progress report: week 27/28
Week 27, 28…I’ve officially lost track. We’ve been focusing on the kitchen, but we’re keeping that under wraps until it gets closer to being done. And this past weekend, we installed the cork! We are exhausted and sore, but excited with how it turned out – a rich blanket of chocolate-brown that, without the finish, resembles a dark suede. The wax goes on this week, so we’ll have a start to finish post next week on how it all went down.
In the meantime, a few random things:
Tomatoes! Fall is here and the garden has been harvested. Now, what to do with them? I’m tempted to just throw them all in the food processor and see what happens.
We’d been looking for a way to provide some privacy at our back door without a clunky roller shade. So we put up some inexpensive, translucent window film. One lookout for the people, one for the dog…everyone’s happy. Oh, and the door trim still needs to go up.
Speaking of roller shades, did we ever show you the ones for the skylights? We put them up several weeks ago but the diffuse light and varying silhouettes are so pleasant that we’ve kept them closed ever since. (We have one of those fancy extension rods to operate them.)
This photo is a few weeks old, but the pile of lumber and sawdust in the driveway is gone! We even mowed the lawn again. What? Is it time to take down the construction ramp off the back door? Let’s not rush things. Even though the backyard is shaping up, the front yard still looks like that of an abandoned house. We actually considered hiring someone to weed our yard, but have since decided to just suck it up and do it ourselves. Eventually.
get out the vote!
Nevermind those mid-term elections, we need your vote on another matter. Back in June, we won the first weekly contest for One Project Closer’s annual Before and After contest (vote here). The polls have now opened for the final grand prize winner and we are currently in fourth place.
Just to refresh your memory:
BEFORE =(
AFTER!
BEFORE =(
AFTER!
The good news, it only takes about 10 seconds to vote and you don’t have to worry about pesky logins or user names. Just click here, scroll down to the poll and VOTE! Voting ends soon, so don’t delay! A big THANK YOU in advance.
art + light
A couple weekends ago, Kyle and I stopped in to Velocity Art & Design, to re-evaluate the Modernica Case Study Daybed (we finally decided it wasn’t big enough, but maybe we could put one in the loft…someday). Anyhow, it just so happened that Amy Ruppel had a showing there that was just about to end. We purchased the piece below (a wax print). I’ve always admired her work and assumed that someday we would just see the right piece and buy it. Looking for artwork is hard, so I’m hoping this strategy continues to work. [The print to the left is a gift from our old neighbor, a bakery photo she took in Paris several years ago.]
Hmm, not sure what Chuck thinks about this new bird lady friend.
One of the most rewarding tasks of recent weeks has been installing the lighting. When we bought our house, it had 4 ceiling lights. Needless to say, an effective lighting design was a top priority (read more about our selections here). We ended up ordering most of our lighting through Seattle Lighting Supply (talk to Sunshine, she’s awesome). It wasn’t intentional, but all of our lighting is from different manufacturers.
For the living room, we’re doing two runs of low-voltage Kable Lites from Techlighting. They provide good general lighting and fit nicely between the exposed joists.
Over the island, we installed a Bruck V/A Linear Chandelier. Bruck is probably better known for their general track lighting, but we loved the idea of a linear light with a central support. On the wall beyond are Utility reach lights from Resolute (one of my favorite lighting companies and they’re local!).
The Bruck lights have a double canopy – a more translucent inner shade and amber color outer shade.
As part of our passive cooling strategy (no A/C here in the PNW), we installed a small fan in our new stairwell. When it’s hot outside (or as it’s been lately, humid?!), we can open the roof window in the loft and turn on the fan to help draw warm air out through the house while pulling cool air up from the basement. We went with another Cirrus fan from Modern Fan Co. (similar to what we have in our bedroom, but shorter blades, a down rod and no light). The blades had to be trimmed just a bit, but it really does help move air vertically through the house [you’re seeing the ridge of the loft beyond].
We still need to find an affordable, ceiling mounted light for the flex room/2nd bedroom as well as a wall sconce for the loft. The problem with lighting is that there are a gazillion options but you have to weed through the 90% that are ugly, ridiculously expensive, or cheaply made to find something decent.
I think the same thing can be said about chairs, but that’s another post.
chezerbey in seattle homes & lifestyles!
Last June, Kyle forwarded me an e-mail about a “designer’s favorite spaces” contest hosted by local shelter mag, Seattle Homes & Lifestyles. On a whim, we decided to enter in the bathroom category and lo and behold we won! The article is in the October issue and you can read it online here. Big thanks to our friend Will Austin for taking the photos!
Here are larger versions of the selected shots – what you don’t see is that just outside this space, the house is completely gutted! Fortunately, the fact that we have no door to the room worked in our photographer’s favor.
Read about our $8 wall art here.
bailey’s before & after
A few days before the big b-day weekend, I took Bailey to the groomer. It had been a while and he was looking pretty scrappy.
There was no choice. His crazy locks were too out of control. Our golden is now a yellow lab.
He looks so much smaller and his disproportionately large head even bigger. He seems happy though, and much more eager to cuddle. The groomer said it would take 6 weeks or so to grow back out. We’re expecting an awkward phase.
Yeah, you look all sweet now. But remember last night, when you woke me up at 3:00 a.m. and then proceeded to steal my spot in bed? Tonight, you’re sleeping on the couch!
