All that's left is the icing

Here I sit at our new bar, typing up the latest (yes, overdue) update on our castle on Camelot. It was gently pointed out to me yesterday that there are people waiting for an update. Really? I'm still shocked that all of you have taken the time to read my blog. Thank you for that!

Granite got installed on May 24th. In just a matter of a couple of hours the installers transformed our room with 'storage boxes' into a real kitchen- just like magic. The granite is gorgeous! It looks even better installed than it did in a large slab. Which is actually a relief! Oh, and that little matter of the agony that we faced over the flooring and if it would coordinate with the counter? It's FINE! We probably could have even gotten away with our first flooring choice and been ok, but 'it is what it is' and right now we're very happy with what our house 'IS'.


Amazingly the plumber actually came out on Memorial Day and got the dishwasher, fridge and sink all hooked up. What an amazing concept, working on Memorial Day. The contractor came back in last week and did some clean up work on a few minor things, so this means that we're preeeeeeettty much done. Yippy! I guess the contractor will be in later this week for a final inspection, and then we can call this project done.

And while things may be done on the contractor's end, we still have our own work to do. I'd say at least 90% of the house is done. We still need to get a big desk for the Reading Room, and organize all of the 'stuff' that belongs in a desk. My inner OCD goddess is jumping at the chance to get organized, but the rest of me dreads having to go through the last 10 boxes or so. But isn't it always that way... you get sooooo far and then, out of exhaustion (or boredom), you just slow down or stop all forward progress.


We (and when I say 'we', I really mean Dave) still have to do the base trim for the living/dining rooms. And I still need to paint our third bathroom pink. Why I didn't have the painting company do this when they were here is so beyond my sleep deprived mind. Luckily I found a shower curtain that I had in my apartment 8 years ago, which is plaid and in hues of pink (see, I loved pink even back then!), so I don't need to spend money on that. And, I think that I've picked out the pink paint for the room, so now I just need to find time to Kilz and then paint the 3rd bathroom.


And other than that, we just need to get pictures hung on the walls- like I said, icing on the cake. We're also getting our old house ready to rent. If any local folks know of someone in the rental market in Winter Park, let me know!


I'll update the blog again once rooms are done and I can show before/after pictures. A lot of that will depend on us getting the pictures and accessories hung. Oh, and if you're going to be in the area in mid July, feel free to stop by for our housewarming open house. It's all set for Saturday, July 14 at 4pm. There will be snacks and drinks (Seriously, what Johnson party would be complete without a keg?) and all are welcome. I just ask that you RSVP so that I can have enough cocktail weenies :-P

Stay tuned for the icing....

We're HOME!

When things started happening around here, they started happening FAST! Let's chat a bit about the last 10 days....

We passed the rough electrical inspection on May 8th, which meant that the contractor was OK'd to go ahead and finish up the electrical work in the kitchen. That meant hooking up all of the switches, outlets, can lights and pendants. OF course this didn't necessarily proceed on as fast as we had hoped, and by the time we moved in on Saturday the 12th we were still left without lighting in the kitchen/living room. But hold that thought and we'll come back to it.

The cabinet installers from Lowe's came in on Thursday the 10th and transformed our kitchen. Dave said the guys showed up, got to work, worked their tails off, and were done before he knew it. Now THAT'S what I'm talking about! When I finally got the chance to come over to the house after work, I couldn't believe how great it looked. In fact I was in quite shock and could only manage to say 'Wow', with my jaw hanging open. It shocked me to see that the kitchen space is still bigger than I had anticipated, even after the cabinets got installed. It was starting to finally sink in that The Money Pit was starting to come together and we were actually going to move into it soon.

The granite folks came out on Friday the 11th to template the kitchen for the counters. Dave got the chance to look at the stone on Monday the 14th, and as of right now, we are slated to have granite installed on Monday the 21st. That's fast! And good, because I'm a little over not having a kitchen sink or a place to set stuff down!

The big day finally arrived: Moving Day, part 2! Dave and a small (yet VERY hard working) band of merry movers were able to get everything moved out fast than I thought they would. I had to work until 3, and by the time I got to Camelot, they were done with moving all of our stuff in. Now the fun started for me. I immediately set out to bust out the kitchen. Remember me saying I'm the queen of organization? By the end of Saturday, I had gone through nearly 10 boxes and I was able to finish unpacking the rest of the kitchen by the end of Sunday.

