something new every day

Something new is happening every day now at Mom's house. It's only been a couple of days since I last posted and so much has been done. Mom and I have been around town picking up lights and faucets and supplies. I wander through the addition at night with a flashlight just absorbing the changes and planning the possibilities.

Here they are getting the dining room floor ready for Mom's new vinyl. The black plastic acts as Tyvek for the flooring--to seal out the cold from the foundation. They have to build up the subfloor in places to even out the floor.

Kitchen cabinets have arrived. They were scheduled to be delivered between 9 am - 1 pm. Actually came at 2:30 pm! Only two pieces were missing. The missing pieces were delivered the next day--speedy.

Inventorying (sp) the cabinet order.

Here are the granite samples for kitchen counters. The dark one is going in the addition and the light color is in Mom's kitchen.

Vinyl flooring for the laundry closet and for the bathrooms being measured and cut.

Installing the vinyl under the stairs (the new laundry closet).

There will be laminate flooring for most of the main floor of the addition (the bedroom/closet will have carpet). I saw this type of laminate flooring on Property Brothers on HGTV!

Vinyl installed in the upstairs bath.

Trim and doors delivered.

cutting the trim for the rooms upstairs.

The two "guest" rooms (actually Taryn will use one). Their doors are installed and their trim is almost complete.

Each of the two "guest" rooms will actually have a small closet in the room. These closets were originally going to go in the bedroom downstairs; according to the blueprint there was room on the west window wall on each side of the window. After framing we realized there wasn't enough space for them, and we had already ordered the cabinets. So we decided to move them upstairs in the bonus room for the guest rooms to have access to. But a light switch in the way nixed that plan and ductwork nixed our other two locations. After measuring, Steve concluded that they could fit in a corner in each room. 

View looking out from one of the upstairs guest rooms.

Start of the kitchen cabinets.

It did try to snow but it was a dismal failure! Darn! We love snow (but I don't think the crew would have appreciated it).

Garbage disposal waiting to be installed in the sink cabinet.

Installing the ugly brown vinyl baseboard. Makes practical sense--I don't have to like it.

The toilets have arrived and are waiting for installation.

The trim--baseboards and door moldings--is stored in Mom's dining area, waiting to be put in place.

Pedestal sink and toilet installed in the powder room on the main floor of the addition. As a concession to me, Steve is installing wood baseboards in here!

The closet cupboards. Each cupboard will have two drawers at the bottom and be open at the top. IKEA kitchen cabinets (which these are) are not the same size as their closet cabinets and so their closet rods do not fit (oops), so I will be creating my own.

Bathroom sink waiting for the counter.

More kitchen cabinets installed. Funny story--IKEA cabinets all sit on legs and then have a baseboard installed to hide the legs. When the cabinet installer started putting the cabints together, he and Steve realized that there were no legs in the whole order. The IKEA person who had helped us  hadn't included any legs! So Mom and I had to hurry to IKEA and get 32 (I think) sets of legs! We did get our original discount on the legs, thank you very much. 

More cabinets. While the IKEA cabinets were a GREAT price and they had a good sale, the computer program to design the kitchen earns an F grade. We even had an IKEA person help with it. When the cabinet guy started laying out the cabinets from our design, the cabinets didn't align with our layout and so Chad (cabinet guy) and Steve (contractor) and I had to juggle to get things to fit with what was there so we didn' t have to go get anything else or return anything.

Doors installed upstairs! Trim installed. About the trim/doors: my first choice for all trim, doors, and cabinets would be white 100%. But for continuity with the original house, white would not fit. We had to go with a close match to the style/color in Mom's home. Plus white trim usually has to be painted every 1-2 years. The only difference in the addition is that the trim is not beveled--the baseboards are taller and the trim is simpler in style.

Another thing about the trim--all windows are sheetrocked wrapped (probably not the right term) and just have wood on the bottom sill. A way to have more of a white, bright look without white trim.

Trim/doors on the upstairs guest rooms.

Painting the ceiling in Mom's dining nook (it's too big now to be called a nook!). As of this week the plastic wall is finally gone! I'm sure it will go back up for a day when they take out the soffit in Mom's kitchen. The walls in the addition are ivory white. Most of Mom's walls are white, and they are continuing the theme in the addition. Plus we want a light and bright interior for a change.

 I told the kids they can't paint any room for 1 year and then they have to get a professional or semi-professional to do it (don't want paint where it's not supposed to be--I'm so mean)! The only two walls that have a different color are in the new family room. They have a brownish/taupe color (I'll post a picture when I can find the one I took!)

Every day there are lots of trucks parked at Mom's. We usually have to park on the street because there is no room for us in the driveway.

Steve (the contractor) and Jake, his assistant, did all the siding for the addition. He hired a crew to do the two dormers--they were high and on a steep roof--easier and faster to have it done.

The painters came to spray the outside of the addition and the garage side of Mom's house (to blend the two parts). We have been blessed with dry weather for a loooong time and they were able to spray all the addition and do some of the trim work before the rains came.

The windows in the dormer are pretty high on the wall inside the bonus room and the guest rooms. Several people have asked why. Mainly because of the framing of the upper floor. While it would be nice to look out those windows, having them high up does give more room to place furniture.

Why do painters wear white? Just wondering....

not house related!

