a case of the Crafties » house

House stuff

CaLynn — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 04:27:44 +0000

Our old front door had a huge gap all the way around it. I mean seriously, that’s where most of the bugs and critters were probably coming from (not to mention where all the heat and air were going to). We found a perfect front door, but since our circumstances have changed (I will explain that in a later post:) we went for a cheapy one and had it installed the other day. The plans for building a small deck are also on hold, but imagine one from the door and under the bay window so my patio furniture has a home. The plans for painting or siding the house are also on hold. Imagine it cute, and happy colors, not prison grey! New light fixture, maybe even shutters or flower boxes. Who knows, but I’m thinking cottage-y. I hope to start cleaning up the yard when it gets cooler (what is up with this massive heat wave of 110+ degrees all the time???) but under that little bushy thing on the left is a mint plant and hiding around the corner is a raspberry bush!

We’ve also had quite a number of nasty storms blow through with tornadic winds. So far, aside from sore muscles after uncountable days of picking up sticks, this has been the only real casualty since that half-a-tree we cleaned up before. And although it hit the roof, gutter, window, and air conditioning unit when it fell (and woke me up), nothing was harmed!
And here are two options I brought home from the store for tile. Although I really liked the one on the left (especially after turning it so the little diamonds were squares instead), I felt like it may date the kitchen. The one on the left matches the colors more anyway, and the dilemma of the wall with the doorway is easier solved with the rectangle pattern. If the store had enough of them last week, it would have been installed by now, but alas, we could only buy half of what we need. :/

Nature

CaLynn — Mon, 13 Jun 2011 17:08:09 +0000

We had a really rough storm blow through when we got back from NYC. Our house wasn’t attacked by Mother Nature as much as other people I know, but we did have a pretty sizeable amount of limbs to pick up. (Other people were without power for a few days, or had many full sized trees completely uprooted.)

Mother Nature has also been sending in hoards of unruly insects into my house. This includes giganto carpenter ants, a plethora of spiders, what we think was a cockroach (it got away too fast to know for sure), beetles, mosquitos (yes, inside the house too), centipedes, wasps, and crickets. Boy and I decided to go full on head to head with the evil armies and created a Master Plan to Destroy Bugs and Protect the Sanity of the Household. Although I have an aversion to chemicals and whatnot, I just can’t stand waking up with bugs in my bed, or in the shower, or in the kitchen, or stepping on them, or sitting next to them, or anything with them considering their large and growing population and diversity. A spider or ant or two, whatever. But they have been coming in droves. Who will win, I wonder?

kitchen showtime

CaLynn — Mon, 18 Apr 2011 03:35:55 +0000

Sorry for the long wait – life just keeps getting in the way. Our kitchen still needs quite a bit done but oh how I LOVE it and will now forever need to upgrade kitchens in future houses. Kind of a curse, that.

I had hoped Boy could take some awesome photos with his wide angle lense but he literally sold it the day I asked. Poo. You people are use to my crummy pics though, right?

My lopsided sink and pretty faucet (excuse the dishes but the reality of the situation is that people do live here).
I picked up this Bekvam stepstool at IKEA and will try to stain-match it to the cabinets. Its perfect for getting in the high places and a great height for sitting while I’m watching a pot.
Drawers galore – the kind that come ALL the way out so no need to dig around yanking things this way and that.
No cabinetry butt = full access of awesomeness.
Kraftmaid gave us a promotion: free sink base, free cabinet glaze, and free whisper quiet cabinets to match the whisper quiet drawers (I am so so spoiled by these!). Give the door or drawer a push and they shut themselves oh-so-quietly. Perfect considering my bedroom is basically on the other side of the wall and I live with two night owls.
Double garbage = trash and recylcling (I think someone should add a tupperware monster to the list next to a sock monster because I finally got all my kitchen stuff put away and I could not believe the amount of mismatched things!)
Boy’s addition to the kitchen: a massive garbage disposal. How do people live without these?
Our pantry, full of our “essentials” (spaghetti sauce, noodles, tuna, peanut butter, cream of wheat with milnot, and crackers)
All of our appliances are new also (all Whirlpool Gold except for the stove which is lacking the Gold declaration). I know: “euw, I hate electric stoves” but I will trade gas for cleanliness any day. We aren’t master chefs up in here and this one cooks really evenly, and the convection oven is the bomb. Plus its got SteamClean – add some water and bake and voila, easy to clean. But my Gramma also suggested I pick up a Chef’s Planet oven liner and I must say: it is *brilliant*.
Microwave with CleanRelease – supposedly stuff will just wipe off!
Dishwasher which has a double rotator thingy (Tofer would laugh at my description) so the entire bottom is usable space, especially since the silverware basket is built into the door.
Our fridge – I just love seeing everything instead of things getting buried and rotten.

