Gallery Goals

My name is Jen and I am a gallery-aholic.

With two weeks until our exchange student arrives and adjust to be a mom to both a pre-schooler AND a high schooler, I'm on a mission to get (most of) our gallery walls completed.

Up until now, I've been waiting for new family photos to be done. Niels arranged for us to have them done by Andrew Glenn Photography and we are so pleased with how they turned out. This photo will be blown up to 24" x 36" and hung above our fireplace.

The frame (which I found at Goodwill for $9!) fits inside the grid:

The next priority was our anniversary wall, which I went up this week.

Last night, Niels and I put up the little gallery under the stairs (post to come):

I really like how these two galleries look together.

The gallery we're currently working on is the big great room gallery. So far, we've decided on a layout:

The big job for this one is deciding on photos. The four 8x10s in the center will have our parents' wedding photos, a photo of us from the recent shoot, and a photo of D from the shoot. The theme will be favorite photos.

The next galleries after that are the "guest gallery" in the in-law suite and the "family" gallery along our upstairs hallway.

The guest gallery will have photos of everyone who has stayed in our guest suite...so far! We have some vinyl art to put on the wall as well, that reads, "Good company is always welcome. I think we will use Ikea Ribba shelves for this gallery.

The family gallery right outside D's door will feature photos of all our family around the world.

Still in the brainstorming stage are the following galleries.

The foyer hallway will have photos from our build, and maybe a big blueprint.

We'll have an inspiration gallery in the in-law bathroom. There's a big blank wall there to allow for wheelchair accessibility so we need flat decor there.

In Niels' office, we'll display large black and white photos.

In our bedroom, we'll have 2 large photos and our marriage motto (no returns, no exchanges) in vinyl. I'm also considering a "our story" gallery using Ribba photo shelves.

After our next Ikea run, I'll finish D's book nook with cute blue and red framed photos of family members.

The idea is to have frames like this for all the grands, aunts, uncles, and cousins, plus a big family photo above his name.

Lastly--I think!--is a good clean fun gallery along the big blank wall in the laundry room.

I found a vinyl I like--I really NEED a Silhouette!--and will include photos like this one:

I don't think I'll be done in three weeks!

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Aging in Place

I came across a very helpful article on Houzz this morning about designing a home to age-in-place. Aging in place is a design term that means planning your home for your long-term live-in needs. This means thinking through potential challenges with mobility, vision, flexibility, etc. as you get older.

Using the article and comments as a guide, I'll show how we have planned for aging in place.

1. Make your home "visitable."
The purpose of universal design principles is to make your home both visitable and livable for a many people as possible, regardless of any limitations they may have. For example, stairs can make entry impossible for those in a wheelchair, and difficult for those with knees issues. A good goal is to have zero-barrier entry (no steps). This wasn't possible with our home, so we compromised with a gently sloped walkway that's easier on the joints.

 

And we had our carpenter built us these ramps for the two short steps we have, which make a zero barrier entry into our home.

The other big consideration we made was adding a first floor master with an en suite. Our room is a second master upstairs, near our toddler, but the in-law suite is available for guests of all abilities. As we age, if needed, we can easily move downstairs. Also, in case of injury, any member of our family can temporarily stay downstairs and have access to everything they need. In addition to the in-law bathroom, there is also a small powder room on the first floor.

2. Make Your Stairs Safe
Whether your joints are stiff, your vision is dim, or you live with vertigo, like I do, interior stairs can be a hazard. Wood stained stairs are beautiful, but they are too slippery for me to risk. (And I need the sound-proofing of carpet to keep my headaches in check). In fact, in our last house, our Shih Tzu refused to descend our wood stairs until we put treads on them!

In our new house, we chose to carpet the steps (which should be done in the next week or so!). As a cost savings, we are carpeting the whole stair, but we hope to use a well-secured runner when the carpet eventually needs to be replaced.

We are also putting lights into the stairway to help with visibility.

Here are a couple of other lighted stairways...that are finished for better visualization. Ours will look more like the first photo. The second photo shows LED lights, which are pretty cool.

