Island Cabinets (Day 420)

Day 2 of the cabinet installation. Its going pretty well, but we ran into a few more problems in the afternoon which will delay completion of the job. More on that later.

In the morning, Brian and I finished installing the west side (range and oven) cabinets and we were acting pretty cocky by lunch time. Still to do are the hanging cabinets. The two on that wall straddle the hood, which should do up first, then we'll trim out the hanging cabinets with fillers. Levi Ross came by and installed the gas line extension, which goes from a floor mounted valve on steel pipe up to the Wolf range top via a flexible pipe. That way we'll be ready to set the range top in place when the counter tops show up. There is a third hanging cabinet (resting really) that goes on the right side of the refrigerator case. This cabinet is really a double door cabinet that sets on an appliance garage, where the coffee maker and toaster will be stored (sound familiar, Bill?). However, since this tall cabinet ultimately rests on the counter top, that must go in first, hence the delays on completing the kitchen (reddish) cabinets. These are quarter-sawn red oak with a burgundy stain and lacquer top coat. (Note to Shelly Little, they look great and you should see them installed soon).

In the afternoon we brought all the cabinets for Island. There are 7 cabinets in this set that all get ganged together to form a 3' x 6' island. They are also quarter-sawn red oak but with a wheat (very light) stain and lacquer top coat. We set the prep sink cabinet first since it straddles plumbing and electrical. Once that was in place, we moved to the right with a recycling (two waste can) cabinet and a double drawer cabinet. This finished off the far side half of the island so we anchored it all down and moved on to the more complicated back side (toward you in the photos). This side has (from left to right) a shallow cabinet (glasses?), two wine racks, and a spice cabinet with false door panel. Well this is where the trouble occurred. The spice cabinet was spec'd out at 23", but supplied as a standard 24" unit. No big deal, just had to cut an inch off the back end, but on the finished side. This meant getting a straight cut with no tear out of the plywood veneer. Brian and I covered the end with tape, cut through the veneer with a knife, then used a skilsaw to rip the inch off the cabinet. Then I planed the end down to the veneer line. It came out pretty good, but I still need to work it over so the seam with the wine rack is absolutely straight (this will show). The bigger problem is that the false door panel, which goes over the spice cabinet, was made about 2" too wide (factory error), so this panel will have to be replaced. So for now, we still have to screw together this side of the island cabinets then figure out how to attach the glass counter top that will float above the granite top. I'll likely loose some sleep over this one before its all done. Today, I'll do clean up and take an initial look at the range-top hood and see how this sucker is going to get bolted in place. It attaches to a 800 cfm blower that is already in place and I keep kidding Nancy that it will probably suck her hair straight up when she powers the fan up. We'll see.

P.S. On Wednesday I finished the island cabinets. Still in a quandry about how the glass counter top will be supported off the end of the island, but I put extra wood backing in the island just in case we have to router a slot to accept glass corbels or mount metal standoffs.

P.P.S. On Thursday (New Years Eve) I worked all day and got almost nothing done. Took my two exterior doors (fir) that go between the main floor and basement and upstairs out to Bill McCutchen to have the birch thresholds that he made fitted to the doors. They turned out great. Otherwise, we'd have black aluminum thresholds with red birch on either side—butt ugly, prevented. In the afternoon, I spent 4 hours cutting a hole in the island cabinet for an electrical outlet, then wiring and fitting the outlet and cover. Turned out great, but that's not much progress for a whole day. Some days you kill the cat, some days it kills you (today). Happy New Year.

Kitchen Cabinets (Day 418)

Its the Monday morning after Christmas and we started in on the kitchen cabinets. Since these are a $20k plus part of the house, there is no room for screw ups. Brian (the trim guy) showed up on schedule at 8:30 am, but I'd been at the house for an hour setting up for the big event. We moved a half dozen boxed cabinets into the kitchen area, and got them ready. Since its an L-shaped cabinet layout, we started with the corner cabinet, which is fondly known as a Super Susan (think big Lazy Susan). We set this cabinet first, getting it squared up in 3 directions so everything that gets built off of it is level and plumb. We had to plane off the bottom and back edges since the Hardiboard flooring sweeps up a bit along the walls.

