Welcome to Turtle House

And the little one said "roll over"

2012-02-19T22:19:00.000-05:00

Let's just say you could fit a LOT of little monkeys in our bed... which finally arrived yesterday! We ordered this bed from Naked Furniture in Ann Arbor, and it took FOREVER to get here. As in, we ordered it December 10. We were told at the time that it should be ready in 5-6 weeks. So after 7 weeks with no news, I called... and was told it would be another 7-10 days. So after two more weeks, I called again... and was told it would be another week. Seriously?! The delay was extra annoying because we've had boxes of clothes shoved in our closets all this time, since the storage bed doubles as our dressers. It turned out some component of the bed was back-ordered - but it would have been nice to get a call informing us of this fact, instead of calling and calling and having no idea if the thing would ever actually show up. That said, it took so long that we just about have the credit card charge paid off, ha!

Oh plus, it's amazing.

I can't tell if I just got used to the "mattress on the floor" set-up, or if it really is ridiculously enormous... Now I walk into our room and it's WHOA BED in my face.

We spent a bunch of time yesterday getting the boxes of clothes unpacked into the drawers, but I figured no one really wanted to see photos of my sock drawer. We also mounted the bedside lamp/tables that I posted about a while back.

I think they look great on either side of the "window." Which, by the way, allows me to pop my head up in the morning and do some bird-watching from bed. This morning I spied some common mergansers by our dock.

Here's the other side of the room, where we've stashed a rocking chair that actually belongs to my sister. We still need to get a proper cushion for the little window seat between the closets.

Anyone who has known me for at least 25+ years will recognize the pair sitting in the window... Tigger and Erica! You can tell by the level of bedraggled-ness how much I loved these two as a kid.

And speaking of cute pairs, here's a gratuitous shot of the boys. Elmo apparently thinks the carpet is just as comfy as his bed...

...However, they both agree that we clearly need to order some Doggy Steps so they can enjoy that ridiculously large bed.

Road trips and dining room tables

2012-02-12T19:30:00.002-05:00

What, those two things don't automatically go together in your mind? Just us? Haha.

I gave a talk yesterday morning at a conference way up north. (Being in Michigan, I have a state-mandated requirement to illustrate this by showing you my hand and pointing to my middle finger middle knuckle.) Brandon came along, and since we were kinda close to Traverse City (pinky fingernail... "close" was relative), we thought we'd head over there to check out dining room tables at Woodland Creek Furniture. I mentioned them in a previous post about our ongoing quest to be real grown-ups with dining room furniture. Specifically, I'd seen this barn wood farmhouse table that I was dying to check out in person.

(Photo from Woodland Creek Furniture)

Well we did check it out, and unfortunately I have to say... I wasn't in love. In person it is MUCH more rustic than it looks here - which maybe I should have guessed from the rest of the Woodland Creek website (seriously, check it out). They have very neat stuff, but it's much more log-cabin than our style, which definitely blends rustic with some more contemporary elements. I just wasn't sure that it would work with some of the other things we have going on in the space. </pretendingtobeaninteriordesigner>

Anyway, happily,Woodland Creek has an associated company/showroom for us non-log-cabin-dwellers. Hooray! It is called Ur Houzz and it was full of many things I wanted to buy. There were two potential tables, and I should have taken photos because I can't find a good representative photo on their site. The first one was another farmhouse style, made from reclaimed wood, and painted with a distressed finish (in whatever color you want!). This is the top, but I'd just get simple square legs instead of the trellis style:

(Photo from Ur Houzz)

Actually now that I look at that again, it may not really be the same at all - because I think the ones we saw had much wider planks on top. Blog fail! Anyway, this of course set my head to spinning about colors... I hadn't even considered a painted table as a possibility, but these were really beautiful. I'm pretty sure I woke up out of a dead sleep on the way home, snapped my head around to look all bug-eyed at Brandon (who was driving), and said "OMIGOD THE TABLE COULD BE PLUM." To Brandon's credit, he kept driving and didn't look at me like I was a psychopath.

The other possibility - which has been floating around in our heads since the beginning - would be a slab table. I just think these are ridiculously gorgeous. My main concern is that we already have so many different types of wood going on, with the floor, beams, counter... would it be too much? Oh also they are like a million dollars.

(Photo from Ur Houzz)

But seriously.

And just to add to the confusion, here is one additional possibility that my BFF Craig found for me on his list. This is an unfinished farmhouse table made by Amish Chic Furniture (I know, awesome).

(From the Amish Chic Furniture Photobucket site)

This particular one is sold, but they can build another one in a couple weeks and finish it however we'd want - and it is significantly less $$$ than any of the other options. In a sad little twist, their warehouse is about two and a half hours away from here in a town we drove through yesterday. But of course we didn't know that at the time. Sigh.

Here are a couple more photos of their tables that other people have bought - a natural finish, and a darker stain.

(Both photos from the Amish Chic Furniture Photobucket site.)

Super pretty, right? Not reclaimed wood (at least I don't think so), but local, so that's a plus.

I am still thinking that in any case I'd like to get a bench for one side, and then Parsons chairs for the other side and the ends. I'm still in love with these, but trying to decide on a table before I commit to ordering them...

(Photo from Overstock.com)

So what do you guys think? Painted farmhouse table? Or a dark stain to match the beams, counter, and chair legs? Or scrap the farmhouse table altogether and go with a slab? Decisions! As a reminder, here's what we're working with now... so any of these would be an exponential improvement.

Oh deer!

2012-02-09T09:44:00.000-05:00

In the backyard this a.m... Don't tell Brandon, he's already worried enough about his as-yet-hypothetical garden!

I know they're wildly overpopulated and ecologically disastrous, but they're still darn purdy.

The stank

2012-02-04T19:36:00.000-05:00

This may have been the longest break between blog posts since I started this darn thing back in July - but there hasn't been much to report! I've been buried in work (actual job work, not house work) and a little sick, so progress on projects has been minimal. And to be honest, it's been pretty fantastic to just be living in the house rather than working on it nonstop. Brandon did make some great progress today on organizing the spare bedroom (a.k.a. random junk room) upstairs, so I will have to get some photos of what is turning into a neat little music room. This may even motivate me to get the trim painted in there... maybe.

Anyway, none of this has to do with what was a monumental event this morning: I showered in non-stinky water. Why on earth was I showering in stinky water, you ask? Because that's what was coming out of the shower head. And the sink faucets. And into the washing machine and dishwasher. UGHHH. It didn't smell at all when we first moved in, but within a couple weeks it went pretty rapidly from "a little sulfury" to "gag-worthy rotten egg geyser farts." Let me tell you, a shower in Old Faithful does not leave you feeling so fresh and so clean clean.

So what's a girl to do? Obviously turn to the best research tool on the planet, Google (just kidding EMU undergraduates who may one day enroll in my classes! Haha! Funny joke!). Anyway, "the Google" told me that the stank could be emanating from one of two sources: either the well itself, or the hot water heater. Being the scientist that I am, I designed an experiment.

H₁: The stank is emanating from the well.
Prediction: The stank will be present in both hot and cold water.

H₂: The stank is emanating from the hot water heater.
Prediction: The stank will only be present in hot water.

Experimental Design 1: Sniff water of various temperatures.
Results: Cold water: NO STANK. Hot water: WICKED STANK.
Conclusion: H₁ rejected!

Peer reviewer: But what if the stank is indeed emanating from the well, but in such a form that it must be heat-activated??

Experimental Design 2 (follow up study): Obtain non-stanky cold water; place in tea kettle and heat on stove.
Results: Stove-heated water: NO STANK.
Conclusion: H₁ re-rejected! Take that, peer-reviewer!

So after I sent the results of my study to Science, I looked into how to fix stanky hot water heaters. Turns out that hot water heaters contain an element called a sacrificial anode, which is typically made of magnesium or aluminum and keeps the hot water heater from rusting (and is also a terrific name for a rock band). However, it also somehow provides excellent breeding conditions for a harmless but stank-producing species of bacteria that releases hydrogen sulfide gas as a waste product. Everything I read about this problem said something along these lines: DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES REMOVE THE SACRIFICIAL ANODE IT WILL VOID YOUR WARRANTY AND RUST RUST RUST OMGRUST YOUR HOT WATER HEATER WILL PROBABLY EXPLODE AND FIRE AND BRIMSTONE WILL RAIN DOWN AND YOUR HOUSE WILL COLLAPSE INTO A GIANT SINKHOLE OF DOOM AND SADNESS.

So then I called the guys who installed the hot water heater, and they say all nonchalantly "oh yeah, we see this all the time with well water - we'll just come out and remove the sacrificial anodes. No prob." ?!?!?!!!? I expressed my concern to them about the rust and the brimstone and sinkholes and all, but they said that they would cover the warranty (instead of the manufacturer doing so) and that this was really the only guaranteed fix (they told me zinc-containing anodes, which some websites had recommended, only fix this problem about a third of the time). And I just could not handle the stank anymore, so over they came, and out went the sacrificial anodes. So here we are on Day 2 of flaunting the #1 rule of ~~Fight Club~~ hot water heater maintenance. But you guys, that shower? It was amaaaaaazing.

Brilliant ideas that weren't mine

2012-01-25T21:47:00.001-05:00

When my parents visited a couple weeks ago, my mom mentioned that it would be really helpful to have some kind of shelf or storage unit by the pedestal sink in the guest bathroom. I had never thought of this, and while I love the sink, I subsequently noticed that guests' toiletry items were either balancing precariously on the narrow sink edge, or were migrating over to the windowsill. Not the most convenient arrangement for tooth brushing, face washing, makeup application, etc.!

I pondered this for a bit, because I thought something big and clunky on one side of the sink would make things look crowded.

Then the other night it popped into my head to see if I could find a glass shelf that would match the other bathroom accessories we'd picked out (as an aside, selecting things like towel bars, tp holders, and robe hooks may have been the ultimate "I have never given a single millisecond of thought as to what style of this item I would like in my house... and now I have to pick 'em out" moment in this whole process; see also: light switches, doorknobs).

Luckily for me, the bathroom stuff we ended up picking (the Gatco Jewel Collection for those who are curious or care more about tp holders than I do) has a matching glass shelf. Even more luckily, it fits perfectly on the wall by the sink! Sign me up.

The shelf arrived today, and I armed myself with a tape measure, level, and pencil to figure out where it should go. We just finished getting it installed, and I think it looks great! It is not too intrusive, matches everything else, and should make things a bit easier on guests.

Just for fun, here's the little nook you see as you enter the bathroom. Brandon's had this small wooden shelf his whole life, and it fits perfectly and is a great spot for guest towels, candles, and a few decorative items (the odd little bowl at right was a $5 treasure found on one of my Junk Hunts with Kit). Sorry for the odd angle - this nook is completely impossible to photograph without some kind of periscope camera attachment.

The second brilliant idea actually WAS mine, but someone beat me to it. I've posted previously about the fact that we're waiting for our new bed to arrive, and that it's a storage bed with drawers in the sides. It's going to be a great space-saver (not to mention that we won't have the dog-fur-tumbleweed problem going on underneath since it sits right on the floor). However, it means that we can't use regular bedside tables since they'd block the drawers. I'd considered using floating shelves (like these from IKEA) instead of tables, but thought they might be a bit crowded with lamps, cell phones, water, tissues, etc. Then I thought to myself, "self, wouldn't it be cool if there were such a thing as a combined wall-mounted swing-arm lamp plus shelf/table?" Well sad to say I am not the next Thomas Edison (although maybe I'm onto something with the periscope camera attachment??)... but happy to say that I found just thing thing I was looking for!

(image from Wayfair)

The ones I bought (with a gulp and a small apology to my credit card) have white lampshades instead of the dark color shown here, and were $107 a pop. They had great reviews though, and arrived today and seem very well made. They also look pretty cool! I'd love to get them up on the wall and share some photos, but we want to wait until the bed arrives so we can be sure to locate them in the right place for groggy snooze-button hitting. Once the bed comes (hopefully in the next week or so) I'll report back with photos!

Getting decent

2012-01-22T14:36:00.001-05:00

No one will truly appreciate this update as much as our only neighbor (who doesn't read the blog... as far as I know)... but we've finally hung some curtains! There is really only one window in the house that needed them, and that was our bedroom. All the other bedroom/bathroom windows face the woods, so while I'll eventually get some blinds for them it just hasn't been at the top of the priority list. However, I was getting tired of wandering out of the shower and into our bedroom in the dark (or hiding in the closet to get dressed).

Hooray! I ordered these on Amazon, and also the new comforter/duvet set. I really like these colors together, so now I'm on the hunt for some more pillows and wall art with the turqoise/dark red combo.

The bedroom still needs a lot of things - for example, a bed. We've ordered one but it will still be another week or two until it is ready. I can't wait for it to arrive, since it's a storage bed so we'll finally be able to get rid of the boxes of clothes in the closets. (I might well throw a party once the last box is finally unpacked!) Once the bed comes I am thinking of mounting a couple of small shelves on either side to serve as bedside tables, since we won't be able to use regular tables (they'll block the drawers). Then we need bedside lamps and some art on the walls... oh and let's not forget I STILL haven't painted the darn closet doors. Even though they bother me every single day. Maybe I'll go do that now.

Also wanted to share a few quick photos of the completed book nook! There is one more shelf that will go up at the very top, but we still have to cut it down to size.

I poly'd the shelves, but it really didn't change the color much at all so they still look pretty raw. I may get motivated someday and stain them, but for now I am just enjoying having the books put away and no boxes (a.k.a. tripping hazards) on the landing!

Book nook

2012-01-18T19:43:00.000-05:00

Remember the charming tower of boxes that has inhabited our stair landing since we moved in? Well, we're finally trying to do something about it by working on the built-in bookshelves. We had a fantastic visit with my parents this past weekend, so of course we put 'em to work helping on projects (to be fair, Roy is always up for kicking it on the stairs with a drill).

Partway through the project the landing was basically an explosion of tools, books, boxes and wood pieces.

That last pic shows the two bottom shelves in place - there are seven in total. After doing some upper-level painting yoga to prime the undersides of the supports, I decided to curtail the installation until I could get the rest primed and painted BEFORE they were attached to the wall. This involved some late-night painting in the PJ's avec beverage.

You can blame Brandon for that ~~blurry~~ artistic shot. But at least he looks cute with a level and safety glasses.

During this process I learned that the air nailer makes him reeeeeeal happy. Simon the dog, not so much - he was cowering in my lap during most of this process.

Yes, that's a single 37" board with 31 nail holes. Yes again, I counted them as I caulked (side eye Brandon).

Six of the seven shelves! Here's a shot of what it will look like as you climb the stairs, but I'd taken the shelves out to caulk and paint, so you'll have to use your imaginification.

The original plan was to paint the supports and shelves the same white as the rest of the trim... but after doing a lot of staring and hmm-ing, I am pretty sure I'm going to poly the shelves to hopefully match(ish) the treads and bannister - they are all red oak, so it should be pretty close. What do you think - white to match the trim, or natural wood?

"But will they hold... a book?!"