Of course, it goes without saying  that a handrail (or two!) is a must. We will have handrails on both sides. Ours won't be as pretty as these, which are a great example of how aging in place can be beautiful.

3. Plan for Future Years.
It used to be that a ranch home was the only option if you wanted to age in place. But now, in addition to building homes with dual masters, like we are doing, home builders are putting in residential elevators. It's much easier on the pocketbook to put in an elevator during construction that retrofitting later.

Even if you don't have the funds put in the elevator, it's a good idea to plan the space for the future if your choices come down to retrofitting or moving into an assisted living center. In our case, we designed a large pantry (9' x 9'10") right under a good size laundry room. If we need an elevator in the future, we can use these spaces for an elevator shaft. Of course, putting the first floor suite should save us from needing an elevator, but it's nice to know we have the space if we happened to need it.

4. Reduce trip hazards.
Part of living with a brain injury, for me, means living with a great risk of falling due to vertigo issues, vision issues, and just plain brain fatigue. This means that we planned our floors and floor plan to reduce any uneven surfaces that would pose a trip hazard.

Thresholds between rooms are a common place for trip hazards.

This really came into play when we planned our flooring. In a budget-free world, we would have used cork throughout the house. It's quiet, soft, sound-proofing, earth-friendly and beautiful. However, it's also a pricey flooring option, so for now, it's going in our kitchen, dinette and pantry. We tried to save money with luxury vinyl tile in the mudroom and in-law suite, but we would have had too much of a height difference in our thresholds between rooms, thus causing a trip hazard. Instead, we put tile in the mudroom (and foyer and powder room), and carpet in the in-law suite (and great room and office), so the floor is level throughout the main level.

In addition to being a trip hazard, uneven transitions pose a challenge for those in wheelchairs.

Cords can also pose trip hazards, as can rugs. The solution for us is to have great overhead lighting, natural lighting, and only use lamps where they can be plugged in close to a wall outlet.

This cord should be under the floor mat.

In the 80s, when I was growing up, sunken living rooms were all the rage. Since trends seem to return every few decades, it's worth noting that this trend is not a very good one for universal design. These are a major trip hazard and mobility challenge!

5. Say No to Knobs (and Switches).  My mom has arthritis, so when we first started designing our house, she made the request that we avoid knobs on the doors and hardware because levers and pulls are much easier to use. We also opted for rockers on our lights instead of switches for the same reason. As you make your selections, make a fist with your hands to test the ease of use of your choice.

Levers instead of knobs for doors.

Pulls instead of knobs on hardware. 

Rockers instead of switches.

Levers instead of knobs on faucets.

6. Consider accessible seating and access in the kitchen. As kitchens are returning to prominence as the center of the home, make sure that the seating you provide is easy for anyone to use. Consider a variety of heights for tall and short users, as well as wide aisles for wheelchair accessibility.

In our new home, we have (at least) 40" aisles in the kitchen and 36" doorways.

Wide aisles

36" wide pantry door

We have stools at bar height in our entertainment counter, but our kitchen is partly open to our dinette, which has table height chairs. Also, the baking center and the kitchen command center are both open underneath to accommodate wheelchairs.

Inspiration for my baking center.

Kitchen command center in progress.

Consider use and access in kitchen design, as well. Think about reaching what you need from a seated position.

Raised dishwashers are easier to access from a wheelchair, and also easier on aging backs.

A modern alternative to the raised dishwasher is the dishwasher drawer, which is especially nice for smaller families or empty nesters.

Drawers provide easy access to dishes, glasses and other kitchenware for older and younger users, as well as those in wheel chairs.

7. Offer Independence in the Bathroom.
In addition to the kitchen, the bathroom can cause the most inconvenience for accessibility. In addition to the things mentioned above, a bathroom needs to be designed with room for a wheelchair to maneuver and easy access to the shower.

This diagram shows an example of the radius needed for a wheelchair to maneuver comfortably (and independently) in a bathroom.

