Kids Vanity

I got to swing by the cabinet maker's shop today to peek in on our vanities, and the kids' vanity is finished. I LOVE it!  It is so fun. This is not a great photo, taken with my cell phone, but you get the idea.  He also made the maple countertop and the two step stools underneath.  The countertop is being finished with several coats of polyurethane to make it waterproof (along with a backsplash, not pictured).  Once we add the hardware and faucets, it is going to be an awesome piece.  If you are in the market for cabinetry, thinking of redoing a bathroom or kitchen, don't forget about your local cabinet makers.  This for us was a far better option than ordering a mass-produced piece online (for a similar price, depending on where you are shopping).  Our cabinet maker offered to make these stools for the boys so they can reach the sink.  The stools are fabulous - they are wide and sturdy, but still light enough for a child to easily move around.  They are made of the same wood as the countertop, and fit perfectly under our cabinet.  The quality of craftsmanship in the stools is evident when you look up close. They are just the kind of pieces you keep and let your kids' kids use one day.  (I'll post a better picture of them when they are delivered this weekend).

To complete our vanity we'll be adding these ring-pulls to the drawers and doors:

And these faucets:

Not sure about the mirror... that may have to be added later.  I haven't found just the right one in our budget and am considering trying to reinvent the one that came with the house, which is the right size, but wrong look!

For our Wilmington friends, we are using The Artisan Studio for both our bathroom vanities.

Almost!

We almost pulled it off - moving in on the 16th.  But, not quite!  We had about six or seven things that had to all fall into place last week before the floor sanding and staining started this week in order to be able to move in.  We needed the painter to finish up, and he did.  We needed the tile to all be installed, and it was.  We needed the contractor to finish a few final items, and he did.  We needed the movers to have an opening on Saturday for us to move, and they did.  We needed the gas line to be installed and new propane tanks for our gas range, and they were (not until the very last minute, but hey, who's counting).  The only person to fall through was the electrician.  Miscommunication between our contractor and electrician as well as the electrician supposedly being sick meant that he could not come until next week!  Agh!!! And we can't move in without a certificate of occupancy and can't get that without passing our final electrical inspection, which of course we can't pass until the electrician finishes his job!  So, the move in is currently set for Friday Nov. 22.  Pray it doesn't change!  (Yes, we are hosting Thanksgiving.  Yes, we are crazy.  I think we've already established that, right?).

Here's what we DID accomplish last week.  Brett and I (ok, mostly Brett) worked every night once we got the kids in bed until about 11:00 or so.  And Brett went back every morning to work from 7:30 to 9:30 before he started work.  It made for a really long week (and weekend, in fact), but a lot was accomplished.

Brett hung 10 new lights!

These flush-mount drum shades are in the hallways, "formal" living room, master closet, and laundry room. We have 8' ceilings in this house, so we are limited in our lighting choices - has to be flush mount in many of the rooms.

These are in the new office.  I randomly found these lights at JCPenny of all places.  I haven't been in a JCPenny in years, but went in looking for blinds and was distracted by these beauties.  I went online and they were on clearance and I had a coupon.  Sold!

We had to select the stain for our hardwoods.  The color choices were almost as comical as the whites I had on the walls. They all looked the SAME!  Well, almost the same.  We decided to leave them natural (the one on the far right).  We want a casual, coastal, light feeling in this home and the natural seemed to be the best choice.  A bonus to our choice is that it will save us $0.30 per square foot!  Yippee!  They started finishing them today, so we can't go in the house until they are done on Friday - a forced vacation from house projects for the week for us.

We tested and selected bold paint colors for the kids' bathroom vanity on some leftover plywood we had from another project.  You are not going to believe these colors!  I picked the color on the top left.  Sydney wanted green, Pierce wanted blue, I wanted something fun, youthful, unexpected, but something we could live with for many years.  It needed to have a little grey to it and not be too bright.  This is our compromise.  For the record, Pierce wanted the one on the bottom left and Sydney wanted the one on the bottom right. (And they all look a little deeper and darker in this picture than they actually are. Sydney's choice in this picture actually looks perfect to me, but in real life it is seriously bright!).  Mommy won, but the color is blue-green, so everyone is equally represented!

Brett bought the tools he needed to cut and install shelves in all of the closets in the house and was able to get the pantry completed.  I was so thrilled to see this beautiful pantry.  One down, many to go!

I painted the magnetic chalkboard wall in our kitchen, and Pierce and Grant gave it a try to make sure it works.  By the way, the magnetic paint is a real pain to use.  Be warned!

Brett finished painting the boarding in the kids bath. We tried whitewashing, but it didn't look like we hoped it would, so we painted it white and it looks great.

Our master bath was completely tiled and we love it (so far).  This is our floor tile (it's dusty dirty, but you get the idea!) It's solid grey with light grey grout.

 

 

And the new, twice as large shower with two shower heads (soon-to-be-installed) was completed.

Hopefully we'll be in next Friday!  I'll keep you posted and also post some final pictures once our appliances are installed in the kitchen next week and the floors are finished.

