WE ARE MOVING FORWARD!

O.K. It's just one room at a time but at least it's a forward motion

I won't bore you with a ton of photos of an unfinished outside but it will probably help to have an understanding of how we eventually plan to get to the end result.

The original portion of the house after being stuccoed . . .

From there, we bought a pre-finished cabin.  This building is to be our master bedroom and bath. The idea was to connect the two buildings with a hallway.  Note the front porch . . .

Well, pretty soon the hallway became a hallway and a closet, and then it was no longer a hallway at all.  The space just kept getting larger and soon it just became a room unto its own. A den. And, at that point, the closet moved to the front portion of the master bedroom.  Note there is no longer a front porch on the cabin . . .

Also, the front door onto the porch has been moved to the side of the building . . .

Attached!  The stucco on the addition has been started.  The white is a foam board which gets covered with chicken wire.  Then the actual stucco goes over that (the gray).  That is followed with a synthetic stucco (if you want) with the color added to it.  You don't have to do that, but that means you are painting the actual stucco and over the years you will have to paint it again, and again. The synthetic never needs to be repainted.  Kind of a no brainer, at least for us.

The small squares you see are 8" glass cubes.  We put four along the front of the bedroom so there is always light in the closet. (O.K. not at night smarty pants!)  The 3 on the foam will be more for design than anything else.

The stucco is done! And, there is now another door for me to paint to match the actual front door. :/  The fence needs to be expanded too, so it encompasses the whole front of the house.  But, it now looks like a semi grown up house . . .

So . . . I think this is where we left off the last time.

Not much has changed in this corner . . .

But, the rest of the livingroom is about 90% done now.  (There is still framing around the door to the kitchen to finish.)  This is a VERY small (narrow) room. It's about 9.5 feet wide by 20 feet long.  In other words, a challenge to do something with.  Down here, it will be more of a sitting room than anything else.  Most of life happens outside.  The funky white thing on the wall is our heat/air-conditioner.  It's called a mini-split and we have 3 of them in the house.  Not my first choice as to where to put this one, but if we want evenly dispersed air conditioning and heat this is where it needed to be . . .

 

The hallway to the right goes into the bathroom and laundry room areas.  The next door on the right goes into the guestroom/my office.  Front door needs to be painted but I'm not quite sure how I want to do that yet.  This gives you a good view of the new floors Glen put down.  The little sample to the right was the old floor, which MANY of our friends tried to talk us into keeping!  But, while it was really pretty cool, it was worn threadbare in too many spots, had splatters of several paint colors on it (not ours) and 2 more layers of linoleum still glued to it that we just couldn't get off in several areas . . . 

  

Below, a corner of the guestroom.  That's all you get for now.  :)  As you can see, it still is somewhat of a mess with stuff on the hide-a-bed and lamps on the floor . . .

And then we have the Den with its 3 little windows.  Well, a corner of it . . .

And, just so you don't forget how all this started . . .

Hope to see you soon!

Stay safe everyone.

Glen and Charleen

AND NOW, FOR THE REST OF THE STORY ....

Welcome to the Kitchen.  I think I posted a photo of what we chose for our main Cabinet before, but maybe not.  I saw this somewhere so I can't take credit for the idea. This is a Stainless Steel Toolbox on Casters.  I just love the Kitchen drawer storage it gives us.  I looked at a lot of similar styles but decided on this one (Costco) because of size and the fact that it has both drawers and a Cabinet.

The drawers are perfect depth for so many of those 'odd shaped' Kitchen items.

     

One of the 'extras' we knew we wanted was a pot filler.  No more lifting a big heavy pot with water from Sink to Stove.  The convenience is all right there.   That's the funny looking thing you see there on the counter.  It just has a cold water connection which is all you need.

Our Coffee Pot is on this counter and so it's very convenient for filling that to make coffee too.  And, with the amount of coffee the two of us drink, that's major!  :)

I opted for mostly open shelving in the Kitchen. First and foremost, I like the look.  And second, I wanted the Kitchen to be convenient.  The truth is we're not getting any younger, (well ... Glen's not :) and to have things easily accessible just makes sense.  The non-open cabinets are Hickory Cabinets, the same as what we have in the main bathroom.

This is the Kitchen Island now finished.  Our friendly little Pig on the counter usually holds notes from our Grandchildren.  When they come to visit, one of them will usually write a 'love note' on it to us.  But, before the day ends, that note can be changed 3 or 4 times by another one of the Grandchildren.  It's become somewhat of a contest as to whose note will be the last one on there when they leave.  :)

sorry, this is a little dark.  This our Buffet and it is directly across from the Island.  

