Sustainability

In the sermon this morning, we were challenged to share what we are doing to live more sustainable lives.  Much of our remodel is resource intensive, but we're doing our best along the way.

Today, while Ian was inside installing cabinets, I was outside gardening.  I removed the last bit of the privet from our front hedge.  There is still plenty of trimming to go, but we're starting to be able to keep it under control.  Before it was a dense thicket, filled with dead twigs and dead leaves.  If there were a fire in Marin, this would be a tinderbox.  I'm working on not just removing the invasive plants, but also creating defensible space.

I cut most of the greenery into small pieces and put it in my back yard compost bin.  I layer it with dead leaves chopped into small, mulch sized pieces by my leaf vacuum.  This compost will go back into my soil to restore the soil health in my yard, or maybe eventually a vegetable garden.

Adventures in crown moulding

Our appliances should come just after Christmas, and we needed to get cabinets out of our living room to make space. 

So Ian shifted gears and started working on the cabinets on the wall with the sink.  This has the added benefit of letting him figure our crown molding on single wall cabinets instead of a wall with deep and shallow cabinets.

The first one is up! 

More progress on kitchen cabinets

More fitting of our kitchen cabinets today.  Our cat Bob decided to supervise our work today.  He does not approve.  There are lots of loud noises.  And he doesn't understand how any of this benefits him.

Kitchen Cabinets

This may not look like huge progress.  But it's significant.  Our floor isn't flat, and our cabinet base for our oven wasn't square either.  So Ian rebuilt the base to make the cabinet level.  It was slow and iterative.  But a wonderful finished product.

More cabinets

We got the last two cabinets in that needed to be rebuilt today. The schedule was to have them in by the end of the weekend, but we are ahead of schedule. These are the last cabinets for downstairs. Yeah! Now onto the kitchen.

Cheryl cleaned up the leaves and cut down some more privots during a brief break from the rain.

Tomorrow we are going to order the counters for downstairs.

Thankful for paint

This is the first coat in our kitchen/family room.  This is a big room that seemed daunting.  This is a huge step forward!

It's not visible in the picture, but the sheen of the paint transitions at that corner.  Satin in the kitchen to be more resilient and eggshell in the family room area for less glare near a TV.

Thanks to our Blog readers

This is the week of Thanksgiving, so I want to blog about the things I'm thankful for.  Thank you to the readers of this blog.  We don't have many followers, but our avid readers are all truly lovely people.  At times this project seems crazy and overwhelming, but then someone will mention something about our blog.  Having your support helps.  Thank you!

One of our blog readers asked about our sink.  We learned in this process that kitchen cabinets are 24 inches deep and bathroom cabinets are 21 inches deep.  In the Snack Bar (aka mini-kitchen) we got vanity depth cabinets to fit the counter behind a corner framed to hide our duct work.  Then we tried to find a kitchen sink to fit.  Every kitchen sink is designed to fit in 24" deep cabinets.  We almost gave up.   Then I found a website (efaucet.com) that let's you search by sink "length" which is the left right distance.  There are sinks designed as bar sinks or second sinks that are very narrow.  I was fortunate that I had a 27 inch wide cabinet - just a little wider than 24 inches.  So I decided to turn the sink 90 degrees wrhom what was intended.  I subtracted 3 inches for the faucet and searched for sinks that would fit in an 18 inch wide cabinet.  There weren't many.  That's a narrow cabinet.  But there were some.  And a few are simetrical.  So we found a deep kitchen worthy sink. 

Ian has temporarily mounted it in a piece of scrap lumber to let us use it until the real counters are installed.  The sink is actually deeper and nearly as wide as our utility sink.  It fits our largest pots.  I'm excited about having a real kitchen again!

Rigid cabinets

Well, after far too long working on them the snack bar cabinets are attached and in their final location. On Friday the sink came. It took a lot of effort to find a kitchen like sink that would fit into 21" deep cabinets. Cheryl managed to find the magic process for searching and we have a sink that will fit. Yay!

Is fall here?

The weekend temperatures did not let on that November has arrived. On the other hand evening light clearly did. I spent the weekend building and installing the backs for the snack bar cabinets. It was a lot more time consuming than I expected, but Cheryl and I are happy with the results. Now all the cabinets for the snack bar have a new bottom and back that makes the concrete stoop disappear without looking too strange. Next weekend will be installing them.