Right off the bat there were a few problems I hadn't foreseen. Firstly, I'd installed a wall outlet for an instant hot water faucet (optional) in the right side of the sink cabinet, but not quite in the right spot. It turned out to be behind the seam between two cabinets (not a good thing), so we cut a hole in the drywall. I pulled the wires over and will put an electrical box in the rear of the sink cabinet tomorrow. Second problem was the gas turnoff valve for the Wolf range top. Turns out that you have to be able to turn off the gas to the range top for maintenance (or leaks), so we need to cut out the back of the cabinet and put in an access port (I bought one tonight). So by 10 am we had a plan for solving the problems and started setting cabinets.

We worked to the left from the corner cabinet along the south (sunny) wall of the kitchen. Two cabinets, then a 24" opening for the dishwasher. Then a drawer cabinet and the big kahuna—the refrigerator case (left side of first photo). Swore I wouldn't have another of these after our Denver experience, but here we go again. The problem in Denver is that the original case was only 30" wide, and the refrigerators got wider with time. When we went to replace ours after 10 years, the narrowest refrig made was 32" wide, so I ended up cutting the case in half and widening it by 2". Now a days, 36" is the standard width, and some builders plan for 48" or more. Anyway, the refrigerator case is built out of two side panels (32" x 96") and an intervening upper cabinet (see second photo).

To the left of the refrigerator case is a narrow pantry cabinet. 12" wide and 24" deep, with a slide out case in the bottom and two shelves in the top. We've pulled a little trick on all of these cabinets. Nancy wanted deeper than normal counters since she's a half pint (5'3"), so I built a stub wall 3.5" deep behind the lower cabinets. This way we got 28" deep counters and only paid for standard 24" deep cabinets. A side bonus is that the refrigerator case is 32" deep, but only sticks out 4" beyond the other cabinets. This gives the impression of a counter-depth refrigerator rather than the standard depth French door model we ordered. Counter-depth refrigerators are the biggest scam perpetrated on home owners in the past decade. They are shallow and nearly twice the cost of standard depth ones. Price a few and see what I mean (yikes).

Anyway, by the end of the day Brian and I place all the cabinets along the south wall (sink and refrigerator), and positioned the ones along the west wall (oven and stove top). A good days work for amateurs, I'd say.

Merry Christmas (Day 415)

With all the holiday activities, we've taken a break from the house, so progress has slowed to bitty stuff like cover plates & cleaning up, and sticking a plant in the ground when the weather warms up. The garage has filled up with the kitchen cabinets, interior doors, and now the plumbing fixtures, all awaiting installation in the coming weeks. Plus more cabinets are due to be delivered in mid January, so you can see what the New Year has in store for us.

In the spirit of the season, Nancy and I gave each other toilets for Christmas. (Hey, I don't want to see any crappy jokes in the comment section.) We tossed in a bath tub for the New Year; who says we don't now how to party any more! We'll hit it again come Saturday; brushing lacquer on the fir window trim, more cover plates, and prepping the kitchen walls for the cabinets, which will start going in on Monday.

Wishing you a Merry Christmas and
a Happy New Year.

Someone is watching (Day 411)

So this morning I get an email (see below) from Brian Wright:

Michael

I am the Wedi western US Sales manager and one of my customers sent your blog link to me. Thank you for using our system and I am glad it is going well for you. I just wanted to say that I noticed that I didn’t see any sealant at the most important joint and this is between the Pan and wallboard or most places between the boards in the corners. I just want to make sure this performs perfectly for you. The application looks great and I like your center niche’ detail. Good job! If you wish to call me @ 206-423-0705

