A New House - Episode 26 - Floors and Walls and Ceilings

People keep asking us if we are ready to move in yet .... um ...no. Our goal is to get enough stuff done to move in by Christmas, however. so we are focusing on the main floor for now.

This is the foyer floor. In this shot, I have installed wiring for the electric floor heating.

This is the "self leveling floor compound" over the electric floor heating. cool stuff. One thing we learned in advance is to seal all floor cracks with caulk, otherwise the self leveling floor compound" will drip on the floor below. 

Deb using the diamond tile saw "tweaking" the quartzsite rock for the floor

She spent an entire day fitting the rocks into place before thin-setting them into place.

grouting with mortar

more grouting

all done and triple sealed

We also installed in-floor heating in Kyle's bathroom, then put down self leveling compound again., 

After finding a good center-line, Deb starts laying the tile in Kyle's bathroom.

Finished tile

Installing the shower door. First I had to buy some 5/16 diamond hole saws to drill through the tile.

door and toilet are done

...and window trim. all we need to is the get the vanity that we ordered from ordered from http://www.foxdendecor.com/

Installing backer board on the fireplace chase .. apparently in a snowstorm. 

Backerboard is done... awaiting some log mantles. Deb is arranging quartszite rock on the hearth. 

Then work start putting up the log walls in the living room. These are 2" thick blue pine with natural edges, that are rough sawn, that we did some light sanding on. So they are relatively smooth, but the circle saw marks are still visible,. 

You can really see the saw marks in this shot.

 we installed them with 3" screws into most of the studs. 

 

Deb installed a foam backer material that sits behind the chinking... so you get a pretty good idea what it will look like when chinked.

This week we received the cabinets. these are maple and cherry cabinets made by Conestoga. But they are unfinished and "ready to assemble. Take a look at http://www.cabinetjoint.com if you are curious. They get great reviews and are way cheaper then most other cabinets.  

we also received the flooring this week. This is 4" and 6" T&G circle saw fir, milled at a local company in Metaline, WA  called http://www.smileylumber.com/

A New House - Episode 25 - Indoors coming along!

We continue to work in the cozy indoors while outside, the warm days have eliminated nearly all of our snow. It's kind of cool how when you get stuff on the walls how things finally start looking like there's an end in sight. We also ordered the flooring and the cabinets .. both to arrive in about a month. 

Deb continues to multitask - splitting her time between skip-troweling, finishing Kyle's bathroom shower, painting walls, and benite/staining pine. Here she is skip troweling the hall area. 

And doing some tile work in Kyle's shower. These are cool wood-look tile planks. 

We bought a 10" diamond tile saw for all of the rock and tile work we are doing. 

Wow more progress!

apparently I am putting up t&g pine in the stairwell area - while it;s snowing indoors! apparently we got some "stuff" on the camera lens. 

Looking back toward the entrance hallway, the kitchen will be on the left. Deb painted the necessary areas of the dining room and kitchen in "apple pie". 

Lately the turkeys seem to want to come into the house. not sure why. 

Yes, ladies and gentlemen ... I do work too ... putting up t&g blued knotty pine on the dining room ceiling.

 Pretty near done with this room. 

The guest bath (aka "micro suite") is finished-ish except for the floor and final plumbing 

We also are nearly done with the foyer entrance. All blued pine. Still need trim and the floor which will be more quartzite rock on a heated floor. 

Editorial comment: I used to use Microsoft's 'Live Writer" because it was an app that I could use to create the blog off line. Now the lame-brained geniuses at Microsoft "improved" it to be ".net" web based and when I tried to 'upgrade' to the new version it just about destroyed my computer. so I eliminated it and went back to Google's Blogger which also sucks but at least works ... unlike the new Live Writer. The End. 

A New House - Episode 24 - It is winter Now - Work Indoors Stupid!

Winter started off REALLY wet, then REALLY cold (-4F), then we got a couple of good dumps of snow and everything was back to normal. So for the past couple of months we have been working indoors.