Tonight was Tanner's second band concert at Alder Creek Middle School. We (Quinn, Grandma, Tanner & I. Taryn was at work) got there really early, so while Tanner checked in in the band room, we had our choice of seats! We sat on the front row (more leg room and we'd get a good view). Sadly, we chose the wrong side of the auditorium--our view of Tanner was obscured by Mr. Winston, the band teacher!

Tanner's in the "Band of White", the beginner band. They played seven short songs. Tanner did a great job. In past years (before they were at the middle school), the 6th graders had band 2 days a week. Now they have it every day. You can see a great deal of difference in the quality of their performance. Tanner did a great job!


I tried to upload a video of one of the songs he played, but it's not working. I'll figure out how to do it later. Last concert I took both Grandma's little camera and Quinn's little camera (my camera is too big in such tight quarters) and one did better at capturing video and pictures. This time I just took Quinn's camera. I guess it was Grandma's camera that did the better job because these pics/videos were not as good as the last concert.

painting time

This hose was hooked up to a vacuum in the crew's van to capture most of the dust as they sanded the drywall rough spots. In spite of that, it still gets pretty dusty!

The walls and ceilings were textured on Monday.

Today, the walls and ceilings were primed. Jake painted two test spots of the paint we chose--ivory white--so that we could see what it looks like on the walls. We're painting most of the walls & ceilings ivory white for now. Two of the walls in the family room will be painted AF-155, a taupey brown.

First paint test--in the back entry.

Second test--in the addition's living/dining area.

Here's a view of Mom's house and the new addition from the North side of the backyard. I haven't been out here since it was started. Mom and I were out scoping out the filbert tree for sturdy, knobby branches to use in two rooms as curtain rods (saw it on pinterest and can't wait to try it).

it's drywall time-part two!

The second part of drywalling is the taping and mudding. For several days the drywall crew has been putting up drywall tape and mudding the seams. They put brown paper down on the floor and a clear, plastic "curtain" between Mom's kitchen & living room and the dining nook & addition because this part of the process is very, very messy--even more than dusty drywalling! After that, they sanded rough spots and then textured the walls and ceilings.

Drywalling is a messy job!

They put this brown paper down throughout the addition to contain the mess.

The crew uses stilts to tape and mud the ceiling. Mom was able to persuade this crew member to pose for a picture.

Metal edges were added to all corner joints.

The windows are going to have sheetrocked edges. There will be a wood sill.

Here's some of the drywalling/mudding mess.

Here's the old garage door location--all drywalled, taped, mudded and ready to go!

oh, what a difference a couple of days make

If I don't post right away, a lot happens on the addition! The furnace in the addition was turned on and it was like a sauna! Everything dried out, so they could start drywalling.

The rains came with a vengence! For a couple of days it did nothing but pour. Except for the rest of the siding, most of the work could be done indoors. But putting up siding was probably very uncomfortable.

The inspector came out to pass off the work before they could drywall. They passed with a score of 10 out of 10 possible. Steve said that never happens. If you have 2 or more code violations, you have to have another inspection to check the corrections. So the construction crew got straight "A's" on their last test (my way to look at it). They had to make one change--the single hung windows in the main floor bedroom are 3/4" too small--so another window had to be added. The windows would have passed the code the way it was last year, but they've upgraded the code and there is not enough square area in the window for egress. Steve was able to use a window they had taken from Mom's house, but it looks kind of funny (to me--Miss Symmetrical) inside the room. Outside it matches with other windows on that wall. I guess on the plus side, that bedroom will have a lot more light.

The temporary walls came out a couple of days ago, and wow! you can really picture what it will look like completed. It's going to be sooooo terrific. Family parties and gatherings will flow so much better. They put up a wall of plastic to protect Mom's living room & kitchen from all the drywall mess.

Here's the plastic wall. I'm standing in the living room looking back to Mom's dining nook and through to the addition.

Adding insulation throughout the house. Big rolls of it came through the doors and were installed quite quickly.

The drywall sheets are bigger than the usual 4x8 type. They were 4x12 or 4x14.

The drywallers were amazing! They worked quickly and each man was able to lift (on his own) one of the big sheets of drywall (4x12) and hold it in place over his head while screwing or nailing it into place.

Here's the boxes of mudding compound and tape supplies waiting to be used.

Steve taking out the garage door framing to move to its new location.

Adding insulation where Mom's garage door used to be. The door and frame are relocated to the family room.

The window on the left is the one they needed to add for egress up to code.

They had already completed the siding on that part of the house, and had to take off siding and then reside it after the window was in place.

Mom and I already have plans to make the windows blend in on the inside.

This wall was so steep and did not have any direct access, so Steve and his assistant, Jake, had to rig up a scaffolding (of sorts) using ladders and wood planking. 

The kids (Tanner and Taryn) joke that we should leave the new siding the color it is so that the house would be two-tone. I for one am tired of a yellow house (that's what ours is now) and would like a different color, and look forward to a green house.

Right now the first round of drywall is complete and the mudding is drying. The crew will come back to sand and re-mud and then another light sanding before they texture next week.

We ordered appliances last week. Mom and I visited several places and then went home to figure out how we could get the best deal. Sadly, I couldn't use ebates (an online savings portal), but other specials gave us a pretty good deal. And the best thing is we are under budget in that category! Wish I could have been able to have a new fridge, but ours still works and will be fine.

We're working on lighting now, and plan to order those in the next several days.

Mom and I chose wall paint for the addition, flooring for her new kitchen/dining and for all of the addition. We just got to choose countertop colors today. It's taking shape quickly.