Feet, Fans, Fixtures and Fixes

In addition to the kitchen countertops going in, there was a lot of other activity at the house over the last day and a half.

Feet

We learned another new term. Feet*. The little part of the baseboard that sticks out over hard flooring (tile, cork, etc.) is called the foot. I never realized that the baseboard was made of two separate pieces before. Carpeted floors only have the vertical piece because the carpet can get flush against the wall. The foot goes over hard flooring to cover up the jagged edges of flooring.

* Okay, I was wrong, but only a little... It's not feet. It's actually called 'shoes'. See how my brain (doesn't) work on a bad day? Close, but a little off. Story of my day.

In-law suite shoes.

Close up

Espresso shoes in the kitchen.

Espresso meets white in D's bathroom.

Fans:

The last of the ceiling fans went up on the back porch. This is going to be so nice when D and the neighbor boys are playing in our backyard. The parents can sit in the covered, breezy shade. 

But first, we need to get a new fan because the light in one was broken. Back to Lowe's we go.

Fixtures:

This lovely pile of boxes represents the latest delivery: toilets, sinks, faucets and bathroom fixtures. I cannot tell you how excited I will be once we finally have a working toilet in the house. Have I mentioned my newly-potty-trained toddler lately?

I did see that the wrong laundry sink arrived. Fortunately, that was fixed within a few hours.

Speaking of fixes, the drywall guys were busy in our bathroom. The vanity lights are now situated above the sink where they belong. The painters will be by shortly to repaint before the mirrors go up.

While it may seem there have been a lot of mistakes lately, really, other than the marble mishap, most of these things are pretty minor, easy to fix, and/or part of the process when you make selections on paper. We learned early on that Todd at Charis is easy to work with and quick to make things right, so most of the time, my heart rate doesn't go up too much when I see something amiss.

Last of the Lights

Tonight, Niels and I are going to purchase the last of the lights for the house. One of our projects for the weekend is to go through and move all the lights, fans and mirrors from the garage to the appropriate room. This might normally be done by the builder, but we bought most of our own lights to save money, so we're the ones who know where everything goes!

Here's a little lighting preview.

Front Porch and Garage Exterior Lights:

Portfolio Aged Bronze Outdoor Wall Light from Lowes (6). We chose these lanterns because the prairie grid matches the design of our windows. These have been installed for a while. They might be a little on the small side for our house, but we like them. We did notice that the one to the right of our front door is cracked, so we'll have to figure out what happened with that.

Foyer and Hallway:


The first light to catch my eye for the foyer and hallway was the Portfolio 17"W Chrome Pendant Light with Chrome Shade from Lowes. I really liked the modern look of the mesh design over the pendant, and thought the silver would look nice with the gray paint in the foyer.

But then we saw the Portfolio 3-Light Painted Champagne Flush Mount,  also from Lowes.

One big consideration for us in choosing lights is the brightness and amount of light they give. My eyesight has been in decline, so the more light, the better. My practical husband convinced me that the three light was better functionally the pretty two light, but when we went to pick up two lights tonight, not only was Lowes out of stock, but they didn't even have an signage for it. I found this especially odd because the Lowes by our apartment had two of the lights earlier in the afternoon. Since we really didn't want to be driving around all night, we opted for financial functionality, and chose my original favorite and saved a bit of money.

Niels' Office:

No photo for this one yet. We're repurposing a light fixture that Niels brought over with him from his house in Belgium. As you can imagine, it's modern Euro design. I'll let you wait with bated breath.

Great Room:

Our main consideration for our great room light was the ability to use LED lights, so we shouldn't ever have to figure out how to get up 14.5 feet to change the bulbs. (LED lights last about 50,000 hours). We wanted a ceiling fan to circulate air, and we wanted one with a light kit. We have fantastic natural light in our great room, so we'll only use the light at night. We purchased the Craftmade Midora 56" Chrome Ceiling Fan with Grill from Lighting By Design in Canton. Their website is pretty challenging to navigate if you're looking for a specific light, so we linked to a different site above. However, if you're in the area, Kelly at Lighting by Design is very helpful and we were happy to work with her. (Funny aside, after we chose this fan, we realized we took a picture of an oil-rubbed bronze version of this fan at another Charis home over a year ago. Guess it stuck with us!)