Hiding the Ledge

All Four Cabinets Set in Place

While I was working on the cabinets, Cheryl did a huge amount of clean up around the house. She also found a sink to fit the cabinets. That was a heroic effort because all the kitchen style sinks are designed to fit 24" deep cabinets. The cabinets we used are 21" deep.

Leafs and Cabinet

This weekend was full with two main tasks. Cheryl worked on making the front yard more appealing. She cut down some privets, which the neighbors have been complaining about. She also made great use of a leaf vacuum that we bought. Instead of blowing leafs around it sucks them up and chops them into little pieces. It creates a lot less dust than a leaf blower and collects them instead of just pushing them around. Considering that I watched the neighbor’s yard service company just blow leaves off their property and into common space, I am glad that we are not being bad actors and are cleaning up the leaves instead of just pushing them elsewhere. Unfortunately, I did not get a picture of all the work that Cheryl did, but this is what things looked like before she started cleaning up after the container got picked up.

The Container is Gone

With Cheryl’s help I spent most of the weekend fitting the base cabinets for the snack bar. There is a ledge along the front wall of the basement due to some foundation details so we had to cut out every cabinet to accommodate the ledge. It was a bunch of work, but we now have the snack bar cabinets roughed in and level. Next weekend will be installing a new bottom for the cabinets and installing them. It is a great feeling to see more base cabinets going in.

Level Cabinets

Cabinets and such

This weekend we made progress in several directions.  First, the storage container that had been in our yard for years is gone!  I spent most of Saturday morning clearing out leaves and pruning back the hedge that was behind it.  As I was doing that, Ian was installing lights, outlets, and switches in the snack bar.  Saturday afternoon, we installed the cabinet in the downstairs bathroom.  Today we got the wall cabinets in the snack bar. 

Biketoberfest

This Saturday was Biketoberfest, which is a fundraiser for the local bike coalition. Cheryl and I volunteered directing traffic. It was a great day, but cut into time to with on the house. We did manage to clear out the last things from the container on Saturday morning before heading to Biketoberfest. Hopefully the container will be picked up on Friday.

Today we spent the afternoon on more painting. We got a second coat on in the snack bar and the hall. The plan for next week is to start working on installing cabinets.

Not quite 5 cubic yards

We had a dirt and rock bin delivered on Friday morning. I spent today putting the last of the dirt pile in the front yard into it. I would guess there was about 4 cubic yards left. It is wonderful to have the dirt pile gone. In total it was about probably over 14 cubic yards that the contractor we hired was paid to take away, but did not.

Mostly full 5 cubic yard bin

No more pile!

What it used to look like

Short Weekend

We spent Saturday up in Santa Rosa doing a fundraiser bike ride for our church to support raising funds to get more nutritious food into local food pantries. However, we still managed to make some great progress.

Today we got some more storage shelves setup in the garage and also setup the second queen mattress that has been in storage. With the shelves we were able to organize a lot of stuff we had stored, but could not access. Now we can get to all the shelves and boxes are better organized. The queen mattress is setup so guests will be more comfortable. I also got up on the roof and cleaned out the rain gutters for the rain that will be coming this week.

Even though these are relatively little steps it feels really good and greatly improves our functionality of the house.

Our local pizzeria will hate this.

During our remodel we needed to use a laundrymat.  Our Friday routine involved getting the laundy started, going over to the pizza place in the same strip mall. Eating our first piece of pizza, then one if us would go back to the laundymat and move the clothes to the drier.  At first I thought we were creative, but eventually I realized there were a group of us going this every week. At first, it was a really lonely, funky pizza place.  But then Franky bought it and turned it around. He turned the pizza place into a nice local hangout. We've developed a friendship with him and seeing him was a bright spot in our week.

Sorry Franky, we don't have to come every week now.  Our washer and dryer are up and running!  Now we'll come see you for the amazing buffalo chicken pizza, without a mundane excuse.

Long Day

Today was a long day, but we got a lot of the container unloaded. At this point we can get to everything that is left. We can figure out what it is and where it belongs. We got our washer and dryer unloaded. We got the plug for the dryer setup. It was a long and productive day. We are super excited that we no longer need to covet quarters.