The electricians came out on Monday the 14th and got all of the kitchen electrical hooked up. And that's a NICE change, since we were operating under the soft glow of bedroom end table lamps! Unfortunately, we still don't have a microwave or a stove, so we're still either eating take out or cold food. I'm grateful to my mom who brought us over sloppy joes and macaroni salad, and to a sweet friend, Sharon, for bringing quiches. We've certainly had a nice 'welcome to the neighborhood' so far!

The other missing part of the puzzle was hot water. Our hot water heater is gas fired, and we weren't exactly sure how we'd get or who to contact for our gas hookup. Luckily I have some friends who live nearby who have natural gas, and they directed me to the company who we needed to contact. After having to go back to Lake Howell for a couple of days to get a warm shower (mama don't do cold showers. Period.), we were finally in business on Tuesday. Yesterday, Wednesday, was the closest thing to a 'normal' morning that we've had in a while. That's nice. REALLY nice.

We've spent this week going through boxes and getting stuff put away. So far it's going well. I don't have as much time as I'd like to dedicate to unpacking, but I know we've got time to get it all done. I'm not a person who likes clutter, so having to shuck and jive around boxes is a bit annoying. The best part is that we seem to still have plenty of room for what we have left to unpack. That's an awesome feeling!

I like to move it, move it

Finally, we have had a breakthrough in the flooring drama.... It's ALL done! Tile in the kitchen, carpet in the bedrooms and wood in the rest. Hallelujah, it's a miracle!


The guys from Ability busted their tails to get all of the wood laid on Saturday. Nice! While the flooring seems to be more varied than we initially had wanted, it looks great. It goes with the paint colors throughout the house and the only variable left in the mix is how good it's going to look with the granite. Guess we'll find out in a couple of weeks how that game plays out. We spent Saturday selecting all of the 'accent' items: fans, lighting and bathroom lighting. The only thing left to get is hallway lights and a chandelier, which we'll be getting from Ikea. Just wish that place wasn't so damn far across town!

Sunday was moving day, Part I. We still had a lot of stuff in Mark and Sarah's garage from closing out the Punta Gorda house, so we got that taken care of first (I'm sure they're glad to have their garage back!). We even got all of the boxes out of the Lake Howell house as well as the stove. I remembered yesterday morning that the granite guys will need to know where the stove is so that they can granite around it. So now I have no stove to cook with at home. Guess it's a good time to start that raw diet, eh?

Here's where the fun part is going to start. My over-obsessive mind is going to take over with how everything is going to be arranged. I even dreamed last night how I'd like to set the kitchen up. I can't shut it off, it's like a sickness! I was able to empty a majority of boxes in the Reading Room yesterday, and I even spent a portion of the afternoon re-thinking how I had organized them (already!). Oy vey.

This week we anticipate the rough inspection on Tuesday. The cabinet installers will be here Thursday and the granite guys will be here Friday to template the counters out. Among all of this will be the smaller punch list tasks to complete by the contractor. Saturday will be the 'big move', and I'm going to have to miss it because of work. I'm bummed. And my OCD is twitching because I can't be there to organize. Yeah, I know. I'm not right ; )

Getting closer

You know, if I wasn't so tired I would be doing the Snoopy dance of joy. Why? We. Have. Floors.

After the week we had, I wasn't sure that Dave wasn't just going to torch Camelot.... We made the change in flooring with Ability on Tuesday. By Wednesday I was back at the shop, dropping off a check for the deposit. Coincidentally, Rick, the owner, had just arrived with our flooring from the warehouse, and he had some bad news: The floor is wicked varied in color. The flooring sample that they had didn't do the true flooring justice. Just the thing we were trying to avoid with the initial flooring choice. Mother Pussbucket!

After talking with Dave (who, by the way, was OF COURSE out of town), we decided to press forward with it. They started to lay it down today and put down a 4' wide sample to make sure that we really like it in the space. I really like that about this flooring company- they are very customer focus and dedicated to making the customer happy. Novel concept in these days, huh? Anyway, I believe the floor is going to look nice. The moisture barrier is down and they plan to work tomorrow (again, novel concept!) to get it finished.