Dinette:
This was the first light we bought. I feel in love with it after seeing it on an episode of HGTV's "Bang for Your Buck." I had to negotiate hard with Niels, but once he saw it in person, it was a done deal. It's the West Elm Large Rectangle Hanging Capiz Pendant.

One of my favorite home decor bloggers has the same fixture in her gray dining room. I am so excited to see it go up, although our dinette will be green, not gray as we were thinking when we bought the light.

Kitchen:
The original plan was for three can lights. Since our cabinets are dark we opted to increase to nine so it wouldn't be do dark. It definitely isn't! It may be overkill, but at the time we made the decision, I had a raging headache (that took three months and three days intensive treatment with my neuro to break up) and my vision was at a low point. I don't regret the change.

We also have two cans in the command center, which is hidden in an alcove to the right in the picture above.

Under the cabinets and in the two frosted glass cabinets, we chose Kichler Design Pro Black 3.5W LED Disc Lights, aka puck lights from Lighting by Design. We wanted LED lights that would be bright and cool, and really wanted to avoid florescent lights which can trigger my vertigo--not a good idea when I have a knife in my hand! Once we chose the type of light, we need to decide between strips and pucks. We chose the small round puck lights primarily because there were quite a bit cheaper. Also, the wiring is a lot easier (read: cheaper) with the puck light. We chose black to blend in with our cabinet. Because our cabinets are not very wide, so I think the pucks will be sufficient. If we had longer expanses of cabinet, we might have splurged on the strips.

They'll look a bit like this:

Over the outer island, we chose three ET2 Fizz pendants. We found these at Whitmer's Lighting and they are really, REALLY cool. They look like solid blocks of glass with bubbles in them. There are also straight lines that are similar to the lines in the glass of the backsplash. The catalog photo really doesn't do it justice:

Here are a few of Niels' artistic shots:

Pantry/Mudroom/Master Closet/In-Law Closet/Laundry Room/Upstairs Hallway


For these utilities areas, we decided to go with a bright yet economical flush mount light from Lighting by Design. The Maxim Malibu is a popular choice with Charis homes. We chose it after seeing in the last Charis model. We bought five large four-bulb lights for the small rooms and closets. We bought three medium three-bulb lights for the hallway.

In Law Suite and "Paris" Bedrooms:
As we get to the end and the bills are coming in hand over fist, we decided to look for some bargains. We found two Casablanca Claremont 50" ceiling fans in Brushed Nickel at Tuesday Morning. They are nice basic fans with high reviews. They came with remotes and we got a great deal. I'll talk more about Tuesday Morning in a minute.

In-Law Bathroom:
We found the Urban four-light vanity light at Menards. There isn't a window in the in-law bathroom, so we wanted to make sure there was a lot of light.

Back Porch:

Our covered back porch will have two outdoor ceiling fans. Other than being usable outside, we just needed fans with light kits. We opted for the Allen + Roth Seagrass fan below because it was in stock and we liked the style better than the other options.

D's Bedroom:

Our three-year-old boy is all about planes, trains in automobile. We found this airplane blade set several months ago and quickly bought it.

We didn't realize we had to buy a specific fan until just recently. We thought he had buy a white fan, but in a happy surprise, we found out that Home Depot had the Hunter Ashlyn fan in brushed nickel.

D's Bathroom:

I discovered Tuesday Morning when I was staging our old house last year. I found lot of bargains on housewares and would browse there occasionally to get ideas for the new house and projects. Usually, I don't see the items on the upper shelves because I'm just not that tall. But, a few months ago, something caught my eye, and I realized that they often have larger housewares and appliances on the upper shelves. I found D's bathroom vanity there. A four- light silver vanity for $30. SOLD!

Powder Room:

In fact, I actually found two vanity fixtures that day. The other one only had three lights, so we decided that since D's bathroom doesn't have a window, he'd get the four light, and the well-lit powder room would get the three light vanity, which was only $20! 

Master Bedroom:
Niels picked out our ceiling fan at Whitmer's Lighting. It's a Craftmade 5th Avenue. We chose it because of its modern look. It doesn't have a lot of light, but we don't really need a lot of light in our bedroom, and Niels deserved to be able to pick one of the lights! (I like it, too!)

Master Bathroom:

We picked out our bathroom vanity lights on a rare date when my mom was visiting. Yep, we went to Whitmer lighting for our first year in a year. We love the ET2 collection and thought this vanity from the Bloc collection was really cool. We actually bought two of the two-light version since our bathroom has a ton of natural light. 