Rootin' tootin' photo-shootin'

2012-01-15T22:25:00.000-05:00

Turtle House designer Steven Varnum came over the other day with a wide-angle lens to get some interior pics of the house, and just posted them to his website. After doing a moderately unreasonable amount of squealing and clapping, I stole them (with permission) to share. I have nothing more to add except that we heart Steven and still can't believe we really get to live here...

Also, wide angle is awesome, unless your thighs are in the photo.

(this picture is an accurate depiction of how I write most of these posts)

(I moved to get out of Steven's photos... SNEAKY, STEVEN)

(dueling dog-butt photobomb)

Wood boxes in my world right now

2012-01-12T20:39:00.002-05:00

WOOD BOXES #1-6: the bathroom vanity drawers

Remember the old dresser that I refinished to use as our bathroom vanity? Last time you saw it without its drawers (scandalous!)... and so it sat for quite a while, while I contemplated the best way to deal with the inevitable drawer-plumbing conflict. Well, we finally went for it and created what must be the most grotesque set of drawers... ever. But hey, they'll only be seen by us, right? (I'm pretty sure there's no one on this whole "internet" thing.)

The top drawers (above) had to get huuuge chunks cut out of them, and I contemplated just removing them altogether and attaching the faces permanently to the dresser. But, that six inches or so of extra storage space won out, and we cut pieces of wood to keep our deodorant and contact lens cases from falling into the abyss.

The two bottom drawers didn't need to be chopped nearly as much, since the pipes run much closer to the wall down by the floor.

What did I tell you, they ain't pretty, but they get the job done. Except, they don't really, because the slides are all wonky and they don't shut right. This is going to require drawer surgery #2, in which we remove the slides and attach pieces of wood for the drawers to sit on instead. Regardless, some drawers and storage is a big improvement over this!

Yes, I took that picture from inside the shower. And yes, I forgot to take an "after" picture with the drawers in. Don't let the suspense kill you!!

WOOD BOX #(lucky)7: the toy(?) box

Don't you love when the internet gives you things like magical rugs? You know what's even better? When you find an "internet friend" and then you meet them in real life and they are hilarious and super fun and you can have adventures! Kit at DIYdiva posted about our first junk hunt (and the recounting made me laugh ALMOST as much as the reality). Well it seems to have become what we will call a "recurring pattern" (rather than a "bad habit"). (I prefer the term "genius," actually, now that I think about it.) The difference between me and Kit is that she has big plans for her thrift store finds, whereas I buy strange things and retrospectively try to figure out what on earth to do with them. Like... this adorable little box on wheels.

It was only after I decided that I completely needed this absurd item that I came up with the idea of using it to hold kindling for the wood stove. And it's adorable. And Brandon thinks I'm crazy... but isn't it so cute?

It may move down to the entryway to hold mittens and scarves or something, we'll see. Or dog toys, or sweaters... really the possibilities are endless. Strange little box, I dub thee "$20 well spent."

Dining room daydreams

2012-01-08T22:22:00.000-05:00

As you may have noted in my New Year's post, our dining room situation right now is a little bit lame. We've been on the hunt for a big, chunky farmhouse style table (in fact I've been pinning images of them on my Pinterest page... well, ever since I joined Pinterest), but we haven't found the exact right thing just yet. Or maybe we have, but we just haven't met it in person - behold this beauty:

This image is from a company called Woodland Creek Furniture, which is located up in northern Michigan. This particular table is made from reclaimed barn wood from right here in the state - and you know we have a little bit of a thing for reclaimed barn wood. OK, more than a little bit of a thing - more like a full-blown obsession with its eco-fabulousness and charmingly perfect imperfection.

So I'm sitting here in the living room, staring into the mostly empty dining room, and occasionally holding my computer up and squinting to try to imagine this table in there. Of course this turned into a full-blown chair search, because I have lots of work to do and this is what I do instead. I'd like to get a long bench that matches the table for the side closer to the kitchen, to keep everything feeling open and tied together (instead of having the backs of chairs facing the rest of the main living area). We currently have a couple of ladder back chairs, but I am thinking of ditching them in favor of upholstered parsons chairs instead.

I like the soft tonal stripes on these chairs, and I think they'd play well with the wall color in the dining room (Silver Fox), but Brandon said they reminded him of a circus tent (most boring circus ever?!). We kept looking and turned up these:

(both chair images from www.overstock.com)

I love the bold pattern on these, and the dark brown would match a lot of elements in the house (ceiling beams, counter) - but I wonder if they would be too crazy? The more I stare at them the more I love them, actually. What do you think, oh wise internet friends?

6.5 months

2012-01-03T14:26:00.000-05:00

Most of the house progress recently has been inside, but there were a few exterior changes I realized I never captured for the slide show (the main entry door got painted, we removed the plastic and labels from the windows, etc.). I just went outside to snap some photos - most likely the last slide show update until the spring when we can deal with grading and landscaping issues. Today's shots came out a little dark because of the glare from the snow, but I thought it would be fun to do one last side-by-side of the first (6/19/2011) and last (1/3/2012) pictures from each angle...

East side before

East side after

South side before

South side after

North side before

North side after

2012, seriously?!

2012-01-02T11:52:00.000-05:00

My gosh, another year bites the dust. Out with the year we built Turtle House, in with the (first) year we get to LIVE in Turtle House! I could get used to this, but what does it mean for the blog? Well, my updates are going to be less dramatic, that's for sure. However, we still have a lot of settling in to do, and a long list of projects to complete around the house (I'm going to write a post on this to keep us accountable!), so I plan to keep updating. Just don't expect me to keep up the pace of the professional contractors, ha!

I wanted to share a few projects that have been completed in the last week, and then some photos of the house in its current state. First off, the wood stove pipe installers came last Tuesday to run the pipe out the ceiling. It was going to run straight up and out the dormer, but when the guys got up there and knocked on the ceiling they got worried because it sounded like a rafter was just exactly in the way of where the pipe was supposed to go. Lucky for them (and us), the house belongs to an obsessive photodocumenter (that would be me). I pulled up photos from when the dormer was being built, and yes indeedy, there was a big ol' rafter in the way. The only option then was put an angle in the pipe - I like to describe it as "jaunty."

Hahaha. It looks a little funny, but it's actually not very noticeable unless you're someone who spends a lot of time looking at the ceiling. And it's totally worth it for the fantasticness that is the wood stove. Here is B starting our very first fire. The installer told us that we should start it really tiny and build it up over the course of 3-4 hours, so that's what we did. We have had it going pretty much constantly since then, and in fact we've been heating the whole house this way.

Another project that we wanted to tackle was getting the media cabinet set up. This involved squirming through a tiny access opening to plug everything in behind the shelf so we won't see any wires from the living room. My cousin, his girlfriend and their dog were visiting at the time, so he got recruited to help out (thanks Josh!). As you can see below, this required some auxiliary equipment (headlamp and beer). The guys got it all done though, speakers wired and all, so now we can watch TV, stream stuff on the internet, or listen to records all from the same central receiver/projector setup. It's fantastic.

We really wanted to get this set up because we'd invited some people over for New Year's Eve. Who hosts a party a week and a half after moving in? Crazy people, that's who. So we spent a lot of time trying to make the main level of the house look moderately sane. I ran around and took some photos before everyone arrived. Starting off upstairs, here's the bedroom, which is pretty clean but lacking in a bed. Our closets are still full of boxes of clothes, because we ordered one of those storage beds with drawers in it, and we're waiting for it to arrive. Once I get the closet doors painted and some window treatments, this room will be done! For now, anyway.

This is the "little room," the backup guest room upstairs. It has become the random junk room. Also note the unpainted but caulked trim... still some work to do here!

This is the stairway landing, where we plan to build in bookshelves. That's not done yet, so instead we just piled all of the boxes containing books into the space where the shelves will be. It's not quite the same effect.

However, things got better from there - for example, we had some exceptionally handsome butlers to meet the guests...

(yes they are indeed wearing bow ties - we're fancy around here)

...and the living room looked pretty darn good if I do say so myself.

We set up a bunch of snacks along the bar - it was perfect because everyone always ends up standing around the food anyway, right?

The dining room is looking a little sparse since we're missing, um, a dining room table and chairs. We brought in the table from our old L-shaped breakfast nook so we'd have a place for drinks/desserts. Eventually I want to refinish (or re-poly) this table and bench set because it fits perfectly on the covered porch, so that will be its eventual home (when it's warm enough to sit outside!).

Finally, I want to send the biggest thank you to our friends who came and helped us ring in 2012 in our new home. We had an absolute blast and received some of the sweetest and most thoughtful housewarming gifts - a new doormat (which we sorely needed), a great photo that a friend took and had printed on canvas, a home-brewed beer with a hand-drawn Turtle House label (I need to get photos of both of these to share!), and... drum roll please...

I am going to be in big trouble for posting this because it is not finished, but I just can't resist. This is a painting by our amazing talented hilarious friend Corey. He took it away with him to finish it so we don't have it hung up yet, but I've been scheming about a place of honor for it (probably in the living room). And, to be honest, I can't think too hard about this without totally choking up about how lucky we are to have such amazing people in our lives. Happy New Year, everyone.

Merry merry

2011-12-25T13:00:00.002-05:00

I thought I'd pop in to wish a Merry Christmas to everyone who celebrates, and to share a few shots of the couple areas of Turtle House that are starting to look suspiciously house-like. We have been working our tushes off the last few days scrubbing and sweeping and painting and unpacking (and trying not to get paint on the things we've scrubbed and swept and unpacked). So far we have a decently functional living room and kitchen! Please excuse the various dog blankets, tools, and boxes... I'm keeping it real here, people.

My eBay train painting is the only thing we've hung up in the entire house at this point, but I love it there because its colors really tie the beams, couch and rug together perfectly. AND HOW ABOUT THAT RUG.

That last picture shows our storage solution for Brandon's huge and ever-growing record collection. Those are two IKEA Expedit bookcases turned on their sides, which are the perfect size for records, and will also act as a behind-the-sofa console table. Our trip to IKEA on Friday was actually the first time I'd ever been there (despite the fact that it's only about 20 minutes away) - that place is kerrrraaazy!

Here are a couple shots of the neat and clean side of the kitchen. I'll post photos of the island once we deal with the piles of stuff all over the counter...

And just for fun, here's a shot of the two swans who hang out down in the river by our house - I took this from the living room. Can't beat that!

ETA, I forgot I had this photo of sunset two nights ago on my phone. Can't believe I get to live here...!!

Happy solstice!

2011-12-21T16:02:00.000-05:00

Ohhh dreeeeeam weaver

2011-12-19T21:52:00.000-05:00

You guys! I just bought the most expensive house-y accessory-ish item I've ever purchased. I'm freaking out, talk me down and tell me it's OK. I have been searching high and low for a living room rug. It had to be BIG (ideally 9x12 so our monster sectional could sit on it), and I wanted a geometric pattern in an orangey/rusty color. Too specific? Apparently the answer is yes, because I have been rug-stalking for weeks and haven't found anything I like. Well that's not exactly true - the two rugs I looooved were both out of stock. Behold the Pottery Barn moorish tile rug in clementine (I think)? ... beautiful, but perhaps a little too reddish for my needs:

(Image from Apartment Therapy)

West Elm had a similar one that I liked even better, but I can't find a photo of it at the moment and it was out of stock. What they also had, though, was this totally rad Iznik Dhurrie rug:

(Image from West Elm)

I LOVE THIS RUG. I have been obsessing over this rug to a moderately embarrassing degree. Why didn't I just buy it? Well if you go on the West Elm website, the only color option is "Citron" - the greeny color in the picture above. I even went so far as to email West Elm last week to ask them whyyyyyy oh why I couldn't order the other color. The friendly West Elm emailer wrote me back: "The orange rug you have inquired about is a photographer's prop and is not currently offered for sale through west elm. Please know we have not been provided any information as to where this item was obtained. We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused." Huhwhat?! The photog just happened to have an exact match to the West Elm product in a different but infinitely more desirable color?? I said a small curse at West Elm and their rascally photographers and tried to let go à la Rose in Titanic ("I'll never let go!").

Which brings us to tonight. We again spent all day painting (master bedroom is done, and guest bedroom is really close!) so I am vegetating on the couch checking Craigslist and other websites for stuff we need (also on the list: dining room table, bedside tables, bar stools). I don't even remember what magical combination of search terms in Google caused it to pop up, but LOOK WHAT I FOUND ON EBAY.

West Elm emailer - how could you betray me!?!!? The color is called Sorrel and it is mine all miiiiiine. And (GULP) I just dropped $650 on a rug. Am I totally crazy? Wait, don't answer that.

Photo dump

2011-12-16T18:25:00.000-05:00

I have been remiss in updating the blog. I've been caulking trim for pretty much the last 36 hours straight (with a brief break for sleeping), so I'm almost completely brain-dead and to be honest typing hurts because my hands are falling apart. All that whining aside, the house is looking AMAZING. I am going to let the photos tell the tale so I can get back to picking caulk out of my hair.

CARPET IS IN! This carpet is amazing - the day they installed it there was a mild odor, but by the next day it was completely unnoticeable - hooray for no-VOC all-wool eco-geekery.

BANISTERS ARE IN!

ISLAND COUNTER AND BEADBOARD IS DONE!

WE GOT THE TEMPORARY CERTIFICATE OF OCCUPANCY TODAY! We are going to move a few things over the weekend, but the MOVE move will probably be mid-next week, since there is still some work to be done and we don't want all our shtuff in the way.

I'm selling all the furniture

2011-12-12T17:11:00.000-05:00

No seriously. All of it. When you visit, we will just have to hang out sitting on the floor. Maybe, if you're lucky, I'll hang on to a few pillows.

I mean really, could you stand to cover up this gorgeousness?!

These pictures seriously don't even do it justice. It's such an amazing beautiful combination of colors. The whole house feels warm and cozy now, and I el oh vee ee LOVE the way it looks with the paint colors... swoon!

As I've mentioned before (and you can see in the pictures above), the flooring guys had a whole bunch of issues to contend with - mainly missing notches and peg holes - due to this being reclaimed barn wood. These were filled with a combination of wood and epoxy.

In a few of them, Brandon and I stashed pennies with sentimental dates - they look really neat! I think you'd need a bright light to read the date in most cases, but we know what they are and I'm sure I'll smile whenever I notice them.

And for your last "detail shot"... my feet! No shoes allowed yet on the newly finished floors.

This was the first time I walked around the house in socks - what a milestone! It is actually pretty amazing when you consider where the house started out (and how many tetanus shots I would have needed if I tried this back then).

