Briarwood

More updated photos

2008-08-21T23:43:00.008-06:00

New fridge, old stove. Next big projects are a ways off, but we hope to go with cork flooring in the kitchen. It would be nice to rennovate the cabinets, keep them just refinish them. Would be nice to update the stove at some point too.

A little baby Hobo spider, yup, it's hobo season. These guys are similar to a brown recluse in that their venom will eat away flesh and can cause bad infections. Oh and they are really aggressive. Again, this is a baby, I just killed "Mom" in the master bath and at first we though it was an ugly mouse, it was that big.

The living room with big front windows and some vintage furniture pieces, including a fabulous rug from my parents. This rug is from my childhood. The couch is "Andre" from Room and Board, we love it.

Living room again, built in book case and flokati rug. The fireplace surround will hopefully be replaced at some point.

More living room, with exposed brick wall.

The front door, joy.

Update Time #2

2008-08-21T22:52:00.022-06:00

the Dude abides, Nixon bowls.

the new media room, without the old door.

destruction.

Destruction of the old office, preparing for the media room.

the "office" when we moved in, complete with second front door. This was our first project, removing the front door, all the wood paneling and creating our media room.

the guest bedroom.

our new master bedroom, there were no windows when we moved in, we added three awning type windows.

master bedroom, with "his" and "hers" closets on each side of the bed. Actually we don't have a bed yet, so still sleeping on the floor. You actually step down into each closet side.

Master bedroom. the cubby in the corner with the dresser is actually the location where the old shower stall was. The old master bathroom came out to about where this chair is. We removed the entire bathroom and added in our master bath suite off the back of the room. The windows are crank out awning style, I love them.

Our Ikea cabinets in the bath suite. They are actually kitchen cabinets which stand a bit higher than normal bath cabinets. So far we are really pleased with the quality and finish.

Michelle doing some finishing touches on the seat in the shower. Cutting the tile for the seat was not fun and well, I did my share of wasting tile getting the perfect cuts, but it was worth it.

Our shower controls in the new shower, one controls the overhead rain shower, one controls the hand shower wand, and yes, you can have both of them on at once. I never thought I'd want two showerheads, but the wand will make it really easy to wash the shower down or possibly a dog if we ever get one. The rains hower, well, that's purely just cause it's awesome.

the rain showerhead and light in the angled ceiling.

the view of the shower from the backyard, through the french doors.

the Kohler tea 4 two tub with the 3-form resin surround. We still need to install the surround, hook up the plumbing fixtures tile around the surround, then finish the floor tile up to the tub. There will also be subway tile up the wall to just above the light switch. It will run along behind the sinks as well.

looking towards the sinks as you step down into the bath from the bedroom. His and hers sinks. There will be tile along the backsplash up about 12 inches. Then we will have a single mirror that runs the length of the back wall between the sinks. All cabinets are Ikea, including the large double glass door cabinet, great for towels.

finishing tile work in the toilet room prior to the installation of the toilet.

Update Time

2008-07-08T20:37:00.016-06:00

Ok, where were we? Oh well I'll blame the lack of posts on the Olympics. How about that Michael Phelps? I know you are probably sick of hearing of him, but that's something we may not see again in our lifetime. And it's due to hard training and of course, some of our secret formulas at Powerbar.

Back to work at hand... I haven't put up any photos in a while so here you go.

This is installing the Ditra underlayment which helps prevent future cracking in tile job

s. I highly recommend it and it's pretty easy to install. Simply thinset it to the subfloor, then anther layer of thinset on top, followed by

the tile.

We finally finished the water closet and again, it's bright red. It kinda reminds me of a dive bar in SF, like you should be writing all over the walls in sharpie. Not sure if that's a good feeling for your home bathroom, but I actually really dig it.

We installed the Grundtal tp holder from Ikea, very simple yet functional design.

We also put in a small wall heater to help on those freezing winter mornings. This little heater along with the under tile NuHeat, we'll be toasty.

Getting a little bit closer.

2008-03-06T21:04:00.010-07:00

Slowly, we are getting closer to completion, spring is in the air and it's only a matter of time till we've got a functional bedroom and bathroom. The wall tiling in the shower is done, still needs to be grouted though. We also need to tile the top of the seat and the wall "nook". Then tile and grout the floors. But it's coming together. The tile is laid in the "water closet" room already. just needs to be grouted. The Nuhea t mat has been installed and it's amazing. It was turned on the other night by accident and you could really feel the heat radiating out from it. Now just to lay it under the underlayment and tile over it. The door has been installed for the toilet room, we've painted all of the trim around the windows, finished up the french doors, cut the 3-form. We hope to finish the floor tiling this weekend and also keep finishing up the shower.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch

2008-01-19T13:46:00.001-07:00

Oi, I think the last post was way back on Nov 7th, quite some time ago. Well, we took a bit of a break for the holidays and now we are looking into starting back up for the final home stretch (pun not intended). Well, I've got a few updates to share about the progress to date. The shower surround is built, in all it's glass shimmering glory. During the day, it really lets the light come in. The second image is from inside the shower during the day.