Thank you

Brian Wright
Wedi Regional Sales Manager

It seems that some anonymous blogophile (I suspect Jim Quandt) spilled the beans to Brian about my shower stall. Well, its a small world where you can post a blog in on a Thursday and have someone notice a problem the next Monday (I have visions of George Orwell's 1984 + 25). To calm the worries of Brian, I responded to his email as follows:

Brian, thanks for the heads up. I ran out of wedi sealant, hence the missing area and lack of a sill yet. Have to go to Seattle for it, so I'm waiting for other reasons to go. Amazing who sees my blog, and why. Cheers, Michael

If anyone is over in Seattle and wants to pick up a couple tubes of Wedi sealant from Daltile, it would be much appreciated and calming to the corporation. It'll make it worth your time in beer. Cheers, Michael

On a different front, Gary Estes (Craighead Electric) and I took on the light switches and power receptacles (plugs) today. Gary did the lights and GFI plugs, and I did the normal plugs. We managed to use up all the switches, so Nurse Nancy ran to the Home Depot in Sequim to restock our surgical supplies. Just like Mash and the 4077th, just a little less imperative (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M*A*S*H_(TV_series)). I think I wired about 50 plugs in 7 hours, which is an average of about 7 per hour or one every 8.57 minutes. Not breakneck speed, but at this rate we'll be done with most of the electrical by tomorrow evening. Hot damn, we'll have power and lights through out the house. Time to party (oops, no can yet).

PS. Tuesday, Dec. 22. Finished all the light and receptacle installation, including the 5 exterior lights. Still have a bit to do, like the two fans and 3 TV boxes but those can wait. Next I have to buy the trim rings for the 65 Juno recessed cans, a couple track lights for the garage, sconces for the staircase, and a couple hanging ($$$) light fixtures. Its only money and time; don't have an excess of either right now.

Moving cabinets and doors (Day 410)

We've been storing the kitchen cabinets (Kitchen and Bath Studio) and the interior doors (Carls) in the rental house garage since early summer. Now its time to reclaim the garage and move it all up to the new house. Its been cold and snowy of late, so getting the cars back in the garage would be a real plus. The weather looked dry for Saturday, so we decided to do it before the next Pacific flyer arrived (every 3-4 days it seems).

Brian (trim carpenter) borrowed his buddy's truck and big trailer for the job. We have about 25 boxes of cabinets, another 14 packages of trim pieces, and 15 doors (five with glass), so the job took five round-trips. We'll start by placing the interior doors where the underlying flooring is already installed (wood), then go to the kitchen cabinets, probably after Christmas. The remaining doors will have to wait until the tile is laid in the bathrooms and the cork planks are placed in the pantry. We spent last Monday in Seattle at Dal Tile and brought home the first batch of samples. If picking out the counter tops is any indication, this may take a several trips since we're just starting looking for tile. This exercise ranks up there with picking out wall paper, and is just slightly above having a root canal. I guess that's why people hire interior designers—to make these decisions and take the blame if things don't work out.

Wedi Board (Day 407)

Sounds like something from Star Wars and the Jedis. No, its a German product for lining shower stalls. We'd seen it at the Seattle Home Show several years ago and Jim Quandt had recently installed the product on a bathroom remodel in Kala Point. Basically its high-density blue foam board coated with a modified polymer cement and fiberglass mesh for strength and rigidity. The boards we're using come in 3' x 5' 0.5"-thick sheets and the preformed shower pan is the same size with a centered drain (http://www.wedi.de/usa/products/fundo/fundo.php). The key here is that this is a waterproof system with a locking drain collar. No more worries about a leaky shower liner like my sister encountered on her home in California (meaning leaks and rotted subfloor and joists—kachine!).