I want to close this post with a big hug and THANK YOU to Brandon's family - especially Grandma, Uncle Scott, Mark and Roxanne - who all had a big part in making this beautiful floor possible! I know you guys thought we were crazy - but don't worry, when you visit and we make you sit on the floor in our furniture-less house, you'll TOTALLY change your mind about that. xoxo

Teaser

2011-12-09T16:53:00.000-05:00

This is a terrible post, I'm just going to warn you up-front. Why? The floors are done (and amazing!)... and I can't show you. I went by the house but we aren't allowed to walk on the floors all weekend... so I creepily peeped into several windows, and tried to get photos, but the windows still have a layer of protective plastic on both the inside and outside - so I got a lot of photos that look like this:

Boooooo. This was the best I could do, after peeling a bit of plastic off the outside of one window (shhh don't tell):

At the far right of the bottom picture (and the very first picture as well) you can see the really neat dark trim around the area where the wood stove will sit - that is going to be a slate tile pad, since it turns out that putting a wood stove on a wood floor is not a good plan. From the barn wood haul we had only two of these very dark boards, which the flooring guys have been debating are either walnut or mahogany. We weren't sure where to put them, since there were only two, but our GC suggested ripping one down to use as the trim around the tile pad - I think it looks great!

Anyway, it was moderately agonizing to not be able to go inside, and to just get a fuzzy hint of how completely rad these floors are going to look. Hence the title of this post... I promise I'll get better photos next week. At least there was a photo op outside the house as well - we have a porch floor!

In other news, I actually uploaded photos and wrote nearly this entire post while on hold with DTE trying to sort out my psychometer problem. Remember how I mentioned Tuesday that our meter had jumped 3000 KWH in two weeks? DTE asked me to go back and read it again in a few days, and call back to schedule a meter check if it still seemed fishy. According to our faaaabulous electric meter, we have used EIGHTY THOUSAND KWH in the last three days. Apparently we have been powering Fenway Park, Six Flags, and hourly laser light shows. They are sending someone out on Monday to see if there just might be something wrong with the meter.

Siiigh...

2011-12-07T20:41:00.000-05:00

Floors are sanded and Brandon spread numerous bales of straw out across the back clearing to deter erosion. Neither of these make for particularly stellar photo ops (especially in the dark), so here's this instead:

I also got mocked for not knowing the difference between hay and straw. Am I the only one??

Hopefully a better update in the next couple day (finished floors?!).

MORE MAGIC

2011-12-06T18:21:00.000-05:00

Quick trip to the house this evening, mainly to read the electric meter because OMG we just got a bill... these have generally been in the ballpark of $50-60... and this one is SIX HUNDRED THIRTY-ONE DOLLARS. And 36 cents. Excusemewhat??? I know the guys have been running drills and saws and whatnot, and a couple small space heaters - which I know are total energy hogs - but this still seems completely out of whack. Want to know what seems even MORE out of whack? That number is based on a KWH usage of 4381 for a two-month period from Sept 22 to Nov 21. It is now Dec 6, and the meter says we have used another 3000 KWH. Since Nov 21, a.k.a. two weeks ago. Ahem. Needless to say, I have spent some quality time on the phone with DTE, and I am supposed to call back in a couple days (when their next reading will be reported) and get someone to come out and do a meter check. Because I'm pretty sure our meter is possessed by demons. Extremely dizzy ones.

Anyway, enough ranting about that - check out the beautiful trim around our kitchen cabinets!

So so pretty. We also have a handrail!

And yes I ran my hand the whole way up it while I went upstairs, despite the dust. The rest of the handrails should go in after the flooring is finished, which will hopefully be later this week! Between Brandon and the flooring guys, all of the floor holes appear to be filled with epoxy and/or pieces of wood (for the larger notches). Hooray for a hole-less floor. Next up will be sanding, because what this house needs most is MORE SAWDUST!

But, you ask, none of this is MAGIC like you promised us in the blog post title. Where is the magic?! Well just you wait, my friends...

BAM! Do you see the magic??? No? How about now:

Why hello, glorious H20. You are sure going to be helpful when I need to wash my hands or my clothes or my dishes. But I might still pee behind the boat house every so often. You know, for old time's sake.

A penny for your thoughts

2011-12-04T12:24:00.000-05:00

This weekend has been supercrazyinsane for me with work for the job I actually get paid to do, so I haven't had a spare moment to get anything done at the house. Brandon, however, has spent a bunch of time there - stacking wood yesterday (we'll be ready to fire up that wood stove the second we move in!), and working on a flooring project today.

As I've mentioned before, the reclaimed barnwood flooring has small holes where the beams were held together by wooden pegs.

We want to preserve the look and historical character of the flooring, but obviously we don't really want holes all over the place (dog fur trap much?). Brandon is filling the holes with a two-part epoxy that the flooring crew will sand down this week when they come back to finish the floors. Apparently he and the GC were joking about putting things in the holes, like dead flies that would then look like they were trapped in amber. This gave me the idea that it might be a lot of fun to use one of the holes as a mini time capsule, and plop in a penny from the year the house was built. Going through our can o' loose change, we decided we would actually hide six pennies in holes around the house.

Top row - our birth years, 1980 and 1982 (that's right, I'm a cradle-robber!)
Middle row - the year we met (2003) and the year we started dating (2005)
Bottom row - the year we got married (2008) and the year we built Turtle House (2011)

So when y'all visit, consider it scavenger-hunt time!

A house of a different color

2011-12-01T17:43:00.000-05:00

PAAAAAAAAINT!!!

I promise that is all the same color - Benjamin Moore's Summer Lime - even though it looks wildly different in each photo. At least on my monitor, the bottom one is the most true to life, and the top one is much more buttery-yellow than the real color. It's a great cheerful yellow-green that changes a lot in different lighting conditions, but so far I like all of the permutations it's thrown at me!

The dining room has also been painted (Benjamin Moore's Silver Fox), and I loooove this color. It immediately sets the dining room apart as a more calm and serene space - a little bit formal without being stodgy.

We decided to bring the guest room Tranquil Blue out into the entry way as well, so as not to get overwhelmed with Summer Lime. I love that it's bright and cheerful without being obnoxiously turquoise. I also admit to a bit of geekery at the thought that my beloved jellyfish will be swimming around in a Tranquil Blue sea...

The back of the kitchen island (where you see the 2x4's in the photo above) will be white beadboard with a dark wood countertop. The wall below the cabinets will be tiled - I am thinking something in tones of gray and white, possibly like this inspiration pic from Pinterest:

That will basically leave us with a bright and light kitchen separating the Tranquil Blue entry from the Summer Lime living room, which I think will work really well.

The plumbers finished up installing the sinks and faucets in the master bathroom vanity - now I have to modify the drawers to fit, and stain and install trim around the bottom where we ripped off the ornate original trim. I think it is going to look fantastic when it's finished!

All of the lights

2011-11-29T18:39:00.000-05:00

OK, not ALL of the lights. But I've been looking for an excuse to link to this video ever since my sister introduced me to it - gotta to love a music video with an epilepsy warning, am I right?

And check it out... WE HAVE LIGHTS.

They don't all have bulbs in them, but oh my gosh, I skipped around the house like a little kid, flipping switches and doing a completely ridiculous dance/squeal combo whenever a switch actually did something.

Walk into upstairs guest bedroom...

Flip switch...

EEEEEEE IT'S MAGIC!!!

As you can see in the photo above, the plumbers were back today installing fixtures, and I think water is supposed to be hooked up tomorrow! The master bathroom now has its shower faucet and glass surround and it looks absolutely gorgeous. Now we just have to get in there and paint the trim and beadboard, and the tile installer has to finish off the shelves in the shower (where you see the red below).

The plumbers also installed the faucets for the vessel sinks I mentioned a couple days ago.

The toilets are in too, but I figured no one really wants to see pictures of toilets...

BUT LOOK, MORE LIGHTS!!

The painters were also back at the house today, and painted the entire kitchen/living room area! We settled on Benjamin Moore's Summer Lime, and it's actually pretty subtle at night with only a limited amount of lighting. It looks pale yellow, whereas in sunlight it has a bit more green in it. I can't wait to see it during the daytime, but for now this was the best I could do, photo-wise:

Things are getting SO CLOSE, you guys. Seriously, I can hardly deal with it. Throughout this whole process, I have every so often just burst into tears when I visit the house, but I think the frequency is increasing. This evening I sat down on the steps for a while to look around, and before I knew it I was crying my face off because I was so overwhelmed with how completely amazing everything is, and how I am the luckiest person in the universe to have the opportunity to build this house, and live there with my best friend and our best canine friends, and have our wonderful family and friends support us in this crazy adventure, and have a job I love so much that hanging out here for the duration of a 30-year mortgage is totally appealing. And all of you who stop by and read this goofy little blog! And and and... amazing. And now I'm totally crying again. Get it together, basketcase!!

Love and spiders

2011-11-28T17:27:00.000-05:00

It's never really occurred to me before how... organismal (for lack of a better word) my taste in decor is. The more I look at stuff I like, the more I see trends toward natural materials (well, I noticed that a long time ago), and simple, clean lines that mimic organic elements. I guess this shouldn't really be that surprising, right... I am a biologist. Still, it made me laugh to think that we now have a jellyfish hanging in the entryway, and a spider hanging in the dining room.

Granted it is an extremely elegant and nonthreatening spider.

I mentioned yesterday that the matching pendents have been installed over the kitchen island...

Here is one of them with the spider in the background so you can see them together. Love! You can also see that the sink faucet has been installed - I forgot to photograph that yesterday. Sorry for all the terrible flash photos with super-evident dust - it was the best I could do under rapidly darkening conditions this evening.

When I first pulled up to the house this evening, I thought "something looks different..." Took me a moment to realize that I haven't had this lovely unobstructed view of the porta-potty in quite a while.

Why? Because that's where the dumpster has been living for the last several months! I think no more dumpster is an excellent sign. Our house is no longer full of things that need to be ripped out and discarded. Hooray! Now we just have to deal with the pile of rubble that the dumpster had been partially obscuring...

In other news, the painters were back today working on the ceilings, so the entry stairs were draped with dropcloths when I arrived...

...and look at my beloved jellyfish! Sniff. At least it is protected from paint drips.

Love and jellyfish

2011-11-27T20:07:00.000-05:00

Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving! How many of you rushed home from spending time with your family and spent several hours caulking and priming trim? No? Just us?

I was very excited to get back to the house today, because we left on our whirlwind Thanksgiving trip straight from work on Tuesday evening, so we hadn't seen the progress from Tuesday afternoon or Wednesday. And it was pretty dramatic! In fact, when we walked in I may have squeaked at a pitch audible only to dogs.

The jellyfish!!! is on the ceiling!!! Photos can't even capture how sparkly and magical it is. I'm pretty sure it's not really made out of capiz shells, it's actually rainbows and fairy dust and unicorn poop.

I love it. I love it. I want to marry it. I also owe Steven big time on this one, because apparently after I saw this and fell completely in love, West Elm stopped carrying it! Steven, being a house genius AND a jellyfish/unicorn-poop hero, called all over the country to find one and eventually tracked down a floor model. Three cheers are not even close to enough cheers for Steven. Have I mentioned I love this chandelier?

OK, there are also some other light fixtures in the house, and I tried to be nice to them too so they wouldn't feel left out. I think I did a good job ooh-ing and aah-ing over the pendant lights in the kitchen...

...but I am pretty sure the light in the guest bedroom might be getting an inferiority complex. Sorry, buddy.

The ceiling fan in our master bedroom might also be feeling a little bummed out. But let's be honest, ceiling fans aren't really all that cool looking. This one is better than most, though.

There are several wall sconces up around the stairwell and upstairs landing. To be honest, I'd totally forgotten what these were going to look like - good thing I like them. They are simple and don't call a lot of attention to themselves.

This is the cute bathroom light we picked out. This one is in the guest bathroom, but we got the same one in a four-light version for our master bathroom.

Speaking of the bathrooms, there was also some progress on the plumbing fixtures. In the downstairs bathroom, we have a pedestal sink currently in two pieces, but you can get the idea...

...and a toilet that isn't quite connected to anything, but at least is no longer in a box in the garage!

The bath faucet, handle, and shower head have also been installed downstairs:

Upstairs, the tile installer finished the grout around the beautiful glass subway tiles, and the shower handle has been installed.

The sinks have also arrived for the master vanity. They are vessel sinks that will sit up on top of the refinished dresser (just how it looks in the picture below). Apparently the plumbers will take care of actually attaching the sinks and hooking up all the plumbing, which means the only thing I have left to do on this project is shortening the drawers to accommodate the plumbing. I am waiting until they get everything installed so I can take measurements and go have some fun with a jigsaw!

Top shelf

2011-11-22T15:52:00.000-05:00

Brandon and I headed out to the house this morning to try to get some more trim painted... which soon turned into the realization that first we have to caulk the trim. Sigh. Why is there always another step (or four) before the step we've actually anticipated and at least moderately prepared for? Anyway, not to brag, but I am basically a wizard with a caulking gun. Caulk doesn't make for good photos, though (NO DIRTY JOKES, my parents read this), so let's turn to what the pros were up to.

Remember the shelving unit turned media cabinet? Brandon and I had primed it and added a back and a top and access holes for wiring, and yesterday B and the GC installed it so it could be trimmed out. It looks awesome!! Still needs paint, to be sure, but I think it's going to be so great for getting all of our A/V stuff organized and out of the way.

The electrician is putting outlets back behind there, so the rats' nest of wiring can be hidden from view... but in order to access it, we'll have to squirm through a tiny opening in the "hobbit room" (storage closet) off the dining room:

In the kitchen, the glass-fronted cabinet has been installed...

...and the beadboard on the pantry is primed and ready for paint.

AND LOOK AT THESE MAGICAL THINGS THAT HAVE APPEARED THROUGHOUT THE HOUSE:

Have you ever seen something so exciting??? The electricians were still working when we left, and some of the lighting fixtures were piled up in the kitchen area - including the jellyfish! I can't waaait to get back there and see what they've gotten installed.

In other news, I just got off the phone with a professional pond installer. No joke. When I described what Project Vernal Pool entailed, he said something along the lines of "oh, no problem. I've done ponds like that before, and all kinds of specialty wildlife stuff - I've even put in artificial crayfish burrows for rattlesnakes to overwinter in." Um, I think I've found my guy.

Yesssss

2011-11-21T21:15:00.000-05:00

On the calendar for tomorrow: PLUMBING AND ELECTRICAL FIXTURE INSTALL. Seriously, electricity. This will change everything and maybe the blog will no longer have to shut down at 4:30 PM.

Also, Google Analytics says that:
(1) Someone found this blog by searching for "ugliest house in the world." I WIN. This is so awesome.
(2) Someone else found the blog by searching for "knock knock refrigerator is running joke." This is also awesome because it means I am not alone in completely lacking the ability to retain and retell even the most rudimentary and simplistic excuse for a joke. Seriously, this is the only joke I can remember: What is brown and sticky? Bonus points if you know the answer. (NOT YOU, BRANDON.) Anyway, hearts to you, my joke-jumbling soulmate.

Counter culture

2011-11-18T17:22:00.000-05:00

I thought about calling this post something like "Counter countdown," but (a) now I have this song stuck in my head on repeat (OK, just the intro - let's be real, no one knows the rest of that song); and (b) we're not counting down, because the counters were installed today!!! (World record run-on sentence?)