We've also painted the separate little 'water closet' room, bright red, we'll see how we like it once we are actually up and running with it. But for now, it's looking pretty good.

The french doors and large 'privacy' window

have been installed and really open up the bathroom with heaps of light.

We originally requested "rain glass" for the large picture window in front of the tub, and when it arrived we noticed it was actually "privacy glass". I have to say i actually like the look and feel of the privacy glass better. It's much more of a diffused light, which floods in right in front of the bathtub, yet still keeping the bathroom private from the backyard.

We've also had the awning windows placed into the bedroom which is really great. They are high enough to be private, but will again allow in lots of light from the backyard and provide some nice breeze in the summer months. This shot shows the house from the backyard where you can really see the layout of the new windows in the bedroom and the window and door in the bathroom. All of our tile has come in so we are just getting ready for the install of that as well.

We will be using 1" hexagon on the shower floor and 2" octagon on the bathroom floor with black accent tiles, we are hoping it'll be a pretty clean look together with the vertically stacked subway tiles on the walls. We've still got a plenty to do so please stay tuned.

been a while

2007-11-07T23:33:00.000-07:00

yup, been a while since we've posted. We had Rob, Angela and Zander here all weekend visiting. We got to visit the Zoo for the first time and see the much talked about baby Gibon monkey, which was well worth it. Like a combination little old man/infant.

Anyway, we also went to SF for a week a little while ago and while we were gone, Ric and the guys put in the three awning windows in the bedroom, the french doors in the bath and the big rain window in the bathroom.

We were shocked to come home to that. Now it's time for painting the walls of the bedroom and closet.

The wall / shower tiles should be arriving tomorrow which will obviously go on the walls, tub surround and shower. We still need to order the floor tile, as fastfloors.com did not have the tiles we wanted in stock for the floor. But we did get the subway tile for a good deal through them.

The glass block shower is fully installed and looks fabulous. It' s much bigger than expected. I hope to take some photos tomorrow to get posted and show off the progress.

more soon...

a little overboard?

2007-10-14T11:11:00.000-06:00

So I came to an almost embarrassing conclusion last night when walking through the master bed space. You can still see outlines on the floor where the original master bathroom sat, and well, it appears the footprint of our old master bathroom would fit entirely in the new shower alone. Holy smokes! Here you see the curb outline, corner seat, in-wall shelf, double controls on the wall. Next steps are the glass block walls, floor and wall tiling, and finish work. Up near the light you can see where the rain head will drop from the ceiling. Then there will be a hand wand above the controls.

The gang also put in the tub this week. I missed that.... darn, and apparently it was pretty humorous as it took 6 people to drop in that sucker in. Next steps are tiling the surround, and putting in the 3-Form Chroma cap on the tub surround. The 3-Form Chroma is a recyclable resin, that will also be the top for the vanity.
Ric has been a HUGE help in the whole project, team leader, cracking the whip, throwing out design ideas, and fabricating all the little details.

Porter is the master sheetrock and mud guy, he's been teaching Michelle a thing or two on sanding and putting up sheetrock, the guy rocks.

Oh, and we've put up a ton more photos on flickr showing the progress, the newest images are on the last few pages.

So now we are ready to start painting or at least priming the masterbedroom. good times ahead....

Let there be Light.

2007-10-04T22:30:00.002-06:00

Holy cow, it's been a busy few days. Michelle and the guys from Changing Spaces have been sheet-rocking, adding in all of the electrical and insulation. All of the lights are now in place and working! This is what the backyard has looked like for a while, I can't wait to get it cleaned up and back to normal once the project is over. This is looking from the backyard towards the new Huge master bath. You can also see the three framed spaces for the awning windows, they look cover red because the interior of the bedroom was sheet rocked in today. Once the windows come in, we'll open those back up to get the windows installed. We went with recessed can lights throughout the bedroom, closet, and bathroom and it looks great so far. Here you can see the doorways to the master closet that will be on either side of the master bed. Eventually we'll have built in shelves in there. This other shot is actually where the old master shower stood, and will now be more built ins for extra clothing storage., it really is turning out well.
If you recall, we had to dig up some of the concrete flooring to make room for the plumbers to do their stuff. Well they came and roughed in everything, so the other night we mixed up and put down another 800 lbs of concrete to fill in all of those holes we dug up. oohhhhh fun times for sure. Oh and for the record, wear gloves when doing cement work. I of course did not and happily played in the cement bare handed like a child making a mud pie. (notice Michelle is wearing gloves!) Well today the skin on my hands is "not pliable" anymore. In fact if I stretch it to open my hand, it simply splits apart. Dry to the nth degree. Not fun. Oh and that also goes for using spray expandable foam. That stuff is toxic and very sticky. I got some of that on my ungloved hands last week and it's still there, when I peel it off, skin comes with it. All of this is on the same hand I originally put a nail through. Yes, as a matter of fact I am feeling pretty dumb about now. So please learn from me.
Here is a shot of the interior of the closet, it's actually much larger than it appears. and then there is a shot of the wall that will contain the three awning windows to the outside. Here we put in some transitional lights.
Next up is finishing the insulation work, put the topping on the cement floor, install the tub surround, the shower curb and so on and so on... Stay tuned.