The big news is that the carpet is down in the Reading Room and bedrooms, so that means we can start moving into those rooms ASAP. Finally! Moving day is just about here! Unfortunately, I'm not going to be able to help the day of the big move because I'll be working. I think we're going to get a U-haul on Sunday and get at least some of the mass of the boxes over to the house. And not to forget the stuff we brought up from Punta Gorda that's been living in my sister in law's garage for the past 2 months. Oy vey.

On the bright side of things, everyone set their calendars for Saturday July 14th. That'll be the housewarming party to end all housewarming parties. It'll be time to take off my moving hat and put the cruise director hat back on. And THAT'S something I can dance about! OK, back to packing. My Friday night is SO glamorous, eh?

Decisions, decisions

We came through last week feeling good about our flooring selections. And then we went granite shopping,  which made us doubt our floor selection. Anyone who's a friend of mine on Facebook might have noticed my status update on Saturday: This 'adult' crap is getting old. And indeed it is. My head hurts so much from the constant thinking it's been doing. No blonde jokes, please. This is serious stuff!

We chose an engineered wood floor in a hickory. It's a gorgeous lighter color and looks very natural. It also is subject to some coloring variations between the planks, and that includes some naturally occurring dark marks and the like. Then came our trip to the granite shops. We picked out a couple of slabs that we liked and moved on to the second stop. We had stopped at Amazon Stone in Oviedo before. While we were there I fell in love with this stone that looked to have river rocks through and through. Figuring that it would be out of our price range, I didn't think much more of it.


Turns out that the river rock is actually WITHIN our price range, and Dave likes it! A note about Dave and decorating: He certainly wears the pants in the family in THAT department. His mom used to tease him that he should have been an interior decorator. I'm able to give my opinion and have ideas, but Dave for sure has a keen eye for this kind of thing. I can look at paint that looks pretty and he'll say 'It's too yellow' or 'It's too blue' and that'll be the end of it- even if I can't even see any blue or yellow in the paint! I wouldn't call him picky per say, but he's certainly very specific about what he likes. Which isn't a bad thing, of course.


So we are going to move forward with the counters in Black Marinace. It's a Brazilian mined stone. I'm super excited, especially since it's so unique. I see so many homes that seem to have the same counters over and over again. No one will be able to accuse our house of being 'cookie cutter'.

However, with the Black Marinace, we realized that we probably needed to change the wood floor that we picked for the living room. While there's not necessarily going to be a lot of overlap of the two, we don't want the house looking too 'busy'. We spent the rest of the weekend going back and forth between 'Ok, let's change the wood' and 'No, we should keep it, it's not too bad'.

We ended back up at Ability Floors today. After a little hemming and hawing, we took a new sample of flooring with us. It's an Anderson Engineered flooring in Brazilian Oak. It's a bit more red than I originally thought I liked, but we were able to take some planks back to the granite and to the castle on Camelot, and I'm fairly certain we are going with the Brazilian Oak. Plus it's cheaper. We'll take any place we can save $$ where we can get it.

SO, as of right now, we've got counters and wood floor selected. And the guys started getting the kitchen tiled today- it's looking nice. And if all goes right, the kitchen cabinets will be installed next week. Fingers crossed!

TWO WEEKS!

Just when you think the worst has happened and it can't get much worse... Yep, it does. Folks, we have indeed bought the 'Money Pit'.

Dave called me yesterday and left a very cryptic message, telling me 'the hits keep coming'. This started the butterflies in my stomach to start flying at mach speed. My call back confirmed the worst: the parquet floor has to go. The wood floor that we had gone through so much to salvage and refinish was finally removed from life support, and in a way, I was relieved.

Turns out that when the floor was originally laid years ago, the people who installed it didn't properly prep the floor underneath. This caused the glue that they used for the wood tiles to crystallize over time, meaning that the tiles were no longer sticking to the foundation, but instead, only to each other. And this meant that the floor was just a floating plank over the foundation. As the guys started to prep the floor to get it ready to be sanded, they noticed that some of the tiles were loose. Very loose. The more they 'dug' around, the quicker the tiles started to lift.