These shelves are to the left of the Buffet and pretty much in the center of the room.  I opted to do our wall this way because I wanted the whole open space to flow from one area to the other fairly seamlessly.  

Here's another view ...

The diningroom table.  This is one of those things that (hopefully!) will get changed  at some point.   It's a great table, it opens up to double in size, but for this space I think a narrow Farm table would be better.  I'm working on that!  :)

Now we are in the Livingroom area.  Yes, the Binoculars are always there.  Out that window we have a great view of the Mountains on the other side of Mullan.  Almost daily we can watch the Elk and Deer grazing on the hillside.  

More Livingroom area.  The Sofa is probably going to get changed at some point too.  It's soooo comfortable but we are probably going to replace it with a Sofa bed at some point.  We don't have a guest room per se, (just our RV 'guest house')  but we've had so much company since being here that we could occasionally use an extra bed.

In case you noticed, yes, I did change the big painting.
The Winter trees are what is up there now.  :)

We have two of these Brown Leather chairs (at the bottom of the photo below) that face across the livingroom to the window (with the binoculars)  For some reason I didn't get a full photo of this side.

That's my Studio space.  YES ... IT IS TINY.  :/  It was suppose to originally be our Office Space and we were going to build a separate Studio Space for me in the back yard.  The house was first priority though, so we said 'Next year' for the Studio and I would just carve out a niche 'somewhere' in the house for now.  Well, the 'Office' actually fit nicely in our Bedroom so I took over this space.  Temporarily. :)  But, other than storage for the non-daily essentials (frames, extra canvases, etc.) this works out just fine.  It is somewhast cramped right now, but I will probably only be designing Jewelry through the end of this year.  Once I stop that and just concentrate on my Artwork, this space will actually be perfect for my needs.   And, the coffee pot is just a few feet away!  :)  

Well, that is where we are at the moment.  There is still a lot of fine tuning to do inside.  But, since the weather is becoming nicer, the priority for now is the outside and the Garage (which needs a whole new makeover!)   Could almost be another whole Blog.  NOT!  :)

"THE ORNAMENT OF A HOUSE IS THE FRIENDS WHO VISIT IT."

                    Ralph Waldo Emerson

Will keep you 'posted' !

Charleen

LET'S ROCK AND ROLL !!

Well . . . Rock anyway.  :)  And we literally have tons of them! You might remember,  I mentioned that this area is called Boulder Canyon . . .

So . . . I thought, if you can't fight them, use them.  There are soooo many that I just figured I might as well make my own Riverbed which, when done, will 'flow' across the front of the house and all the way down one side.  This is the start of it here.  As late in the season as it is, I was lucky to be able to still get a few plants in so it didn't look completely naked.  Next Spring the plan is to get more plants and ground cover in.  Our Sidewalks, (below) are on the City's schedule to be replaced in the next year or so ...  :)

There is so much that has gone on this last month that I'm not sure where to start.  I really need to write more often so each Blog is not a book in itself.  :/  Reminder to self:  Procrastination ALWAYS catches up to you.

How's this for a Step ladder!  That's a 14' ladder.  I 'might' get up on it but I'd probably never get down! :/  The Electric is in!  A few trials and tribulations, (like not hearing before a weekend if the inspection passed the previous Tuesday, so we could move forward with the insulation. You are not allowed to cover ANY of the wiring before an o.k. on the inspection).  In the scheme of things though, that becomes minor compared to some of the other shenanigans we've had to deal with.  The electricians will be back to hang the lights and finish the rest off once the ceiling and walls are in.

That's my son, John, making some temporary steps for me to get up and down to the RV.  Could have really used them at the beginning of the season but we've learned, you take the help whenever you can get it! 

The Kitchen Island is in!  Sides to be finished with Beadboard ~ but, how do you like the Top?  That's the top from our 'Solid Oak' Dining room table.   (Don't cringe ... it turns out o.k.)  We actually have two tables, this one, and a Beautiful Round table made of Parawood. (Also called Rubberwood.  Parawood is from Southeast Asia and these trees are where latex and natural rubber come from :).  Both tables have had various uses in various rooms around our home.  Since we are downsizing we had to make the decision as to which one stayed.  We decided to keep the round table because, without its leaves, it takes up less space.  So, yup, decided to take the top from our Oak table and turn it into the top for the island.   My girlfriend and I found this table in an Antique store in Cashmere, Washington.  (They have the best Antique stores there.)  The tag said the table was Oak.  The top was Oak, the legs were Oak, and the underneath was Oak.  It was Oak.  It was Oak UNTIL we cut out the hole for the sink.  Then we found out that it was just a veneer over press-board on the top AND a veneer underneath.  Who would have thought there would be a veneer on the underside?  Well, it certainly made it look like it was solid Oak.  :/  Needless to say, we didn't feel nearly as guilty cutting in to our tabletop once we realized it wasn't the solid oak we thought it was!  But, it still looks pretty!  :)

Plumbing is in!

