Take nothing for granite...

Take nothing for granite....

December 27th  -- While no one came to work yesterday, today two finish carpenters and two tile guys were on site today, the day after the day after Christmas.  The major task of the day for me was to return to the only granite yard that had the granite I wanted so that I could view all three slabs.

Here are photos that I took of each of the Nordic Black Antiqued granite.  My primary objective was to measure on each slab the distance from the edge of the slab to the white mineral vein.  My hope is that the fabricator will be able to produce counter tops for the kitchen that won't have the white vein and will use those pieces with the white vein for the back splashes or tops for the bathroom vanities.  These photos do not do the granite justice because of the lighting conditions which make the granite look more brown than black and much less interesting than I think it is in reality.

So, here are the three  111 by 67 slabs of granite:

Slab # 1

Slab # 2

Slab # 3

The good news is that the standard width of the kitchen counter top is 25.5" and the shortest distance between the edge of the slab and the white vein is 26.75" on two of the slabs.  So, as I later discussed with the fabricator, it looks like the kitchen counter tops will be "white vein free" with the possible exception of the little peninsula/breakfast bar that will anchor the north side of the galley kitchen, or the side with the range top.  That works for me.

Then there was an interesting little glitch with the tile.  I went to a tile designer who helped me figure out what type of tile would go into each of the bathrooms and the kitchen.  My contractor told me how much square footage of tile I needed for the bathroom floors, shower floors, and other areas in the bathroom and kitchen.  The tile designer ordered the tile, which was supposed to be delivered to my house.  Well, that didn't exactly happen.  So, the head of the tile installation company went to the tile designer's business to pick up the tile, only to find that the place was closed on the day after the day after Christmas, apparently for the holiday.  When we tried to contact the tile designer, we received auto reply messages by e-mail and voice saying that he was out of town and wouldn't return until January 6th 2014 -- that's right, NEXT YEAR!  Neither my contractor or the tile installation folks knew anything about this.

Fortunately, the head of the tile installation company is a resourceful guy.  He contacted each one of the tile distribution companies that had the tile the designer selected to fill my order, drove around town to pick up the tiles and then brought them to my house.  The head of the tile installation company and one his crew then became very were busy moving the boxes of tile to their respective bathrooms and locations in the house. Just to give you an idea of what this was like, on the bottom of this stack of tile boxes shown in the next photo are the 4 x 16 "cotton glossy" large subway tiles that will go into the 3/4 bath shower walls.  The "daltile" box on the top of the stack is the white hex tile that will go on the shower and bath floor, with some randomly placed black hex tiles thrown in to break up the white.

Here is white hex tile that will go on the floor of the 3/4 bath off the gathering floor.

Here is the stack of tile boxes outside the master bathroom, and the black and white hex tile for the bathroom floor:

In the master bathroom "wonderboard" has been laid down on the floor as a prep for the tile.  In the master bathroom "warm wire" will be laid on top of the wonderboard.  The warm wire will heat the tile floor to avoid a cold floor in the winter.  

In addition to all of the tile for the bathrooms, the box of slate tiles from Italy that will go into the mudroom was  delivered.  My "homework" assignment for tomorrow will be to arrange the tiles in the order that I want, number the tiles and leave instructions for these to be laid on Monday.

Besides the tile, there was major progress on hanging doors.  Below is the pocket door to the laundry room, which is next to the opaque glass door that leads to the pantry, as shown in these two photos.

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The opaque glass library doors that will separate the guest suite from the dining room were also installed, as shown in this sequence of photos -- there is a plastic film that remains on the glass doors to protect them, and the door hardware will be installed after the walls and trim are painted in a few weeks.

This is the view from the dining room, looking at the library doors.

Here is the view of the library doors from inside the guest suite, and in the second photo you can see the four-panel door that will lead to the guest suite closet.

No one is scheduled to work this coming weekend, which means I will do my homework assignment with the slate tiles for the rear entry and I will make another trip to the paint store to revisit the interior paint colors.

It is beginning to look a lot like.....

It is beginning to look a lot like...