So that’s it thus far. Still to do: trim along the ceiling, kick plate, align doors, install handles, tile, paint, light fixtures, cut a small back section off the oven so we can scoot it back over the gas pipe (we left it there in case electric did us wrong), and a little sanding so we can push the fridge back and not dig into the wall with the door.

Let me remind you, that this is what it use to look like (Boy is next to where we placed the pantry looking towards where we placed the fridge):

I think we did a splendid job thus far, don’t you agree? :)

things on my table

CaLynn — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 18:06:10 +0000

I am sure you have been expecting pictures of my new kitchen but it has been really hectic here. Not only is there still much to be done with it, but Boy also has moved his company to a new location so that has taken a higher priority of our time. I will leave you with this tease though:

I also began scrapping again since I recovered my craft room. I posted all the pages I have made in my personal book, but I have yet to show you my Peru scrapbook. I started it shortly after my return in 2007, and school got crazy so I never finished. This is a shot of me trying to work out the layouts for the day trip to the national museum in Lima:

I also need to get in gear if I want to participate for the Sew Mama Sew giveaway, hopefully coming up in May. I’ve had so many ideas for covers but it is time to start working them through. This isn’t intended to become a cover, more like an idea board of options while I work through the problems and creative process and await my nice wool felt shipment. (I just may have purchased the dream bundle at WoolFeltCentral, ooo la la!)

And have you ever heard of 31bits? Apparently there are a few companies out there doing something similar but I must say this one rocks – anthropology for the win! One of the founders is a cultural anthropologist who saw these Ugandan women, having survived and been displaced from the civil wars, making paper beads and jewelry but with little market in which to sell. 31bits was developed as a way to give them a client base and therefore a way support themselves and their families. Unlike other “parties” out there, this one is neat and simple – you get a box of goods, you sell what’s in the box directly to your friends, and you ship back what didn’t sell. No overhead of shipping, waiting, or returns. No obligation to try to get to a certain price-point to get discounts. Just an honest transfer from their hands to yours. I’m not much of a jewelry gal but Boy felt the urge to buy me this bracelet:

(Oh, that background? Well, one day I must tell you of the gorgeous quilting my Aunt Sandy does – in fact if she is reading this, she should really consider having a website to show case her work!)

kitchen progress

CaLynn — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 20:06:09 +0000

Ah ha!

I was not home when the counter top people came, and what serendipity that the appliances were delivered the same day?! Tofer sent us these pics with his phone. I’ll take a nicer photo once everything is put away and all the appliances are installed. It will be so good to finally have a working kitchen again!

kitchen install

CaLynn — Thu, 17 Mar 2011 18:10:31 +0000

Our cabinets are installed! They are beautiful and really look awesome with the flooring. Phew! We hired Clay through my friend Angela and he did an amazing job. I mean really, even after we did everything to level the floors and the contractor leveled the ceiling, things were still incredibly wonky. I haven’t taken a picture yet of the complete install because I want to wait for the counter (which comes in like a week!). Instead, here are some quick photos from install day:

kitchen weekend progress

CaLynn — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 01:36:32 +0000

We had two major tasks ahead of us this weekend. Laying the floor and getting the pantry upright. Both were very time consuming.

