Flooring is first of many final steps

Keeping up with the progress on the house has been a challenge. Lots has happened over the past months as we move into the final stages of construction.

FLOORING
In July the laminate flooring and vinyl were installed. We found the laminate at the same store, I Got Wood, where we bought the unfinished drawer units for the closets. The flooring comes in individual planks which have slightly rounded edges, so that its just like a plank of real wood flooring. I like the grain and the color is slightly red and a mid tone between the light maple cabinets and dark chocolate mocha cabinets. I was concerned that the flooring contrast with the cabinets so that the floor didn't blend into the cabinets which would have been uninteresting visually. This laminate perfectly achieved the look I was after.

We decided to put laminate in the kitchen, adjacent dining area, and the perimeter of the great room. It continues into the hallways and the lower laundry. Our plan was to enter from the garage onto the laminate, but have carpet from the laminate into the lower bedrooms. However, the laminate installers continued it down the hall to the doorways of the bedrooms. We decided to keep it since it was installed and are having a carpet runner made to go over it with just the edges showing of the laminate. I think this will look nice and will mirror the look in the great room.

I used vinyl in the bathrooms and upstairs laundry. I didn't want tile because it can crack and I hate cleaning grout. I found a great tile-like pattern in vinyl which had a bit of green in it to go with the counter tops. Unfortunately, it was discontinued so I had to pick something else. I ended up with a gray tone granite stone pattern. Its color tone changes based on the lighting in the room, which is interesting. In the upper master bath it has green tone from the sunlight coming in through the tree. In the downstairs master bath it has a warmer color from the afternoon sun. I thought the pattern was an okay solution, however, as the counters and adjacent carpet have gone in, the vinyl really works well.

This week the carpet was installed. There's some finish work to be done still, once the entry tile and stair railings are in place, but all the rooms have carpet. The colors look great with the wall paint. Since there are two different colors used for bedrooms, masters are medium sage green, and the other rooms are desert fawn (tan) I had to find something that worked well with both. Fortunately, my original color was no longer available and I was forced to choose again. The new color is a better choice. The first color was primarily a gray green with speckles of tan. The new color is tan with various shades of brown and some green. It really looks good with both wall colors. It also is moderately light in color yet the various thread colors will hide the dirt. Yeah!

The great room has a carpeted area in the middle which is surrounded by laminate. For this carpet I wanted to bring in the green tones from outside. Originally, I'd picked a solid green pile, which was surprisingly expensive. When I had to pick a new color for the rest of the house, it made me wonder if the green for the great room was a good choice. So I decided to see what the greener version of the new carpet would look like next to the laminate. I quickly realized that it was a much better choice. It has a variety of colored threads and the green is on the tan side. The original color looked garish in comparison. Unfortunately, the original green carpet had already been received by the carpet installer. I decided that color would be a horrible mistake so had them figure out what it would cost to send that back and buy the new color. Fortunately, the new carpet was $7 per yard cheaper! Yeah, I was thunderstruck to learn that my first choice had cost $22 per yard, yikes! So the significant savings per yard resulted in me saving about $20 in the total cost after factoring in the restocking charge. Few, that was a horrible mistake prevented.

Now that the new great room carpet is installed its tone looks great with the laminate, the wall paint (desert fawn) and the stone. I saw it in the late afternoon sun and the tone looked more tan than green. Overall its a bit darker than what's in the rest of the house. The green tone is subtle. It will be interesting to see if different times of day and lighting make the green more noticeable. I also wonder if it will be more apparent in the spring when the grass outside is green.

As mentioned earlier, the tan carpet looks real nice next to the bathroom vinyl. The various tans and browns tie into to the subtle golden variations in the vinyl which are more apparent with the carpet next to the vinyl. Now that all the other flooring, the cabinets and counter tops are in the bathrooms, I am much happier with the vinyl. It all ties together nicely.

Flooring Photos

Laminate in the kitchen.	Laminate planks in the dinning area.
Vinyl flooring in the master bath.	Carpet in the great room with laminate around the edges. (The laminate is covered with protective paper.)
Carpet in the lower master bedroom.

We're close yet so far

We're in that final finish work stage where lots of little things happen, but the list of little things is huge.

All the granite is finally been installed. We ended up with three different colors. The master bath has its own blue green granite with some striations. The other bathrooms, laundries and hall counter have a real affordable, but pretty sage green, yellow, black fleck. I wanted to use that in the kitchen too, but we couldn't find a large piece that could be cut to fit the outer kitchen island. So we had to abandon pre-fab and actually go with the full slab and custom finishing. I picked a dark green with gold, white and red flecks. Fortunately it was on sale and one of the cheaper slabs to begin with. Unfortunately, the pretty green tone is hard to see without lots of light. It does contrast well with the two colors of cabinets and the floor, it just looks almost black in somelighting situations.

