Happy Mother's Day

Mother's Day and time for a little break.  This is what the biking looks like out our back yard.

A little break for everyone

Time for lunch

Back to work.  I finally got the new fan motor for the oven since I destroyed the last one trying to clean it.  I was taking off the fan blades for overhaul and, after breaking the threads off, I realized that it was a reverse thread nut and metric at that.  You just don't get those at your local hardware store hence the new motor with a new nut.

Grrrrrrrrrrr

The final fit for the microwave

Rounding the edges of our island top

Lots happening as I prepare for the loft floor.  We have to varethane each piece twice so that should slow things down somewhat.  Hope to start that tomorrow.

Ready to go

Len

The Week That Was

Sorry to be tardy - the combination of good weather, lots of progress, band practices and laziness is my only excuse.

Well the kitchen is ALMOST finished.  Just a bit of trim around the oven and microwave to go.  I spent all evening Friday and into Saturday unpacking boxes and boxes and boxes of kitchen "stuff".  It was embarrassing to see how much stuff we had accumulated over 38 years.

The dining fixture goes up

We can dine in style

The pendant lights over the island

So in addition to  loading up the drawers and shelves, I loaded up three boxes of good but excess stuff to be given away.  If I was the garage sale type, I would be putting up my sign.  I am NOT a garage saler.  We have asked our friend Pat if he knows anyone who needs our excess.

Len has spent hours perfecting the trim for around the oven and microwave, but it isn't quite done, so we'll save those pictures for another day.

Kitchen cabinets without the oven trim

The other big accomplishment was moving into our bedroom downstairs.  Len put in the carpet then we dug out the bedroom furniture from the very back of the garage and got it set up in time to fall into bed.  The room is quite a bit bigger than our old house, so there is room for a "hot tub towel and bench" area and I plan to add a bunch of oxygen-producing plants.

Getting ready to tape the carpet together

Ready for move in

The red tape trim on the windows is a "special" touch.  Not sure when the trim will get done.

We don't have the master bathroom even started, so the powder room had to be finished to avoid going up or down stairs.  We have ordered the countertop for the basement bathroom and powder room so right now we have some lovely plywood as a countertop.  But the sink and taps and vanity are in and all our stuff has been moved down.

Len putting in the vanity

The poor garage loft must feel a bit unloved.  We only visit for watching Netflix in the evening.

This morning Len mounted the post which will start the hand rail on the stairs to the loft.

Today is Mothers Day.   In celebration, Len and I are planning to take Banjo on a bike ride in the Walker Valley, and maybe take a picnic lunch.  This evening is another band practice.  Tomorrow I travel to Vancouver for work.

Banjo sunning himself on the deck.  His favourite spot and occupation

Beautiful sunset over the marsh

That's it for now.
Cath

Cath

2 steps forward 1 step back

Today was a bit frustrating after all the progress yesterday.  Len spent the whole time rebuilding some of the doors.  It was harder than he thought it would be.  So instead of a cleaned up kitchen ready to move into, it looked like a clamping convention.

Door ready to be put back together

Clamps and glue fix anything

More clamping

And more ....

The day warmed up nicely, so when Cath finished work on the computer, she went out to the garden.  To find out more, visit "Gardening in the Cariboo".

Cabinets up, Doors on, Drawers in

The weekend made a mess of the partly finished kitchen - lots of moving cabinets, finishing doors, and putting things together.  At the end of it all, we have the kitchen 75% done (my estimate).

Len mounting the upper corner cabinet

Cath sanding and painting cupboard doors

What would Len do without his clamps?

First door goes on

Island drawers with knobs installed

Pantry and baking area next to the sink (one drawer missing)

Corner cabinet and above the range (less the range hood) with handles on

It was a beautiful day Sunday, so we ate on the deck and went for a nice walk in the early evening.  Then we decided to bring in the underlay and carpet for the bedroom, but opted to leave the carpet laying for another day.

Underlay and carpet ready to go

My plan is to move some things into the kitchen once Len finishes the bits that are left.  He has to resize a couple of cabinets that go next to the fridge as we decided to get a slightly bigger one than we have now.  He is also waiting for some supplies to be shipped from Lee Valley to complete 2 drawers and needs to make some adjustments to the cabinet doors under the sink.  

