The Final Inspection

We passed! Holy crap. We can't believe it. He was here for less than 1/2 hr. We feared it so much and now it's over. What do we do now?! It's been five years since we took out our first permit. Oh, boy.

Uninvited Guest

The kitchen smelled a little last night, but I though it was just the two dirty dishes in the sink. This morning, I took the Cupcake out to get one of her many shots. When I returned with my traumatized child, I nearly threw up at the door. The smell was nothing short of extraordinary. It was really and truly the most rancid thing I have ever smelled in my life. It's the kind of smell that is so powerful that even while you are refraining from breathing, it still gets to you. It almost knocks you over. It goes down your throat and makes you want to vomit more than you can possibly imagine. I threw my bag down and took Cupcake upstairs.

I realized that Mikey had died the night before. Mikey was a mouse that we had trapped under the stove. He would visit me almost every night. He would stop in like clockwork to peruse the garbage can for dinner. He found his way in through the garage and then through one of the holes for the water lines into the cabinet. We haven't been able to sheet rock up that back side of the studio yet, so there are ways for a little fellow to find his way in. After we finally saw the little fellow make a run for it from the dish washer to the stove, we stuffed towels under the stove to block him in so that we could figure out how to lure him out in the light of day. Mikey didn't like that. We did have every intention of helping him find his way back out to the delightful streets of the Mission District in which we live. We thought we had time. Mikey was a plump little fellow, but he didn't have the stamina.

So, the ridiculous thing was that I found myself with my newborn baby upstairs not knowing quite what to do with myself. You see, the problem is that we're waiting until this coming weekend to actually start sleeping up there so that the polyurethane odor can completely disappear. It's almost all gone, but there's no reason to be exposing the Cupcake to these things if we don't have to. I don't mind her spending short periods of time up there, but sleeping up there is a different story. I found myself having to choose between the rancid studio downstairs with the non toxic mousey smells or the certainly toxic but not that disagreeable of a scent of the lingering polyurethane. Keep in mind that the Cupcake was also feeling a little cranky from her shot. Poor girl. So, we attempted to run errands, jogged back for naps upstairs and finally retired to the studio in the evening with the air filters going full blast and the door wide open. I think that the smell has improved, but I honestly don't really know. I've been back for several hours now, so who knows. I probably smell like a dead mouse. All that I could think each time that I would attempt to venture back into the studio to get various things during the day was, why did they go to the trouble of water-boarding people when they could just pipe in the smell of a pile of dead mice?

The Final Dump Run

Here are J & L last weekend after one of their final dump runs. The number of times that we've been to the dump is rather impressive. Luckily, this is a task that I did not have to participate in anymore once I got pregnant. Can't say that I missed it very much, but it is kind of a cool place. They even featured the SF dump on an episode of Dirty Jobs once. If you've never been, you should go some time to see where all of your garbage disappears to every week. The best time to go is right after Christmas when you can see the giant --and I mean GIANT-- mound of discarded Christmas trees. I digress. L has been with us a long time working on the house. All the way back to when we were endlessly digging in the studio to get rid of more and more dirt. He's helped us every step of the way and has never complained about any of the crazy things that we've asked him to do -- probably because J was right there working with him most of the time. But we are incredibly grateful to him for all of his help.

Do Not Touch Unit

Josh has this week off of work so he has been busy upstairs scampering around in the attic working on the low voltage wiring. Too tired to shower last night, he crawled into bed and fell right asleep. This morning he really wanted to take a shower, but I prevented him because the shower door people were due to arrive any moment and I figured, why create another lake in the middle of our new bathroom when we didn't have to? 

Well, five hours later they finally arrived and installed our doors. The good news is that the shower doors look even nicer than we expected. The bad news is that we can't use the shower for another 48 hours. Lordie. The above pic is how dirty my sweetie got today. Notice that his smile gets bigger the dirtier he gets. There wasn't even a remote option that he wasn't going to shower tonight. The layer of grease and grime on him was so thick that could have scraped it off. We went over to Jonathan and Arminda's to shower tonight. Believe me, this was no small act of generosity. Jonathan's offer to hose Josh off before getting into the shower wasn't such a bad idea. Now we are fresh and clean. Josh did get the clothing dryer installed yesterday which is extraordinary. I've done about twenty loads in the last 24 hours. So much freshness we can barely stand it. 