Electrical Trenches

Rob has been overseeing outside projects like the electrical and water systems. Both required trenches be dug from the house to the electrical meter and to the well and water tanks. There were two parallel trenches one for the P G & E electrical and the other for water and gas. In the photo at right Rob is cutting a conduit piece in preparation for putting it in the trench. This is between the house and the oak tree by the garage. Its about to go around a corner, so connecting sections with bends went between several pieces. You can also see how deep the trench is since it come sup almost to his arm pits.

For weeks we had to squeeze around the trenches. Rob rented trench plates so it was possible to drive up to the house. In the last month, Rob's been working on covering the trenches. They've been covered up to almost where the electrical meter board is, however there's still the run from the well to the tanks and a bit more electrical to be covered. P G & E did pull the madible (sp?) through so they know they can get the wire through the conduit. They're just waiting for Rob to give the word that he's ready for them, hopefully in the next couple of weeks.

Is it done yet? No

Boy have I gotten behind on house construction news. A lot has happened since February's last post. Unfortunately, the house still isn't finished.

The house has been painted inside and out. I almost had a catastrophe with the outside green wall color. The photo at left shows the original color on the bottom and a lightened version on top. Both were too green. I spent a frantic weekend with new colors and mixing in white to come up with a new green, grist mill, that really looks nice. Its a grayed green so it blends well with the oak trees and the rock facade.

Speaking of rock, the manufactured stone decoration on the inside and outside looks fabulous. We were at the house on one of the days it was being worked on. The change to the house was dramatic. It just really adds a lot to the house. The style is called country rubble. Its installed the same as if it was real stone: the masons chisel and and break it to get pieces that fit together in the random pattern you see above. We also have used it on the inside of the house for the two wood stove hearths, the front corner of the outer kitchen island, and under the main support beams in the great room. It looks really cool on the inside.

Wall texture and paint

Once the wall board was installed texturing of the walls quickly followed. We went with a heavy texture so there are noticeable strokes on the wall. The idea is to look reminiscent of hand plastering. Right now, without paint, the walls have a varigated color pattern. That will become more subtle when painted, but will have lighter and darker areas as the heavy trowelling adds subtle shadowing.

I've picked the tan color, Desert Fawn, which will be used throughout the house. I'm considering using a sage green called Mosele for the upper master and possibly the lower master. The painters are starting to prep this week and will mix some lighter versions of Mosele for me to look at. I like the tint of the color and it goes well with Desert Fawn, it just needs to be lighter.

Stucco and Doors

Now that the sheetrock has been installed, the first layer of stucco was applied two weeks ago. Apparently, the weight of the sheetrock moves the exterior of the house enough that stucco is done afterwards to reduce cracking.

Last Saturday the finish coat of stucco was started. This layer has the finish applied, a rough texture with lots of rough spots visible.

I found a house to serve as an example in a high-end neighborhood on Bluff avenue. The contractor said this was an older style finish. That's fine, because I really don't like the style in vogue now where they make it as smooth as possible. It's so smooth it reminds me of the Grenache melted chocolate frosting they use on Cold Stone ice cream cakes. That look makes the house look like a mission and that is not the style I'm after. The rough look, I think, fits better with the rustic style we're going after.

In strategic places we'll be adding manufactured stone made by El Dorado so the exterior won't be all stucco. The main corners of the house, the outside wall behind the great room's entertainment center, the bay window wall and the outside wall of Rob's bedroom, and the first floor exterior around the garage doors will have stone. It's impressive how real the stone looks. They have multiple different sized and colored pieces which are placed by hand like real stone. Be picked a rough, irregular shaped, style called "Country Rubble" in a color style, Bella, that has the various shades of rock we see around the property. There are even some pieces with rust marks, just like we see on some of our real rocks. This same rock will also be used for the wood stove areas and some accents in the house. The "rock" may be delivered Friday for installation starting next week.

The doors were also installed last week. We have lots of French doors with solid glass centers, for the front door, and both master bedrooms. That will give us great views from these rooms. We also have two cafe doors to the outside that have glass in the tob half of the door. This way we'll get more light into the lower laundry and the lower masterbath. The remaining interior doors have verticle slats in them which seems to fit better in a country house like ours. We found out that they are so new our house is the first in California to get them and only the second house in the west.

Fixing Mistakes

Now that everything has been covered with wall board, we discovered a couple of oopses on lighting fixtures.

Over the stairs there are four can lights. With the wall board installed one of those lights was obviously out of alignment. Since the ceiling is going to be covered with wood planks we were concerned that their lines would make the misalignment even more noticeable. So there was nothing for it but to cut out the wall board and reposition the light. It turned out that it was approximately 3 inches off. When the ceiling wood is installed it will cover the hole.

