Grass seed planted

After a lot of hard work, the grass seed is finally planted! Now we just hope for some rain. We cleared a large area below our house but kept plenty of trees for privacy and shade. I used heavy equipment to pull stumps and haul trees up our steep lot, and then churn up the topsoil so we didn't have to bring in 50-100 yards of topsoil which would have cost a couple thousand dollars. After that it was a lot of hand shoveling and raking and clearing additional debris to smooth everything out. I'm getting in good shape doing this! I finally got so worn out I posted a craigslist ad for some help and had two guys shoveling and raking within an hour!


Here's the view from the deck


Here's a new footpath I bulldozed, the slope straight down is too hard to walk down. The guys I hired did a good job smoothing this out, it was pretty rough form the dozer.

Including what we had leftover from before, we now have about 5 cords of wood stacked. There's still an additional cord or two in smaller stacks elsewhere. About enough for 3 winters.

A change of pace, sorta

So, since our house is basically done, we had a change of pace... and worked on friends Cameron and Millie's house instead!

We had 8 days in Portland to hand out and work on the project. The time estimate was 5 days, and three of those were supposed to be partial while waiting for drywall mud to dry. Well it turned in to a little more, like 7 long, full days and one partial (like 7am to 11pm a few days). This was mostly because I'm not good at estimating these things (I'm known for saying every little task till take 15 minutes when it actually takes hours). There was some little slowdown at almost every stage, like drywall screws not setting properly, batteries running out, etc.

In the end though, I enjoyed myself, and we did a great job turning two small rooms with small closets into a large master suite a huge window into the back yard and a huge walk in closet.

Demolition was a little slower than expected. The walls had a combination of drywall, soundboard, and the most difficult to remove: plain ol' plywood. However, this stage revealed a pleasant surprise: Beautiful clear fir wood floors under the carpet! At least it will be beautiful after it's refinished. It's all covered in paint and drywall texture.

We also made a slight plan change, which required a trip to the permit office, and added a little time and complexity with the post and beam, but ultimately made a much better layout in my opinion.

Then there was the first inspection, which covered the framing and was supposed to cover electrical as far as we thought, but apparently there was one simple form that needed to be filled out. Really, the inspector could have had this with him. Another trip to the permit office while we added hard wired interconnected smoke detectors, which the first inspector told us we needed since we exposed the ceiling and made it doable...

Also, I was slowed down by being unfamiliar with some of the 1940s construction methods. Most noticably the electric. Durring demo I labeled a wire "power" but later discovered it came directly from the light fixture, so I assumed I mislabeled it. I thought we had pushed the power through the floor, but there was only a 240 volt line for the heater down there. I did some load calculations and saw it was possible to power the room off that circuit, and assumed they must have wired it that way, off one 120v leg of the 240v circuit. This made wiring a bit complicated, but I finished it this way.

THEN, when cutting the previously labeled POWER line which only went to the light fixture, we were all shocked (pun intented) by a huge spark when we thought all power to the room was off! It turns out this part of the room was a continuation of the living room circuit, and the hot power went through the light fixture (most commonly there is only power to a light when the switch is on!) So I had to rewire, which actually simplified it and let us properly dedicate the 240 volt circuit to the heating, like it's supposed to be. Luckily, the spark didn't hurt anyone or anything, I just shorted the lines with the cutters. We probably burned an extra day in all with the electric.


Yay, real wood under the carpet! See that wire there, touching me? Later we found out it was hot.


after tearing everything out, we first put in the new closet wall (this is later, after wiring and some drywall



Attic access. I spent far too much time up there. Very hot.


the post goes through the floor to a foundation footer. I got to crawl around down there a few times


applying rounded corners to the beam

it was usually like this, with several people working hard together


drywall taped, drying for first top coat of mud. The door on the right is the closet entrance


mudder fudders


John sanding away. Messy, dusty work

Texturing. This is about 3 hours before we thought we had to leave for our plane (turned out to be 5 hours). And I still had to connect outlets, smoke detectors, thermostat, and a light switch!

new post and beam in the forground where old closet and wall used to be, new closet wall and doorway in the background. This is pretty much what we got done. Framed, wired, rocked, textured. Cam and Millie still need to prime, paint, hang doors, patch floor, refinish floor, trim. Lot sof work, but I know they can do it and it will make a really nice room!

Yard

First I cut down about 20 big trees and a lot more small ones to extend a natural clearing. After cutting them down we realized it looked really nice without flattening, so we decided to keep it naturally sloped, which makes the yard much bigger, less erosion prone, and faster to make.

Last weekend I rented a Cat 277C multi-terrain loader:

This is about a 10,000 pound machine with a rubber track

The first attachment I used was an industrial grapple fork. I used it to haul tons of trees, about 3 cords, up the very steep slope. It also was sturdy enough to push over stumps and grab a few at a time, along with other brush, and pile it out of the way. All in all about a summers worth of hand work in 5 hours.

Not my picture, I didn't get any pictures during the process

Then I used a Harley Box rake, which is a high powered attachment. Think fast spinning 500 pound steel rolling pin with carbide spikes. This churns the soil, mixes in debris and rotten wood, and leaves behind a flattened mulch.