Counters and Backsplash!

The tiler installed the slab on the counter yesterday and the tile for the backsplash today. All the tile work is done! Yet again, I am surprised about how different tile looks after the grout is added. Luckily, for the better. 

The plumber is coming tomorrow to put in the faucet, dishwasher and sink in the bathroom. 

Meanwhile, we FINALLY got that pesky beam approved by the city which means we can finally finish the sheetrock and painting in the bedroom area of the studio. Cesar was back at work finishing that area today. He just needs to finish that back there as well as the baseboard trim and then paint. And we need to install the appliances. But that's it! 

We really are moving back to the studio this Saturday. It's crazy how much we've accomplished in the last six weeks. 

We've lined up Pat's roofer to do the kitchen area on Friday. We'll install the skylight in the kitchen on Saturday. We will schedule the framing inspection for early next week and then it is full speed ahead. The framing inspection is the only real hurdle ahead. 

We have three sheetrockers coming out to give us estimates for the upstairs this week. 

Today, Elder and I tried to figure out exactly how high the towel bars and toilet paper holders are supposed to be. This pregnant lady was trying to squat in the bathroom area to determine the optimal height. We'll see how that measurement turns out! 

Overdrive

There are no pickups at the house today. I don't like that. I've concocted a new plan of attack that will have everything finished by August 14th. That gives us the 15th to move the bed and crib upstairs. And cupcake will arrive on the 16th. Let's hope she gives us an extra week. That would be nice. 

Current update:

Studio - 

- The kitchen counters and backsplash are going in tomorrow.

- The finishing for the electrical work downstairs is done. That means the trim on the cans, the light switches, light fixtures, under counter lights etc. Much nicer. 

- Toilet has been installed. Hoorah! Shower head and trim installed.

- The plumber will come later in the week to finish the kitchen area and we will install all the appliances.

- The closet doors and bathroom door have been installed.

- The only thing we're really holding our breath on is getting this stupid beam signed off by the city. As soon as that's finished, we can seal up the bedroom and then finish the trim work back there and then paint all the trim.

Either way, we are moving back into the studio this weekend. 

Upstairs-

- The framing is done enough to get it inspected. 

- Half of the new windows are in. Gorgeous. 

- The rough plumbing upstairs is done.

- In order to get the framing inspection done we need to get a roofer out to finish some stuff up above that f'd up area in the kitchen. We can no longer see into our grumpy neighbor's house. Thank God. 

If all goes as planned, electrical will start next week. Please let it start next week. Getting sheetrocking/taping estimates right now. I am ready to rock. 

Today, I am driving out to Hayward to meet with our magical appliance guy today. He has a 3.5 year old Wolf for me with minor damage at an amazing price. Fingers are crossed that she's operational. I am optimistic. 

Now that the framing is completely done, I can order the cabinets for the upstairs kitchen and the tile for the two bathrooms since that will take about 4-6 weeks. Plan to wrap that up in the next day or two. Vavoooooom!

Studio Cabinetry

Molding Moulding?

I went to Beronio last week to look at moldings for the upstairs. Beronio is like a wood superstore. Molding is yet another thing that I didn't realize that you have to have all picked out even at the framing stage to make sure that you leave enough room for the casings on the doors, the lights switches, plugs, etc. Or if you want to do crown molding or picture frame molding then you need to do additional framing to hold them. Who knew? I certainly didn't.

I took the remnants of the picture frame molding and baseboard that we had salvaged from the original house over to Beronio. Only one room in our house still had original trim and they were in really bad condition, so they had to go. I didn't expect to find the exact replicas, but wanted them along for inspiration in an attempt to keep with the original spirit of the house. I nosed around a bit myself for awhile and couldn't find anything close and was on my way out the door when this crazy guy stopped me and offered to help. His help involved telling me about 10 times how ugly he thought that the original plaster picture frame moldings and wooden baseboards were and that I was basically crazy to try and even get close to imitating them. Instead, he showed me a few other stock items that they had. I finally managed to wrangle myself away from him after about ten minutes feeling rather defeated about my little moldings. 