 If you know that a family or frequent guest is in a wheelchair, a wheel-in entry to the shower is best.

Our in-law suite was laid out with room for a chair, but we opted for this tub instead of the wheel-in.

For the needs of our family in particular, it's less likely that I'll need a chair, but I have some balance issues. This shower has a moveable seat that allows me to sit down as I shower.

We are also designing our vanity that's open under the sink, like this, to allow a wheelchair under it.

An easy aid to incorporating grab bars into fixtures like the toilet paper holder and towel holder. We are using these fixtures from the Moen Home Care collection.

Building a home to age in place is a lot like going green or being energy-efficient: it's a process. There's always more you can do, but whatever little thing you do do is better than nothing. One commenter in the inspiration article from Houzz used the term "invisible accessibility." That our goal, to create a beautiful modern home that subtly and fully meets the needs of all our family and friends.

Color Selection

This is a bit of slow season in our build as the electrical/plumbing/HVAC finishes up. There's been a little bit of insulation blown in and then we're see the drywall going up. At the point, our house will really start to look like a home.

We've handed off our flooring selections, and the folks from Charis will do a little research so see if we can get the costs in line with our allowance. 

The other big batch of decisions we made this week was selecting the colors for our soon-to-be walls. Sue, from Charis, came over with her big book of Sherwin Williams color swatches and we got to work. Our allowance is for six colors, though we could always pay more for additional colors if we wanted them. Our current house has five colors (mostly one outside the bedrooms), so we figured six was plenty.

In our current house, our base color is what I call "chocolate milkshake." When we put in on almost 5 years ago, it really reminded me of a Wendy's Frosty. But as we've been looking at models and watching HGTV, we've been won over by gray as the new neutral. It works with our modern bent and our steel appliances and fixtures, so we think it will look nice. 

Thanks to the Sherwin Williams Color Visualizer, we're able to get a large scale sense of how the colors will look.

We'll use the darker gray as the base on the first floor for the kitchen, great room, dinette (maybe, see below), foyer, mudroom, office and maybe in-law bath (if we don't go with the room color). We'll  use the lighter gray upstairs in the guest bedroom, hallway and our bath, with a transitional treatment using both hues on the stairway. 

SW Classic French Gray

SW Light French Gray

The next decision was the in-law suite. We knew that it would be the same (or Sherwin Williams equivalent) or our current master bedroom colors, which is sage green and chocolate. I was happy to keep those colors (since we have all the accent decor) for our new master until my awesome hubby said we could use plum: my most favorite color! So here's the color for the in-law suite (and laundry room)

SW Dried Thyme

So, our room will be this pretty plum color! Our wedding colors were platinum and plum, so of course, I love that subtle reminder in our bedroom. What can I say, my husband is the greatest!

SW Expressive Plum

Just for giggles, I did this rendering for the dining room. It looks a lot richer/deeper than the rendering of our bedroom. Interesting. Our dinette will be very bright because it has windows on all three sides (and open on the fourth), so I think we could play with a darker color if we wanted to be crazy with it.

SW Expressive Plum

Our 2.5-year-old son's favorite color, for quite some time has been yellow. When we asked him what color he wanted his new room to be, he has quite consistently requested yellow. However, yellow is not really the calm nap/deep sleeping-inducing color we have in mind, so we're sticking with blue like he has in his nursery, but more of a "big boy blue. We saw this particular color in another Charis home and we feel in love with it.

SW Bracing Blue

So that leaves one last color. We had to decide between the vibrant orange Dutch bathroom I put off in our current house because we needed to be neutral or yellow for our amber-obsessed son. After looking at pictures of my Dutch decor, we decided that the yellow would work, so this is the yellow for our powder room and D's bath. The power room will have orange tulips for accents, and D's room will have blue accents.

SW Bee's Wax.

We made all these selections in our home, at night, under warm lights. Sue, our interior designer, is ordering larger samples that we'll bring to the new house to view with natural light. If needed we can adjust the tones.

I can't wait to see it all come together!