The Kitchen Wall is Moved But the Rain is Back!

Yesterday, before the rains came again, the framers finished moving the north wall in the kitchen. It was a complicated process. First, Adrian the plumber needed to come and move the roof drain to the other side. You can see the rerouted drain in the picture below. The drain needed to be moved anyway, since if we left it where it was, it would come out right over the new big window in the kitchen wall.



Then, Dan, Fernie and Casey needed to build a temporary wall both above and below the floor to support the ceiling. They removed the wall and cut the ceiling joists so that they could slide the new beam up into the ceiling. When they opened the wall between the kitchen and the dining room to put in the post that will hold up the beam, they were met with an unwelcome surprise. The flue for the furnace and hot water heater travels through the wall exactly where they wanted to put the post. Rather than even think about moving the flue, they build a new wall on the outside of the old wall, making it three studs thick now. You can see the flue in the wall in the picture right below. In the picture below that, you can see the temporary bracing and how they cut the path for the beam.



After attaching the beam, they built the new wall closer to the basement stairs. The wall takes a jog inward after the pantry. The door to the stairs is no longer in the north wall but around the corner. This is a huge improvement, because now you don't need to turn 90 degrees to go down the steps right after opening the door. Instead, you will be able to open the door and walk straight down the steps. The first picture below shows the framed opening for the door down to the basement. In the second picture, the girls are standing in the doorway of the pantry. The long wall next to them will have the banquette on it.




It seems like a lot of time and money to spend to get an extra 6 inches or so in the kitchen, but without that space the design would not work. I am very attached to the banquette idea, and we need the extra width to make having the banquette feasible. I know it will all be worth it in the end!

Countertops for the Kitchen

It seems like putting the cart before the horse, since we haven't even picked out cabinets yet, but we purchased our counter top material yesterday. We decided on soapstone, since we are trying to restore that original bungalow feel and many of the original arts and crafts bungalows had soapstone counter tops. We bought the soapstone from M. Teixiera, one of the few places to buy soapstone around. To find out a little more about soapstone, you can check out their website here.

The soapstone we chose is called Julia, and it doesn't have the big white streaks through it. It is more subtle, with black and green swirls once it is oiled. The natural color of soapstone is dark gray, but when you put mineral oil on it, the color darkens and becomes black and green. We needed to buy it now, since the company isn't getting any more Julia and they are almost out. It was lucky I could go up to the city yesterday to pick out our slabs. The slabs aren't that big, and it is going to take 3 slabs to cover our counter tops. The main reason we will need three is that the island is big enough that there won't be a two foot strip left over after fabricating the island.

The picture at the top shows the natural color of the soapstone. In the picture below, I put water on half of it to simulate what it will look like with the mineral oil on it.

Windows and a Patio Roof

We had two days of rain this week, and the framers had to spend one whole day cutting bracing and working to attach the old foundation to the new foundation. It was important work, but it is all under the plywood so there is no picture of all the progress they made. On Thursday and Friday they worked really hard, though, and put in most of the windows and framed the porch roof over the back patio. They also started preparations for moving the wall in the kitchen. Once they finish putting the beam in the ceiling to take that load and build the new wall, they can fill in the hole in the ceiling and connect the old and new parts at the top instead of just at the bottom. They also need to install the back doors.

The windows look great. The picture below is the huge bank of windows that will be on the south wall of the kitchen.



Here you can see the two big windows in the south wall of the family room.



The patio roof looks nice too. In the top picture, you can see it finished as viewed from the front porch of the casita. Below you can see it in progress:

The Addition is Really Taking Shape

The framers have been making tons of progress on the addition. All the walls and roof have sheathing on them now, so all the cross bracing is gone and you can really get a feel for the new space. In the picture above you can see our new bedroom. They framed the kitchen wall closest to the driveway yesterday, and it is going to look great with the huge window in it, as you can see from the picture below.



The great room is going to be awesome. In the picture below you can really see the kitchen and family room areas well defined. The wall where the girls are standing is going to come out two feet to hide the edge of the refrigerator, and make the rooms even more defined. The family room is just the right size -- big enough for a comfortable couch and some friends, small enough to feel comfortable.



The picture below is of the load bearing kitchen wall that we need to move. We want to put the beam supporting the ceiling joists up into the ceiling, so that is doesn't hang down. The big problem with that is that we need to move the main roof drain, which is the black pipe you can see up in the roof in the picture. We need to move it anyway, because the pipe comes out right over the big window in the kitchen. The solution is to just route the pipe the other way, but I don't want the framers to work on the wall until we move the drain, since there is still no guarantee that it won't rain and I don't want all the water from the roof to pour down into the basement on the water heater and furnace. Adrian the plumber should be coming by next week to move the drain so that the framers can move the wall for us.