The next day, I went to Victoriana which is this amazing mill tucked under a freeway overpass perfectly located en route from our temporary housing at Cristina's to our house. They only make moldings and I sighed a big gulp of relief when I walked in and immediately spotted 15 plaster picture frame moldings somewhat resembling ours. I brought my salvaged pieces to the counter and the employees all came over to admire them and tell me how beautiful they were. I knew I was in the right spot. I found some moldings for our downstairs studio which are in the pic above. It's a little more modern and less ornate since the studio isn't exactly original. The upstairs will have a nice deep baseboard moulding for the 10'6" ceilings and more ornate casings for the doors. It's the plaster ceiling medallions that I'm most excited about though. 

A Painted Studio

Here is the little studio all fresh and painted. They finished putting in the floors now and the cabinets go in tomorrow! I am very pleased with the flooring. It's a tasty floating floor. No, that's not the new flooring in the pic. That's the concrete. Be patient, my sweets. 

I am starting to feel really pregnant again now meaning that my fatigue has come back. It's very annoying. I'm just glad that I channeled my second trimester energy while I could, but it is brutal to fight the fatigue with all that needs to be done. I'm hoping we will be able to move back into the studio in about 1.5 weeks which should make things a little easier. 

76 days 'till the cupcake arrives, but who's counting?

Framing

I know I promised more demo shots, but this is what I got for ya for now. It's the view from the front door looking in. Pretty crazy, huh? The amazing framing team is making incredible progress. Luckily, they still can't get back to their other job site, so we've been lucky enough to have them for the last three days. They moved through the original portion of the house pretty quickly. Where we've run into more difficulty is in the horrendous add-ons that were done of the years. The lack of an exterior wall in the kitchen is one, the sloping floor being another and then in the bedroom we discovered that when they added on a portion, they neglected to make the floor level with the rest of the room. It's about an inch lower, so they're dealing with that. They're also adding in a lot more supportive beams. These framing guys are incredible. Pat has some for foresight about everything. He knows to build a door opening two inches over to make sure that you can get a full casing on either side when you go to do the molding later. Every little possible detail he can think of, he does.

Cesar is almost done prepping the downstairs to paint. I'm hoping he can prime the whole studio tomorrow. The tile guys finished laying all the tile yesterday and will be back tomorrow to grout. 

We just have to deal with the city now in getting a few final sign-offs for some structural things downstairs. Some things that a contractor who was working for us briefly 1.5 years ago now managed to f up. We'll get it all sorted out, I'm sure. Just another hurdle for now. 

Pregnant Lady with Power Tools - 25 weeks

Living Room Ideas

Joelle sent me this. I don't know where she got it, but I love the colors. Can't stop looking at it.

T is finally back today. I'm understanding why he said it would be a week before we could paint now. J's work has finally slowed down a little bitty bit, so he is downstairs working on stuff too. We will move all the kitchen cabinets from the garage today into the studio to make room for our upstairs furniture. I am busy packing. The packing just goes on and on!

We're finally ready to make a decision on the flooring and paint for downstairs. We will likely use a floating floor downstairs so that we don't have to put a 3/4" piece of plywood underneath. Every centimeter matters down there with those low ceilings. I'm having a really hard time deciding on the floors and paint though. Ideas to come.

Nailing Inspection

We passed our sheetrock nailing inspection yesterday! In case you're wondering, the green walls are greenboard which is what you put in areas like a shower or laundry area. The boys have taken the last two days off and are coming in tomorrow to start the puddy and taping. The tiler comes on Monday to build the shower pan. Giddyup.

Non-VOC Paints and Varnishes

We are debating yet again about whether to paint the walls and varnish the floors before moving down into the studio. My hesitation is that it will take several more weeks and also that I will want to delay things even longer because of any potential fumes. I have heard good things about Yolo Colorhouse for paints and safecoat for varnish. I'm looking for products that are the safest (especially for a pregnant lady), will minimize the time we have to wait to move in and offer the nicest selection of colors. Does anyone have any good resources for this? Also, how long does a pregnant lady have to wait before moving into a freshly painted room with non-VOC paint?

Reno Update: After opting not to show on Friday, T made some good progress Saturday on the sheetrock and is at work again today. He has almost everything done except for the bathroom. J is busy moving the ceiling fan in the bathroom. We will be disconnecting the gas line to the stove today. I need to look for a microwave that will fit downstairs and hook up the camping stove. No joke.

Saying "No" to Blowtorching at 1AM

The sheetrocking is comin' along. The boys have made good progress on the ceiling. We are calling today to see if we can schedule the nailing inspection for Tuesday. My fantasy is to have it taped and sanded by the end of next week.

