Completed Backsplash

Saturday was a very eventful day for us.  I spent the evening grouting the kitchen backsplash while Travis was working. 

 When Travis got home, he installed the pot filler!

 The pot filler works great and I feel so spoiled.  I decided that it is going to add to my laziness - now when I want to fill my water glass, why should I have to walk all the way to the fridge or sink when I can fill it above the stove?

 After I finished grouting the kitchen, I decided that I may as well do the tile on the mirror in the Jack & Jill bathroom - not because I was having so much fun grouting, but more because I knew if I didn't do it right then, I would never finish it.  I forgot how much of a pain it was to grout and I was even sore the next day!  For this whole last week, even when I wasn't actually tiling, I was dreaming about it, so I am sure glad I am done with tiling for awhile!

 Also on Saturday morning before Travis left for work, we brought down the sand for the back patio and were getting it leveled out for the pavers.  It still needs a bit of work to make it slope away from the house, but we hope to make some progress on it before we leave for vacation.  We were going to work on it today, but we were exhausted from all the work yesterday, and it was rainy.

 We got two different sizes of pavers.  The bigger size is leaned against the box in the picture below.

Backsplash Accent Tile

After work on Monday, Travis and I worked on the accent piece for the kitchen backsplash.  We spent some time trying to figure out how many pieces of black granite to put in and then tiled away until 8:30 pm.  I feel like we are back in the full swing of building a house with eating our dinners so late again and having progress to post every night.  After we moved in and relaxed for a little while, I thought back and couldn't imagine how we didn't feel completely exhausted from working after work each day and on weekends, but as we get back in the swing of things, it is amazing how fast our bodies can adjust.  Now that I have said that, I hope my motivation doesn't magically disappear!  So, here's the progress for tonight 

We just have a little more to tile around the stove.  All that's left is the area above the cabinets to below the hood.

As promised, the pavers were also delivered this morning (3 pallets worth), so we aren't running out of stuff to do anytime soon.

Weekend Warriors

It seems after I post something, I always remember something else we did.  So we are still doing some little projects around the house.  When Travis had gotten the master shower all ready, he also put hooks and shelving in the "mud room".  Now, he doesn't have the excuse for not finding his keys, wallet, coat, etc. as long as he puts them away as soon as he walks in the door...Amazing how this little touch makes the house feel so much more finished when you walk in from the garage!

 He also surprised me this week by hanging shelving in our master bathroom (and cleaned too!).

 Another nice touch he did this week was adding the toilet paper holder in our master bathroom - like I said, lots of small projects are still getting done

 This weekend was a big weekend for us.  It was our last weekend off together before our vacation, so we thought we better get some work done on some bigger projects too.  Trav and his dad spent another full day rocking the outside of the house.  Trav's dad made a lot of progress and got to the bottom of the window on garage wall.

 Travis got all the way to the top on the inside of the arch.  I wasn't out there to witness, but I can only imagine how hard it was to do those cuts along the curve.  Again, the pictures weren't very good because it was getting dark, but when they finish at 7 pm and we didn't eat until 8, my stomach takes priority over pictures:)

 We had a spur of the moment decision this morning to do the backsplash tile in the kitchen, so I spent my Sunday tiling away.  After over a year off from tiling, it was fun to get back into it again.  We'll see how I feel after I have to grout though...

 I did all the walls up to the cabinets and we used a random pattern of 3 different sizes of tumbled marble and will do a different pattern as an accent piece above the stove.

 These 2x2 inches of honed travertine will go above the stove as the accent and we are going to put in some 2x2 pieces of black granite in there as well.

It already feels a lot more finished in the kitchen, so I'll be excited to see the finish product.  Notice the abundance of tile pictures and lack of rock pictures - not sure if I'm going to blame it on the lack of sunlight or the fact that I am working on the tile and am pretty proud of my handiwork...I'll stick with the lack of sunlight:)

We also made a big purchase on Saturday and will hopefully start installing pavers for our back patio this week.

Gearing Up for Summer...or Snow

Surprisingly enough, Montana weather is somewhat unpredictable, which is causing us to start on projects and never finish them.  It's not US procrastinating, it's the WEATHER...I swear!  So, on a slightly chillier day, we were working away on the table.  We got the legs built for the table, so we wanted to see what it looked like somewhat put together.  We still have to stain the different parts, cut the legs to the size we want, and build some additional supports to connect the legs to the table top, but here is a general idea of what the table will look like. 

 We also have finally started using the shower in our master bathroom and it only took us about 15 months after moving in to start using it.  I feel so spoiled now, I can't imagine having to go all the way downstairs just to take a shower!  While I was at work one day, Travis caulked all the seams in the shower and put a glass sealer on the door.  I got home and he asked if I noticed anything else that he did.  I always struggle with these games, so I started off easy...I noticed that he replaced the lights in the shower with LED bulbs instead of CFLs.  We wanted to silicon the light fixtures to the ceiling in the shower so that no water would get up there and since LEDs last longer and put off less heat, we thought it would be a perfect fit.  So, I was correct, but there was something else - after desperately searching, I finally noticed that he installed a filler piece in our master bathroom cabinets.  Now we aren't having to look into this empty whole by the tub that continually reminded us that we still had lots of projects to do around the house.