Here they are in all their (somewhat dusty) glory:

The countertops are this very cool textural "Venezian finish" granite. We had initially been leaning toward soapstone, because we wanted something in a slatey-gray tone and I don't like how super shiny granite usually is. I'm a matte finish kinda gal. We saw this material at the stone warehouse (the organized one, not Granite Adventure Jungle Kingdom), and I couldn't keep my hands off it - it just feels really neat. And when we found out it was significantly less expensive than soapstone? Sold!

That last shot was taken with a flash, which makes the stone look a lot lighter and more heterogeneous than it actually is, but maybe it will give you a sense of the bumpy awesomeness going on. If they rated countertop material on bumpy awesomeness, this stuff would totally win.

In other news, it looks like every plumbing and electrical fixture for the whole house is in an insane tower in the garage. I can't wait to see it all installed!! Especially my most beloved West Elm capiz chandelier, a.k.a. "the jellyfish." The day the jellyfish gets installed will be glorious indeed.

Maybe I should plant a flag at the top of Mt. Fixture to claim it for the Turtle House Republic??

ADHD paparazzi

2011-11-17T17:32:00.000-05:00

This has been a busy week at work, and I haven't been able to escape early enough to make it over to the house during daylight hours for quite a while. This is kind of a bummer, but in some ways totally fun, because when I got back there this evening SO MUCH STUFF HAD HAPPENED! I ran around with a camera snapping pics like a crazy person (the fact that I was also petting tiles and talking to window trim probably didn't help my case as a non-crazy person). First things first, we have a front porch!

This actually happened last week, but the foundation guy covered it all over with straw so I couldn't get a good photo... not that this one is particularly good either (although it's nothing a few miniature goats wouldn't take care of, Brandon...).

Inside, the carpenters have been killing it on installing trim, and the painters must be following right behind with primer. It looks like the trim is almost done, whereas last time I was at the house only a couple windows were finished. It all looks so great! Here is the entry area on the first floor:

The beadboard around the pantry has also been installed:

The living room door and windows are all trimmed out as well, including the giant windows that look out over the river.

Pardon the strange angle on that last pic; I took it from upstairs so my camera would cooperate with the weird lighting situation. These windows, and the dark beams against the white ceiling... I die. So beautiful.

The trim-tasticness continues upstairs in the landing:

The narrow door on the left side will be a linen closet, while the bifold doors close off the laundry closet. LAUNDRY. UPSTAIRS. Someday I might get over the miraculousness of this concept, but it won't be anytime soon.

The tile installer has also been back working on the master bathroom for the last few days. The glass tiles seem to be nearly impossible to photograph, but in person they are a beautiful smoky green. Using the flash (as in the bottom pic below) makes them appear ugly 70's olive, so I included the out-of-focus top pic because the color is a bit more true to life.'

In other news, I picked tile today for the pad area underneath the wood stove. I wanted natural slate, and figured we'd just use basic square tiles, but then this pattern caught my eye at the Tile Shop. Love! Brandon had texted me: "Oh suit, I didn't send you measurements. 52.5 x 36. Get trout, and sealer." I picked up two boxes of the tiles (each 3' x 3'), and sealer, but decided that grout would probably be a tad more useful than fish for this particular project. And I'm pretty sure he didn't mean to reference business attire, either.

Slow but steady...

2011-11-13T19:50:00.000-05:00

... is apparently an apt descriptor of my painting skills. We have a whole lotta trim to paint, and that was the plan for this weekend...

...oh, along with painting the master bedroom, which was going to be totally quick, so no problem, right?

Um, right. Except for the part where the master bedroom has twelve foot ceilings, four doors, three windows, and five paired beams that intersect the walls. Not to mention the other part where we hadn't realized we'd have to fill all the tiny nail holes in the trim with wood filler before we could paint. So yeah... we'll paint the trim next weekend.

Is your refrigerator running?

2011-11-10T19:03:00.000-05:00

How the heck does that old joke go? I just sat here for five minutes trying to remember it, and had a lot of trouble because somehow it got mixed up in my brain with a knock-knock joke. "Knock knock!" "Who's there?" "Where is your refrigerator going?" Which makes no sense at all, obviously. I think it must not be a knock-knock joke.

Anyway, I again didn't make it out to the house today before dark - not to mention there was white stuff falling from the sky?!?! - but wanted to post a quick update to the refrigerator saga. You guys are not going to believe this - THE SECOND REFRIGERATOR IS LOST. I wish I were making this up. As you may recall, the Lowe's delivery manager told me last week that our first refrigerator had gotten damaged and then gone rogue, and he'd placed an order for a replacement. I was supposed to get a call within five days to schedule delivery. Well it's now been nine days, and no call, so I called them this evening. There was no one in the delivery department to take my call, so I spoke to another manager, who went through many of the same procedures as the first guy ("Ma'am, we show the refrigerator as having been delivered last month." "No, that was the FIRST lost refrigerator."). Cue my head exploding. They are now "looking into it" again, and I'm supposed to call back in another two days if I haven't heard from them. All I can say is it's a darn good thing I'm not living in that house, refrigerator-less, or this would be a lot less entertaining - but the fact that they have now lost TWO ENORMOUS REFRIGERATORS is pretty hilarious. My hypothesis is that the second refrigerator has run off and eloped with the first refrigerator (where do you think those little dorm-size fridges come from?).

Standard Time is ruining my blog

2011-11-08T18:16:00.002-05:00

Standard Time, I dig you in the morning when my alarm clock goes off and it isn't pitch black. Kinda dark, admittedly, but bearable. But we have a bit of a problem: YOU ARE RUINING MY BLOG. By the time I get out to the house after work, it's DARK and gloomy and I can't see things or take photos or let the dogs run around without losing them. Grumble grumble grumble.

Anyway, all to say that I don't have an update today. So why am I posting, you ask? This post is a plea for help. We have to pick out carpet for the two upstairs bedrooms soon. (The rest of the house will have wood floors courtesy of Brandon's grandma's barn, but we don't have quite enough wood for the whole shebang - plus I think the pooches will enjoy carpet in the bedroom - and yes, I make house-related decisions based on the assumed desires of my dogs. WHAT.) Ahem. The point is, you guys, I KNOW NOTHING ABOUT CARPET. I don't know what to look for, how to tell if it's good quality, how to tell if it is going to off-gas a bunch of weirdness and make us high. Help me, internet! Have you bought carpet recently? Any recommended brands or retailers? Extra points and kisses if it's made in the U.S. without murdering the environment. Mwah.

Clearly, we have pleased the shelving gods

2011-11-06T18:08:00.000-05:00

I'm not sure exactly what we did - it certainly wasn't dusting our current shelves. Whatever it was, I am pleased as punch that one of our house dilemmas has been solved in a bizarrely fortuitous way. To back up, one of the many (many) things we're really excited about is having recessed shelving in the living room to house a bunch of media stuff - mainly, the mini-computer and projector that we use instead of a TV, and a receiver for the speaker system. Mounting the projector at the top of this shelving unit will get it up high enough that we won't be projecting silhouettes of people, wagging dog tails, etc., like we have been for the past five years (woohoo!). It will also provide some storage for part of Brandon's record collection.

Anyway, the idea for this recessed shelving occurred to us after the budget had been drawn up and agreed upon, which meant it was going to have to be completed either (a) as an add-on, or (b) by us. We got an initial add estimate for a *fancy* version... although to be honest, I can't remember what was so super fancy about it except for the price ($1500!). When I squawked about this, we got an estimate for a scaled down version (basically a box made of MDO plywood, trimmed out) which was still $600. Again, this seemed like an awful lot for something I felt like we could tackle ourselves.

One day sitting in the living room at our rental, I happened to be ruminating on this issue, when I looked up... and the clouds parted, and a blinding ray of light came shooting out of the sky! And then an apple fell on my head.

OK, not really. But I did look at this shelf - which was built by Brandon's grandfather - and I thought to myself, "self, that sure looks similarly-sized as the opening where the built-in shelves are supposed to go for the media cabinet." Low and behold, we measured the shelving unit (20" wide), and went over to the house to measure the opening... 20.5". Seriously.

So today we hauled it over, increased the height of the opening a bit...

...and plopped it right in there!

(...trapping Brandon in the wall in the process.)

Could that possibly be a better fit?? Ridiculous. All we have to do is slap a plywood back on it, paint the inside, and trim it out. Even better, we'd been unsure where this particular piece of furniture was going to fit in the house. Et voila!

(Here is Brandon when I told him to look like a drywall-knife-wielding serial killer.)

Hooray for saving $1500 and repurposing something you already have! Shelving gods, I promise to be better about dusting in the future.

In unrelated news, I checked my Google Analytics account earlier today. One of my favorite things is to see the ways in which people are finding the blog via Google searches. Apparently there's been a burst recently of people searching for "red house brown trim" (and likely getting to the blog via Google Images). The one that made me giggle the most today was "how to build an outdoor turtle house." My friend, I'm sorry you likely did not find what you were looking for... but please send photos of that turtle.

There's a hole in my cabinet, dear Liza

2011-11-05T16:40:00.000-04:00

A couple holes, actually - the GC is getting ready to install the over-the-range microwave, so this cabinet had to be modified to accommodate the vent:

Apparently one of the mounting screws was missing, though, so he had to pick up a spare at Lowe's. It is exciting to think how close we're getting to things like appliances and counters going in... I know I keep saying this, but it's starting to look like a REAL HOUSE!!

The other hole is unfortunately a big chunk of paint/finish missing from one of the cabinet doors in the little desk area (cue sad trombone). I haven't pointed this out to the GC yet but it'll have to be replaced/repaired... I am actually stewing a bit over the whole desk region, because I am feeling a bit "meh" about the color we picked for the cabinets.

At the time we went with the cream to set this area apart from the kitchen cabinets, which are just around the corner, and we wanted this to feel like a separate space. Now I am wishing we'd just gone with white, because this color is really not going to agree with the Summer Lime paint selection. Hrmmm... I am considering options like maybe painting the surrounding wall a different color... maybe one of the blues we've used elsewhere in the house... what do y'all think? I should get back to the house and put up some samples next to the cabinets so you can get a better picture of it.

In other areas of the house the trimming is moving along... like around the door and window on the river side porch:

And the pantry:

This will be painted beadboard - I know right now it's giving me scary flashbacks to the rampant wood paneling disaster that was the original Turtle House, but it'll be a nice touch when it's painted. The front side of the island will also be beadboard so they can be friends. No one wants lonely beadboard.

The master bathroom vanity that we are making out of an old refinished dresser has also been moved to the bathroom. We have to cut holes in the top to accommodate the rectangular vessel sinks and faucets, and I still have to figure out how exactly I'm going to shorten all the drawers so they don't hit the plumbing. Oh and add trim around the bottom. Details, details - it is going to be super pretty when it's done! I am really pleased with how the staining/polying came out.

I updated the exterior slide show for the first time in a while today... can you spot the difference?

Let me give you a hint - there is a little less plywood going on. That's right, our super classy front door - which had had the glass busted out and subsequently replaced with plywood - is history.

This door will eventually be painted a warm golden color, and there will be a concrete porch instead of the current plywood version. But you know, we can't get rid of ALL of our plywood accoutrements at once.

Taking care of business

2011-11-02T21:19:00.000-04:00

Quick update today to report some progress in the "office" - that is, the small nook around the corner from the kitchen that will house our files, printer, pens and pencils, and other businessy stuff. Probably also my TI-82 calculator.

I only got one picture today because I was visiting with a friend who was really there to talk about herps and wetlands - and let's be real, if there's one thing that can sway my attention from my house, it's some good salamander habitat. Anyway, this little mini-office is going to be rad. The cabinet on the upper right actually has an outlet inside it, so we can plug our printer in there. The lower two cabinets are lateral file cabinets. Three cheers for being able to get rid of the steel monstrosity currently hulking in the guest room!

Also, I forgot to mention yesterday that we made a morning trip to Tractor Supply Company to get our wood stove! We bought this model - $600 at TSC, versus over $1000 at Lowe's. Score!

The case of the missing refrigerator

2011-11-01T19:29:00.000-04:00

It ain't every day you can say that your refrigerator went missing. Yesterday, however, we could honestly claim this to be the case. As I mentioned in this post a week and a half ago, our appliances were scheduled for delivery on Friday 10/21. Our GC planned to be at the house that day, so we coordinated with him so he would meet the delivery truck and have them unload everything into the garage. We never heard anything further, and assumed (you know what they say about that) everything went fine - even peeked into the garage to ooh and ahh over the couple things that were unboxed (the range and microwave). As you'd expect when you're acquiring a whole house's worth of appliances, there were a whole bunch of big boxes. It wasn't until a few days later that Brandon noticed the lack of a certain REALLY LARGE box... there was no refrigerator anywhere to be found.

I emailed the GC, who said that a fridge was never delivered, and that it hadn't been on the list of items he got from the delivery crew. We found the list and indeed, no fridge. Cue a major sigh of relief, because when I talked to Lowe's, they said their computer showed it as delivered! I was really happy that we had documentation that this was NOT the case. The delivery department was extremely helpful, though, and I talked to them several times while they tried to track down the rogue refrigerator.

Long story short (too late), it turned out that it had been damaged somewhere in transit, and so the delivery crew hadn't delivered it. Apparently there was some confusion because it wasn't in Lowe's warehouse, but also wasn't with the delivery company... but as I was told on the phone (and fully agreed with), none of this is my problem. They put in an order for a new fridge, and it's supposed to be delivered sometime next week. Whew! The other one will probably show up somewhere having "fallen off the back of the truck"... Also, I feel like I just wrote some permutation of the word "deliver" about 100 times (drinking game, anyone?).

OK, if anyone is still reading, I have a design dilemma for you! Maybe should have considered leading off with this, instead of rambling about refrigerators for three paragraphs... The decision regards the fascinating topic of window trim (Brandon, stop rolling your eyes). The trim in the original design was to look like this:

The carpenter doing the installation felt like a little something was missing, and that it looked "bottom-heavy," so he made this modification:

Can you even tell the difference? In the bottom pic there is an extra trim piece along the top edge. What say you, interwebs? Classic and simple, or a little more dressed-up? Brandon says it's up to me - oh, the pressure!

Island getaway

2011-10-27T19:17:00.000-04:00

Cue up Kokomo, kids, because we have an island! Granted it's not the sunbathing-and-snorkeling kind... more like the dinner-prep-and-dishwashing kind. Although I plan on piña coladas, either way.

The sink and dishwasher will be in the island, and it will have a raised countertop along the back with bar stools (duh, I need somewhere to sit with my piña colada while Brandon cooks dinner).

Lots of other excitement at the house today as well... check it out, we have DOORS. INSIDE the house.

HERE IS A DOOR YOU CAN SEE THROUGH ANOTHER DOOR. I know.

Things are getting downright fancy around here. We even have a window with trim around it.

Aaaand, stairs that are not made of 2x4s!

Here, you can pretend you are going upstairs...

...and now downstairs. Don't trip, we are still lacking in the banister department. Also, Brandon mixes a strong drink.

Nice day for a white decking

2011-10-25T18:55:00.000-04:00

My first clue that something new was going on in the house yesterday was this view at the top of the entryway stairs:

That is one large pile of stuff sitting in front of one large expanse of tarp.