The Dryer Circuit in the Panel

A Laundry Room Ready for a Washer and Dryer

The little things

Weeknight progress

The vent fans for the laundry and one of the bathrooms are cleaned and installed. As a tip, never have a vent fan wired while a sheetrock worker is working. The fan in the laundry was filthy. The outlets and some of the lights are installed in the bathroom and laumdry. It is really nice to just be able to take a switch and have light. The next steps are to install the toilet and the shower hardware. One bite at a time.

Bathroom paint!

We got a finish coat of paint on one of the tiles bathrooms and made good progress on other rooms.  We had the surprise that our wall color, "silver drop," looks surprisingly close to our Kohler White tile.  The tile looked shockingly white next to the primer.  Now it looks creamy.

Laundry Room

Oh my, it's been a month since we blogged.  The progress has seemed slow week to week, but dramatic since our last post.  The downstairs tile is done, and we're working on painting the rooms that have tile.  The laundry room got it's final coat of finish color today.  We've also got the second coat of primer in a few rooms and a coat of the finish color on the ceiling in the hallway, storage room, and apartment bathroom.  I'm really happy with how the tile has worked out. 

I'd been thinking of the laundry room as the Brazil room (a reference to the movie, not the country) because of the duct that takes up most of one wall.  With the tile and finished paint it makes the room feel like a real room, and not just a weird area for ducts. 

Tile, Oh My!

The shower tile is starting to go in!

More Light, Color, Outlets, and Lights

On Saturday we had a local tree service company come out. They trimmed two trees and took out a large pine that was in our back yard. We feel sad about ending the pine trees life, but the area was too crowded. It will help with fire safety and also allow more space for the liquid amber that was beside it to bush out. There is now a lot more light in the downstairs. They also trimmed a large tree in the front, which should help that be healthier. The yard is still a long range project and there is a lot left to be done.

Before

During

After

On Friday there was another cabinet delivery with more problems. It looks like the cabinets are going to be a long saga.

We now have a second color coat on two of the bedrooms. With the paint nearing completion in those rooms we lights up and some outlets installed. The usable space in the house will be expanding soon.

Lights

More outlets

More color

Cheryl and I got back to painting since we were not able to do much with the cabinets. We got a color coat on the ceiling and the walls of another bedroom. This bedroom is on the north side of the house and has different lighting. The color feels a little different, but we still like it. Once we get another coat we will probably start using those rooms.

Cabinets

Cabinets arrived yesterday and we noticed some damage to the boxes. There were scratches on the front of the cabinet we opened while the shippers were still here. We noted the issues and hoped that other cabinets would be okay. Today we spent the morning opening and inspecting cabinets. Seven of the twelve cabinets that arrived were damaged. One of them was particularly bad. The drawers were crooked and it was poorly constructed. Let's hope that the vendor makes good on this. The cabinets were not cheep.

The Worst of the Bunch

The rock and dirt bin is gone

The rock and dirt bin just got picked up. It is nice to not have that in the front yard anymore, but we will probably need another before this whole project is done.

Yesterday the tile contractor wrapped up all the DensShield installation and today they placed the pans today. The next step is the waterproof membrane. That will be a hold point for inspection. Once the inspection happens we should be able to move forward with the shower tile.

Last night I pulled the formwork from the tiny little slab in the front. The surface finish could be better, but the compaction looks good with only very small bubbles visible on the faces where the formwork was. In general we get better compaction than most concrete contractors around here, but we still have a bit to learn on our surface finish. In a way I hope I do not have enough opportunity to get good at surface finish.

Lighter day

After 3 days of relatively heavy work we decided to take it a bit easier today. We poured a tiny slab on the front so that soil was not too close to the siding. We also did a little extra on the rat slab under the porch. It was nothing epic, but thing that needed doing. Cheryl enjoyed doing the rat slab.  It reminded her of making mud pies and brought out her inner child.

Dirt and Green Waste

Today was about getting rid of things. Our neighbor Rick came over and helped me fill the 5 cubic yard dirt and rock bin. I underestimated how much dirt we had and there is still more to deal with. However, most of the pile is dealt with and I am not sure we would have had the motivation to fill a 10 cubic yard bin. Cheryl spent the whole day chopping up and disposing of the green waste that we generated from clearing along the fence line. After Rick and I finished with the dirt, I joined Cheryl in dealing with the green waste. We got everything we generate this weekend cleaned up and ready to be hauled off. We are really looking forward to a new fence that is not literally held together with bailing wire, zip ties, and ivy.