The bottom line is that it would have taken more $$ and a lot of time to re-stick the tiles, sand and then refinish them. We were at the point where we needed to let it go. I'm honest when I tell you that I really felt like we had just taken a friend off of life support! Sounds dramatic, but for the past 2 months it's been a fight to keep the parquet. Time after time we had some bad things happen, yet we powered on, determined to keep this floor and make it gorgeous.

Luckily I was able to leave work early, so we met at Ability Wood Flooring in Orlando to pick out new wood. Very helpful folks and we quickly and easily came to a decision. We're still spending more than we thought we would for flooring, but, this is where the rubber meets the road. We've got no choice.

So, timing. The flooring folks (who also happen to be the people who are installing our carpet) seem to think they can get carpet done for sure this week. They're currently working on moving some other jobs around to try to accommodate our job. Luckily, the wood we chose is in stock locally, so that should help speed up the process too. Maybe the tides are turning?

And our cabinets got delivered yesterday! CABS ARE HERE! The garage is filled with the sweet smell of fresh wood and it's beautiful. We had a little gathering of some friends last night at Camelot, and some of the new neighbors even stopped by, seeing the flurry of people activity. It's going to be great living in that neighborhood! I only hope we've put the worst past us and we have nothing but smooth sailing to the finish.

Must I always be waiting on you?

Anyone who knows me well knows that patience is a virtue that I work to perfect daily. I have been working tirelessly on my patience skills lately with this house remodel. Yesterday found me nearly at the brink of collapse.


I will filter some of what I have to say, because I don't necessarily believe in burning someone in effigy when they cannot defend themselves. However, we've hit a rocky point in our relationship with our contractor and it looks like the completion of our castle in Camelot will be delayed another week (that sound you hear is me clenching my teeth and biting my tongue). 


And it's all over the floor. The damn parquet floor. The damn beautiful parquet floor. The damn floor that the workers damaged in a couple of places during the demo and reconstruction. We had to have some new wood pieces milled to replace the parts that were damaged by water. For whatever reason it took a long time for the wood to be completed and John (said contractor) didn't think the wood could make it until Saturday the 28th at the least. And this meant that work would not start until Monday, and the floor would not be ready for our big move in on May 5th. What? WHAT?!!


I think Dave and I blew our mutual gaskets at hearing this. Because as of May 1, we are now responsible for 2 mortgages and it's GO TIME to get Lake Howell rented. Grrrrrrr. I guess you can't just sand a bit here and then sand another part there- it all has to be sanded and then refinished at the same time. Oh, and once you put the finish down, you have to let it set up for a few days before you start moving furniture on it. Who knew? 


It took most of the afternoon to calm down and come to terms with the fact that we were going to probably lose the parquet in order to move in on the 5th. Bitter, party of one? Bitter, your table is now ready. This just seemed to be *one more* thing that's gone wrong in getting this remodel done. Don't get me wrong, our contractor has been great, and very apologetic over the fact that there've been *glitches* along the way. But I've just not gotten a sense that he's got a fire lit under him to get this work done ASAP.


So we sat down and talked about the pro's and con's of keeping the parquet or installing laminate instead. It all boiled down to we are going to KEEP the parquet in the living and dining rooms and the hallway, and we're going to put down tile in the kitchen (probably more practical than wood in there anyway). This also means that moving day has been backed up to May 12th now, instead of Cinco de Mayo. Bummer, but it's the only way to get it all done and done the way we want it to be done. Victory is mine!


Dave called John today to explain our new plan, and surprise! The parquet work begins tomorrow. I'm still scratching my head over how the wood got here earlier than anticipated, but I'll take it (boy I'm cynical tonight, aren't I). We made a trip to Floor and Decor tonight and picked out a nice porcelain tile in a gray tone for the kitchen. The best part of it is that the grout will be a darker color- yeah buddy. No scrubbing grout to get it 'clean' anymore.


Tomorrow should be a big day and I'm looking forward to it, since it's been a couple of weeks since we had a 'big day'. The cabinets are set to be delivered and the floor work begins. We're getting close and I'm just waiting for the end of the construction so we can start to live in our new castle.