And why, you ask? The painters were back, tackling the somewhat crazy challenge we presented them with: paint the ceiling decking white, but leave the big dark beams unpainted. I know, could we be a bigger pain in the neck?! It looks like they've got a system all figured out, though. They did a test run in the master bedroom, covering the beams with brown paper and painters' tape, to see if they could get away with using a no-VOC paint. Unfortunately there was a ton of bleed-through from the original stain, as you can see if you look at the photos in that older post. It wasn't purty. We gave the green-light to use a stain-blocking primer - still low-VOC but a bit stinkier than the original plan. It worked like a charm though, and the ceilings are looking great. I can't wait to see them without the beams all covered up...

In for a penny, in for a pond

2011-10-24T18:47:00.000-04:00

As you guys may recall, I had a bit of a hard time (OK, emotional meltdown) with all the digging that had to happen to install our geothermal loops. The backyard went from looking like a pleasant little meadow to looking like the site of the county fair's tractor pull (TANGENT: Brandon took me to a tractor pull very early in our relationship, to try to remedy some of the Midwestern cultural deficits of his east coast girlfriend. Tractors + jet engines = insane). Anyway, the one consolation at the time was that we could restore the area with native plants, and perhaps even create our very own vernal pool. These small ponds (which hold water in the spring, and then dry down by late summer) are ideal breeding habitat for many amphibians, because they don't support amphibian-egg-eating fish. And as we all know, I'm a bit of a sucker for an adorable amphibian.

So, this plan was somewhat percolating in my mind already... but then this weekend we got some major bummer news. Brandon chatted with one of the neighbors who own the property adjacent to Turtle House, and thus own the fantastic vernal pool that sits just over the property line. I have kind of adopted the pool, and pulled a bunch of trash out of it last spring (when I realized there were at least four frog species breeding there). It is such a cool pond that I've been scheming about how I can buy the property (or convince a friend to do so) to protect it. Looks like I may be too late, though. Apparently the owners need to put in a new septic system, and they think this little pond would be the perfect place to do it. And then they're going to fill it in. And then they plan to reach down my throat, rip my heart out of my chest, chop it into a million pieces, and feed it to rabid dogs. And then shoot the dogs. Seriously you guys, TEARS.

So Project Vernal Pool (PVP^TM) is now in overdrive, because I need to create some good breeding habitat before next spring so hopefully some of my displaced little amphibious friends can find it. If the neighbors' pool still exists then, I may even collect and move egg masses... we'll see. Anyway, all of this tragic preamble is to explain why I spent part of this evening out at the house scoping out the site where I want the new vernal pool to be. This area is adjacent to woods (good) and the soil has a lot of clay content so it holds water (also good, especially since so much of our property is so sandy). I am meeting with our GC tomorrow to explain the scheme and ask him how much it would cost to have the foundation guy dig a big ol' pit. I plan to compare that number to the cost of a dozen shovels, six pizzas, and a keg of beer (a.k.a. the "alternative method").

Anyway, I was pretty freakin' bummed out after learning about the neighbors' plan early Saturday afternoon. I was trying hard to get all zen and overcome my bummedness and act like a normal, non-salamander-obsessed human, because I was expecting a visitor - Kit, a.k.a. the DIYdiva, was in our neck of the woods, and stopped by to check out the house. Despite finding me covered in poly, paint, and wood chips, and Brandon wielding a chainsaw (!), she did not drive away in terror - and it's a good thing, because let me tell you, that girl is just as hilarious in real life as she is on the interwebz. I'm pretty sure she gave me three new laugh-wrinkles, so THANKS A LOT, KIT. Just kidding - Kit is rad, and her can-do-anything attitude is incredibly inspiring and infectious to be around... to the point where crazy ideas like digging vernal pools by hand start to seem tooootally reasonable. Who's in? I'll buy the shovels and beer.

Ca(AAHHH!!!)binets

2011-10-20T19:24:00.000-04:00

I am going to do something flat-out CRAAAAAZY on the blog right now. LOOK OUT! I am going to create a "kitchen" label for the bottom of this post. I KNOW. What will I do next?!

I feel like I can do this at this point, because we are moving from the realm of "the space where the kitchen will be" to the realm of... dare I say it??... ACTUAL KITCHEN.

The fridge will go in the space at the left of the pic above (the cabinet on the floor is just there temporarily on its way somewhere else). The range will be in the middle, with a microwave above, and the pretty glass-fronted cabinet in the pic below will be in the space at the top right. The cabinets will be trimmed out all the way to the ceiling, and we'll eventually put in a tile backsplash, so you actually won't really see any of the color on this wall. And in front of this whole expanse will be an island, with more cabinetry, the sink, a dishwasher, and a bar height counter with stools.

THERE ARE CABINETS. ON THE WALLS. Sorry for all the caps lock, you guys. I am a little bit excited. And I can't promise to be any better about it tomorrow, because the a(AAHHH!!!)ppliances are coming!!!

In other news, the flooring guys were wrapping up their day when I got to the house this evening - they had laid more flooring in the guest room...

...and dining room.

It looks amazing!! But the living room currently looks a bit disheveled, what with all the cabinets and wood-cutting going on.

I chatted with the flooring guys a while today about what they'd recommend to seal the floors. Being an eco-nerd, I'd hoped to use a non-toxic, low-VOC product like linseed oil. They warned me that using a natural oil would be super high maintenance (it would have to be redone frequently) and it wouldn't protect the floor well from spills, dog toenails, etc. They recommended a product called Glitsa that I'd never heard of. I came home and Googled it, and learned that it contains formaldehyde... but then found another site claiming that the formaldehyde breaks down very quickly and there's no off-gassing, whereas polyurethane finishes can off-gas for much longer. Sad face. What's a girl to do? Anyone out there have any experience with these purportedly green sealers?

There was also progress in the master bathroom upstairs - the floor tiles are laid! I heart white hexagons. It is like a beehive of cleanliness.

The shower is all prepped for tiles, including what I like to think of as the leg-shaving bench:

I can't wait to see how the glass tiles look up on the walls! And the rest of the cabinets! And the appliances! Things are getting exciting around here, people.

Disney's magical world of... granite

2011-10-19T20:37:00.000-04:00

You guys, I think I've been to the weirdest place in Michigan. And I have only seen maybe 2% of Michigan - THAT IS JUST HOW WEIRD THIS PLACE IS. Yesterday Brandon and I met Steven at a stone yard to look for... well, stone. Yeah. We needed to pick out countertops for the kitchen, and also some stone for the master bathroom, which will be used for a bench cap and shelves in the shower. To find this stone yard, you head out into the kinda-boonies, find a random house on a random road, drive past it down a dirt track, and suddenly come upon this:

Yes, those are just slabs of granite and other types of stone basically scattered about in a field, behind a barn. Sometimes getting a closer view involved some serious bushwhacking.

Check out the crop of grapes growing over this pile of stone (click on the pic to make it bigger):

It is a good thing we trust Steven as our Designated House Genius because otherwise I would have been pretty sure that he was going to kill us and our bodies would never be found (although they would be potentially well-marked by hundreds of lovely ready-made granite headstones). Luckily we made it out alive, and even found a beautiful piece of stone that will work perfectly in the bathroom! We didn't find anything for the kitchen yet - we are hoping to find a nice dark soapstone - so we are heading out to a stone warehouse tomorrow morning. Apparently they have a larger selection, but fewer possibilities for wildlife sightings, grape harvesting, and rock climbing adventures.

Evacuate the dance floor

2011-10-17T19:17:00.001-04:00

We actually evacuated the whole darn house not long after we arrived today, walked in, and took a whiff. I am not sure what the flooring guys put down, but the wood floor looked wet and it staaaaaank. It wasn't the final stain/sealant, because the peg holes haven't been filled yet and we haven't really discussed how we'd like it finished. Despite the stankification, it looks BEAUTIFUL so here are some shots I snapped quickly - you're welcome for me having sacrificed numerous brain cells for this effort. Hopefully they are the ones that are now playing this on repeat in my brain (you're welcome for that, too).

I am in looooove it is so pretty. The flooring guys did such a good job at interspersing the different widths and colors! In that last shot you can see the space they've left for the wood stove - it will be tiled (probably slate).

We also found our stair steps hanging out in the entryway:

Oh hey stair steps! You are going to be much more pleasant to walk on than the questionable 2x4s that have been in place during construction.

Sometimes our evening visits to the house take on a Nancy Drew-ish quality, when there is a perplexing mystery that we can't figure out. Today's mystery was this little mailbox house:

We have no idea what is going on with this. It isn't ours, but there it sits in the garage, being hilarious and random and kind of adorable.

Finally, there is some BIG NEWS from yesterday that I shared on Facebook, but haven't mentioned here yet: LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, WE HAVE A SALAMANDER. By which I mean, I found my first salamander at Turtle House. And was it a puny lil redback? (No offense redbacks, I do love you)... NO! It was perhaps the raddest salamander in Michigan: the eastern tiger salamander, Ambystoma tigrinum. Those of you who know me will know that I pretty much completely lost my $hit, jumped around, squealed, and haven't stopped smiling about it for the past 24 hours.

This brings our property herp survey up to 14 species if I get to count the northern water snake (THAT I SAW SWIMMING IN THE RIVER, BRANDON). Here is yours truly completely geeking out yesterday... Yay!!! Tiger salamander!!!

Painting and tiling and flooring, oh my!

2011-10-13T19:13:00.000-04:00

Turtle House must have been a bustling beehive of activity today, since evidently the painters, tile installer and flooring guys were all at work. The painters were in the master bedroom, taping off the beams (which we're leaving their current dark brown color) and painting some of the decking in between. We think this is going to look great (like this inspiration picture - but a less glossy white), but we wanted to test it out in the bedroom before committing to doing the whole living room/loft ceiling this way:

Not sure if that is primer or paint, but it certainly looks like it'll take a few coats to get an even color up there, because the decking was so irregular and discolored in certain areas. I am excited to see what it looks like with the protective paper taken off the beams!

This is actually an update from a day or two ago, but the painters have also completed the porch ceilings...

...and the much discussed garage doors! We went with plain brown to match the trim:

The tile installer came back today to grout everything in the downstairs bathroom. For those of you who have been up all night worrying about it, he also switched out the mismatched soap dishes. Both are now the glossy white color - so they don't match the matte white subway tiles, but they match each other, and the tub, toilet and sink. So much better! Here is everything all groutified:

Perhaps the most exciting thing today was the beginning of installation of the wood flooring. I am not sure if I've posted about this on the blog yet, but this flooring is one of the things we're the most geeked out about (and clearly, we're super geeked out about a lot of things). It is actually old barn wood reclaimed from a barn on Brandon's grandmother's property. Brandon's uncle, who farms their land (and a lot of other land!), couldn't fit his enormous farming equipment into the barns that were built nearly a century ago, when farming implements were muuuuch smaller. They decided to modify one of the barns by removing a whole bunch of interior beams (and then securing the exterior structure with cable instead - it's actually pretty ingenious). When Brandon heard about this, he begged his family to save the beams for us, which they did - and his amazing parents even hauled it all up to Michigan for us (yes, I totally lucked out in the in-law department).

We found a miller up here who cut it down into tongue-and-groove flooring several months ago. He told us that it is mostly red oak and white oak, but there is also a lot of other wood mixed in there - whoever built the original barn probably just used whatever was on the property! We asked the flooring guys to just lay it haphazardly, so the different colors and widths will all be randomly interspersed. Luckily they were totally gung-ho about this, and told us they'd done another similar floor recently and it came out looking amazing. We are so excited!

One thing that's really neat is that some of the boards still have holes from the wooden pegs that held the whole barn together. We asked the flooring guys to just fill these with a clear epoxy, so they'll still be visible and we can tell people the neat history of our wood floor.

Here are a couple shots from the upstairs landing. There is still a ton of wood in piles all over the place, but the flooring guys said they'd be back all day tomorrow - can't wait to see how far they get!

Tiles on the floor, tiles on the floor

2011-10-10T21:27:00.000-04:00

Yep, another original composition by yours truly, closely related to the Paint Song currently shooting up the charts. Here is my muse:

Beeyoootiful, are they not??

Also, a brief update on this weekend's wall saga - Brandon and I went back to the house after work today to try to fix the &@%#!ing crooked wall. We pulled seven of the nine 6x6's up off the rebar we'd driven through them, and let me tell you: if there is anything worse than building a retaining wall, it is DISASSEMBLING AND REBUILDING a retaining wall. But, I do think it's much improved - it is still a little uneven, but at least it's not doing the drunk-lean into our front porch anymore. Instead of uneven, I am going to call it "rustic" and claim it is charming. And if you're tempted to disagree, please recall my mad skills with a hammer drill.

Wallapalooza 2011

2011-10-09T17:44:00.000-04:00

At the beginning of the weekend, the house to-do list looked like this:

(1) Paint master bathroom;
(2) Add a second coat of polycrylic to the dresser/vanity;
(3) Build three (!) retaining walls.

Here we are on Sunday afternoon, and the list looks like this:

(1) Ice all my muscles, possibly for the next three days;
(2) Advil. Lots of Advil.

Yup, we got it all done - with help, ALL DAY yesterday, from T & M, who win all sorts of major friend super bonus points redeemable for food, beer, or manual labor. Or all of the above. (Seriously, you guys are rock stars and we never would have gotten it done without you!) Here's what we started out with on Saturday morning:

Southeast corner of the house

Northeast corner of the house

Major pile of 6x6's (and more in the truck, not pictured)

This was one of those projects where you don't really know what you're getting into until you just dive right in. We knew we wanted to anchor the wall with both rebar and "dead men" (boards that go backwards from the wall into the hillside), but that was about as detailed as the plan was. As a result of not knowing exactly what we'd need, our day included the following: (1) we went to Lowe's; (2) we went to Home Depot; (3) I went to Ace Hardware; (4) B went to Ace Hardware; (5) B went to Lowe's again; (6) B went to Home Depot again. So let's just say it wasn't the most efficient process in the history of retaining walls, and over the course of those trips we purchased a drill bit, we rented a hammer drill, we purchased a non-cordless drill, we got another load of wood, we purchased another drill bit... Then this morning B returned the rented hammer drill and the first drill bit, so add another trip each to Lowe's and Home Depot. I think I got that right, but who knows, really. It's all a blur.

Hammer drills are for girls only

I told B to "Vanna White the wall" - I think he did alright

Anyway, when all was said and done yesterday we ended up with this:

Southeast corner of the house

Northeast corner of the house

In the interest of full disclosure, that last shot above is quite artfully angled... here is a slightly different view:

(Click to zoom in if you'd like the full tear-inducing view)

Yup, we still have some work ahead of us. Somehow, probably because one of the lower boards was drilled crooked, we ended up with the whole wall leaning forward a bit. Not good for either its soil-retaining capabilities, or the OCD tendencies of its builders. So, once we've recovered the use of our arms, we are going to pull it apart and try again.