In order to completely finish the sheetrocking, two pipes need to be capped off and the gas line currently feeding the upstairs dryer needs to be capped off. It currently is also feeding the upstairs stove. I can live without a washer and dryer, but I need a stove. So, my superman, J, finally agreed to call the plumber and have him come out for a few hours this week to take care of these things. He's quite capable of doing these things himself, but challenging because he has been getting home from work at midnight. So, this would mean that he would be downstairs blowtorching past midnight. Me no likey. Our lovely plumber has promised to come out by tomorrow at the latest to take care of it for us. Thank God. It was a big deal for my superman to agree to this. I'm very proud of him.

Slow and Steady

A little bit of progress was made on the sheetrock today. I found myself frustrated by the rate of progress this morning so I tried to stay away from the house so as not to vent my frustration. Let's just say I have my teams ready for every last step of this operation as soon as this sheetrock is taped, sanded and smoothed. I am a little fearful about how long that part of the process is going to take. It's a tiny little studio. It really shouldn't take more than a few days. We shall see, won't we?

The slow progress downstairs has already made me decide that we will move down there without painting, doing the floors or any of the other finishing work. We'll just finish the bathroom and kitchen and move down. We have to make the main house a priority. When we move back upstairs, we can finish the downstairs.

And yes, it is totally bizarre that they come and inspect the nailed sheetrock before you tape and sand it. I think it's all about making sure it's done properly for fire-proofing reasons.

On a brighter note, I went back to Young's Custom Cabinets today and made more progress. We discussed all of the cabinetry in greater detail today. She was still unable to come up with prices on the spot, so I decided to make a list for her and see what she would come up with on her own. I remain hopeful. I am also unclear as to how they possibly sell enough cabinets to stay in business. As I entered Young's today, the smell reminded me of the fabric cutting warehouse that I used to use when I did Kept. It must be the rice cooker. I was not able to verify this assumption, but why else would a cabinet factory and a fabric cutter's warehouse smell the same?

Dangling Roofers

Our neighbors decided to redo their roof yesterday. The trickiest part is that decorative bit at the very front. The crazy thing is that one of those guys that you see up there had hopped over to the front where he had about 2 feet to squeeze his body in order to grab at the roof. It was crazy to watch. Kind of of one of those trainwreck moments. No harness. No nothing. Nothing but certain death if you fell. Anyhoo, all went well and the new roof is coming along swimmingly.

Some progress on the sheetrock yesterday. He estimates that it will be done by Wednesday and then we can schedule the nailing inspection. We are afraid to schedule the inspection before he's done because his timing is usually a little off (read: slow). Our tile guy is lined up and ready for action as soon as the rock is. Then we will really see this place start to come to life!

Josh added another electrical outlet to the area where the dryer will be that we didn't realize we'd need because we were hoping for a gas dryer. But Bosch doesn't make the Axxis series in gas anymore for some reason.

Mini Stackables

I've been stalking Craigslist for this Bosch Axxis stackable washer and dryer set. I finally threw in the towel this morning and we ordered them from Lowe's. It was going to further delay things downstairs not to be able to install them, so we had to bite the bullet and move ahead. Currently, the washer and dryer for upstairs have a gas line and water pipe that are running through the studio that we have to disconnect in order to finish down there. This is the only model that will fit in the closet downstairs at only 24" wide and 24" deep. They're pretty sexy. I hope our future tenant appreciates them!

Sheetrock

We are making slow but steady progress on the sheetrock. There has been so much in the news about that horrible Chinese sheetrock that was giving everyone respiratory problems and destroying their plumbing and electrical. Of course, this is something that we don't want to experience -- especially with the bambina cooking in my belly. I've had a really difficult time finding out which brands of sheetrock are OK. In the end, we're going with USG which is supposedly all made in the US. It's great that the news likes to report on all this stuff, but how about a little more information on what's safe?!

Insulate This

We passed both our insulation inspection and our HVAC/heating inspection yesterday. This means we are green-lighted to start sheetrocking. Woo hoo! I thought this day would never come. The studio is about to become completely transformed, my sweets. Our general inspector also informed us yesterday that he'd been layed off. Too bad. We'll see what this means in terms of turn-around time for future inspections.