Color Inspiration

Just a few pics of the fabrics I'm using for color inspiration, the basement staircase solution and insulation progress. I think the inspector is coming out today, and once they get his OK they will start drywalling. Last chance for in-wall time capsules!

This is the herringbone tile that will be behind the stove. The rest of the wall will be in subway tiles in the grayish-blue color of this pattern. The color of the glazes found in this blend are reflected throughout the new kitchen... in the granite counters, the floor, the cabinetry, and the curtain fabric.

These are the colors in the new kitchen. Grayish blues, golden yellows. I'm going to make curtains for the windows in there with this fabric.

This is the new color scheme for upstairs. Gray, soft yellow, Merlot. I think it's going to be really nice up there when I'm done with it!

The drainpipe staircase solution. The black pipe will be in a space that will eventually be a laundry room so I don't really care that it shows.

The base of the stairs. You can see the drain pipe now angles behind the staircase, but back in to the same hole in the floor.

The basement stairs. New side wall on the right, and no more pipe running through a tread. The inspector came out and said we are up to code, yippie!

My bedroom.

The kitchen extension. Hopefully some time within the next two weeks a window will be here!

The section that is open will be an access door to the storage area and crawl space.

A fully insulated garage will make working out there much more pleasant.

Tortoise pace.

It seems like not much has been done over the last week... but I know they've been working away over there. It's hard to get too excited about progress which includes weatherproofing paper and electrical outlets after seeing leaps and bounds made with framing and roofing weeks before. Just this past week I really started to miss my house and garden. The more I want it to be done the slower it seems to go! Ug. One big issue this last week was the stairs to the basement and their relation to my bedroom closet. In order to bring the stairs up to code we had to get creative with the closet floor. You'll see.

This is a view of the stairs from the basement. Notice the black drain pipe that currently runs into the stairs. That has to be rerouted.

This is a view standing at the top of the basement stairs, looking at what will be a sloped ceiling and a box in my closet. There is that black pipe again. That is the vent part which they are hoping to move out of this area to create more room in the closet.

This is a view of my closet from the bedroom. We had to raise the floor in order to get the head height on the staircase. In the back is the heat and A/C to upstairs.

This is the "box" they built over the stairs to that I can get some hanging clothing in here. See black pipe all the way on the left of the image.

This is the lower part of that same area. This was the only way to get the freaking code head height on those stairs. Stupid code!

My old bedroom window used to be just the top half of this. Now it's twice as large to be an egress window.

Framing on the main deck has begun. The deck is accessible through the sliding doors from the the new kitchen area.

Framing on the small deck outside the mudroom door has also begun.

Interal Medicine for the Home

Looks like they wrapped up the roof over the weekend, and inside the main focus is bringing the electrical up to code. They've also been working on a new staircase to the basement. In other news, my neighbors are loving these guys. The neighbors that I share my driveway with want to hire Right Angle to do an addition on their house. And the neighbor on the other side of them stopped me on the street today and said they've been watching the progress from the second story of their house and they are very impressed. Both people have commented that the guys show up at a decent hour, they don't disturb anyone, the work looks really solid, and they have been all-stars about cleaning up. Yeah! Happy neighbors!

New electric in the wall behind the stove. Hooray for being up to code! This area will be getting a super nice tile job next month.

New electric on the other side of the kitchen. The open area will be drywalled and painted.

Bye bye basement staircase. Not exactly sure what they are doing here, but my crappy death trap stairs are gone so that's a good thing.

The heat and A/C now run up the back of my closet to the upstairs.

The new skylight upstairs will really brighten things up. This will have a shade attached eventually.

New wiring in the floor of upstairs.

Old knob and tube wiring.

On the back side of the addition I had a hot and cold water faucet installed. Now Gus will get his baths outside!

The new roof is on. This window is being replaced by one slightly larger, so once that is done they will repair the stucco.

They've started wrapping the house in this breathable weatherproof paper called Jumbo Tex.

No so good.

Had the first "set back" of the project. Looks like most of the wiring in the house is not up to code, and any room that is part of the remodel has to be brought up to code. Ug. This is not going to be cheap, boo!

This is old knob and tube wiring that is in the ceiling of my bedroom. At some point someone spliced into this and ran other electric off of this... no bueno. This has to go.

This is the sub floor of my bedroom. They pulled up all the yellow painted flooring that used to be under my carpet, and they will lay the new hardwood floor on top of this.

This is the subfloor of the kitchen. At some point someone cut out part of this (see striped green/black, and did a crappy patch job, leaving a hump in the floor. This needs to be leveled out before they lay the new cork flooring.

The counters and lower cabinets have been pulled out for the most part so they can get to the floor, and have access to the walls for new electric.

The white and black tile on the wall is now gone and you can see the multitudes of colors that the kitchen was once painted. So far I seen evidence of purple, orange, yellow, green and blue. The holes in the floor were how the stove was hooked up to gas and electric... not to code either. That has to be in the wall.

My kitchen looks pretty sad right now!

Upstairs, they have pulled out the old shelving in the wall and pried up the remnants of the white cabinetry.

No more ugly toilet!

No more ugly sink and cabinet!

We've got a completed roof on the garage! Just need some gutters!

Wall and ceiling framing

Hooray for more framing! The kitchen area dimensions are much more apparent now that the guys have framed the other small walls in the space, including the entry to the basement, the side wall of the mudroom area, and the ceiling of the nook. By the way, I think they put off the re-roofing later this next week. We are supposed to have a run of sunny days so that would certainly help!

The framing for the ceiling of the nook area, at it's highest point it is 9'9".

The entry to the basement is on the left, and the mudroom is on the right.

The mudroom is a pretty small space, just enough for a small bench, some cubbies, and a few hooks for jackets.

In order to keep the basement stairs in place (thus retaining maximum head height), there is a step down to a landing from the kitchen. Right now you can see through to my bedroom, but that will get closed up, as will the side wall facing the mudroom. You can also see they opened up the walls leading down to the basement.

A little progress in a lot of places

Lots of new pictures to show. Over the last few days progress was made on my bedroom, the roof framing of the garage, and the a little bit in the kitchen. They started removing the roof on the house yesterday, and thankfully today has been fairly dry. I met with my architect and contractor yesterday and they are predicting a late May completion. Just in time for summer BBQ season, hooray!

The old backyard facing wall of my bedroom was removed and now you can see the precious few extra feet I'll gain in there. Four feet makes a big difference when the room was only 9 feet long before! An awning style window will be on this wall.

The window on this wall will be twice the size since it has to be an egress window. No more purple walls either. Any suggestions for paint colors?

This is inside my bedroom closet. They are opening the wall and back portion to run a vent upstairs.

They've finished up the framing of the support wall.

The wall from inside the kitchen.

This corner is coming off next week, I think, when the cabinet guys comes out to rework the corner area.

Thought I'd share some photos of upstairs. They are doing some of the work, and I'm doing some other stuff. This bathroom cabinet is going bye-bye.

I tore up the rug, and removed the old cabinetry with my sis' help. The contractor will dry wall this area so it will be sealed up once we get heat and A/C up here.

This window is being replaced, and a skylight is going in this area.

The roof framing on the garage is done. And look at the pile of crap that is my backyard!

More garage.

Inside the garage.