Speaking of arm use, all that drilling and lifting made painting today just a little bit tougher than usual - but we still got a first coat up in the master bathroom. It is a veeerryyyy light purpley-gray-beige called "Lacey Pearl." I'd initially wanted something bright in the bathroom, but given that we went with "Antique Moss" glass subway tile in the shower and a dark-stained vanity, it seemed best to keep the walls light. I'll get some photos later this week, hopefully with some tiles in place too - they've all arrived and are sitting in boxes waiting to be installed. I can't wait to see how they look on the walls!

Paint on the wall, paint on the wall

2011-10-07T18:20:00.000-04:00

Those are the words to a little ditty that I came up with today. It's quite catchy, really - I think it has "hit" written all over it.

Anyway, sorry for the crappy cell phone photo, but you guys! I loooove this color. It is "Summer Lime" by Benjamin Moore, and it is so happy and cheerful it just makes me want to do a dance - but it decidedly does NOT look light you drew it with a Highlighter marker. Dance, dance, dance. And it plays so well with the "Tranquil Blue" in the guest room - it'll be even more beautiful once the dining room is painted ("Silver Fox," which is a lovely warm gray-beige... yes, I reject the word "greige," and its equally trendy cousin "grellow," even if that is precisely the color I picked for the living room).*

*This post brought to you by eight hours straight of grading exams today. Somebody bring me a beer!

Awetumn

2011-10-06T22:24:00.000-04:00

No major house updates to report today - the tile installer made some more progress yesterday on the subway tile shower surround, and it looks great! The only issue is the soap dish and shelf. Neither of them match the tiles, and in fact they don't match each other, either. The soap dish is a really bright white, while the shelf is more gray. I will have to get some interesting and colorful soap to distract guests from noticing the mismatch, ha!

This evening the dogs and I spent a little while just hanging out on the dock, and it was an ohmygoshbeautiful autumn day. Sunny, mid-70s, deep blue sky behind golden orange foliage... sigh. The light was so lovely that it made me wish I were a photographer... but I snapped these few shots to illustrate the real reason(s) we're so excited about Turtle House!

Zzzzzzz

2011-10-04T21:51:00.000-04:00

I am super sleepy right now and don't feel like writing words - so this is going to be a nearly all-picture post, with caps lock and exclamation points to convey how excited I was about all of this earlier in the day. When I wasn't so sleepy.

DIGGING!!!!!! (OK, this is always less excited, more startled.)

CABINETS WRAPPED UP LIKE PRESENTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

TILES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Superheroes

2011-10-03T17:47:00.000-04:00

Tile prep has begun! The installer was at the house today putting cement board on the floor and walls around the tub.

The brand name was PERMABASE, which was written all over the place (as you can see). The edge of the cement board by the doorways also said EDGETECH, but somehow I misread it initially as EDGETRON. Don't those sound like superheroes? "Have no fear, fair lady! PERMABASE and EDGETRON are here to save the day!"

Grade grubbing

2011-10-01T20:22:00.000-04:00

Because of what I do for a living, I must admit that I was perplexed for a few moments when I got an email from our GC with the subject heading "Grading."

Grading?! I just handed back that last set of homeworks, and the students don't take their midterm until Monday... what do you want from me?!?

Of course, that's not what he meant...

This past week the foundation guy was back to work on the rough grading to improve drainage around the house. It is tough to tell in that bottom photo, but they are knocking down part of the very steep hill and creating swales to move water away from the house. We will likely also end up with a couple of retaining walls, since the house is built into the side of a hill... the exact plan is still up in the air, but we'll have to make decisions about this shortly.

Speaking of decisions, there's also been some progress inside in preparation for the tile installer coming next week! Our master bathroom now has the beginnings of a real shower stall...

This meant, of course, that we really needed to stop procrastinating on making paint decisions, since we wanted to paint BEFORE there was brand-new tile on the floor. So this morning we got up bright and early (for a Saturday), and headed over to the house to prime over all of the various paint samples that we've put up over the last couple weeks. Blank slate! Then we headed over to the paint store to pick up a couple gallons of our choices for the downstairs bathroom and guest bedroom. The guest bath is the room that has changed the most from my original paint scheme. I really love several of the burnt orange-y tones that we tried out there, but they were all just too dark, especially given that the room is an odd s-like shape and part of it won't get much natural light. I tried going lighter with these types of colors, but was aghast (aghast!) to realize that they turn into peach! Which basically made the whole main floor take on a tropical cabana sort of vibe. Much as I dig pina coladas and palm trees, it wasn't really what I was going for.

Sooo, I needed plan B. Luckily Mandi (interior design guru) met me at a paint store last week and listened to me whine about colors and made several fantastic suggestions - including the idea to let the bathroom be a lighter version of the blue in the guest room. Because of its odd shape, the room needs something light and airy, and going with a blue would sort of visually join it to the guest room... so y'all, now we have a GUEST SUITE. Look out!

We ended up trying several blue combos, and I did my best Goldilocks impression... "too bright... too gray... juuuust right!" The color we loved for the guest room was Benjamin Moore's "Tranquil Blue" (2051-50) - even the name is perfect for a space predominantly used for sleeping, right? So we went two steps lighter in the bathroom and used "Crystal Blue" (2051-70) - although we actually got this paint sample for free when the paint store employee mixed it by accident when I asked for the Tranquil Blue... so we started calling it "Accident Blue" or "Mistake Blue" and now we can never remember the actual name. I just had to look it up.

So this afternoon we bit the bullet and got a coat of each of these up on the walls. We bought the new low-VOC interior paint by Benjamin Moore, called Ben, and it is aaaaawesome. We are going to head back tomorrow, but I actually suspect we may not even need a second coat - the coverage is fantastic. The sad news is, I couldn't manage to get any photos where the colors actually looked true-to-life... The Crystal Blue is so light that it just looks really washed out in the photos. Here it is next to a white wall (hallway) for comparison:

I promise it's really pretty and not at all as boring as it looks here.

And here are a couple shots of the Tranquil Blue in progress in the bedroom:

I am really happy with both of them, and they should look great with the other colors we picked for downstairs - Summer Lime (2026-60) for the kitchen/living room, and Silver Fox (2108-50) for the dining room. Upstairs colors are still up in the air a bit, but we may use one of the lighter versions of Silver Fox for the bedroom or bathroom... pending tile decisions... which have to happen by Monday. Eek! I have to say, though, despite the short timeline - it is a total blast finally seeing some color up on the walls!

Tiles for miles

2011-09-29T11:18:00.000-04:00

Just a quick update because Brandon and I made it over to the Tile Shop this morning to scout out tiles for the master bathroom. In the guest bathroom, we are going with a really classic look - white ceramic subway tiles for the shower surround, and these white octagons with black accent squares on the floor:

We figure with that combo we can introduce some interesting color on the walls, but if you could see the paint sample army that has overtaken the house, you'd know we're not quite there on that decision.

In any case, we figured we'd make the upstairs bath a little bit more "us," and pick tiles/colors that we love, since no one else will be using that bathroom. As of today, these are our favorites - but I am always interested to hear what you guys think! Anyone have experience with these or similar tiles? Love 'em? Hate 'em? Let us know!

For the floor, we love these little 3/4" hexagons in the "gloss moss" finish:

And for the shower surround, I've always loved the idea of glass subway tiles. Today we perused the colors available, and liked both Water:

And Antique Moss:

I worry that the second one will be a bit too dark - but we are going with a light color on the walls (probably Lacey Pearl by Benjamin Moore, which is pretty neutral and seemed to look good with both options). Here they both are next to the floor tiles:

(The price tags on the glass subway tile makes me cry a little bit... but I think we'll be coming in under budget on most of the other tile selections, so hopefully we can make it work!)

For the paint junkies

2011-09-22T17:04:00.000-04:00

After three trips to the paint store(s), we have some samples on the walls! And because I know you guys have been anxiously awaiting an update in the color selection process, I snapped some photos today to share. As always, these may look different on the screen than they do in real life - I know my monitor at work makes everything look psychadelic neon, which is unhelpful when I am trying to procrastinate grading by looking for house inspiration on Pinterest.

Steven and I met yesterday to talk colors, and came up with a paint chip palette that we were decently happy with - or at least happy enough that we were going to try to find some samples in this general viscinity.

From left to right, we were looking for a greeny-yellow for the main living area, blue for the guest bedroom, green for the guest bathroom, and an orangy-red-tan (yes that is the technical term) for the dining room. That would cover the whole first floor, but leaves the upstairs rooms TBD.

So today I added to the collection of paint samples on the wall. Here is the living room by the windows on the south (river) side:

From left to right these are Cypress Grove (388), Sweet Pear (389) and Fresh Cut Grass (2026-50), all from Benjamin Moore (as are the rest of the colors in this post). I loved Fresh Cut Grass most purely as a color - it is so cheerful! - but once it was up on the wall I realized how bright it was. I told Brandon that it almost verged on a shade you'd find in a highlighter marker. The other two are less saturated, but I think Sweet Pear may be a little too dark, and Cypress Grove a little too yellow. Sigh. Not in love with any of them yet, although I took this with the Cypress Grove still wet, so I am holding out hope for that one... Anyway, here they are by the dining room (the corner furthest from the windows), with Cypress Grove on the left, Fresh Cut Grass on the top right, and Sweet Pear on the bottom right:

As you can see we also pulled some samples for the dining room. Here they are closer up:

From top to bottom these are: Copper Mountain (AC-12), Davenport Tan (HC-76), Peanut Shell (2162-40) and Pecos Spice (AC-14).

Copper Mountain and Davenport Tan:

Peanut Shell and Pecos Spice:

I like both of the top two far better than the bottom two, which I thought to myself as I painted looked "fleshy" and "porcine," respectively. Not ideal words to pop into your head in the dining room... and maybe a bit of a terrifying window into how my brain works.

Moving on to the guest bedroom:

From left to right, these are Fiji (AF-525), Hemlock (719) and Seaport Blue (2060-30). I bought Seaport Blue first and had another "oh wow!" moment when I opened the paint can and realized how darn bright it is. Still a beautiful color, but I love that Fiji still has a bit of turquoise in it while being less "in your face."

Now for the downstairs bathroom:

These are Dill Pickle (2147-40) and Dill Weed (481), which I thought was hilarious. I kinda like both of these, but I think if we go with a more yellow color for the great room (e.g., Cypress Grove), that Dill Weed would work a bit better with it. We'll see...

And finally, you can laugh at yet another OMG-bright selection by yours truly for the upstairs bathroom:

These are Passion Plum (2073-30) on the bottom (Take 1), and Bonne Nuit (AF-635) on the top (Take 2).

So that's what's on the walls at the moment... I think I'll take the dogs over to run around and then I can see how these look in the evening. I am trying not to stress out, but the GC would like both bathrooms painted this weekend (!) so that the tile guys can come in next week, so we have to make decisions pretty quickly!

Primed and ready!

2011-09-19T18:45:00.000-04:00

I know the people working on our house are professionals who do this for a living - the carpenters, electricians, drywallers, plumbers, and painters do this stuff every day and so they are really freaking good at it. Even so, there are days when I just think they must be some kind of evil geniuses because they do things SO MUCH FASTER than I can even conceive of doing them. It totally blows my mind all the time... like, for example, today. We got to the house to find THE ENTIRE INTERIOR primed and ready to paint. The. Entire. Thing. Every wall, every ceiling... I know, I know, you get the picture and I should stop rambling, but seriously: mind = blown. Especially since we didn't even know that the painters were going to do this! We thought, since we were in charge of painting bedrooms and bathrooms, that we'd also be priming those areas. What an amazing surprise! Time to return the primer I bought yesterday!

Anyway, we came straight from work, so I only have these few cell phone pics to share (but really, how exciting are photos of bare white walls?). PAAAAAAAINT TIME!!!

Lazy Sunday

2011-09-18T17:45:00.000-04:00

Just kidding, not really! But it was a good excuse to reference a very funny SNL skit.

Actually, this morning did start out fairly lazy - I slept in, and did a bit of work before lunch. I planned to go out to the house in the early afternoon to put another coat of stain on the dresser that I bought to convert into our master vanity. I started thinking about this project over a month ago, but had some trouble finding a good candidate dresser - it had to be the right size, sturdy, and relatively simple in design (both because I prefer that aesthetic, and because I didn't want to lose my sanity trying to sand and stain something super ornate).

Of course I turned to my good buddy Craig and his most excellent list. After much repeated checking (i.e., stalking) the for-sale furniture section, I found a dresser that looked perfect. My ever-tolerant husband accompanied me on the nearly hour drive to the north side of Detroit to snag the $80 dresser. I was apparently so excited to start sanding that I yanked all of the drawers out before remembering to snap some "before" photos. So here it is drawer-less:

And here is what the original drawers looked like, complete with retro liner paper:

The plan was to sand it down and stain the whole thing a rich, dark chocolate brown a la this gorgeous vanity I found on Pinterest. Here are the drawers all lined up, knobs removed, and ready to be sanded:

The two little drawers at left in the pic above live behind the cabinet door in the middle section of the dresser. If you are observant you will notice there is one drawer missing - it was the recalcitrant one that I couldn't get the knob off of. Brandon eventually got it off by getting all aggro on it and busting it into many pieces - luckily I was planning on getting new knobs anyway.

I used 80-grit sandpaper to start, and then finished everything with 220 so it is all nice and smooth. (Luckily the dresser top and drawer fronts are all solid wood. The sides of the dresser are veneer, but the veneer itself is really thick so I wasn't too worried about sanding, and it all went fine.) Because we are low on storage space at the moment, I stuck the sanded drawers back in the unsanded dresser after I ran out of time on the first day.

(mmm, Jimmy Johns)

The one feature of the dresser that we (OK, Steven) didn't like was the trim piece at the bottom. He thought it would look much better if it sat against the ground (like baseboard) rather than having the decorative cut-out section. After much grumbling I had to admit he was right (as usual), so Brandon did some minor surgery:

...which had the intended consequence (see ya, offending trim piece)...

...as well as some unintended casualties. Ouch.

Fortunately that section will be covered by the new trim piece, once we get the new trim piece.

The staining process has taken me several visits, since I put two coats of stain on everything. It is nearly impossible to get a good picture of the stain color (MinWax ebony), because when the drawers are inside the boat house I have to use a flash:

And when they are outside there is too much glare:

Alas! The color is exactly what I wanted after two coats, but I am a bit concerned that I put too much stain on the drawers. I wiped the excess off with a rag but I may have left it on too long, because there are still shiny patches on the drawers, a week after they have been stained. It isn't wet or tacky anymore, and I can't wipe anything off with a rag, so maybe it isn't a problem. I plan to polyurethane the whole thing anyway since it will live in a bathroom and be subject to moisture - does anyone with more staining experience than me want to weigh in? Think I can poly it, or should I try to wipe off some of the excess stain with paint thinner/mineral spirits/etc.? Let me know what you think, oh helpful interwebs!