Progress

2007-09-27T21:00:00.000-06:00

Neosporin is my new friend, well it's always been good to me, but now I really like it. The nail hole in my hand is totally healed. I doused myself with neosporin regularly and kept that sucker bandaged up and it's already pretty much gone. Which is impressive since the hole was more of a tear than a clean hole, yeah, it was pretty ugly.

For the record, it's really not so much fun breaking up concrete. The plumber's came in and cut some outlines for the pipes that will run between the tub, vanity, shower and toilet. It was my job to break up all the concrete in that general area, while Michelle filled buckets and hauled it out to the backyard. "simple" I thought, but pure back breaking stuff for sure. At one point, I was pounding away and Michelle broke into singing "Workin on a chain.... gaaaaaang". Well it was pretty funny at the time.

The window holes for the bedroom windows were all framed-in the other day and the placement is exactly what we were hoping for. We will have 3 awning type windows here for some good airflow, light and still keep our privacy. From "head on pillow" level, all you see is trees, so it's fabulous.

We also got the framing done for the french doors and big window in the bathroom. And by "we" of course I mean Ric and the crew. I'd love to help during the day, but I'm stuck creating new PowerBars in order to help pay for this madness. So I work all day, then come home and slave for a couple more hours of hard labor. Meanwhile Michelle is here with the guys all day, hauling debris to the dumpster and maintaining the peace in the rest of the house, then she runs off to sling booze for the local yokels all night. Both of us are working like maniacs to see this through.
The big hole to the left will be where the french doors go, the hole to the right will be the big huge tub window (it won't be see through, but will allow in tons of light). Sure the french doors will allow some visuals into the bathroom, but our backyard is pretty private, so it should work out nicely. The floor plumbing rough-in looks to be almost done. Next up is building the tub-surround, which we are still working out the kinks on. The fun part is going to be installing the tub... it's a whopping 450 lbs.... oiy.

Tell me again why we are doing this....

2007-09-19T21:42:00.001-06:00

The other day I put a nail through my hand during demolition, that was swell.
I finally uploaded some images of the process on my flickr account. Take a peek when you get a moment.

Holy cow, this is some serious hard work. So we had to rip out the vinyl tile in what will soon be our master bath, sounded easy. Well the vinyl flooring came right up, but the paper backing stayed stuck to the cement floor underneath. We tried scraping with a hoe, yes, a hoe. We tried hand tools and soaking the topside in water. Finally Michelle got a sidewalk scraper and some adhesive remover and went to town. She did a fabulous job and I'm saying it's 98% done. So now it looks like we may go with the big guns and get a cement sander this weekend to get the rest off. Now that the floor is visible, the plumber will be coming to see how to tie into the sewer, where to mount the soaker tub, the sinks etc... Speaking of bathroom equipment we just got the toilet today and it's a beauty. More than we wanted to spend, but has gotten some great reviews. It's the Toto Carlyle and we love it!

In fact we saw it (used it) originally at the Hotel Valley Ho in Phoenix on a recent trip down there. A great place to stay by the way. We've also received our sinks, faucets, tub filler. We are now in the process of designing what to do with a vanity and where to put the sinks. It's pretty crazy to take on such a huge project, but I guess people do it every day.

...and in the beginning...

2007-09-10T19:15:00.000-06:00

Dipping a toe into the calm waters of bloggerdom, a quiet yet calculated move to see if we can hack this. And by 'this' I mean, writing about ones' own experiences in life and plopping them out on the web for all to see in some "look at me!" way.
Actually we are in the process of starting a renovation project on a 1952 Ranch style house in Boise, Idaho and we keep getting requests as to how it's going, so this is our way of showing you all the good, the bad, and the ugly. Hopefully it'll give some of you insight, inspire some of you, make you laugh, make you cry