68 days but who is counting

No sleeping in on Sunday.  It’s time to ride and get out of the house, away from the remodel.  We still have boxes and boxes of stuff to unpack and they will be there tomorrow or the next day, but Sunday was about riding with friends, laughing, enjoying the sun, and seventy-two degree weather.  We came home long enough for a quick rest and then it was off to small group with friends and a time for fellowship and study.  Rejuvenation for the coming week.

Bob the painter is back from surfing in Hawaii for his vacation but he caught more than a wave while he was gone--the flu struck him his last days in paradise and then he came home to try and recover.  Bob is getting the stairs done so the carpet can hopefully go down on Friday if James isn’t slammed with another job.  Bob will also finish up the trim work, doors downstairs, and windows.  The rest we told him to fit it in between his commercial jobs coming up.

Bill is getting creative and used tile left from the kitchen to finish off the tub trim in the upstairs bathrooms.  Tom is busy trying to get the crown cut and finished in the kitchen and the panels on the cabinet housing the stove vent.

Bill and Tom came up with an idea to get a little extra wood and Tom will router it and stain it to match the crown molding and it will then surround the kickboard on the base cabinets;  A little extra protection for dings and dents.

The under counter lights should ship by Thursday and the island light fixture should arrive tomorrow. 

I keep plugging away unpacking the stack of boxes in the dining room and Larry keeps flattening the empties and storing them in the garage until we completely empty all the boxes.  We are going to run an ad in the Bellingham Herald free section:  boxes, good, clean, barely used, must take all.

Two more loads of dishes washed and put away.

I finished sealing the slate tile around the fireplace so Bill will be able to grout it tomorrow.  I only had a small section twelve inches wide by about five feet by four feet by five feet.  Our main fireplace has three sides with a brick façade that raises about four and a half feet tall, topped off by a custom built mantel the previous owners’ son made.  My friend Kim has an entry, dinning, and kitchen in slate that she washed and sealed on her hands and knees.  She is younger than I am but knee pads helped.  I guess I shouldn’t whine about the small little section of tile that I finished.

Another day, another dollar; not our dollar, well it is our dollar, but we owe it to the crew who have transformed our home into a jewel.

Tuesday morning it was more of the same, a wet and grey drizzly day, sort of like a repeat of last year.

Bill finished the grout on the kitchen backsplash and the slate tile around the fireplace.  Not much to do until the trim is ready for the kick plate and the last piece of trim on the cabinet for the hood vent.

Bob is putting a second coat of paint on the staircase, base moldings, and getting the windows and trim ready to paint on Wednesday and then he will probably been done with this phase.  He will return when and if we ever get warmer weather and do doors and trim upstairs.  He can work this in between other jobs as his schedule allows.

Another load of dishes washed and stacked on top of each other in the cabinets until I figure out their final resting place.  The china is all unpacked and put away safely in its own cabinet.  My parents gave me this china as a gift for Christmas my senior year in high school.  My mother’s green Jewel Tea glasses and her dessert plates and cups are on display in the hutch cabinet, no longer hidden in the pantry.

The whimsy in the hutch is two red ceramic chess pieces—salt and pepper shakers--about six inches tall, the queen and knight.  Michael dropped in the other night with a friend and immediately said “I want these, where did you get them.”  Sorry, they came home from a shopping trip with Kelly to Hobby Lobby in Las Vegas this past Christmas.  Larry likes them as much as I do; they are a little conversation piece. 

Lights, camera, action!  The camera keeps snapping shots of the progress on the remodel even if the action is slowing down because we are nearing completion.  The lights…well we still aren’t sure where they are, but we have been assured that as soon as the manufacture ships to the warehouse, they will get shipped out to us.  Not holding my breath because I have heard this story before and from a subsidiary of the parent company. 

We have decided to hold off carpeting the bedrooms upstairs until the fall.  We just need to put the house back together and breathe.  We also need a thorough house cleaning before anyone sets foot in this house.  We are planning an open house for family and friends to come see the new kitchen and enjoy lots of home cooked food (we don’t know what the menu is but Larry finally will get to cook again) sometime in May.  Jim and Nicole will be here in June to visit.

Wednesday Tom is doing trim and Bob is painting.  It’s all in the details.

Thursday the butcher block counter arrive and was installed.  It looks wonderful and the counter guy was impressed with the progress since he was last here.

Bob is still painting.  Lots of trim work, doors, base molding, and windows..  I guess maybe we should have counted the number of gallons of paint it took to transform the house.

I made a run to Lowe’s, haven’t been there in days so I know they miss me, to pick up food grade butcher block oil to condition and seal the new top--Two coats of sealer six hours apart.

I cooked chicken fajitas as our first meal on the new cook top.  Fresh tomatoes, avocados, and salsa topped off the fajitas.  What a treat to be able to cook again.  We still have paper plates because the backsplash needs a few more days for the grout to cure.

Friday Bob finished up the painting that he could do and will return on a warmer, sunnier day (haha) to spray the bi-fold shutter closet doors in the entry.  He actually left early enough that he might get to ride for a little while.

I sanded the butcher block with four hundred grit sandpaper, wiped it down with a lint free cotton cloth for dust, and put the final coat of sealer on.  Now it needs seventy-two hours to cure before we can use it.

Tom won’t return until a missing piece for the cabinets arrives.  Bill stopped by to check on the progress.  James called to say they would be here on Monday to install the carpet on the stairs and the upper hallway.

No,  we never made it to IKEA to look for door handles so we still need to make a trip next week.  Home Depot finally tracked down our under counter lighting from the manufacturer and it has a tracking number now but the box still does not show it has left the building from its origins.