Gas Fireplace installed!  Gas Water heater installed!  

BUT THEN, YOU KNEW IT ALL WOULDN'T BE THAT EASY . . .  

The gas company came, dug up the street, ran gas to our house, patched up the street, put the gas meter in, and then they lock it until the State Inspector says all is o.k.   Meanwhile, the Heating Company came and installed our inside gas lines so we would be able to use our gas fireplace, gas hot water heater, gas stove, gas barbque, etc., etc.  Then they called for the Inspection so the meter could be unlocked.  

What we didn't know was that the State Gas Inspector was also the State Plumbing Inspector.

When I came a few days after the inspection was suppose to have taken place the meter was still locked.  AND, ... the plumbing (?) was Red Tagged.  Where did the plumbing guy come from??  I called the Heating Company who told me they didn't know why the meter was still locked ~ they passed inspection, and they didn't know anything about the Plumbing (even though they would have had to let this person in because they had the key.  How does that work?)  But, I was told they would check and call me back in  a few minutes.  No call back.  Called again.  No call back.  Its now after 5 on a Friday night.  I called their personal number (What can I say. . . it's that New York thing again  :/  )  Still no resolution though.  Would have to get back to me.  Glen calls the personal number the next day (See... he's learning!) and is now told that the State Heating Inspector is also the State Plumbing Inspector and, of course, while he was there inspecting the gas lines, he also inspected the Plumbing.

He didn't like the Plumbing.  His Red Tag comments were not very nice. :(  They led us to believe that we were going to have to tear up our concrete flooring and concrete patio and redo all the lines. All we could envision was money and time flying away laughing as they went.  Glen was not able to get a hold of him until Monday.  The weekend, to say the least, was complete Stress.  The phone conversation on Monday did not go much better.  (You know, some people should just not talk on the phone.  It is not their friend.  This person is one of them.)  He would be up Tuesday and go over everything in person.  Glen had to take that night off from work so he would be there in the a.m.  

Tuesday morning did not go as bad as expected.  Much better one on one.  No, we wouldn't have to tear up the concrete.  He could make us but he wasn't going to. : /  But, we would have to dig up across the whole backyard and partially down the driveway.  Forty-two inches deep  (the city of Mullan Water District only requires 36 inches ?)  There goes the two truckloads of gravel we paid to have hauled in so we wouldn't have all mud out there this winter :(  But, water line is now changed and comes in through the bathroom floor instead of the kitchen floor. A few other minor 'violations' on the inside, easily correctable are scheduled to be worked on next weekend.  What the heck, it's just time and money.  

 So . . . back comes Scott and his backhoe and the digging begins.

  

Of course it rained and everything turned to mud and required 3 changes of clothes for the day.

But, we got the 42" and that part passed inspection.

I did get a few more Boulders for the 'River' out of the deal though . . . 

(these can only be moved with a backhoe so not quite sure how this is going to work . . .  :/  )

  

Oh yes, the lock on the gas meter . . .   Seems that won't get unlocked until after ALL of the insulation is done, ALL of the sheetrock is up, and AT LEAST one coat of paint is on the walls.  Evidently the state doesn't allow the gas to be on while you are working on the place.  (No one we've talked to seems to have heard of that rule before . . .)  So the heat we thought we would have while we worked on the place is isn't going to exist. (29 degrees last night)  When we questioned the reasoning behind that we were just told to get an electric heater. :/  Now, call me silly, but I would think that a company that installs gas lines, gas furnaces, gas water heaters, gas fireplaces (need I go on?) in new and existing construction, would have known that.  And, call me even sillier, but I would have thought that they just might have mentioned that to us before we went to all the time and expense to install these items at this point in time when we probably won't be able to use them for several months.  Just thinkin' out-loud here mind you.

You know, even when it rains, water or otherwise, there is still a beauty to life that can't be ignored.

til next time . . .

Charleen