Anyway, this all brings us up to today (ha! faked you out with a super long preamble). I was going to head to the house after lunch to finish staining the dresser. When I got there, though, the extremely hardworking drywall crew was back at it, finishing up sanding the drywall, and told me they would be cleaning up shortly. This caused the synapses of my brain to rewire into a giant pulsating paint can. After a quick call to Brandon, I realized that I had barely an hour to drive back to our rental, pick up my wallet and the shop vac, drive back to Turtle House, drop the shop vac to the drywall crew (who said it would be a big help with clean-up), and drive to Ann Arbor before the paint store closed at 2pm. I got it all done though, through sheer determination and willful disregard of posted speed limits. I returned to the house with a bunch of primer for the bathrooms, pans and rollers, and four sample colors (one each that I picked as starting points for the living room, guest room, and both bathrooms). Whew!

Unfortunately, the drywall crew was still hard at work cleaning up. Our GC had sent us an email indicating that they would be done at "e pm" which made us laugh super hard. Given that e=2.718, we thought that meant they should be done somewhat before 2:45, but apparently this was not the case. Indeed, they were still going strong after I put another coat of stain on the vanity and left the house (around 4:30 pm). So, perhaps no priming today... but now we're ready to go!

Scene of the crime

2011-09-15T18:26:00.002-04:00

Painter Al was at the house today for more work on the exterior, and it is looking terrific! It looks like he finished the rarely seen west side of the house, and the second story of the north side (where the horizontal Hardie board siding is).

It was a good thing I knew what was going on before I went in the house, or I might have taken a look out the dining room window and called in CSI-Ypsilanti.

Bloodbath!!!

But seriously, I am loving the exterior color - we wanted to play up the "barn charm" of the house, and this color is just a great traditional barn red. We (by which I mean designer Mandi) even found these terrific lights for over the garage and main entry, perfectly in line with the whole barn vibe:

Adorable, right? I lurves them.

In other news, the garage door installer was back today to hook everything up on the inside. There is no power yet, but I can gaze at this and daydream about all the snow I will NOT be shoveling off my car this winter...

I think the drywall guys were back again today too, since some areas inside looked re-mudded. I figured you guys have seen enough photos of drywall mud, so instead, here are the boys looking perplexed about why I will not let them further into the house. Dogs + drywall mud = disaster!

P.S. Thank you all sooo much for the comments on my recent posts on interior paint and garage door color selections. There were a ton of great ideas and tips that we wouldn't have thought of on our own - we really appreciate it! And now that I've got the blog bug you know I'll keep you updated on how it all turns out!

True colors, garage edition

2011-09-14T19:05:00.003-04:00

Brandon is teaching a late class tonight, so the four-legged boys and I traipsed out to the house on our own to see what was going on. And hey, we have garage doors!

And yes, they are glaringly white at the moment - more on that shortly. Also today, siding got put on the main entry porch area, and the door that had been the main construction access (through the garage) got moved to the front door location:

(apologies for the bad photo, I was getting rained on)

Of course all of this will be red eventually (as will the faux-dormer at the top right of the pic below), and there will be a concrete foundation poured for the little entry porch - I think that is supposed to happen later this week. For now, it is fun to see this whole side of the house coming together!

Let's take a little walk down memory lane, shall we?

Ugh, on second thought, let's try to forget that ever existed.

So about those glaringly white garage doors - obviously they are going to be painted, since right now they stick out like two big ol' chemically whitened buckteeth. Since my post yesterday generated generated the most comments ever (y'all like to talk about paint!), I thought I would share my current conundrum.This whole side of the house (in fact, the whole house period) will eventually be red with brown trim. Steven and I had discussed that it might be nice to do something different color-wise with the front door, to make it stand out and look warm and welcoming. One idea we considered was a warm golden color. With that in mind, today we discussed colors for the garage doors, and the first thought was to make them match the main door. Of course, I went to my trusty "doodle in PowerPoint" approach (I know, I really need Photoshop, right?!).

Of course, there is the same caveat as yesterday that this color will look different on every individual monitor - but it is supposed to be a dark goldenrod. After seeing this, I am thinking that maybe the doors will "stick out" too much? We really don't want the garage doors to be the focal point of the house... The other idea Steven mentioned would be to paint them the same color as the brown trim on the rest of the house:

I can't get the brown to match quite right, but you get the idea. After doing these doodles, I am leaning away from the yellow I think... Anther idea might be to match the red, but that might be a little too red-tastic. But it would certainly make the doors "go away." What do you guys think? Other ideas?

Update - red doors for your consideration!

Update #2 - this one is for Scott K:

And this one just popped into my head and I'm sort of enamored with it:

I may be having a bit too much fun with this...

Update #3 - red doors/brown trim & vice versa! OK, I really need to stop now.

True colors

2011-09-13T17:43:00.000-04:00

You guys, IT IS ALMOST TIME TO PAINT. Confession: I have been looking forward to this since we started the project. I love colors, and living in an all-white rental house has made me perhaps obsessively excited about picking colors for our new house! Of course it is also a bit intimidating... so like any true nerd, I started playing around with ideas in PowerPoint. This is the current permutation that I am most happy with - BUT, the big bummer of sharing this electronically is that it's going to look different to every single person who views it because of variability in computer monitors (so if you think it's totally heinous, blame your computer!). I'm providing the closest match for each color from the Behr paint deck (the one I had on hand) - so if you are truly super duper into this project, you can grab some swatches and play along at home. I'll also try to give a verbal description of each color so you can hopefully picture it even if your monitor is much different than mine.

Downstairs: I wanted the whole open kitchen/living room/loft space to feel bright and cheerful, but not be overwhelmingly saturated with color. We are also going to have a multi-toned wood floor (more on that later - we're using flooring that was cut from barn beams from Brandon's grandmother's farm), and there are also the dark ceiling beams to contend with (although the decking between them will be white). To balance/compliment all of that wood, I decided to go with a bright greeny-yellow. The original one that caught my eye was a Benjamin Moore color (Fresh Cut Grass, 2026-50), but this is a really close match to the Behr color called Pear (400A-3). Loooove this color, and can't wait to get a sample up in the house to make sure it's as gorgeous on the wall as it is in the paint deck.

Because that color will be visible almost everywhere in the house (upstairs and downstairs), everything else had to go with it to some degree. There is a huge wide doorway into the dining room, so for there I needed something that would match but that would also be a bit more "formal." This color is tricky to describe, but I was looking for a warm (red-toned) neutral - kind of clay-y or taupe-y (I just sensed every man in my life rolling his eyes... sorry guys). The other colors downstairs are a bit easier to describe - I wanted a bright peacock blue for the guest room (inspired by this fantastic room from Young House Love - although ours will be a bit more turquoise), and a brick/terra cotta orange for the bathroom.

(You can click on the pic to make it bigger.)

Upstairs: The greeny-yellow carries upstairs to the loft walkway, so again I wanted something for the bedrooms that would match, but be a little more sedate and calming. The color I picked is another red-toned neutral, but it's a bit more gray and less brown than the dining room. For now we decided to leave both upstairs bedrooms the same color. I liked the symmetry, and we figured that for the most part we'll be using bedroom #2 as a walk-in closet, so it'll be nice to tie it all together. The two rooms are joined by the master bath, which I saw as another opportunity to add a fun color without overwhelming a large space with it. This color is just what it sounds like - a really deep but lovely plum.

So, that's what I'm thinking for now... Of course this could all change at a moment's notice! But, we just got word that drywall should be done this week, which means painting could start next week. The professional painter is going to do the two-story "great room" area (basically all of the greeny-yellow above), but we'll be in charge of bedrooms and bathrooms. And "go time" should be juuuuust before my mom and dad get into town for a visit next week... muahahaha.

Mud pie

2011-09-12T20:09:00.000-04:00

We made it back out to the house this evening, to find all the drywall completely mudded! Further evidence to support my hypothesis that drywallers never sleep. Apparently between yesterday (Sunday!) and today, they got everything done. Of course it will need to be sanded, and perhaps touched up here and there, but it is so neat to have real, cohesive walls in there! Here are a couple shots of the entryway ceiling.

And a few views from the living room - toward the entryway, dining room, and stairs/porch, respectively.

In that last shot you can see that they used some of the magical purple drywall in random spots - this is the waterproof kind they used in the bathroom, but they must have had some left over. It is good to know in case a water balloon ever gets launched from the loft into the living room - we should aim at this spot. (I know, I know, why do I give Brandon these ideas?!)

If you are wondering about the strange opening next to the stairs in that last pic, that is actually going to get cut out all the way up to where the wire protrudes. There will be built-in shelves which will house a bunch of Brandon's record collection (although they won't all fit - he has a small problem with records). The super snazzy thing is that the top shelf will house all of our AV equipment, including the projector that we use instead of a TV. It will be up out of the way, and will project across the living room to the east wall (which will be opposite the couch). Given that our current disastrous nest of wires resembles the lovechild of Medusa and a high-voltage power pole, this is an improvement I am really looking forward to.

But on to more pics! Here are a few shots from upstairs - first, the auxiliary guest room:

And a couple from our bedroom, facing the bathroom (top) and then the south window (bottom):

That last picture makes my pupils turn into little floaty hearts à la Pepé Le Pew. I just love those big old oak beams, how they zoom through the wall and then fly through the space in the dormer. Plus they kind of make the whole room feel like an awesome boat. We are still up in the air on how to treat the ceiling, but we are leaning toward just painting the decking (the wood between the beams) and leaving the beams au naturel. We'll keep ya updated (I am sure you'll be waiting with baited breath!).

Drywallers never sleep

2011-09-10T22:02:00.000-04:00

This is my conclusion after (a) the drywallers were at the house this morning when Brandon and I got there; (b) they were still there when we went back at 7:30 PM; and (c) THEY ARE COMING BACK TOMORROW (weekend day #2) to start mudding. Holy cannolis, dudes! I want to move into that house wicked bad, but it's totally cool if you take breaks for things like, you know, eating and sleeping.

So wow, the entire house is drywalled. In two days.

Garage (high kicks to go with yesterday's jazz hands):

First floor:

The dormer:

And the loft!

The three doors in the photo above are upstairs bedroom #2 (L), linen closet (C), and laundry closet (R). Our bedroom is out of the photo to the right, beyond the window two photos up. Here are our glorious closets:

And the view from the master bedroom window!

We're in selections overdrive now since flooring, paint, plumbing and electrical fixtures all have to be chosen/ordered imminently - exciting times!

I don't dig it

2011-09-10T21:05:00.000-04:00

I'm having a surprisingly hard time with this whole dug-up yard thing. OK, maybe it's not really so surprising. I was back at the house today, and the trenches have all been filled... but now where there was a jumble of greenery, there are only mud puddles and tire tracks. It just looks so... violent, I guess. I know, I'm the world's most ridiculous softie, and I'm sensible enough to be moderately embarrassed - but hey, no one reads this newfangled "internet" thing anyway, right?

I dunno, I just keep thinking of an Aldo Leopold quote that always stabs me straight in the heart: "One of the penalties of an ecological education is that one lives alone in a world of wounds. Much of the damage inflicted on land is quite invisible to laymen. An ecologist must either harden his shell and make believe that the consequences of science are none of his business, or he must be the doctor who sees the marks of death in a community that believes itself well and does not want to be told otherwise."

"Alone in a world of wounds" - that phrase completely kills me. Humans are just so unknowingly destructive... even ecologists, even on our own little much-loved three acre properties. I know I am being overly dramatic, but the reality of the trenching looks very different than the neat little drawings. Plus, I found a dead brown snake in the aftermath, and I just hate that. It made my heart hurt. I went back in the woods for a while afterward, and a little toad hopped across the path, which helped my hurt feelings and herp-karma a bit, but still... ugh.

[UPDATE: Gloomy McDramapants is feeling a little better now... I was stewing about replanting the torn up area, and it occurred to me that they still have to do some grading, which means the digger will be coming back. And THEN it occurred to me that this might mean I can construct a vernal pool... which I think would help my heart a bit.]

You're my wonderwall

2011-09-08T22:16:00.000-04:00

Oh yeah, I went there. Thanks, Oasis.

This is going to be a quick post, because beer makes me sleepy. To sum up: WE HAVE DRYWALL!

Brandon made me post this picture, even though I told him it looked like he was doing "jazz hands" in a Broadway show. He is trying to portray our excitement about having a house with walls that we can't see through. Check out the entryway...

And the dining room:

You may be wondering what Brandon is standing in front of in that second picture... that is what we like to call the "hobbit door." It is a little space under the stairwell that we can access from the dining room. It's future use is still up in the air - I think it would be excellent storage, whereas Brandon thinks we should put in portholes so he can pretend he is in a sailboat berth. The recessed space at the left of the picture is where our china cabinet will live.

And, here's the pantry! I saw it and said, "pantry, I can't wait to store food in you." Brandon corrected me, saying "pantry, I can't wait to take food out of you." Priorities.

Also, geothermal pipe is laid! More on this soon, I'm sure, but check out the crazy looping going on...

The Big Dig

2011-09-06T18:32:00.003-04:00

Apologies to anyone with a slow internet connection, because this is going to be a very photo-heavy post. I just got back from the house and an accompanying near-panic-attack, and I think the story of my visit is best told in picture format, with captions detailing my thought process.

Whoa! It looks like they were here to do the digging for the geothermal system! Neat!

Yup, that's definitely a lot of dirt - can't wait to see what they did!

HOLY COW there is a dirt ravine and peninsula and dirt mountain

in what used to be the back yard! :-o

(Turns slightly to the left)

OMG THERE USED TO BE TREES THERE

...AND THERE TOO!! AND NOW THERE ARE ONLY TIRE TRACKS AND MISERY!!

(At this point I may have burst into tears.)

OMG MY STREAM IS GONE, AND THE SPRING AND THE TREES AND

EVERYTHING GOOD IN THE WORLD... SOB

AND IT'S YOUR FAULT!!! (sniffle) i hate you backhoe

(Walks further along desolate moonscape)

Oh wait... there's the stream. And the spring. And most of the big trees...

I guess this area was probably really mostly honeysuckle

(sniffle)

and wow, this is really a remarkably large hole...

hey dogs, come check out this trench

NOOOOO WHERE ARE YOU GOING?!

Well, I guess I have to follow...

this is sort of an interesting perspective on the house

And geologically, really quite fascinating...

Sand!

Doo de doo... I will just pretend I am walking on the beach.

How the &#%$! did you get up there?!?!

ARGH! Get in the truck, we're going home!

Frenzz

2011-09-05T19:05:00.001-04:00

We have the world's best friends and family. I've been thinking about writing a post on how many visitors we've had (and dragged out to the house) during the year that we've lived in Michigan. As I started going through photos, I realized (a) I am missing photos of so many of you who have visited!! Please send 'em along if you have them... but also (b) you've all helped out in a million big and not-so-big ways along this journey, and we are the luckiest people ever. So, THANK YOU to the old friends who've visited (Cbus folks, you have no idea what it means to us to see your faces up here); the new friends who've helped us make the riverbank, at least, feel like home; and our super duper families for maybe not telling us when they really and truly thought we'd lost our minds with this house purchase.

LOVE FEST!