Now that plumbing and electrical are done, we decided to focus on the main floor. This room will be Kyle’s room - just off the front entrance. We bought a unit of 1x10 rough cedar and for his room decided on a staggered board on board look finished with a vinegar/steel wool/stain mixture to look like barn boards. Debbie is now an expert in this finishing technique having spent a lot of time testing various recipes.

We think it turned out pretty cool. The ceiling is done with the same wood, but board and batts. We still have the closet ceiling to finish and doors.

This cool sconce lamp in Kyle’s room also shows off Debbie’s suburb skip-trowel work.

Kyle’s bathroom has a doorway as opposed to a door.

His bathroom. Deb was working of skip troweling this room today. The shower has an ‘Onyx” brand composite base and the walls are covered with Hardie backer, joints sealed, then painted with “Red Guard” to waterproof the whole mess. We have wood look (rustic of course) tile planks that will be the shower walls.

oh … and the new fridge.

Sheetrock in the dining room.

Oh and the new pellet stove in the basement. We had planned on heating the basement with just wall heaters, which worked fine until we got our last electric bill (argh!). so after some research bought a Pelpro 35,000 btu pellet stove. On the lowest setting, it keeps the basement at around 65 degrees.

The finished plumbing in the mechanical room. I will be adding a 50 gal conventional water heater because the electric on-demand unit isn’t up to the task for our cold water. The best it can do is give us lukewarm water at around 80-85 degrees.

… and we have the master bathroom soaker tub in and set. Deb’s tile work using quartzite rock was spectacular. We would be taking baths if the on demand water heater was up to par – but it isn’t.

We also bought a Samsung washer-dryer set and plumbed them in. Deb says “yay” no more crappy little washer dryer.

From here, we will continue to work on the walls, finish the main floor bathrooms, foyer and kitchen areas. We are also nearing completion of the kitchen cabinet design and hope to get them ordered soon.

A New House – Episode 23 – More Insulation, the Tub and Plumbing

 

It has been a long friggin’ time since the last “A New House” post. I’m sorry, but we have a couple of excellent excuses – a 60th birthday party, and a grand wedding at Disney world !!!

So what in the world have we been doing … ANYTHING???  Well, yes. The outside of the house is in stasis -  we’ll get to the siding next spring or summer, so we have been indoors (when we weren’t on rides at Walt Disney World)

 

Deb’s world was insulation. Everyday. for weeks. She did the whole friggin house. Argh!  R-38 in the ceilings and R-19 in the walls.

since some of the ceilings were 2x12’s and R-38 is 11” thick, we had to install these foam baffles to keep airflow between the plywood and the insulation.

 

While she was doing insulation, I was doing the drain/waste/vent plumbing. Not fun, but it’s done. what’s the trick to it you ask?   2 rules to follow … (1) Water flows downhill and, (2) don’t drain shit into a sink. Other than that, you’re good to go.

   

Then I got started on the water lines. for the first time, I did pex plumbing. This is Uponor PEX-A pipe, which is different that what Home Depot sells in that you expand the pipe to fit over barbed fitting, as opposed to crimping. Quite fun actually.

 

Let’s see…red is cold and blue is hot, right?

 

Also unique with pex is that typically each fixture has a dedicated water line running to it from a manifold. These are valved manifolds, so each fixture (cold and hot) has a small valve I can open/close for control.

 

Watch this swell video of me doing PEX!!! 

   

We are also going to be experimenting with this new-fangled electric on-demand water heater. 24kw, taking (3) 40a circuits.

 

And this whole-house 3-stage water filtration system.

 

Meanwhile, since the insulation is done, Deb dives in to rock the soaker tub’s deck. Starting with Hardibacker on the deck and walls, she first sealed the joints, then surfaced the deck with Redguard waterproofing. We bought 1-1/2 tons of 1’’ quartszite slabs for this and other areas of the house.

  

We also took delivery of our new range.

    

An Ilve UM90 36” dual fuel range with top griddle. Midnight blue. In this picture, we haven’t yet installed the legs. Can’t wait to try this baby out!