December 25th  -- With Christmas music blaring through the speakers of my iPod dock, I spent the holiday doing something I have never done on the holiday before.  To say that this holiday season has been unlike any other would be a gross understatement.  Who would think that I would spend part of the 25th of December experimenting with interior paint colors and installing insulation in the space between the floor and drywall before the baseboard trim is installed?  Not me, but that is what I did.

Making selections about interior paint colors has to be the most challenging and difficult task so far.  I thought I was partial to shades of gray, but now I'm not so sure.  Although the paint supply house has several tools on their website, including the ability to upload a photo of your space and then the ability to "test out" colors, that won't work because my spaces are not yet done.  

Here are some photos with the two colors I thought I would be interested in.  The darker color is Sherwin-Williams, Lazy Gray, and the lighter color is Sherwin-Williams, Ice cube.  I thought the lighter color would work for the ceiling and the darker for the walls, but now I've come to the conclusion that the darker gray is too dark, even though I have looked at it at different times of the day and at different times of natural light  in different locations in the house. Even in these photos the same colors can look so different.


































So, I think it is back to the drawing board on the interior paint colors, so stay tuned.

Consistent with the period and style of the house, the baseboard trim will be taller than that found in most contemporary houses.  However, I noticed that on some of the exterior walls there was a gap between the bottom of the drywall and the wood floor, such that the basement was visible through some of the gaps.  When I mentioned this to the contractor, he said that was typical and the gap would be covered by the baseboard trim.  I told him that I was concerned that even though the gap would be covered by trim, there was no insulation to ward off drafts. His reply was to tell me that he was not going to install insulation, but if I wanted to do that, I should go ahead and do so.  

Okie, dokie, so that is what I did.  You can see in the following sequence of photos how I shoved pink insulation in the gaps.  The worst was in the guest suite in the bedroom and bathroom, which are both along the north exterior wall of the house.  Even though the plumbing is interior, I installed insulation so that the room would not be drafty and the plumbing would not be vulnerable to freezing temperatures during winter. 

These two photos show the pink insulation peeking out of the filled gap in the guest suite bedroom.

These photos show the insulation in the guest bathroom

There was also a gap between the floor and the south exterior wall in the dining room where the sliding door had been installed to replace the dining room windows.  The next few photos show where I installed the insulation in those gaps

It is amazing to me how installing a small amount of insulation goes a very long way to saving energy and increasing comfort, yet in the scheme of all the different moving parts that go into home renovation, contractors seem to only focus on the insulation that is required by code and they do not go out of their way to look for every opportunity to ward off drafts by installing insulation.  Living among the ruins has given me the opportunity to install as much insulation as I can, and I expect these efforts to pay off in the long run.

I used up about a half of a regular-sized roll of insulation and will probably put the rest to good use in the days to come.

December 26th -- My contractor told me that he didn't think there would be much work going on the rest of the week, but yet again I was surprised.  It was a quiet morning and when I returned from the grocery store, I was pleasantly surprised to see the finish carpenter's truck parked outside my house.

Two finish carpenters were on site today, with one working on setting the double vanities in the master bathroom, as show below.

The head finish carpenter was working on the crown molding and the other trim pieces on the cabinets in the kitchen.

Here is the trimmed valence where the range hood chimney vent will go.

And, here is the trim work on the wine rack with some temporary masking tape covering the corner where some cement is drying.

On the 24th I was surprised that one of the tile guys had shown up to put in the concrete to form the shower pan in the 3/4 bath so that the shower tile floor could be installed.  Here is the shower pan for the downstairs 3/4 bath off the gathering room.  The tile guys will be here tomorrow to begin setting tile.  In preparation, they already dropped off several bags of tile grout on the front porch.

 Before the finish carpenters left for the day, they hung the etched glass door to the pantry, as shown below.  The plastic cover is still on the glass to protect it, so it will be a while until we get a good look at the door.  The finish carpenters will be building shelves in the pantry, but I guess it was easier for them to hang the door first, just to get it out of the way.  The etched glass pocket doors that will separate the guest suite from the dining room have also been delivered on site, but have not yet been installed.

Tomorrow promises to be an interesting day with the first of the tile to be laid on the two shower floors.  I also have an appointment to view the three slabs of granite that I have on hold at the granite yard.