Our first visitors (I think?), J & F:

Boat house re-roof crew:

Winter stroll with L & C:

Pond hockey with J & M:

World's best invasive plant ID squad, A & S:

Kayaking with K, A & P:

Out to dinner with S & J (top) and C (bottom):

For some reason when B's brother and his girlfriend visited, all I did was take photos of the dogs. So here's Simon with his BFF Tucker...

...But here's the rest of B's family, from earlier today!

And a shot from our Labor Day cookout yesterday, with Cbus friends J & A and many of our very favorite people in Michigan. Here's to you all, because what good is a new house without awesome people to fill it with? Come back soon!

Then and now

2011-09-03T13:58:00.001-04:00

I've mentioned the little issue I have with watching the "progress" slide show again and again... But although the step-by-step version is fun, I also love the startlingly dramatic comparison of where we started back in June vs. where we are now. So here is a little "before and after" (or, perhaps more appropriately, "before and current") for a Saturday afternoon...

East side

South side

North side

Snug as a bug in a...

2011-09-02T17:57:00.002-04:00

CELLULOSE-WRAPPED HOUSE!

No? Not how the saying goes? Hmmm, I coulda sworn...

Anyway, as you may have guessed, the insulation is done! Our house now looks like it's been wrapped in a cozy cozy snuggly blanket of... dryer lint. Actually, I think the texture of it is really neat, and the inside of the house looks so different now because the insulation has basically hidden every last vestige of non-new-ness. All to say, I was psyched to take a bunch of photos to share with you. I got to the house and, as usual, did the requisite jumping up and down while making high-pitched sounds involving lots of vowels. I turned on my camera, and almost simultaneously: (a) the lens, which had gone from an air-conditioned 70°F to an is-this-really-September-in-Michigan 97°F, promptly fogged up; and (b) the battery died. Sooooo. What's a girl to do? I snapped a few lame-o cell phone pictures, and I promise I'll update this post later this weekend with some better shots.

Bring on the drywall!

UPDATE 9/5: I promised I'd be back with some more cellulose-photo goodness, so here it is! Here is the entryway and dining room from the living room:

The living room looking east (top pic) and west (bottom pic):

And the upstairs loft and extra bedroom:

Drywall starts tomorrow!

Insulation installation

2011-09-01T18:22:00.000-04:00

The dogs and I arrived at the house close to 6 p.m. today, and were surprised to find the insulation crew still there. I just snapped a few photos outside since I didn't see anyone to talk to, and I didn't want to surprise them/get in the way/end up looking like the Abominable Cellulosewoman.

I can't even express how excited I am to live in a non-drafty house. This will probably be the first year since we started dating that Brandon won't have to put that plastic stuff up over the windows to keep me from shivering and whimpering (OK, OK... whining) all winter!

Pardon our dust

2011-09-01T12:22:00.000-04:00

Just a quick note to apologize for the blog-chaos going on at the moment... I am in the midst of a redesign which will let me do a bit more customizing 'round here. The blog may go through a few iterations while I work on color schemes and a custom header, but I hope - like Turtle House itself - it'll all be worth it once the dust settles!

Insuuulate good times (come on!)

2011-08-31T21:43:00.000-04:00

OK, we're not quite insulated, but we will be in the next couple days! Today there was evidence of some preparation for the blown-in cellulose insulation that will be going in later this week.

It's tricky to see in these photos, but the upstairs (top) and guest room (bottom) ceilings have been covered with a fine mesh netting, which will hold the loose insulation in place. Here's what it looks up close:

And if you're quite observant, you may have noticed a little critter in that top photo. Not sure what he/she is (some kind of stick insect?), but it's definitely not in a great spot... hopefully it'll squeak out of the netting before the insulation arrives!

In other news, there was some more wiring downstairs for our AV setup. We decided that since we have the opportunity, we should wire the living room for a built-in speaker system (of course, we don't own the speakers yet, but we'll get there eventually!).

This set-up should allow us a lot of flexibility with our AV/entertainment stuff... We will probably end up getting an all-in-one receiver plus 5.1 speaker set-up, so if you're an AV nerd buddy, let us know if you have recommendations! (We need it to be able to hook up to the computer, since we stream everything through the computer/projector, but we also want to be able to hook up Brandon's turntable - so those are the major requirements.)

Also, apparently this happened yesterday, but I failed to photograph it... the porch roof is done!

Hooray! Can't wait to hang out on that porch next summer. The house is looking so good that I wanted to get a photo of us with it in the background... yup, we're big nerds.

Simon was more interested in the giant log he found to gnaw on, but we think he'll be more impressed with the house once there are kibbles in it.

While you were sleeping

2011-08-29T18:26:00.001-04:00

I know, logically, that we are going to be paying dolla dolla bills to the bank over the next 30 years or so for this amazing project. But sometimes - like right now for example, when I've just gotten back from 10 days hanging out on the east coast - the progress seems like complete magic. Wizards and genies and fairy dust, seriously. Somebody pinch me, this thing is starting to look like a house!!

I reported already (thanks to the photo update from Steven) that the crew had started on the siding while we were gone. There's also been a lot of progress on the "house guts" - plumbing, electrical and HVAC. We had another meeting this morning with Steven and the head electrician, mainly focused on figuring out our AV needs. We don't have a TV, so actually all of our TV-like entertainment (Netflix, MLB.tv) is streamed through a computer to a projector. This has presented some complications in figuring out the wiring, where speakers should go, and such. However, it seems like we came up with some good solutions today. One of the most exciting things about this house is how intentional everything is. Our current and previous places have always had miscellaneous inconveniences - useless spaces, lack of storage, outlets hidden behind furniture (or no outlets a'tall). None of these things are a huge deal, and you learn to live with them. What's so amazing about this project (especially to a Type-A freak like yours truly) is that everything we own is going to have a place, and the way we live has directed every decision along the way. I seriously feel like the most fortunate human in the world to have this opportunity.

But enough of the rambling - here are some pictures! This is the current state of the exterior:

Don't worry, the battens will eventually be painted red as well. Faux zebra stripes is not a look we're going for.

There were some major changes in the basement, where as I'm sure you recall, the spiral staircase of doom used to spring from the fiery bowels of the earth. It is now an ancient (but fear-inspiring) memory, and instead we have some framing for the new mechanical room (where the HVAC, hot water heater, etc. will reside).

Also of note in the basement, they busted a door through the concrete block wall to join the basement with the new entryway (in this sentence I imagine "they" to be a crew including Superman, Captain America, and Hulk Hogan). You're welcome for the additional perk of Brandon's sexy laygs in this photo.

The new entryway (and the lack of the giant hole in the middle of the floor) really makes the first floor seem huge and spacious.

Here are a couple more shots of the house guts...

Pipes and ducts and wires, oh my!

Elmo approves.

The electrical work is all supposed to be done in the next few days, because insulation is happening at the end of this week, and drywall next week! I believe the drywall is actually slated to start on Tuesday, which is our third wedding anniversary. According to Wikipedia (reliable source of all important information), the traditional gift for the third anniversary is leather. I'm disappointed, I was really hoping it would be gypsum plaster.

To end on a note of "things that never would have occurred to me as river-based recreation," Steven came over yesterday with a remote-controlled model sailboat that he built. The wind was a little shifty (can we blame Irene out here in Michigan?), but the boys still had a good time launching and sailing the little boat.

Unfortunately there was a small malfunction - either the batteries weren't quite charged, or the boat hit the Bermuda Triangle of the Huron River, you decide - and a rescue boat had to be launched.

(No ships were lost at sea in the making of this post.)

Time is on our siding

2011-08-23T14:40:00.000-04:00

Another quick photo update from designer/blog support staff member Steven. As you may have gathered from the title, the crew has started putting up siding! Eventually the house will have a board-and-batten appearance, but the battens aren't up yet - so here are the boards.

Other than all that barn-red loveliness, Steven reports that they've been making good headway on the mechanicals and electrical work. The switches now resemble crazy jellyfish (is that just me?).

Also of note - the bathtub is now located in the bathroom! Of course, it's a bit lacking in privacy at the moment...

We're having a great trip but looking forward to getting back to check out the progress ourselves. In the meantime, thanks again to Steven for the update!

Absolutely slabulous

2011-08-17T20:34:00.002-04:00

Hey look - our garage is going to have a foundation!

Aaaand... when you visit, you won't fall through that treacherous hole in the middle of the floor!

Good news all around.

The bad news - at least for the purposes of this blog - is that B and I are out of town visiting friends and family at the moment, so the updates may be few and far between for a little while. I should have set up a webcam - is that creepy? What? I just miss my house!

UPDATE - big thanks to Steven for sending the following pics of the completed foundation!

Come to my window

2011-08-15T21:15:00.001-04:00

Actually it would be more convenient and less creeper-tastic if you'd come to the door, but that isn't functional yet. So the windows will have to do - because they're here! And they all got installed today!

For those interested in the minutia of our house (Roy), we went with the Low-E EC Argon windows from Jeld-Wen. These have a U-factor of 0.30 (and even a bit lower - 0.27 - for the fixed windows), which is the Energy Star recommendation for northern climates. These recommendations vary depending on where you live, and whether most of your energy will be used to heat your house in the winter, or cool it in the summer. Obviously in Michigan we fall solidly into the former category!

Here are a couple views from inside. The windows all still have protective films (and many stickers) on them, so the views leave a bit to be desired at this point, but here's the big master bedroom window:

And the view from the master bedroom out the upper dormer window, facing the river:

That bank of windows is one of my absolute favorite things about the house... check these beauties out!

Now just imagine that space with a big comfy couch, rather than scaffolding and ladders. This set of windows is gigantic - we were at the house earlier in the afternoon for a walk-through with the electrician, and it hadn't been installed yet. For scale, this is a full-size bathtub peaking out (looking tiny) from behind the living room windows:

You also may notice some lovely red siding in the foreground of this picture! The painters were hard at work today putting a first coat on the wood for the exterior siding (they'll put another coat on it once it's up on the house). It was quite a stack by the time they were getting close to done...

Not gonna lie, I was pretty jealous of their sweet paint-sprayer. I could have a lot of fun with that (and probably end up with barn red dogs).

In other news, today we said a final, not-so-fond farewell to the last section of the crazy spiral staircase of doom. Soon the giant scary hole will be no longer, and I won't have to gasp and wince and tremble every time someone walks near it...

...and hopefully soon we'll be able to get from the basement to the first floor without doing this!

We're told the foundation crew is coming out tomorrow to finish the foundation in the garage and the new entryway, so the carpenters will be able to finish the main entry stairway (as well as the door on the north side of the house). That'll be good, because right now that last step is a doozy...

Vanity, thy name is...

2011-08-12T18:06:00.001-04:00

I am waiting for Brandon to wake up from a nap before we head out to the house today, so here's the story of how we spent our day (a.k.a., why is Brandon asleep at 5:51 p.m.?). I like to think of our activities today as the "Tour de Thrift" - going to five (count 'em five) different thrift stores in Ann Arbor. Why? Well, it's about time for us to pick out the vanity cabinet for our master bathroom. I've looked through every option at the big box stores, multiple times, and would kinda sorta settle on something... but then I'd go to my Pinterest page, look at images like these, and sigh a small heartbroken sigh...

Image from Coastal Living via My Little Happy Place

Image from Design Sponge

So, with some courage and inspiration from my favorite blogs* (and enabler/designer Mandi), I decided I am going to try to DIY this thingamajig. I will worry about how to do that after completing Step 1: finding the perfect sturdy old dresser. And so far, Step 1 has been fairly daunting.

Ypsi --> ReUse Center --> PTO Thrift --> Salvation Army --> Treasure Mart --> H4H ReStore

No dice. Back to Craigslist it is... I will keep you updated!

*And OMG you guys, speaking of my favorite blogs - I just have to share this because I am having a major newbie-blogger geek-out. Just checked my Google Analytics data to see who's been visiting the website. I do this every so often and usually the most exciting thing is getting a hit from "Palestinian territories" (hi Diana!)... but here's the view from today:

As it turns out, the hits are piling in from one of my absolute favorite websites - so big hugs & power tools to the DIY Diva herself for sending some traffic over to this lil corner of the interwebs. For the ~10 of you who didn't get here from Kit's amazing website, go check it out immediately! I have been devouring her archives for the great tips and also snort-soda-out-your-nose hilarious writing. No joke, it hurts when that happens.

Up on the rooooof

2011-08-10T21:22:00.000-04:00

Long day today for the roofing crew! I think they were at the house first thing this morning, and they were still there when Brandon and I left after 6pm (he was chopping firewood while I finished up a manuscript - the river is a great antidote to writer's block!). I zipped back over there around 7:30 to snap these pictures after everything was done... and I do mean DONE!

I can't believe how fast they did all this!! Here's the north side of the house...

...and the little roof over the new entryway:

And an up-close shot of the garage roof from the master bedroom:

They had some help from this neat truck that lifted supplies up - I have to admit I was a bit startled when I looked up the hill and saw this giant mechanical arm looming over the house!

It all looks so great - it was getting kind of dark when I took these photos, so you can't see the color too well, but it is a subtle brown that I think will look terrific with the red siding. Now all we need are doors and windows, and I can stop getting nervous about rainstorms!

There were a couple changes inside as well. The formerly-exterior wall between the new bedroom addition and the loft landing came down...

...so now you can see straight from the landing to the stairwell, and you no longer have to step through one of the openings of the giant asymmetrical windows.

I'll be so excited when the ghosts of all those ugly windows are gone for good!

There is also a new silver pipe for the dryer vent...

...which goes all the way up and out the roof:

And if you peek into that circular opening at the top left of the photo above, you can see some grayish material... it is the first round of our insulation! As I mentioned in this post, we spent a lot of time thinking about insulation, and how to prioritize r-value (insulating power) versus using natural materials that are for-sure safe. After all was said and done, we decided to go with blown-in cellulose insulation. I am not sure exactly what I was picturing it to look like (clumps of grass?), but it wasn't this:

It honestly looks like something that would come out of your pocket after you wash your favorite old pair of jeans... or out of your belly button, if you don't shower frequently enough. Ha! Of course I brought a sample back to show Brandon when he gets home, but I could have just wiped the dryer screen and showed him that instead!

P.S... you guys... I CAN'T STOP WATCHING THE SLIDESHOW. It's a sickness. I've created this small schematic to illustrate what happens to my face over the last few slides. Yes my eyes do bug out and I'm pretty sure I've pulled a muscle in my cheek. Someone help me.

Oh. Em. Garage.

2011-08-09T16:34:00.000-04:00

We have one! With a roof and everything!!! And I can't believe how completely different the house looks...

All of a sudden it's like driving up to a HOUSE, rather than a towering three-story facade of everything ugly from the 70's. Let's take a little stroll down memory lane, shall we? Here is the house a mere month ago...

And another angle from today:

Here is the house from the river side - see that new garage roof on the right? That perfect, south-facing expanse with nothing at all shading it? Yup, that's where the solar panels will go - just as soon as we can afford it.

We went over a bit early today, because Brandon was going for a run so I joined him on my bike (don't laugh - it had been so long since I biked that it was just about the right pace...). The workers were still there and we didn't want to get in the way, hence the lack of close-up and interior shots. More tomorrow, at which point the roof will have shingles!