5 Cubic Yard Dirt and Rock Bin

Dirt Pile Before

70 Year Old Grape Stake Fence

Dirt Pile After

Full Dirt and Rock Bin

New Fence

Painting took a break since our two neighbors to the West are going to replace the nearly 70 year old fence. Cheryl and I spent the last two days clearing plants that were growing on the fence so the fence contractor could replace the fence.

In parallel the tile contractor has been out for the last two days. We are really excited to see the progress there and are looking forward to real bathrooms!

The cabinets for some of the bathrooms should arrive next Friday. Things are starting to come together!

Ready for a new fence

More of the same

On Saturday morning I finished up an electrical box that was sitting open. Other than that this weekend was mainly filled with more priming. We are down to the master bedroom, the living room, and some other miscellaneous locations. It is exciting because the dust is getting under control.

We have become big fans of short nap wide roller covers. We are currently using a 14" wide Wooster roller cover with 3/16" nap. It does not hold as much paint as longer nap rollers, but it works a lot better for getting a smooth finish. The 14" width makes up for the reduction in paint since you are covering a wider area in the same number of strokes. The frame for the wider rollers supports on both sides, which also makes it stiffer and a lot easier to apply even pressure.

There was also a meeting with two of our neighbors to discuss replacement of the almost 70 year old fence in the side yard. Things keep rolling forward.

Hopefully we will be on to at least one color coat next weekend!

Priming

The sheetrock is basically wrapped up. Cheryl has been priming as I was working in the front yard. This weekend we had a 4 day weekend and went whole hog on priming. Unfortunately, the first coat is very time consuming. There is a lot of dust left from the sheetrock that needs to be removed before priming. There are also a number of places that need touch-up on the sheetrock. Additionally, the sheetrock contractor sanded the raw paper from the sheetrock so we need a second sanding after the first coat of primer to remove all the fuzz from sanding the paper. All in all we got a first coat of primer of 3 large rooms, a hallway, and a closet under the stairs. We got the goofs patched, sanded the first coat, and applied the second coat in one of the bedrooms downstairs. It's a lot of work, but the second coat went a lot faster.  We're looking forward to the next coat - color!

So. Much. White.

More work in a small space and cabinets

The rework of the front planter area continues. I was able to get the sub-grade work wrapped up and started back filling. I extended the perforated drain line to include another few feet around the foundation perimeter, which was not the biggest deal from a drainage prospective, but it moved the clean out to a location that did not interfere with our front porch. So overall it is a win win. A little better drainage and a lot better configuration to accommodate the finished porch.

Cheryl helped me pull wires for the new high and low voltage boxes. I still need to get the outlets and breakers to hookup power, but there is not much more to do. We need to pour a small slab and do final grading.

The end effect on the surface does not look very different than how it was a month ago, but in terms of drainage, irrigation, and other general functionality it is significantly better.

Cheryl spent the day specifying the cabinets for our "design appointment" tomorrow. It does not sound like much, but figuring out all the details to make things work is not a trivial task. I spent a few hours with her verifying things and figuring out how to optimize available storage. We are excited about the configuration we figured out for our kitchen island.

Extending the Perforated Drain Line

Back Filled!

Lots of primer, a car charger, and other improvements

Cheryl has been priming the sheet rock and making AMAZING progress. She has primed all of the bathrooms, the laundry room, the pantry, the family room, the kitchen, and is starting on the living room. I have been working on a small planter area where we will have the irrigation controls, some outlets, some low voltage boxed, and the car charger. It also needed some improvement with the drainage. The progress has been slow because there are two camellia bushes that I am trying not to hurt to much and also just too many thing going into a small area. I got a bunch on conduit and also irrigation lines to that we had done some initial work on to there final location. I also added a new surface drain to allow proper grading and get the soil elevation sufficiently down from the house. The major accomplishment today was getting a 220 volt 50 amp plug from a temporary location under what will be the front porch to its permanent location at the edge of the driveway. This makes our car charger A LOT more flexible. Now the cable reaches to more of the driveway so we have flexibility in where we park the car while still being able to charge. We are happy that things are not as overpowering as we were worried about given how much we are installing into a small area. There are still some more details to wrap up, but hopefully next weekend I will be able to back fill the area and get things closer to normal again. I wanted to add some photos of the amazing progress that Cheryl is making, but it is largely white on white so the photos do not show much.

Lots of Conduit and Water Lines

Tight Line Reworked

New Surface Drain

Relocated Car Charger