Just a peek

The kitchen is almost finished and it is looking great!  However, I am not going to show you pictures just yet because it will ruin the surprise at the end!  The cabinets, sink and some doors were installed last week.  The appliances are still in the garage and scattered throughout the house, but will be installed this week.  Here's a little peek...

This is our new bay window bench (as a work in progress).  I love it!

A peek at the style of our cabinets.  Lots of drawers!  Love those drawers!

I have always loved a white kitchen.  And I love the clean lines of shaker style cabinets.  We have them with these sort-of farm house pulls, which I love, but the clean lines of the cabinets allow us to go totally modern with the pulls years down the road if we ever want to change it up.

Brett has been hard at work paneling the kids bath.  He bought some new toys to get the job done - a circular saw and nail gun... not sure what else.  Does anyone find it odd that all over the country people are ripping down paneling and we are putting it up?  It's going to look great!  Here's the beginning of it. We plan to whitewash it, and if it's still too cabin-y and rustic, we'll paint it white.

Like the barn light for a vanity light?

I decided to research the Cape Cod style house online today and find out a little about its origins and the typical styles and colors used inside. (Shouldn't I have done this about two months ago?)  I was thrilled to discover that Cape Cod interiors are characterized by lots of white (phew!), hardwoods throughout the entire house (yippee!), and accents of blues (for the ocean), red, and tans (the color of sand).  I think I'll take this information to heart when decorating and embrace the blues and reds.  Cape Cods are so charming - I need to do this cute little house justice.

We got to see our 2 slabs of Carrera marble at the stoneyard this week and are so excited that they will be installed on Tuesday.  We are in the final stretch here.  The plan is to move in November 16, but every time I say that to someone I get funny looks!  Doubters!  I am pushing forward and pushing for that date, because I've learned that in this business if you don't give people firm deadlines, nothing will be finished and work will drag on forever.  We'll see if I get my move-in date!  I'm sticking to it until someone tells me it can't be done.

Turning Point

I think we are at a turning point.  I think the pictures I post from here on out will be getting progressively better.  No more exposed studs, walls will be gradually painted, dust will eventually start to clear, counters and appliances will start to fill the empty space.  It started last week with the drywall going up (and us passing all our inspections!) and will continue tomorrow with the installation of the kitchen cabinets.  Here's what the kitchen looked like yesterday morning. 

I love this picture - Grant and the glow of the morning light pouring through the bay window. 
Feels like home looking at this shot.

We slid the existing pantry down about 2 feet to create a larger space for cabinetry
(and lost the utility sink from the laundry room to do that).

We widened the doorway to the dining room from the kitchen seen here by about a foot.

To the average eye, this kitchen probably looks pretty dire!  But to me, it is spectacular.  Seeing the walls up made such a huge difference.  And the morning light pouring through the bay windows just warmed the space and allowed me to envision it as the heart of our home.

I'll post pictures after the cabinets and appliances go in (Wednesday through Friday of this week).

Busy week!

It was a seriously busy week at the new house.  I mean so busy that every waking moment Brett and I had available to work on house projects, that's what we were doing.  If I wasn't driving someone to school or feeding someone or dressing someone, I was either buying tubs, faucets and door knobs, meeting with appliance sales people, designing bathroom cabinets, talking with the plumber, checking on the painter, measuring all sorts of things to make sure everything will fit and function properly, selecting tile... and so on. Brett's spare time involved marking out our bathroom tub on the floor for our plumber (so he doesn't screw it up installing it!), measuring shower head heights, shower basin widths and depths, talking with gas line installers, multiple trips to Lowes and Home Depot, trips to the outskirts of town to pick up plumbing valves for 3 shower heads, meetings with sales reps at Fergusons, late night shopping online for tubs and tub fillers.  It has been NONSTOP and very little sleep around here.

A bit of unsolicited advice for anyone contemplating a major renovation... don't do it unless you really like this stuff.  I mean REALLY like this stuff.  Decorating, space planning, designing, engineering.  I love these sorts of things, and the parts I enjoy (decorating, space planning, organizing, designing) compliment nicely the parts Brett enjoys (engineering, mechanics, functionality, etc.).  So, in the same sick and twisted sort of way that marathon runners enjoy running 13 miles on a Saturday morning to prepare for a race (no thank you!), we really enjoy the remodeling process.  Now, at about 11:30 pm each night this week when Brett and I were frantically searching online for tubs and faucets because our plumber said, "You need to have a tub picked out by tomorrow morning so that I can get the plumbing roughed in before the inspector comes and we can pass inspection and get these walls closed up," I can't really say we were having FUN.  But, we did find an awesome tub (at 11:15 pm, after days of looking at other lesser tubs!).  She's a beauty!

And we selected tile (in less than an hour - nothing like a deadline to get you motivated to make decisions).  The tiles we selected were quite reasonably priced (yay for us!), but then we got the bid for the labor to install the tile.  Gulp.  My estimate that I had used in our budget for the master bathroom planning was about 70% LESS than the actual cost.  OUCH!  Time to revise the tile plans a little.  We had planned to do white subway tiles about 4 feet up the wall all around the bathroom (and subway tiles are CHEAP), but the labor is outrageous, so we are going to have to rethink that part of the vision for our bathroom.  I think we're planning to only tile the wall behind and around the tub and leave the rest alone!

