Food!

On Sunday, Heather made oatmeal for the boys. Oh; and bacon. In the oven. Ever cook bacon in the oven? Absolutely the best way to do it.

Sunday night, she got to make the first dinner meal in the new kitchen; lasagne. Yuuum.

Monday night after work, Heather was coming home late, so I got a chance in the kitchen. Pasta primavera. Yuuuuum. What a great kitchen. And magnetic induction is absolutely hands down the best cooktop system in the world. Ever leave a burner on accidentally? If this cooktop doesn't sense a ferrous iron pot on top of the burner, it shuts off automatically. And talk about quick response; wow. I've never ever had a gas stove, but this thing behaves the way I've always imagined a gas cooktop would, but I think this is even faster. And no fossil fuel! (Unless of course the electricity's coming from a coal-fired plant, which it's not. Seattle's old coal fired plant is now the Zymogenetics building on Lake Union; saw it fire up once on an extremely cold winter day in 1976, that's it.) So if you're going to remodel, go magnetic induction all the way.

Last item (besides the final lighting) that needs to be working in the kitchen is the range hood, or as Heather called it the other day - fume hood. From her days as a PhD chemist.

That's it for now; have a great day.

Sunny Fall Day; Yard Cleanup

Morning brought blue sky and sunshine to Wedgwood; tee shirt and shorts weather for some, like Kian here in the backyard, helping me and Daniel clear out construction debris. That's been one of those things that we've been itching to get to as soon as we have the time and decent weather, and voila, Sunday, no appointments, and Heather's station wagon with a tarp draped all over the back.

The final product today is as you see in the larger photo. Most of the detritus ended up either in the clean-wood-and-yardwaste truck (two loads) or the landfill truck (just one load). Whole bunch of yardwaste in the yardwaste bin for pickup this week too. Can you see where the bocce court will go?

Heather's making lasagne in the new kitchen now; the first real meal being created in there.

Here's a question for you, just to see if anyone's really reading this stuff. You ever take a shower and in the middle of it just lay back in the tub and let it fill up around you with the shower raining down on you? Not me....

Wow; First Cooktop Food!

Heather got some pots and a pan that will work on the induction stovetop yesterday, and used it for Kian's oatmeal this morning.

Notice the clever cropping that meets H's request to not be in the picture, but still captures the awesome action of the oatmeal event.

Nudder Pitcher

Just because you said you wanted one and I happened to have the bberry on me (such a rare moment!)

Welcome!

The third Hubbardton Forge sconce arrived yesterday; I put it up this afternoon - that's it to the left of the front door. I'll hve to take that one down to change the light bulb too, just like the other two. :-(

And Heather, after conspiring with Mary, selected rosemary for the planter in front of the pilaster to the left of the entry, so she picked up a new variety that you can see sitting in the planter now. That'll be huge in no time, I'm sure.

Temporary Lido Deck in front of the living room door for now - there's plenty of block stacking in our future. Have a great evening.

Another Pic

Jonathan came over tonight, just to see our cat Wookie!

Another shot

Those bookshelves still have some room in them, too!

Some Pics

Here's a peek at what it looks like from where I've been working this afternoon, just 'cuz somebody said they wanted to see some more pics (you know who you are...)

Where's Waldo?

More like "Where's Michael?" Haven't posted a thing in - gosh - five days! I actually haven't rushed home during lunch to answer questions or check on progress for - gosh - three days (if you don't count last week too)! It's been positively relaxing. I worked out on Sunday morning, Monday after work, Tuesday after work, and tonight was tennis night - I haven't been on that kind of a schedule for at least four, maybe five months. Makes me think we're actually done.

But we're not. The two front wall sconces flanking the patio door to the Lido Deck arrived last week, so I installed them on Sunday. The third sconce, for the entry, should arrive tomorrow. The four pendant lights, apricot colored cones with bright tiny halogens are ready for installation too - they're from Tech Lighting, that awesome company that makes the main bathroom fixtures - and they use their proprietary "Freejack" system that brings power down the skinniest of cables to the lamp, and it just screws neatly into the housing on the ceiling. Ingeniously elegant and simple. So I'll certainly be installing those babies this weekend.

Meanwhile, Heather's back in full swing working at the office, working here at home into the wee hours (she was after all gone for a whole week, so she needs to catch up), so things are pretty much back to "normal" again for her it seems. But there are still some things we need to get unpacked and put away, like the spices, and all the stuff that's staged in Heather's new office, which by the way still doesn't have power. I need to figure that one out this weekend too.