To assemble the shower stall, first you plumb your 2" drain pipe in the center of the 3' x 5' opening (other sizes are available). Cut the pipe off flush with the floor, then put the locking ring over the pipe. Drop the pan into place and secure it with a bed of polyurethane sealant. The sides of pan are rabbited out for the side panels. Since we made the stall exactly 3' x 5', we could use full sheets, vertically on the ends and horizontally on the back. The product is fairly expensive ($30 a sheet and about $300 for the preformed, sloping pan with stainless steel drain). We're into it for about $500 in materials. The alternate solution is to use Hardibacker board and to pour your own pan with mortar mix. A bit sloppy and hard to get a uniformly slope, but I did it years ago so its not rocket science. Wedi's pitch is that you save buckets of labor putting their system in. So far we have invested 6 hours of my time and 2 hours of Jim's time.

To make life interesting, we built a recessed nook in the wall that will accommodate all the manditory shower stuff—shampoo, soap, razors, etc. When the tiling is being done (by us), we'll get some of the leftover travertine countertop material from the bathroom and have 3 shelves cut for the nook, and cement them in place.

The Wedi board is screwed and glued in place. The screws go through large washers that help hold the board, then the washers and all joints are caulked with polyurethane. Pretty simple, just make sure you don't have any big ridges of polyurethane sticking up that will interfere later with the tile cement. So the pan and side boards are in place and I still have to build a small sill that will hold the glass door. However, we haven't priced or bought the door yet so the sill will have to wait for a while.

Trimming out (Day 412)

I'd made good progress on the paint-grade trim and was ready to start the fir (clear lacquer finish) trim for the downstairs windows and doors. Brian Van Dalsum (finish carpenter) came over on Wednesday and we made a serious run at cutting and attaching the fir trim. Most of the windows and doors are trimmed out the same way with 5/4 (1") x 6 tops, 4/4 (3/4") x 4 side pieces, and 5/4 x 4 base pieces (windows). We're not placing any sill extensions on the fir windows since they may have furniture against them. Even though Gary and Troy did a great job framing the house, the drywall is either proud or thin around about 1/2 of the windows and doors. So we either planed down the adjacent drywall or added small jamb extensions (1/4-3/8" thick) so that the trim would mount correctly. Even with this complication, Brian and I trimmed out the French doors, the front and mudroom doors, and 10 window units in 13 hours (one hour each). We still have about 8 more doors to trim, but they aren't mounted yet (waiting to get tile, cork or remaining hardwood in place).

Brian is so fast and careful that I expect to use him on the kitchen, pantry and mudroom cabinets and other little projects where I can. I suspect he saves me 60-75% of the time I'd spend on a task. In other words, if I takes me 10 hours to do something, he and I can do it together in 2.5-4 hours. At that rate, we might make our May deadline without flaming out.

The one problem with having help like this is keeping up with him. Material has to be ordered, picked up (or delivered), then planned out, and prepped (trim drywall back, etc). So to use Brian effectively, I can only work him every other day. So for now, I suspect he'll be on site 2 days a week, and I'll spend the other 3 getting ahead of him and doing other chores like wiring lights and receptacles.

Trim costs are right up there. Vertical grain fir is pretty pricey. However, it really gives the house a Craftsman look which is what we're after. For example 1x6 vg fir (no knots, parallel grain) is going for about $6 a linear foot ($6.50 a board foot). The bill for trimming out the 10 windows and 3 doors so far is about $700, or $55 a piece and an hour of labor. Add to that about 200 linear feet of 1 x 6 base trim ($3/ln ft) and the 8 additional doors (at $65 each) and the total cost for the fir trim materials will be about $1800. Add labor, both to mount and finish off and we'll be coming in at about $2500. Not too bad since the fir windows and doors cost roughly $10k.

Bathroom Cabinets (Day 409)

Nancy (the painter) finished painting the clerestory window in the master bath on Monday, so I was ready to place the cabinets in there. They have been in the garage for a couple weeks and I figured it would be best to start on these (6) cabinets than the more complex set in the kitchen (20+ cabinets). I moved them into the bedroom and unpacked the boxes, saving the cardboard for floor and cabinet protection down the line. The bath setup includes his and her sinks and plenty of storage. The 6 cabinets are ganged together to fill a 12' 8" wide opening between the shower and the toilet room.

