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.

Build - Day 42 - August 24, 2011

We're baaaacccckkk! ;-) Not a lot of visual progress this week. The crews have been busy on the inside of the house and the plumbing and HVAC lines are mostly done. The biggest visual impacts are in the basement, bathrooms and attic space.

The other things happening are outside of the new house and relate to flooring choices. We've settled on our tile (Emser Strands for floor tile, Solistone Carrellton for the kitchen backsplash) and know we will be doing cork in our kitchen and dinette. We're not sure yet on the type of carpet but are leaning towards either EverStrand (Mohawk) / Green Smart (Bliss) fibers which are both made out of recycled PET bottles or the SmartStrand (Mohawk) that is made from corn in a methane-powered factory which a near unbeatable stain resistance.

The other item that rocked our world this week was the 5.9 earthquake in Virginia. That is about 8 hours from here but was strong enough to give you some weary sea legs similar to your first voyage at sea. I wish we would be in our new house which is basically earthquake proof with 6.25" of concrete for all exterior walls from the basement to the attic. To be honest, the 5.9 quake was the largest in 150 years but it is still nice to know that mother nature would need to bring her A-game.

Also, when looking at our toilets our GC realized that in one of the bathrooms our toilet was directly over a floor support. This would have mend a switch to a single-flush so we're switching the vanity and toilet location so we can keep our dual-flush toilets.

On the back patio we've added two gas lines; one for the grill and one for some overhead terrace heaters you'd normally see at restaurant patios. This will extend the usability time of our back patio far into the fall and winter. We're looking forward to a nice grilling session outside watching the snow fall outside from our heated patio.

Alright, off to load some pictures so y'all can see the progress too... and here they are:

Electrical boxes for switches and outlets. We're using the rocker style switches instead  of the regular switches.

Plumbing for the main-level laundry.

The product box...

The product used (with insulation surrounding it)

2nd story laundry room plumbing

Basement plumbing (left side is the rough-in for a future planned bathroom)

Return-air roster

The flooring choices: espresso shaker cabinets, white quartz counters, kitchen back splash, Emser floor tile, cork sample and carpet sample all in our colors. We think it looks pretty good... ;-)

The Toto Package

We're really getting into the nuts and bolts of selections now, so here I am doing a post about toilets.

To start, we knew that the green choice was to go with WaterSense toilets. Much like EnergyStar, WaterSense is a program that designates green home products. In order to be labeled as a WaterSense fixture, the item has to be certified to be at least 20 percent more efficient without sacrificing performance. 

Toilets today do use a lot less water than the toilets of decades past, but with dual flush toilets, a user can conserve even more water by selecting the amount of water needed per flush. My first experience with dual flush toilet was at my in-laws house in the Netherlands, where I saw something like this when I looked for the lever:

Dual flush wall buttons

I quickly learned that the little button was for liquid waste and the big button was for solid waste. Pretty easy to remember! Obviously, more water is used for solid waste removal.

Dual flush toilets are not common yet in the States, though we do believe they will be in the coming years. We choose to install Toto Aquia toilets.

Toto's Aquia line

For most of the bathrooms, we'll install the Toto Aquia CST416M, which is standard height.

In the in-law suite, we'll install the similar Toto Aquia CST412MF, which is ADA compliant as it is a little taller.

Here's a fun little fact about Toto toilets: they don't come with seats...

Just compare the Amazon picture below to the Toto product picture on the left. Good to know, eh? So, make sure you order them or it'll make for an interesting sitting experience... ;-)