We are having custom vanities made by a local cabinet maker because we can get the exact size, height, look and drawer configuration we want in the bathroom and at only a slightly higher price than shopping online (and, FYI, we can get custom handmade solid wood cabinets for LESS than the Pottery Barn bath vanities - so buyer be warned!).  This is the design I came up with at 11:30 at night.

Oh, and did I mention that at the eleventh hour we decided to add the kids bath remodel to the mix?  It looked like this a few days ago:

Now it looks like this:

I've designed this cabinet (11:35 pm!):

The space under the cabinet will accommodate step stools and a basket for laundry or towels.

To compliment this rockin' sink!

Are we crazy?  Yes.  But, now that we are doing the kids bath too, we can get all the bad plumbing out of the house.  And while I was designing one vanity, I figured I should just do the second and not have to worry about it later.  All the cabinets (including our kitchen cabinets, which are ready to install as soon as we get the walls closed up) in the house will be shaker style, clean lines.  The bathroom vanities will be painted (ours light grey, the kids maybe blue?), and the kitchen cabinets will be all white.

We'll do this light (which we found at Lowes for $40) and this horizontal boarding on the walls in the kids bath.  The pine board project will only cost about $100 and will really change the look of the space for plain to interesting (you can get them at Lowes or Home Depot).  Nice little project for Brett to add to his list.

We are keeping the neutral tiles and leaving the tub alone for now... Simpler, faster and less expensive!

And yes, the move-in date is pushed back to mid-November.  And now our master bedroom ceiling looks like this (to get to the plumbing in the kids bath):

 

Such an inviting master retreat, isn't it!

As for paint... we are going with Valspar's "Du Jour."  It's white.  White white.  Here's what our dining room looked like in the decision making process. 

How did I manage to work from right to left?  So funny!

This picture is very inaccurate in translating the colors (because we have NO electricity in our house and the flash on my camera ruined the colors).  But anyway, #1 is what we chose, #2 was too bright, #3 was too grey, #4 was too creamy, and #5 was just right but too expensive.  Basically, we couldn't tell the difference between #1 (Valspar Du Jour) and #5 (Benjamin Moore Chantilly Lace), and choosing #1 saved $200-$300.  So, there you have it. We had several people walk in the house over the past few weeks and ask what the squares on the wall were (seriously?  Isn't it obvious?).  Brett or I would explain, and each time the person would reply, "But they all look the same?"  Ha!  They are definitely not the same - I promise!

Oh, one last thing.  The playroom addition rocks.  Lots of usable space.  Here's a decent picture of the opened space.

Lots of barely visible progress

Lots has been accomplished in the last week or so, but there is little evidence of the progress when you walk through the house.  Many of our walls still look mostly like this:

And this:

We have no water, some electric.  Dust is everywhere.  Nothing is finished.  But the good news is that everything is started and lots of things are past the halfway point, dare I say almost finished?  (Ok, that is a bit of a stretch!)  We are still relatively on "schedule."  Not that we ever had a schedule, but when we bought the house, Brett and I calculated what we thought this would all require as far as time, and we estimated a move-in at the end of October.  We *might* be in by Halloween.  If not, the first weekend or two in November.  Not too bad.

All the hardwoods are in (upstairs and down) and they look great.  They have not yet been sanded and finished, that will be the last step in the renovation.  For now, then can just get trashed!  We are thrilled to have them upstairs as well.  Thanks for all your input.

We do have all new electrical in the kitchen (notice those holes in the walls!).  Light switches have been moved and added to work with the new kitchen layout.  Cable outlets removed and relocated in many places.  We have added recessed lighting as well as pendant lighting for over the island.  We have all new plumbing on the entire first floor - the plumber had to remove the 1980s Polybutalene piping which will no longer pass inspection and replace ALL of it.

See those new recessed lights in the kitchen!

 

We even have a new stove!  It's on our floor in the family room - right where stoves belong, right?  It's a Bertazzoni and I can't wait to show it to you - it is beautiful.  A little piece of jewelry for our kitchen!

 



We have a new 80 gallon water heater, now in the garage instead of the hall closet (which is going to give us a bigger shower!).

Brett stripped all the closets of their wire shelving so he can repaint them and build in wooden shelves and maximize their usable space.  The closets in this house are generally a little smaller than in our last house, so adding shelves and double hanging rods and shoe shelves and things like that will be really helpful over the long run.  That's his next big project.

Before all the closets had some type of wire shelving like this.

Now they are all "naked" like this!

The master bath is plumbed and rewired - new light over the shower, wired for a chandelier over the tub, etc.

The black box will hold a chandelier over our (yet-to-be-selected-or-purchased) free-standing tub.

 

Oh, and my new addition to the playroom is lookin' good.  We have a light switch, recessed light and two electrical outlets in there now.  The room feels (and is) much bigger.

To be honest, this weekend we mostly did this:

And this:

 



 And a little of this:

Instead of this:

But, hey, you gotta play a little, too, right?