Tuesday: Catching up and venting (10/19/11)

While I've been in a bit of a mood the last couple of days, venting can be good, it seems.  Particularly, venting in the kitchen.

They installed the hood a couple of days ago, and I've since cleaned it a bit better...

They also cut the whiteboard panel to size.  It matches the cabinet fronts very well, and I love the ability to leave notes on it (albeit in German).  It wipes off very cleanly.

So this is the fridge wall so far.  The pantry cabinets are about 7" taller than the fridge, so we're going to make the side cover panel (on the far side here) taller and create a small faux cabinet above the fridge to match the taller height.

Today, the plaster guys were here and put the third coat on the fireplace wall.  This is difficult to capture well in a photograph...

But it's very hard and smooth to the touch and reflects light at some angles.  I love it.

They also primed all the previously gray outside walls...

...and began applying the same color plaster in a different formulation, designed for exterior use, called Antico.  This is pretty exciting to see go up.

I forgot about the venting part.  Recently we've had three occassions of strangers that I've found just wandering around the property, and aren't the slightest bit embarrassed when they realize that we're living in the house.  Needless to say, I've been locking all the doors.

Tuesday: Before photos (10/18/11)

I've had a lot of people ask if they could see before photos of the house recently, and probably the easiest way to show them is to put them up here...

The front...

The back...

The old front hall...

The outer wall of the kitchen...

The interior side of the kitchen...

The dining room...

The living room before...

...and the basement before.

Gosh, this house almost looks like you could.........  live in it, no?

Wednesday: Fireplace wall, during (10/12/11)

We're still incrementally working on the kitchen cabinets, but it's rather slow going.  And I've made two trips to Ikea in the last two days to tweak how things are put together, so it's been rather busy.  But progress is being made on the fireplace wall...

First, he put a coat of primer on the wall this morning.  And then by afternoon (when I got back from my daily trip to Ikea) he was applying the first coat of Venetion plaster.  It contains slaked lime and marble dust, so in effect, when it cures, it's reconstituted stone in a flat form.

Here, the first coat is complete and partially dry.  He'll come back tomorrow to do a second and maybe third coat.  The color becomes much lighter as it dries.  We had a hugely rainy day (again!), otherwise he would have started on the exterior walls.  So far so good!

Saturday: Fireplace wall, before (10/8/11)

This photo was taken before the last coat of stucco base was applied to the fireplace wall.  The guys came on Saturday to apply a new thin coat because the last coat had some significant rough areas that would telegraph through the venetian plaster application.

Friday: The kitchen is underway! (10/7/11)

We have the beginnings of a kitchen, finally!  And the stove actually works.  (The blue is protective film on the white drawer fronts.)  There are white toekicks, filler panels and end cover panels yet to be installed.  And the counter is temporary.

This is the opposite side.  The sink cabinet will have doors rather than drawers, and the dishwasher is not yet really installed.

The fridge is operational and will have a white board panel insert on the front.  There will be three units to the right with drawers, then two tall pantry cabinets on the right of those.

They also installed a lot of the recessed lights, but not all.

Also installed were all but two of the hallway lights.  The recessed lights could only be installed in the old ceiling.  The ceilings that have insulated panels just above the surface couldn't tolerate the heat generated by recessed lights, so these had to all be surface mounted.

Wednesday: There once was a man from Pawtucket... (10/5/11).

...except that he wasn't.  He was from western Providence.  And I can't think of anything that rhymes with that.  Joe probably knows several gritty limericks about Providence, but I don't.  But a fabulous time was had by all at Cafe Italia tonight in Crystal City, with Jack and I chatting with a work friend who happened upon my blog somehow and has committed it to memory.  Now I'm up to three readers (this does not include my husband....).  :)

Monday: Front door montage (10/3/11)

This is our old front door (photo taken almost exactly a year ago).  Sheila didn't want to get rid of it.  She said it would be ok to replace it as long as we got one that looked exactly like it but was new.

This is currently our interim front door (photo taken quite a while ago), once they cut the hole in the stone wall at the front of the house.  I don't think Sheila has become particularly attached to this one and the architect is horrified that people might think that this is part of the design.

Since we couldn't find a door that exactly matched our old front door, we might just have to settle for this one.  (It will have a handle...)  It's Douglas Fir to match the wood in the windows.  Just hoping that Sheila can cope.

Sunday: Cabinet building (10/2/11)

We spent Saturday and Sunday building cabinet bases and putting them approximately in place.  The builders should be installing them in the coming week.  Might we actually have a stove and oven in working condition soon?!

So this part will have four units of drawers to the left and right of the stove, and the cabinet to the right is the sink cabinet.  The dishwasher will go on this side of the sink cabinet.

On the opposite wall, we'll have the fridge to the left, then three units of drawers, then two tall pantry cabinets that we haven't completed yet.

If you were standing at the kitchen sink you could see over the raised bar into this hallway area (old front hall) where the second sink will be on the left and drawers on the right.  (They're sticking out unevenly only because of the piping for the sink protruding from the wall.)  It might be an exciting week!