 I thought after that nice surprise that I would do some major construction around the house while Travis was at work.  I read the instructions thoroughly and got out all the tools and was able to install our towel rack for the master bathroom - and it is even level!  I was so proud of myself that I had to brag about it to Travis before he even got home.  I got quizzed to make sure I did it right.  Trav asked how I hung it and I said that on one side I hit a stud, so I just screwed straight into it and the other side I used the little sheetrock screws provided.  The follow-up question was how were you sure you hit a stud, which was then followed by are you sure the stud wasn't the pocket door...

It wasn't the pocket door and my major construction around the house passed Travis' standards, so it has to be well built!  We also didn't realize how nice it was having towel racks and Mocha really likes having the shower mat too! 

 The other thing I have meant to post about was that we started installing (notice I said starting) knobs and pulls on our kitchen cabinets.  They are so nice to have and the reactions from our mothers when they found out we started this project was priceless.  They were all giddy and jumping around - you would have thought they just found out they were having a grandbaby, but sorry moms - the wait continues on that part.

 Travis and his dad have been busy rocking away on the house when the weather cooperates.  They worked more than a full day on Friday and Travis was going to get more done on Monday and Tuesday, but unfortunately, it is snowing in Montana.  I hadn't posted pictures of the front in awhile because I wanted it to be a surprise and have this big grand finale picture of the front of the house all finished, but I decided not to wait. Travis made it to the top of the columns and now just has to rock up to the peak in the front of the house.  My pictures were rushed because my battery was about dead, so these pictures don't do justice for how nice the rock is turning out.

 and his dad was busy working on the side of the garage

These were the last pictures of the rock that I posted, so you can see the progress on the columns and front of the house

 as well as the side of the garage...



Is That Furniture?

Hey look folks don't be alarmed there is finally furniture in our great room.  After many trips to miscellaneous furniture stores we finally decided we would have to order couches to our rather profectionistic wants.  We ended up ordering our color based upon a 2" by 2" piece of leather, and our layout off a 2 dimensional drawing online.  Needless to say they look great and we are excited to have furniture in our living room. Who knew how ergonomically these couches were designed, was this by coincidence or did Megan have future plans of when I may be sleeping on the couch!!!

Dining Room Table

We have been working away on the slabs that will make up our dining room table.  The first step was planing the joining edges so that they fit together.  Then, we cut out holes and inserted dowels to help join the two pieces together.  In between the dowels, we also put in some nut/bolt things to pull it together tighter.  Finally, right before we joined the two slabs, we applied lots of Gorilla Glue.  This picture is of the bottom of the slabs right before squeezing them together.

 You can see the dowels and the holes for the nut/bolt things (sorry for the lack of terminology - there's a picture later that better describes them than nut/bolt things!)

 All squeezed together - now the top of the slabs are right side up.

 Last, but not least...the nut/bolt things!

The next step will be sanding and planing down the top to make it level.  Then comes the stain and table legs.  Travis has been creating some very cool leg designs for the table, so I am excited to see how it all turns out!

Steam Shower Door

We continue to work on the house off and on, but I haven't done an update in a while because it has just been little stuff here and there.  Today, however, was different and deserved to be posted.  We finally got our shower door installed for our steam shower!  We still have to hook up the steam unit and seal the tile and the glass, so we won't be using it quite yet.  I figured that we've waited over a year to shower in the master bathroom, what's a couple more days? 

We can remove the blue tape after the silicon dries, which takes about 24 hours.

 We also purchased blinds for our master bedroom and bathroom.  The blinds are cordless and for in the actual bedroom we got room darkening shades.  Shades up...

 Shades down...

Quite a while ago, we put mantles up on both fireplaces.  They are made of the blue pine beetle and then stained.  We then made a railing, so that when our nieces came to visit they didn't run over the edge to the right of the fireplace and fall down the stairs.  As nice as it was for our nieces, Mocha doesn't think too highly of it because now she can't look downstairs at us as easily.  We also brought our rug out of storage and soon we will have a big leather sectional couch with it.  The couch was on back order, so hopefully by the middle of March, we will actually have a place to sit upstairs!

We searched and searched for dining room tables that we liked and that were big enough for our dining room, but had no luck.  So, recently we purchased more blue pine beetle to make one big dining room table.  The slab in the top of the picture will be used to make the legs and we will join the bottom two together for the actual table top.

 The two pieces for the actual table top

 The end of summer/fall, we did a lot of work to the garage so we could park our vehicles in there for the winter.  We taped, textured, and painted the walls and ceilings; installed the garage door openers; made cabinets; epoxied the floor (it's really dirty right now, but it's a white epoxy with red, black, and silver flakes);  and more recently hung up some peg board.  This picture is just one section of three.  We still have work to do out there as we want to cover the cabinets with laminate.  We still have to tape, texture, paint, and epoxy the third garage bay as well.

 In the Jack and Jill bathroom, we installed a mirror and put a tile border around it that matches the floor tile. 

 We also started installing crown moulding in the dining room.

 Here's the mantle on the downstairs fireplace

 The newest addition to the "man cave" was a dart board.  We made our own frame out of leftover hardwood and trim.

 We have also started hanging up a few more decorations.  Now hanging by the bar are coasters from several breweries across the United States and some overseas.

Not sure why this picture got out of order, but here's the shower door again and the non-room darkening shades.

 It's funny as I started writing this blog, I was feeling like we have accomplished so much, but the more I wrote, the more I found things that still needed to be done!  Stay tuned as we continue on all the little projects we still have yet to complete...