It's snowing appliances....

It's snowing appliances....

December 23rd --  

It's not really snowing appliances, but why did we have a "surprise" snowfall overnight on the morning that my appliances were to be delivered?  Oh well, at least it warmed up from the overnight low of 18 to about 28 with lots of sun by the time the two guys came to deliver the appliances. If the appliances were delivered later that afternoon, the snow would have been gone as the temps rose to the low 40s.

The delivery guys could not have been nicer, but when they saw the width of my front door their smiles turned into frowns.  They carefully measured and began to formulate a strategy -- this is why the new rear door of the house is 36" wide!  Too bad we can't use that doorway for the appliances.  The range top could be turned on its side and the microwave was no problem.  The real challenges are shown in these photos  -- the double ovens and the refrigerator.  The first strategy was to take these appliances out of their packaging....in the middle of the street! 

Both guys wore these harnesses with hooks and they put a belt under the appliance and then carried it in the house as shown in these photos.  

The delivery guys kept trying to wipe the snow off their shoes and were apologizing for the mess -- while carrying these heavy appliances, but I was just so happy to have the appliances on site, that I told them not to worry.

Over the weekend I had made space which they easily filled up with appliances.  Here is the 6-burner professional range top.

The double ovens came through the door, only after they removed all packaging.  They were careful to set it on a piece of cardboard and to give me the packing material so I could cover it up later to keep it protected.












Next came the refrigerator, which they also unpacked in the middle of the street.

They opened the top and bottom doors of the refrigerator and while the doors were open they "angled" the refrigerator through the front door.  It was really something to watch, and I told both of these guys that they deserved A+ grades in their geometry class.  They smiled and were happy to save me from the "refrigerator door removal charge" when that is the last resort for getting the refrigerator into the front door of an old house.

They brought the refrigerator box in the house and used it as a cover up, again to protect the appliance until it could be installed.

And, here is the view of my temporary kitchen/living room, with refrigerator, double ovens, range top and the microwave sitting onto of the range top box.  As long as I can still access my espresso machine and coffee grinder, I'm ok with the new cramped quarters.

Before the appliances were being delivered the head finish carpenter arrived.  I gave him the happy news that he would not have to deal with working around appliances as they will be stored in my living space.  He was over the moon excited, and I was happy that he was happy. 

Next, a man showed up who spoke English with a very heavy Russian accent and I learned that he worked for the main Tile/granite fabricator guy, who is also Russian.  A few moments later the main fabricator guy arrived. The tile/granite guys have to work in concert with the finish carpenter so that the vanities can be set in the bathrooms in concert with prepping and tiling the floors. So, there was another strategy session about which bathroom to begin in.

The first order of business was to set a concrete floor in the shower in the master bathroom, which, by the end of the day, looked like this and prepped for the tile floor:

 A few of the new four-panel doors were hung:  Here are two different views of the door to the linen closet that is right outside the doorway to the master bedroom suite.

The door in the guest suite that leads to the closet that was formed by dropping a wall in the foyer is up, and can be seen below:

But, the best part of the progress that was made today was in the kitchen.  Not only are just about all of the cabinets set, but they started on the trim and crown molding.

And, they hung the wall cabinets that go over the kitchen counter/desk area:

Here you can see how the chimney for the range hood vent will go into a trim piece, rather than directly into the ceiling, as is the usual installation.

While most of this work was going on, I took an excursion to yet another industrial part of the city that I never knew existed to the place where I am getting my decking materials.  For the south side porch and the porch on the entry at the rear of the house, I am going with a composite product that is very low maintenance. The composite product is the typical dimension of most decking planks.  For the front porch, I am using a different composite product that actually looks like porch decking with thinner planks, but also requires no maintenance.  The guys at the deck place were really interesting and told me that they saw a spike in their business two years ago and were pretty sure that building would increase as yet another indicator that the recession is over. The decking material will be delivered after the first of the year.  

There should be more tile prep work tomorrow and more installation of the cabinet trim and crown molding.  

With the house considerably less dusty and my upper-respiratory virus gone, I've moved back in and am settling back into the construction zone.