Sunday, September 18, 2011

M-day

But not as in the day of the week...as in change of location day!

That was yesterday.  I cooked supper in the new house last night, and we all woke up in the new house this morning.  Seems our friends are very excited.  Don't get me wrong, we're happy, we're thankful for all friends who had time on very short notice to lift and carry furniture, and for the friend who borrowed us some temporary countertop that he's not using just now.  Along with that, we feel a little relieved to be into the house in fall so we have time to do a few other very necessary things before winter. 

There are still lots of little evening projects and many of our conveniences have an inconvenient element today--and will continue to for a couple of weeks. We're going back hourly to the "old house" to collect more things that weren't in the first batch to migrate.  However, it's unanimous, we'd much rather be in the new house with some of our things than still in the old one with all our belongings. It's SO VERY good to have come to this stage in the journey.  Amazingly, the move was only 2 days off our ambitious, optomistic target date.  Lowering our standards of what consitutes "done" helped! :-)

Hope I can get some pics up soon for those who can't come to see it!

Saturday, September 10, 2011

The pictures

Here's a quick look at the laminate,
ceramic tile,


and granite.


I'd like to say I finished tiling today, and I did reach a milestone.  I finished all the large tiles:  floors & bathroom wall.  In a week or more, I'll start agian with small tiles on the kitchen walls.  That has to wait until the cabinets and countertop are in.  Until then, there's grout to do, boxes to pack, tomatoes to can and more apples than I care to deal with (which really isn't that many...I'm just not feeling motivated, considering how much pie filling I still have from last year).
 
The cabinet installation seems to be coming along well.  Here's a couple pictures from the end of work today, a first peek at the kitchen.




The island install is done.  The rest of the cabinets are ready for all the pretty trims: light rails, crown mouldings, and toe kicks.  In the next few days we'll be shopping hard for the countertop, and scouting for just the right drawer pulls/ door handles.

We are having a lot of conversations about what needs to be done before we move.  Turns out the list of things that must happen after we move, but before freeze-up is the pushing factor now.  Dare I hope for moving within a week of the optomistic target date?!?

Tuesday, September 6, 2011

More progress

Again, it's 4 weeks since my last update, but there's lots of news.  Seems that a blog is a lot of work!  Either I have photos ready or I have text to share, but to get both ready...well, that has caused a lot of delays.  A week ago I started on the text for this post, and since this time yesterday I've tried 4 times to upload the photos that are finally ready to illustrate what I want to say.  No success with the upload.  Maybe I'll post pics without words another day.

We've had a successful shopping trips for doorknobs, heat vent covers, a small piece of linoleum, ceramic tile, a vanity, 4 more light fixtures and towel bars.

There's visible progress everywhere these days!  I'm getting nervous about how poorly I'm prepared to actually MOVE.

About a week ago we had our first look at the dining / living room areas without scaffold.  That experience added greatly to the feeling that it's a home. Also a week ago, we commemerated the first anniversary of Frame Raising.  The journey's felt long, but in some ways, it's only a year that we've been building on the house.

Except for the door & trim, the upstairs bathroom is finished!  Vanity, fixtures, towel bars, lights, and linoleum.

All the light fixtures are up.  The laminate flooring in the rest of the upstairs is finished.  The last of the masking tape is taken off walls & beams.  Granite tile is awaiting grout in the ensuite bath.  The 20 sq ft of ceramic tile is laid in the main entrance.  This evening Dennis reached the 2/3 point of the main floor laminate, which worked out exactly right.  The end of the hallway just past the kitchen was the 2/3 mark, and we got the phone call (also this evening) that the kitchen cabinets will be delivered tomorrow, at the short extreme of the estimated 4-5 weeks since they were ordered!  Amazing timing!

There is still 110 sq ft of ceramic tile to go, and all the grouting.  We continue to look for an antique cabinet to re-purpose as a vanity for the ensuite.  And the over-ambitious "countdown to moving" will switch to single digits tomorrow morning.