Hopefully by the end of next week the current hole in the roof between the family room and kitchen will be gone, the wall will be moved and the front porch will be framed. They may also get the windows in then too!

Doors for the Casita

We're slowly working on the finishing touches for the casita. The garage door man came to install the garage door, which makes the building much more secure. Todd and Matt installed the interior doors on Friday. They will come back next week to finish the interior trim. We also still need to do the finish electrical, but we are getting pretty close to the point where the finishing touches (like the bathroom) will be up to us.

Walls, and Even a Roof!

In spite of huge amounts of spring rain, the framers have been hard at work framing the addition to the house. We have all the walls up now, including the interior ones, and we can walk around and really get a feel for how the space will turn out. The family room with its high ceiling is going to be fabulous. I am also really excited about my desk space, which will be tucked into the hallway into our bedroom. The back wall of doors looking out on the back yard is great as well.

We have had a few framing challenges. A few old walls we thought we could keep were so badly out of square that we had to replace them. Also, we need to move a load bearing wall, which is relatively straight forward, but the main roof drain is in the way. We are going to reroute the drain to the other side of the house, which will also prevent it from coming out right over the kitchen window. We still have a few questions on how the final wall (after being moved) will look, but we will work it out.

Another challenge has been the merging of the old and new roofs. Our house has a butterfly roof that dips down in the center to a main drain. The new sections will be framed differently, however. The framing is flat and then the carpenters and roofers build up a slope on top of the flat framing to allow the roof to drain. We have to have the butterfly roof and the flat roof come together gracefully, and the new section has different ceiling heights, so those sections need to meet as well. After much discussion with the contractor and framer, it seems as though it will all work out well. In this picture, taken earlier in the framing process, you can really see the slanted roof that they will have to join with a flatter one:



In this picture, you can see the view from the backyard. The ceiling in the family room will be 10 feet, as you can see by how much higher the joists are than the ones in our bedroom, which will have a 9 foot ceiling.


In this picture, you can see the huge beam which spans the distance between the kitchen and the family room:


The picture at the top of the post shows the interior walls in the hallway in our bedroom. To the left of the picture is our closet, to the right is my desk and straight ahead is the framing for the pocket door into our room.

Floor Yes, Walls Not Yet

In the past two weeks, we have managed to get the floor of the addition on the regular house insulated and framed. It took so long because the plumber had to come in and run the rough plumbing for the new bathroom and the HVAC guy had to run the new ductwork under the floor before they could finish the insulation and the plywood subfloor. We tried hard to make sure that there will be enough air circulation in the back of the house so that our bedroom won't be freezing like the spare room was before. We'll have to see if it works.

Here you can see the plumbing for what will be the master bathroom:


We also asked the contractor to dig out some of the dirt under the old third bedroom so that we would have access to the crawl space. We will have the access door in our closet for the whole new part of the foundation, although it will not be the most comfortable crawl space in the world. I think we will need to paint arrows underneath so that you don't get lost down there.

They have delivered the wood for the walls, so hopefully the weather will get better this week and Dan and his crew (the framer) can get to work on the walls. We were worried about the third bedroom's structural integrity, but in spite of the water damage to the one outside wall, it is in surprisingly good shape. The beam that supports the floor is actually dimensional redwood and looking good in spite of how long it has been under there. You can see the beam running under the joists in the plumbing picture above.

Jake also dug the hole for the dogwood. When the crew comes to trench through the yard for the utilities to the casita, we will get them to scoop up the dogwood and stick it in the hole. It is way too big for Jake to do it himself.

Finished Walls and Tile Roof

In spite of the rain, the contractors have been making progress on the casita. They finished the drywall in both the room and the garage. They have also tiled the roof, and it really looks good, as you can see in the picture. The outside stucco is also done. We added two tiles on either side of the sliding door facing the house, which adds a little custom touch to the building. The roofers did a nice job on the tile roof. They will come back to finish it once the building has been painted, because the edge row overlaps the edge of the roof.



Here you can see the tiles we put on either side of the slider:


Matt has ordered the interior doors, and they should come in within the week. The garage door should be installed this week as well. Once the interior doors are installed, they will install the interior trim, and then their part of the building will almost be done. We are planning to paint the inside and finish off the bathroom, and ask them to paint the exterior at the same time as the main house, so that the colors match. We're planning on putting carpet in the main room, just because it is easy and relatively inexpensive.