Whew! That's it! We also have a door bell and some lights on the stairs, but for the most part, these are all the lights in our finished level. We'll need to get something basic for our unfinished basement, but that's a decision for another day. 

Primed for Painting

We drove down to the house today so Niels could see the paint progress. There were a few people visiting with Todd, our GC, so it was fun to show them around and answer questions and explain why we've done what we have. Joe's cabinets were a big hit!

In the last two days, a lot of staining and clear coating got done.

The foyer niche bench:

Close up with the beautiful grain

Big pictures view

 Stair Hand Rail and Kitchen Trim:

In-Law Suite Vanity:

Pantry Door:

Mudroom Locker Shelves and Tub Surround Panels:

Stair Rail:

All that's left for staining is the mudroom lockers and in-law vanity drawers, which are currently at the carpenter's shop. Hopefully, they'll arrive on Monday to be done.

My mom reminded me that the most time-consuming part of painting is the prep work. So for the first few days, the crew did a lot of caulking, hole filling, smoothing, and taping. Then, they moved on to the trim. We went with Sherwin Williams Pure White for our trim. It's a nice bright white.

Pure white snow and Pure white sill.

Nice deep ICF sill under a nice warm Low-E window.

And now, the best part: COLOR! As part of our contract, we had an allowance for six Sherwin Colors, plus a trim color. In addition to the Pure White trim, we chose Oyster Bay (a grayish-green), Dovetail (a dark gray), Mindful Gray (a light gray), Sensuous Gray (a plumish gray), and for our son, Scanda (boyish blue) and Solaria (yellow). All of our paint is zero-VOC for clean, healthy air quality.

We ended the week on a high note, with the first room painted. Here's our son's Scanda blue bedroom with Solaria yellow closet. Our son just turned three. The nook to the right will be his super special secret hiding place, with a little help of a curtain and rod. When he's a bit older, we'll turn it into an indoor tree house, and when he's a lot older, it will be a desk area.

This is the view of his room from the closet looking out. 

By next weekend, most of the paint should be done, and possibly some of the porcelain tile and luxury vinyl tile (LVT). The flooring is ready for us at Northport Flooring America, but we want to make sure it isn't painted! Our appliances are also ready for us at MAS. Most of our fixtures have arrived, but we'll pick out the last choices this weekend. Joe Yoder will be back on the 19th (five days) to raise the command center desk a little bit and deliver the last of his trim work (the laundry cubbies, mudroom locker door, and baking center support).

We're at the point where everything is the last thing, so Todd has quite the dance card to arrange. He'll be working on a schedule soon. We're still hoping to be in by Valentine's Day. Our corporate housing apartment is pricey and we're getting antsy to be in our new home!

Getting Organized with Pinterest

It's a snowy day here in Ohio, so no trip to the new house this morning. And since Niels accidentally took our son's coat to work with him in his car, the boy and I are staying inside doing our projects. D is three and loves to do his projects, whether coloring, playing with letters, baking with me or anything that else that we can come up with together.

We get a lot of ideas from Pinterest, not only for things for the two of us to do together, but also for cooking, organizing, and of course, getting ideas for the new house. If you aren't familiar with Pinterest yet, think of it as a online filing cabinet or cork board to file or "pin" all the wonderful things you find on your favorite blogs and websites so you can find them again easily. In other words, is a collection of images on topics of interest to you with clickable links to the original source. Depending on how the original pinner described a pin, it can also include the price or other information.

Before Pinterest, if I saw something I liked on Houzz or Garden Web or any other site, I would download the picture to a folder on my computer. I might name the file to give a little detail, but I could never find the original photo again, or remember where an item was for sale, or find the original link or post. The brilliance of Pinterest is that you can put a little bookmark on the top of your browser so you can easily save any image you'd like, and Pinterest automatically remembers where you found it.

So, for example, if you were looking at ceiling fans online, you'd do your regular search. In this case, I'm at Lowes.com. If you find a fan you like and want to save it, you just click on the bookmarklet. It's a little  goofy with Chrome, but on Firefox and Explorer, the bookmarklet has the Pinterest logo.

Once you click on it, a pop up will come up that looks like this.

There's a gray box that comes up over each image if you hover over it that says, "Pin this." When you click on the gray box, another pop up comes up, like this:

This is where you use the drop down menu to determine which board you want the image to be saved in. I have board for each room of our house, for "culinary creations," for each person, etc. In this example, since we haven't made all of our lighting decisions (but really need to!), I have all the lights we're considering in one folder. After we make a purchase, I "repin" a duplicate copy into the corresponding room folder.