The floor isn’t finished in the front room yet but it is done in the kitchen and looks great! It is very slow-going, however. There are five different patterns without any instructions included on how to lay them. There are four boards per box, and though most have two that match with two non-matching others, sometimes there were three in a box that matched or all four were different. We could not find any system to the pattern so we had to keep laying boards down to see if they would work out or not. Then there is the whole issue of aligning the grout line, something not necessary with a wood grain pattern. Lots of precision work!

The second major task was getting a 90 inch pantry upright in an area that at best was 90.5 inches high (at its worse, 88 inches – low ceilings in a wonky house are nothing to brag about!). We never considered the geometrics involved in such a device until we went to do it. Undaunted as usual, we googled some answers and went with a big hole in the ceiling. Eh, what’s more drywall work anyway, right? I am so glad I decided not to primer the entire ceiling yet.

It worked with just the three of us so I will not complain. But I am complaining a wee bit on the subject of the pantry doors not fitting correctly. Someone at the shop messed up on the pilot holes. Before we drill our own, we want to talk to someone to see if theres any kind of inspection – maybe they will give us a coupon or something on our next purchase, who knows.

And my friend Angela made us a chicken pot pie since she knew we would be without a kitchen for a while longer yet. It made for a scrumptious lunch break. And look at those stars, doesn’t she rock?! YUM :D Thank you!!

room full of cabinets!

CaLynn — Fri, 04 Mar 2011 19:50:07 +0000

I wish I could say that it was a kitchen full of cabinets but we are not quite there yet. They are Kraftmaid, which we ordered through Lowes. Maple wood construction, “Hanover” style, rye stain with a sable glaze – I personally think they are beautiful.
We got the whisper quiet drawers and cabinets and sink base for free as part of a promotion. All the bases have pull-out shelving, and one of them is a double wastebasket. But this baby will be my favorite:
It’s on its side because our ceilings are low and we did not want to mess anything up prior to the install but its a full size pantry. The doors have shelving, the inside shelving swings out, and then there is more shelving behind that. That’s a splurge I know I will never regret!

And it occurred to me that I never posted about this stack of flooring. It is the Pergo brand, but it looks like tile. Rocky Mountain Morning Mist is the style (whites, beiges, greys). It should be laid this weekend.
You can see it next to the upside-down window valance – I think the colors are a great match. We called the cabinet guy and it looks like he can come out on Tuesday! Not only will I get my kitchen back and my belly will be happy, but I’ll get my craft room back also! More posts to follow:)

kitchen remodel progress

CaLynn — Tue, 08 Feb 2011 17:20:58 +0000

Our kitchen has come along quite a ways! We made the final decisions and ordered the cabinets. They are due the first week of March. Here is the progress in photos:

Old linen closet, that wasn’t deep enough for a folded towel and only irked me day after day:

Newly drywalled built in book case instead:

Newly routed electrical work and insulation (to deaden the sounds between the kitchen and bedrooms):

Drywall patched and mudded:

house and games

CaLynn — Fri, 10 Dec 2010 18:27:18 +0000

The contractor came on wednesday, yay! It didnt take nearly as long as we all expected because the work he thought he was going to have to do had actually already been done (installing a new header for the load-bearing wall). The guys just ripped out the parts i didnt want and whipped out a wall frame.

Hopefully soon, we will be able to tackle the electrical work – outlets, lights, switches. (By we, i mean boy and his dad.) Then the guys will come back to do a professional drywall job. With the holidays nearing though I fear it will be delayed until January. But at least now I feel like its coming along again.

Boy and I are pretty into boardgames. We utilize the rating system over at BoardGameGeek a lot because in the past we have bought awesome looking/sounding games only to find out they completely suck. So far, BoardGameGeek hasnt really let us down.

That being said, we did think one of the games was rated a little high. Here is our spread of Descent: Journeys in the Dark.

Its number 62 out of who knows how many, and the only thing we can think is that its super awesome for people who either a) have never roleplayed before or b) make up their own campaigns (which in theory would be like roleplaying with miniatures). I teased boy by claiming it was probably rated higher than we would have rated it because other people had better dungeon masters;)

Anyways, I am thinking Ill do little posts on the games we enjoy – a lot of people I know arent exposed to the plethora of board games out there and I really think they are missing out.