Again not my picture, but this is the tool I had

After 10 hours in the machine over the weekend, we ended up with this. It's at least half an acre (22,000 square feet), we haven't measured it yet:

Looking East, 7am

Next steps are doing some final cleaning and raking by hand, then planting fieldgrass. Finally we'll fence it in and have a large dog park for Roland!

new stuff

We've been looking for a nice table for a long time, with no luck. I considered building one, but we finally found this on craigslist. It's all real cherry, and not stained so it will darken with age and any scratches won't show a different bright wood underneath.


I'm also working on a boardwalk from our parking area to the house to make a more welcoming entry along our raised garden, and cut down on dirt and mud getting into the house. I still need to flush the boards on the right side, and then we'll plant grass along that side between the boardwalk and the garden. I screened all the gravel I dug during the process through a metal shelf to get 1" and bigger rocks, to make a nice approach and fill the spot between the boardwalk and the garage to the left. Still a little more to do.

Changy mcChange

Have you lost all hope? Do we keep changing too much? Does it seem like we don't listen? We do, there are just too many choices!

The below is rising in the ranks for several reasons. It's not too much for most people, like the red was. The green was a nice color but could have clashed with all the different types of wood we have. An accent wall may have been too much. A solid color seemed overwhelming. In this one, the color pallet goes with the floor, wood, and furnishings. It's kind of a masculine and conservative color - funny, I'm neither. The split tone serves to section off the lower floor from the cavernous vaulted ceiling. It makes the living area a little more cozy and contained.

red might be out

Decision...making...hard...

It is fun hearing people weigh in though. For every yes there is a no, for every no a yes. Other than the crazy stripe color, now that my dad has voted white we have every color voted for!

A choice may be emerging

Marcy and I are both starting to like this one. A safe, neutral, but rich color for the main walls with no two-tone, and a stronger bold accent wall color. Looks like green might be out, despite everyone, including Marcy and I, liking it. I cleaned up the Photoshop work a bit, and added dynamic lighting for a slightly more realistic preview

Little consensus

Thanks so much to all for the comments on colors, and please keep them coming!

There has been very little consensus, and we got several back-to-back comments or emails with opposite opinions!

red bad! - John
RED GOOD! - Cam

split color good- Stephanie
yes, split color good - Carol
split color bad!- Jess
yes, split color BAD- Kara

Gray looks like a battle ship - John
Gray is gloomy - Kara
Gray looks nice! - Carol

Then there are votes for most colors - red, burgandy, blue, green, sage, cream, chocolate, gray, black

So far the only color to stand out with any consensus at all it sage. And no votes for keeping it white

Personally, I think any color darker than white helps draw the attention to the floor, ceiling, furniture, windows, etc, and takes advantage of our excessive accent lighting. Now the good things provide the light and aren't drowned our by the big white walls.

I definitely like the chocolate color in the kitchen. There are highlights of that color in the counter Green matched the counter too strongly and looked bad.

I think the 2tone looks OK, but not up the stairs like the one photo.

I'm leaning towards more of a neutral color to go with the tile and ceiling, a warm gray or more chocolate perhaps, with a contrasting accent wall, maybe of that nice sage. The brown could continue into the kitchen. The sage wall is opposite the kitchen, which has a similarly colored counter top.


However, I know Marcy thinks one color on the big wall is too dominating. Any thoughts?

Update:
Below: The above photo changed with Marcy's input (and color corrected on the blinds):


Hmm, and another open, more bold, but doesn't overwhelm the room like doing the whole thing in burgundy

Paint?

So, I thought maybe our great room could use some more color. We had the drywall guys paint it asylum white. To see what it would look like, I painted it a whole bunch of different colors, took pictures for you, my faithful readers to see, and perhaps share your input on. There are, of course, many more colors available, but I can only paint the living room so many times.

Any that don't make the cut for this room could go elsewhere. Marcy and I are currently leaning towards 2tone gray on the great room, sage in the kitchen, light blue in the bathrooms, and maybe something more bold in the office/loft.

Update: I've added colors, reduced the image size (click for full view) and removed my cheeky color names just to make it easier to see the colors side-by-side.


current color white, cream

beige, gray

sage, lighter sage

2tone gray/sage

half&half gray, choco / gray

2tone gray

light blue, dark blue

burgandy, red




Here's a color option for the kitchen that Marcy and I like, along with the 2tone gray/sage living room.

And this would be a view of the whole great room. At first I had the loft a different color, but 4 colors in one room seemed too much.

Like it, love it, hate it, vomit?

And here's another option, as suggested by my sister. I like it.

accent wall

Energy usage continues to impress

The coldest winter in many years is nearly over, and our 12 month fuel usage for heating the house, separate 2 car garage, and hot water generation, is 560 gallons. Next winter will likely not be as cold, and I'm putting a small wood stove in the garage. I could also burn wood more in the house, but it's difficult with working full time. Either way, I'm very happy with the low heating bills!