Moving In! (Just Kidding)

Flood o' Photos!

My parents were nice enough to lend us their saw and brad nailer today. I also drove into Totem this morning to get all of the tile for the back entrance. I'm glad we have a truck! We then worked on cleaning up the garage and putting down tile.

Our appliances came on the 15th and we got a couple of them set up. Beck also laid the last of the tile in the kid's bathroom.

You can also check out our bi-fold closet doors. My mom came out last week and helped us paint trim and doors. Thanks Mom!

I'm also aware that this post is disjointed and possibly the worst thing I've ever written. Meh.

Grout

More.

Sorry.

Sorry it took me a week to post these! Here are the pantries for the kitchen. Ikea was out of the drawer fronts for the bottom. I'd wish for an Ikea to go up in Lethbridge but I know we'd just get a useless downscaled one like our Home Depot. Another thing that is infuriating me about Home Depot Canada is that for some reason we're expected to pay up to twice the amount for the same merchandise that our cousins do to the south. Try as I might, I can't seem to figure out the justification for this. I guess HD Canada just thinks it's OK to rip us off.

Examples:

1 Roll of Schluter Matting Great Falls - $80 Calgary -  $150

1 Ridgid Vacuum Great Falls - $99 Lethbridge -  $150

1 Ridgid Table Saw Great Falls - $450 Lethbridge - $550

Stainless Range Hood Great Falls - $340 Lethbridge $3200!

Also Beck has laid down the heat mats and some of the main bathroom and kitchen tile. I'll try to get some pics today. Appliances are coming on the 15th. 

I'm throwing in a picture of the Sweetgrass hills from Writing-On-Stone park 'cause all the photos I take from our deck don't really do them justice.

And yes… our cupboards will have toekicks–they snap on to those ugly-looking black legs you see under the cabinets.

Kitchen Cupboards, Flooring, and Some Cheeseball Garage Doors!

Well, Beck got a bunch more done on the kitchen cupboards and I like how they are looking. They even have a soft-closing piston action on the drawers and doors.

You can also see the travertine that we're using for the kitchen floor. We had to wipe it down and seal it so that the grout doesn't stain it.

I put the fake hinges on the garage doors today and I have to say I'm not all that impressed with the overall look. What I had originally envisioned was wood doors that looked like barn or carriage doors. Well, wood doors are a pain to maintain and I wanted something that was insulated so that narrowed things down quite a bit. Another thing I've learned while building this house is that just because you see something in the US (pop. 300 million) doesn't mean it's available in Canada (population 30 million). Also, we wanted something that matched our trim and so that narrowed things down even more. I didn't want to have to special order and pay a million dollars for doors so we went with what our local supplier had. Then in the supplier's brochure the panels actually look like there a vertical pieces of wood running through them whereas if you look at the final door it doesn't look like that at all.

To me it's kind of like the difference between solid wood mouldings and those plastic, vinyl-wrapped moudlings they used to put in mobile homes in the 80s.

That's my rant; thanks for reading.

Cabinets and Flooring

We got the subfloor (?) laid down for the tile in our kitchen this weekend. Also, we set up some more of our cabinets. We still have to go back up to Ikea® to get the rest of our kitchen. Charlton and Hill came out last week and installed our wood stove so we tried it out on Saturday. I've also included a picture of Becky and Cobalt.

Hardwood Floor

We bought this hardwood at an auction almost a year ago and we finally got to see what it looks like. Chad Lister who is Becky's niece's fiancé came and put down the wood for us today. He also laid down the tile for the fireplace. I'm so glad we were able to have a pro come and do this for us. He did a great job and we are really happy with it.

Dormers Complete

Reba was working on finishing the dormers while I worked on some domestic chores inside. We also put the steel around the garage doors.

We are tired.

Painting Finished and Dormers Started

I put the last coat of paint on the stairways and that is pretty much it for paint. We still have to paint the ensuite bathroom. We want to choose the tile before the paint colour.

If you like the stairway and LR colours let us know because we still have two gallons of it left!

We are in the process choosing all of our tile and it is quite overwhelming. If anyone has any ideas, please comment. My niece Tiff's fiancé has generously agreed to come down and do the tile and hardwood. Sweet!

Becky is working on the dormers so you can kind of get an idea of what they'll look like when they're finished. I'm more happy with their fake vinyl-ness trying to look like cedar than I thought I would be.

Electricians and plumbers are returning next week as well.

Labour Day Weekend

You may be "labouring" under the misconception that we haven't been doing any work on the house. However, nothing could be further from the truth!

We had our garage doors and openers installed.

We've also finished most of the painting throughout the house. We are using Home Depot's Behr® paints and are very happy with the results. Reba has also started installing the kitchen cabinets that we got from Ikea®. Any ideas for the countertops? We have to get going on that. The cabinets' exterior is the colour of the corner shelf you see in the picture.

We also spent a bunch of the day yesterday installing the siding above the garage. It worked out well b/c its been raining all day today.

The siding that we're using for the dormers arrived on Friday as well.

Becky also informs me that she has been installing light fixtures, switches and plug-ins. I hit my head on the chandelier in the kitchen again today. Ouch!

Cobalt (the cat) continues to be hale and hearty as well despite the ongoing presence of hawks in the area.

Helpers!

Yesterday was great because we had some helpers show up unexpectedly! My sisters-in-law Kathleen and Carolyn came to help us paint. We also had some much-appreciated help from my niece Brandi and her friend from Raymond. Kath and Carolyn didn't want their pictures on the blog but I think this one turned out well. We drank pop and ate pizza from Dine-O's when it was all over. Also we ordered up Kath a new computer from the Apple® store.

Painting

Fun with Paint (or Taking Five Years Off of Your Life!)

The knock down got finished as you can see in the picture of the kitchen (the room with the round hole in the wall). In the upstairs we also sprayed a whole bunch of money out through a paint sprayer. I breathed in a whole lot of paint (good thing it was latex!). My parents are coming over today to help put on the colours.