodel, and then it seems like progress slows just when things get interesting. Actually, its not really that things a progressing more slowly, the guys still show up every day and work all day, its just that what they are working on is not as dramatic as it was in the beginning. Take for example, insulation. Its pretty cool, actually, made of recycled denim (I think it is, at least, thats what Maurice had said in the beginning), but not that exciting to show in pictures.

The big window over the sink was installed, however, and it looks great.

Also, we are working with Maurice on determining what the ledge outside on the deck should look like -- we are trying to make it more open so it doesn't feel as heavy. This looks so much better than it did originally, I think, and now we just need to figure out how to put up the right railing so no one falls through!


Speaking of railings, we've been trying to figure out what style of railing we should use. Maurice had an open house for two houses that he built in Berkeley and we went to see the railings on the decks there. I didn't take pictures, so I can't post them here, but here is the link that shows pictures of the houses and you can see the railings on the decks. http://www.openhomesphotography.com/1411_7th/

I like them a lot -- very simple -- but they might end up being too modern? What do you think?

Up next week -- stucco and dry wall. Pictures should be good!

Windows and Doors

The windows (or at least most of them) and the french doors came in this week, and they put them in. It is still hard to tell exactly what it will look like, but so far, so good, although I have to admit that I pictured them bigger. Here are the french doors from the outside:

I think it will be fine though, once everything else is in place. The design of the deck had to accommodate our entrance to the basement, thus the ledge in front of the window - still trying to figure out exactly how that is going to look like.

Here are the doors from the inside -- again, a little hard to tell exactly what they are going to look like since the dining room is shut off:

Here are the windows that will be above the cabinets on the east side of the kitchen, and the window that looks west - Sage has already found where she will reside on Saturday mornings:










And finally, my favorite window to the south(which has not yet arrived) where we will have the sink:


The pantry has been framed out. The door will be at the angle, and on the left outside wall we will have a floor to ceiling bookshelf for our cookbooks.

While we have already made many choices, it does seem like they keep on coming. We have chosen the tile -- it was between the Heath tile (nice, but 2x the price) and the Italian tile (buttery color, not yellow, but a warm off white). We chose the Italian tile, mostly because of the price. It is lower price because it is factory made, rather than glazed by hand. I love the Heath stuff, and in fact our dishes are Heath now, but I liked the Italian stuff fine. Here it is -- its the big one on the bottom:
Up this week? More windows, I think. We'll see.

Island Choices

Here are two possibilities for the island - you have to use your imagination -- we wanted something a little bit different:




The idea with the second one is that we would put bun feet on the bottom and put a top (maybe zinc or distressed wood) on the top that would extend enough on one side to sit at. Like this one:




The first one would be a table, at island height (36"). No storage or shelves.

Post your comments below.

More work and more rain

We were in Seattle last weekend, visiting Kendall and our friends Jim and Mary and their son Sammy. We had beautiful weather, warmish and no rain at all. Here's what Seattle looked like:


We saw Kendall, who seems to be having a great time in Seattle:

Had some great food and generally enjoyed ourselves at Pikes Market.

In the meantime, work was progressing on the house! The concrete for the foundation and decks was poured, and this week they put in the deck joists so you can see how big the decks will be:

Now we have to pick the deck material...it is spec'ed out for Evergrain -- which is a "green" material, a composite. Maurice dropped off the samples of Evergrain, Treks (Trex?) and Machete (an eco-friendly Brazilian hardwood). When you pick them up, your eye (of course) goes immediately to the wood. When we looked at the Evergrain and the Trex, we didn't really like them. One of the Trex samples, "Brasilia" actually looked ok, but when Maurice priced them out for us, the Trex material cost more than the Machete! Here are the samples (the Machete is the long one in the center):

While the Trex and Evergrain are "green" materials, I am not that certain what happens to them after someone tears out a deck -- do they decompose? Probably not. Anyway, because the decks are big, I am really worried about putting something in that I will eventually hate. Argh.

I am guessing we will go with the wood. I tried and tried to like the Evergrain, mostly because it is half the price, but I just can't see it. Oh well.