The bath cabinets include (from L to R) a full-height linen closet (30" w, 24" d), His drawers (18" w, 21" d, 34.5" h), His sink cabinet (30" w, 21" d, 34.5" h), a middle bank of shared taller drawers (24" w, 24" d, 41.5" h, Her sink cabinet (30" w, 21" d, 34.5" h), and Her drawers (18" w, 21" d, 34.5" h). With this setup, we had 3" of extra space (aka wiggle room) that was taken up with 1" fillers at each end and a final 1" piece between the bank of cabinets and the linen closet.

I was a bit more than nervous about this cabinet install. I'd done all of this before, but long ago in Denver under the watchful eye of Bill Hart (master cabinet maker of older times). I'd spent the better part of the morning cutting a hole in the side of the linen closet for a power receptacle (His). This had to be square and just the right size to hold the metal mounting box and conduit that protects the electrical cable. I managed to get it right, but by lunch time the idea of drilling the entry holes in the sink cabinets for the water and drain pipes was giving me the willys.

So I called up a finish carpenter that Tom Christopher had put me onto this last year. His name is Brian Van Dalsum, 40'ish and a recent emigre to PT from Florida. Brian had his own carpentry company with 30 employees in Florida before the housing meltdown, which took his business with it. So as they say in the business, it was time to strap on the tool belt again. He and his wife moved to PT about the same time as us (Summer 2008) and he found work with Tom's builder—LD Richert. However, business slowed down here last winter and Brian hit the streets, looking for work on his own. I gave him a call and he came over to scope out the job (these cabinets and possible other work later). He offered me a good price and within 15 minutes screws were turning and wood was flying.

Three hours later, we were done mounting the cabinets. Level tops and square fronts, just like it should be. We worked pretty well together so I offered him some trim work and probably placement of the kitchen cabinets. Lord nows we have plenty to do, so his help will speed things along and allow us to star thinking about the tile and plaster, which are two big jobs on the horizon. Tomorrow I'll rehang the cabinet doors and adjust the drawers, then cover them all up to protect the beautiful finish (Pecan stain on Cherry, shaker style cabinet doors).

Landscaping (Day 404)

The trees and shrubs we've been buying were stacking up on the property, so with the delivery of another bunch it was time to plant the trees. They'll grow roots in the winter here, when the ground isn't frozen. We had our first hard frost around the 1st of December, but it was still mild (40s in day, 30s at night).

Tim Hamm, a hardscaper from Sequim, had been building some small rock walls for us and had his small tractor on the site. So on Saturday Dec. 5th, he divvied up the big piles of top soil (30 yds) and bark chips (15 yds) that I had delivered last summer. He moved them around the property, closer to where plants and trees would be going. That saved me a couple days behind a wheelbarrow and a sore back. I started digging tree holes in the morning and planted about 8 by early afternoon. When Tim finished the first rock wall, he helped me for an hour and we planted another six trees. It was getting dark and cold, so I left the remaining 4 trees for another (milder day). Plus our friends Ken and Deb Olsen were arriving that night and I had to do a serious scrubup with Lava (soap) to be presentable.

After our wholesale tree cutting last year to clear the lot (60-80 trees), we've replanted the following:

2 Leyland Cypress
3 Giant Sequoia
6 Western Red Cedar
3 River Birch
3 Vine Maples
2 Autumn Harvest Maples
1 Sweet Gum
1 Umbrella Pine

Still out of the ground are 8 Rhodies, 8 Portuguese Laurels and 2 English Laurels. So far we have about $2000 into the plants, but most were bought on sale this fall at the two local nurseries and Home Depot (laurels). Also looking for a couple Holly trees, which do well here.

We took Sunday off to play with the Olsens and it snowed about an inch. No big deal (icy, mainly) except that was the start of a week of freezing temps (19° F min). The upshot is that the ground is pretty well frozen as well as the hoses. So it looks like those last 4 trees and shrubs will have to wait for a rain storm to melt the ground.