Cat Taxi

The boys recently had a visit to their country getaway house. Here they are en route to Rose and Mike's.

Mystery Hill - The Beams in the Kitchen Survive

At least for now. We've been struggling with the decision to leave exposed beams in kitchen (beautiful) vs covering them up with drywall (convenient for many reasons, not the least of which is lighting choices). Here again is the site of our kitchen. We've sent initial requests out for quotes late last week. Its very exciting. Also, the e-bay ordered built in fridge and wall ovens have arrived, safe and sound. This was a huge savings. $12K vs $5K. Woohoo!

Mystery Hill - Temporary Stairs

We have a staircase, its temporary but it is in the right place. The final window (above upper beam at landing) will be installed after the front porch roof is completed to ensure that the window is installed above where the roof hits the front of the house.

Mystery Hill - Front Porch

The front porch is almost done. Once it, the screened porch and the chimney are built, all major construction is done. And then its on to the finishing bits. We expect to have a structural inspection this week or next. Siding is being ordered as is the front door. Everything is a decision or several. Front door is black (inside and out), the sill is steel (not granite, less expensive and matches roof), it is a 3/4 panel glass door (clear glass), and the handle is satin nickel, modern style with a single plate and a basil lever on the inside. I think that wraps up all the key points in ordering a bloody door... :-)

Front porch is going to be gorgeous. I can totally picture sitting out here. The underside of the roof matches the style of our interior ceilings - white beadboard and wood rafters.

The supporting columns will eventually be clad in stone to match the chimney. We're weighing the options of real stone and cultured stone.

Here is the door handle we picked but on the wrong door and in the wrong finish.

Minding the details - The Pot Lights

No pictures at this time because I'm technically challenged. The latest pictures are on my phone, not my camera and I haven't figured out how to get them from the camera to the laptop. Argh.

Building a house. Lesson #1. Pay attention to the details. A few weeks ago, I was reviewing lighting plans with our designer. Seb had summarized the plan in an email. (And let me just say that who thinks about this kind of stuff? You walk into a room, hit a switch, and voila, from darkness to light. Sconces, pots, ceiling mounted, tracks and even floor lights... we have them all! Who knew they made lights that you can set into floors?) So the designer and I are reviewing Seb's doc and we come to a line item: front hall 6" pots, we immediately agree that its a typo. We must have 6 pots, not 6" pots. A quick call confirms that we are, in fact, wrong. Seb has installed 6" pots in our front hall because "they give more light". They're gone now (OBVIOUSLY) and even one of our contractor guys said, "they're kind of 80s, Seb"...