Under the drop down menu, you can describe the pin. In case of items we may purchase, I like to include the official name of the item, the price and where it can be found (even though the link will take me to the site. This way I can know without the additional click). Anytime you use a dollar sign, Pinterest will put a banner over the item with the amount so you can see it right away. Sometimes, if I'm on my game, I also include model numbers and the purpose for which I'm considering an item--which room it might go in, for example. 

You can share your pins on Facebook, if you want, but most people don't because Pinterest is highly addictive and that would be annoying to have a steady stream of pins on your friends' facebook feeds...especially if they aren't on Pinterest.  So you click the red Pin It button and it's saved.

You'll then get a fading pop up that confirms your pin to your specified board.

If you go to that board, you can see all of the images you have pins on that board at a glance. You used to be able to scroll through each image with your arrow key, but they did away with that for some reason on the last upgrade. Not a fan of that change. However, you can still click on any image from the gallery and see it enlarged.

Pinterest has been a great help as we've waded through all the selection decisions in building the house. Since I am at home all day with our son, I have more freedom to browse and research. Before Pinterest, I would send Niels a bunch of emails, or print of a lot of pages for him to go through when he came home. Now, we just look through the gallery together and can immediately spot trends to get a better idea of what we want. 

Pinterest is also a great resource if you're just getting started and don't know what site to search. Keeping with the ceiling fan theme, I can use the search function at the top of the main page and type in "Ceiling fan." A new gallery will come up with images that have been tagged with "ceiling fan" or use those terms in the description. 

From there, I can look at any image that catches my eye, and can access the original source. Other pinners can like and make comments, which can be helpful as you are making decisions as well.

Each pinner has a home page with all their boards. You can arrange these in any order you want. 

I've had several people ask me how to use Pinterest, and how I use it to organize our build (and home). It helped to think of the various categories for which I draw ideas. I have many, MANY boards (58) and the moment, but these are the ones that relate to building our dream house:

• Room by Room
• kitchen
• pantry
• dinette
• great room
• mudroom
• foyer
• office
• in-law suite
• master bedroom and bath
• D's room (our toddler son)
• guest room
• bathrooms
• laundry room
• command center
• exercise room
• basement
• landscaping ideas
• Selections
• fireplace
• lighting
• paint
• flooring 
• counters
• universal design
• General
• dream house. This was the original board for house things, that quickly got more precisely defined.  It still holds ideas and images that relate to the whole house, things that haven't re-ordered, and really cool ideas that we aren't doing but are fun to drool over
• home decor ideas. This is generally things that would be bought, not made.
• going green. Do it yourself cleaners and ideas to reduce, reuse and recycle
• projects, tips and organization. This board needs to be divided as well. Currently, it includes DIY projects for the home, simple solutions, unique uses for ordinary things and ideas for a clean and decluttered life.
• Uppercase Living. I'm a big fan of word art, so I created a place to put my ideas.
• Big Bad Lowes Buy
• Big Bad Ikea Trip

One of the reasons for Pinterest's popular is the ease and flexibility of use. In addition to looking at items on your board, you can also go back and look at everything you pinned in one gallery. Just in case, hypothetically speaking, you forgot where you pinned something, but you just KNOW that you did.

In you have a blog, it's kind of fun to see what things other people pin by doing a search of your blog name:

 

But I think the most popular way to use Pinterest is to just browse. Since you can follow friends you know (like Facebook newsfeeds) and people you don't, but who interest you (like Twitter), and see what they are pinning. You can follow specific boards or every board, so you can customize what you want to see. 

Pinterest is technically still in Beta, but it's easy to get an invite if you know someone who's on it (like me). There are still a few bugs, but it is an absolute godsend for keeping ideas organized for your house, planning meals, planning a wedding, dreaming up a wardrobe, or hairstyle, or travel, finding learning and play ideas for your kids, finding inspiration for your workouts, your goals, your life. In this down economy, Pinterest is a fantastic place to learn to do it yourself, make it yourself, or reuse it for something else. It's brilliant. I've pulled up my boards when talking to our GC and subs, when talking to vendors and store clerks, when explaining to friends and family what I'm looking for/hoping for/planning for. It's a brain injured girl's best friend. (Other than her hubby and son, of course!)

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