We had our engineer over to do a final inspection of the house structure and he was satisfied that it was put together well.  Next inspection will be the final electrical and general inspection but we aren't ready for that quite yet.  Still lots of plugs and lights to be put in. Not to mention all the outside work to be done (siding and soffits).  We're just taking it one room at a time.

Ironing, tiling and drawering(?)

Another day of firsts.  My first ironing in the laundry room,  not so important, but nice to be able to leave things out .  You can also see that we brought the freezer in from the deck so all that is needed is a cabinet to put the sink in (the sink is in the box under the ironing board).

No more wrinkled shirts

Len did two big jobs today.  Got the drawer glides installed and you can see the drawers in place in these pictures.  No drawer fronts yet, so limited usefulness.  But there sure will be lots of them  and I am really looking forward to unloading the boxes of stuff in the garage to fill them up.  We put in only a few cupboards as I really prefer drawers.

Drawers by the sink and under the stovetop

Island drawers minus their fronts

Under the oven and next to the sink

Job number two was tiling the powder room.  Len wouldn't let me do this one as there were so many cuts in a very small area - around doorway, beams, and the toilet of course.  He has a special grinding disk and a tile cutter and has become very adept at doing tile cuts.  So I let him do the tiling and I will do the grouting.

The first of many cuts

The artist at work

All done.

We took most of the evening off to play music with our band which we are calling 5 Alive.  (yes, like the juice - refresh me!)

Tomorrow I hope that Len will start on the drawer fronts so that I can start filling those drawers.

Cath

Advice and more

So what has happened since Sunday?  Lots!

Cath cooked her first stir fry on the range top.  Too bad the rest of the kitchen is a disaster and won't be ready to hold pot or pan or anything else for a bit.  Len is busy making drawers and fitting the glides.  He has a special little gizmo to help mount the glides but needed a vice grip clamp with a 4" reach.  So after going to every supplier in the valley, he opted to have one he already has modified.  He took it to his welder friend who did the deed and now he is back in business.

Home on the range

Drawers being glued

Sink but no water until we get the drain (special because of the thickness of the cast iron)

Now for the advice part of this blog.  Cath is raving about the ease of painting experienced lately.  What is the key?  Good quality paint?  Of course.  An easy rolling roller?  Yes!  But the key is buying that $4 professional roller refill.  What a thing of beauty!  The paint almost jumps off onto the wall by itself.  No lint, no splattering..... pure heaven.  So don't go cheap - buy the good ones and then throw them away after you're done.  Yes, we saved one for the whole day by putting it in a plastic bag between painting sessions, but no more washing them out and saving them.  All that water wasted and our septic full of paint grunge.  Forget about it.   (end of lecture)

As much as Len wanted to continue kitchen things this evening , Cath had other plans.  How about getting a few lights put in?  Yes, we can actually put in lights because she managed to prime and paint the bedroom, closet and master bath as well as the front hallway.  Things came to an abrupt halt as we tried to fit the receiver into the ceiling fan for the remote unit that it came with.  After about an hour of trying and, yes, modifying the piece to fit, Len gave up.  It can't be done so we are taking it back to Home Depot.  We'll have to fins another unit later.   Next on the list - ????carpet for the master bedroom and moving in????  We'll see what tomorrow brings.

The front hall light

Len's words "I'm not stopping until I get this".  Unfortunately, it just didn't fit.  Notice the lovely painting job.

Hard to see, but the grout is done in the laundry room

Sorry this blog took so long to make it to the web.  We worked on it bit by bit over a couple of days.  Watch for an update tomorrow - lots has happened again today.

Cath and Len

The things that make us happy

Oh the joy, the rapture!  Today I washed a load of dishes in a DISHWASHER and did a load of laundry in my WASHER and DRYER.  Doesn't get any better than this for a day's work.  Actually, it could be just a bit better...let's try having 4 burners on a stovetop and a sink in the kitchen!

Anyway, the day also included doing tiling in the laundry room while Len worked on things in the kitchen.

Here are the pictures to prove it!

The subfloor is in

Light in the laundry room

Laying tile

Towels in the washer

The washer and dryer

Len cutting subfloor for the powder room - tomorrow's project to tile

Tomorrow Len will continue on the kitchen and will put in a temporary countertop of plywood so the sink and stovetop can go in and be used until we get our final countertop.

Cath