Some kitchen accessories!

We've had a functional kitchen for a while -- but we finally got around to accessorizing!  Isaac installed the ikea shelves (don't they look great) and hung the pictures.  I selected the frames and pics -- he styled the shelves :}  And the pot filler is done!  It's been finished for a while.  We're still missing a backsplash ... but it will come in time.  I hope :}  We still have some work to do before we show off the other side of the kitchen.

The basement!

We did a lotta thinking and pre-planning in ikea --- and since this is the second kitchen that we had installed .... we're getting better at ikea hacks to their products that make better use of the space.  For this galley kitchen, we used upper cupboards as lower cupboards on the right-hand side so that we'd have usable counterspace - yet not take up too much kitchen.  We're really happy with the finished product!  We really love the amount of light that the basement gets -- and we made the window bigger to accomplish it.  The flooring is ikea ... we installed it ourselves.  We should have taken some pictures of the bathroom -- the shower tile is killer and isaac did an AWESOME job on the floating vanity/sink combo.  But we forgot and now andrea's in. 

Before pics ...

So -- it's a bit late in the process to be posting "before pics" of the basement.  Especially since it's now done, I haven't finished recounting the story, and we already have a wicked tenant.  But i just found them.  So I'll post them now anyway.  Here they are -- ugly-ass fake wood panelling and all!!

Slacker!

Haven't I been a slacker in posting blog entries!  you know what's happened since i last wrote?
-we drywalled (well -- when i say we -- i mean they)
    -- for the most part sebastian and co did a good job.  a few places that could have been a bit more thought out -- and will take a little creativity to frame on our (or ben's part).  cost for labour for this part (drywalling and mudding and sanding) was about 3x the cost of drywall.  hopefully that sounds reasonable.

-we mudded and sanded (again, they)

-we primed and painted (really we -- and it freakin' hurts to paint ceilings!) - first a white primer coat and then a coat of chantilly lace -- at andi's insistance

-we floored - first ikea laminate
      -- at $1.49 a square foot, it was a deal.  i think it looks amazing.  the floor wasn't as level as we would have liked -- but we couldn't afford to lose the head space  -- so we couldn't level it all to the highest part.  so we just went with what we had and hoped for the best.  we were laying over vinyl.  we used a foam layer of underpadding from ikea (which really takes the cost over $1.49 a sq ft - but i'm ignoring that for now :}) and used some flooring itself as well as cardboard and gravel to fix local unevenness.  sounds crazy -- but it seems to have worked out.  that being said -- it's only been down there for 2 weeks with barely any traffic.  i'll let you know in a year!

-we floored again - marble tile for the entrance way.  i'm not totally sure what we were thinking.  but we got some discount marble tile from tilemart (i think that's where we went) and isaac went ahead and laid them.  looks pretty snazzy if you ask me!

-we made the last layer of the shower pan.  the shower pan has been a complicated story.  i'll write it up the next time (when i include more pics of these last steps!).  but let it be said that we just did the deck mud layer -- meaning, we can tile next!  and isaac's getting to be a pretty good tiler .....

Drywall!

Yea for drywall! Sebastian and his buddy (Robert?) were here to get the board up. it looks amazing now that it's done! we still need to mud and tape and sand (which they're doing next week) but it's really starting to come together :} now we gotta start thinking about finishing touches --- floor (i think ikea tundra), trim, kitchen (we got it at ikea at the kitchen sale!), doors interior and exterior) and bathroom -- tile, fixtures and floor. oh, and appliances. that'll make a big dent in the budget. i'm ready to declare that we're officially overbudget on this one. yep. we are. at least it's a renovation project that will come with some income.

Pex plumbing rules.

i'm just sayin'. seriously -- it's easy. pex refers to the plastic tubing that some people now use instead of copper pipes. it's nice 'cause they're flexible (but still sometimes a pain to maneuvre in all honesty) and you don't need any fire to join them. so maybe safer. and then there are the fittings. there's the pex-for-dummies sharkbite fittings that we started using at the beginning. they're expensive (but waaaay cheaper than a plumber!) and simple. you just have to push them onto the pipe and they lock into place. we're since graduated to a compression system. you need a $40 tool and you squeeze a metal ring around the joint between the pipe and the fitting. we graduate 'cause a/ it's 99 cents a fitting instead of $4-$7 and b/ shark bite didn't have as large a variety of fittings as the compression system did. anyway -- we're happy with how things worked out and we'd definitely do more plumbing ourselves in the future.

ps -- it's not actually leaking .. it just got a bit wet when we emptied the pipes

Pot filler

soooo --- we're not particularly good at focusing. you may realize this as you read. we jump around a lot. in our defense ... there were a lotta things to do at the beginning -- bathroom, kitchen, everything (haha) .... so we had to jump around to get running water in the kitchen and a place to pee. and a place to shower, come to think of it! so i'll be posting bits and pieces wherever. anyway -- while the basement ceiling was still open (someone once described the basement ceiling as the main artery of the house .... once you close it up, it's hard to make any more changes) we decided to put a pot filler in the kitchen over the stove. it's mostly for show seeing as the sink is approximately 4 steps away ... but it looks cool. and it had better 'cause it was a huge pain in the ass. in the end (after it had already leaked a zillion times and then water had poured all over the kitchen floor when we once turned the water on while to pot filler was running and didn't realize it!) it turned out that we weren't tightening the last 2 bits of pipe enough. so we figured it out and are now in the process of patching up the wall. it's not totally leve at the moment either -- we gotta play with that a bit. we're not sure if it's us or if it's the filler. we'll let you know how it goes :}