The other lighting problem also involved the stairs. We both did not notice that one of the stair lights had not been installed. Unfortunately, this was discovered after all the wall board was installed in the under stair closet. After cutting out the wood where the light goes, Rob then had to carefully cut out a piece of the wallboard under the stairs so he could feed the wire. He was able to keep the wall board in good shape and reinstall it.

So with texturing on the walls and wood on the ceiling it won't be possible to tell where these fixes were done.

Things are moving fast

In the three weeks since the contractor has been able to progress on the project lots has happened.

Even as Rob finished up the home automation control panel and the outer island electrical wiring, the insulation was going in. We went with R38 in the ceiling and R19 in the external walls. In addition to the required ceiling and wall insulation we also had some internal walls insulated for sound dampening. Our master bedroom has insulation to quiet things between the master bath and also the laundry room. Downstairs we added insulation between the lower master and Rob's office/bedroom and in the hallway walls for his bedroom and the guest bedroom. A friend told us that an added benefit of internal wall insulation she found in her house was that less heating and cooling was needed as well.

While the insulation was being installed the sheetrock supplies were delivered. As soon as insulation was done, the sheetrockers went to work. Covering the walls makes a dramatic change. First you go from darker wood to bright white which lightens the rooms up. The enclosing of the walls also changes the feel of spaces in various ways. In the master shower, it actually feels bigger and more elegant now that the walls, seat and outer support beam are enclosed. Conversely, the lower master feels more intimate than it did when the walls were open.

The sheetrock was finished last week. To our surprise the next step of taping the sheetrock seams began last Sunday. A crew of several guys spent super bowl Sunday from 7:00 am until 5:00 pm getting the first pass of the whole house done. That dried for a few days and they came back on Wednesday for the next pass. Next will be the wall texture, but with the rain this weekend there will need to be more time for drying the taping so there will be a delay.

On the weekend we also designed the layout for our walk-in closets and the pantry. The contractor suggested we find unfinished drawer furniture that he could have his carpenters build into the closets. He's found this is a cheaper way of getting a custom closet. So we looked at unfinished furniture and a brand, Rocky Butte Mfg. that makes dovetailed drawers, full slide out extensions and simple exteriors that will work well built in. Wednesday I found a local dealer, "I Got Wood" that gave me a very good deal and worked on arranging for the shortest delivery time possible. So I placed the order yesterday for 4 pieces that should arrive by the end of February.

I've also found the look for the stucco texturing, rough and chunky, chosen the look for the internal wall texture, heavy, picked the wood and stain for the cabinets and the Zodiak countertop for the kitchen. Oh yeah we picked the doors too. Whew! Next is plumbing fixtures, internal wall colors.

My question is how soon will the house be done with things going this fast?

The Wiring Is Done

Since July, we've been wiring the house. Now after 6 months its done!

Rob actually began work on planning the wiring back in June. We had Jim Ashjian from Jim Ashjian Lighting come out and walk through the house with us. He helped us decide on what type of lights to wire for and where to place them. He also helped us work out where ceiling fans will go. As we went through the house he drew out diagrams for what to do in each room. His expertise helped us figure out how we could use can lights for the kitchen instead of pendants that would cut the view and be more expensive. He also told us we could get small enough ceiling fans for the master bath and for my closet vanity area. In the photo, Rob is going over Jim's drawings and the lighting plans.

About mid July we made the first trip to Home Depot to buy electrical boxes and wire. Rob started putting in the boxes and got a couple weeks of help with the wiring from two guys who work for our builder's electrical contractor. But there are a lot of light fixture and boxes in the house. The photo at left show's Rob installing one of the can lights for the kitchen. To do this he had to purchase a 17 foot ladder so he could reach the ceiling to nail in and wire the light cans.

Rob worked for several months, weekends and vacation days to get all the electrical wiring, boxes, fixtures and panels installed. We've got far more switches and outlets than most houses. And we've been able to insure the placement and functionality that meets our needs. for sure everything has been thought out. I'm sure that when we live in the house there will be some things we discover would be better done a different way, but we've done all we could to plan this as thoroughly as possible.

Near the end of November Rob had just about finished the electrical, which passed inspection,and then started on the low voltage wiring.This was for the home automation system, which includes audio, video, computer network and alarm. The lengthy time for electrical was costing us in monthly interest charges and delays to construction so in mid-December he took a leave of absence and worked for 5 weeks to get the low-voltage in. With the help of friends Steve and Clark, his sister and her husband Dave and me, we got thousands of feet of wires pulled. In the photo at right, Kathy and Dave pull speaker wire in one of the bedrooms (aka Rob's office).

All of the low-voltage wires terminate in a control center under the stairway. As you can see in the photo at left there was a mass of wires and they nearly ran amock! This past week Rob finished up organizing the wires in the command center box under the stairs. Just as the sheet rockers were about to cover up the wall and his wires!