We moved our open house to Saturday the 29th, the Saturday after Turkey Day. Sent out an official evite to all our friends whose email addresses we know, but unfortunately we don't know our neighbors' addresses, so we'll have to notify them in person. That's all our thumbs-up neighbors of course.

Oh; I also put together one of those Rubbermaid pre-fab sheds for bicycle and tool storage in the back yard last week. Got to put the door handle and padlock hasp on it though. This weekend. Yeah. It's back to home-improvement on weekends, baby.

And I'm sending Steve and Pete to all my friends because those guys are the absolute best.

Ciao for now; I'll maybe post again on Sunday evening perhaps.

Connected!

This entire project, I've never been able to post a blog entry from the project site; there's been no internet connection. Not so any longer. The neat little curly queue of cable is from Comcast, finally providing internet access, and that box on the left is Qwest- phone access. Back to civilization!

Which Would You Choose?

To mount a closet pole bracket in your wife's closet? (Hint; it's not the small one. )

Unfortunately:

A). I didn't get that hint before I started.

B). I forgot that my wife's closet's back wall was old plaster about 7/8" thick, shortening effective embedment.

C) my wife's closet is still not big enough to hold all those clothes!

So naturally, as soon as Heather finished squeezing the culled-through-but-still-significant wardrobe into her closet and let go a sigh of accomplishment as she closed the door, she heard the sound of a big "WHUMP".

So I used the big screws today. And, I'm switching to the big ones in the other closet for safe measure.

How's that go... Fool me once...?..-I know George Bush knows that saying....

Barrow Shuttle

Wheelbarrow load by wheelbarrow load, the concrete gets dumped into place.

Mobile Concrete Unit!

Check out this truck; it's a concrete batch plant on wheels.

The vertical tank in the back has cement, the long bins in the middle have sand and gravel, and right behind the cab is a tank of water. It all dumps into a big mixer at the back and gets poured down a chute, at the end of which Steve waits like an anxious soccer coach as the first load approaches his barrow.

Danny's Man Cave

This is likely the neatest room Daniel's ever had. Spent the past three days doing about 35 loads of laundry (no wonder he didn't have much to wear- it was all in his hamper!) And arranging stuff to settle in, finally finished today.

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Mancave Door Installed

Kian's bedroom door from before the remodel has been placed in its new location, the man cave entrance.

Passages 1

Steve framed up and covered the future concrete walkway with OSB today.... One of his last items to do. I just noticed it looks like a long unrelenting straight shot in this photo; you'll have to come see it in real life.

Passages 2

All good things must end- Steve's packing up tools, loading them into his pickup truck today. He might be back later in the week to finish the walkway, weather permitting.....

Spent the day moving lots and lots of little things from the rental house to our house today. Heather says it's time to do what Frank Lloyd Wright recommends and just lose a bunch of stuff. If it's been in a box for 6 months and you haven't needed it, and in a box for 3 years before that and you didn't need it then, you don't need it period. Value Village here we come.....

First Morning Musings

Wow!
Didn't freeze our buns off.
Daniel and Kian took showers simultaneously and got out of the house on time.
Wookie (our orange tabby) didn't sleep in our room; he was out on the green sofa all night.
The adhesive on the paper pleated shades didn't fail all night.
The hydronic pumps kept clicking on and off throughout the night; didn't really notice it until the morning as I lay in half-sleep.
I need to put in the plug strip in the south kitchen wall; too many appliances on the peninsula and sink area.

For the move yesterday, I had to put some plywood down over Steve's sidewalk excavation so that we wouldn't get our shoes all muddied up and track it into the house. I had to pile some dirt back in there so the plywood wouldn't cave in, messing up Steve's great work. So this morning, before Steve got there, I went out and reexcavated for him so he wouldn't be upset. Finished just in time. Whew.

This week will be largely about moving all the remaining stuff from the rental house back to our house somewhere, in the man-cave basement for the most part, until we can figure out where it all goes. It turns out that the closet space in Kian's room will go largely unused since he never hangs anything up, so that whole thing can be used as mass storage. I also have to finish sweeping out the Kayak Storage Facility and building the plastic storage shed in the back. Sooo much still to do, and only a week to do it.

I'll get off my buttoski now and go get it done.

Ciao!

Nice Truck, Great Help!

And Peter from my office (our first friend to have a Nanawall in his home, installed by Pete Rankin!) Helped out today too!

Nice Shelves, Great Helper!

Jonathan helped out today (he of new car post back in July).