Hiking path

So what's up with the names that are chosen to designate colors of paints and fabrics? The color of our new walls in the addition, "silver skates", is a blue-gray. We chose the paint for the baby's room this week, and it's called "hiking path", which is a yellowy light green. Seemed an appropriate tone to choose, at least based on the name (although in truth that was not the justification for our selection). We have the room all painted, and are in the process of cleaning the carpet today.

A cat lookout

Keesha has been a bit traumatized by all the changes during the past few days. Boxes are furniture are getting moved around non-stop, it seems. She has decided, though, that she likes to sit on top of the computer, which is now located near the window that looks out over our deck. She continues to be cute and beg for food, but that's normal . . .

Outside views

Some more views of the current appearance of our backyard. I used mulch to create a path to the back gate. We are working furiously on painting and cleaning carpets, plus organizing some stuff downstairs -- more pictures to come, tonight or tomorrow.

Rain Barrel

We have installed a rain barrel on the back of the porch. This structure has 2 primary purposes: (1) it reduces the volume of high-speed runoff from rainstorms. In an natural environment, trees or other vegetation absorb rainfall and allow it to slowly infiltrate the soil, eventually reaching groundwater or a stream. Developed areas are rife with surfaces that are impervious to infiltration, such as roofs. The altered hydrology has several negative consequences: stream flow volumes and intensities are altered, with high flow following rain events and lower flows at other times. This high flow volume can scour stream bottoms and reduce the quality of habitat for stream invertebrates - which in turn feed the fish and birds. Runoff from impervious surfaces also causes surface erosion, and can carry with it any pollutants - such as oil - that are on that surface. Water flowing across over-fertilized suburban lawns or poorly-managed animal enclosures also carries nutrients, which fuel algal blooms in the water, which in turn deplete the oxygen in the water. So the rain barrel is meant to reduce all those problems by capturing the rain off the roof and allowing it to slowly infiltrate the soil. (2) we can also use the rainwater for our garden. Natural rainwater is better for the plants than water that has been purified for drinking - plus, it's a bit of a waste of resources to treat water to drinking standards and then use it to water plants.

You can see in the picture that our contractor also added some lattice fencing across the bottom of the deck. GHI required this modification in order to prevent raccoons and other animals from taking refuge under the deck. Turns out it improves the aesthetics - at least in my opinion.

Marmoleum

So, we have decided to forgo the traditional "trimming of the tree" this year, instead opting for trimming the floors. We now have the baseboard trim in the entire downstairs essentially finished. I cut some of it earlier this week, and nailed most of it in today. Still need to do the finishing - push the nails beneath the surface and add some wood putty. But that's just cosmetic, so it might not happen for a bit.

Brian came over today and helped me lay the flooring in the entryway. It's Marmoleum tile, a type of linoleum made from linseed oil and other renewable materials.

The contractor is finished with his part of the job as well. The last item was to add some wooden lattice beneath the deck, to prevent raccoons and other animals from taking refuge close to the house. I have yet to take a picture . . will post one later, but it might be after Christmas before it happens.

Floor is nearly done!

We completed a floor installation marathon yesterday. Doug, Tyson, and Sarah all joined in the fun . . fitting pieces in the tight spaces of the kitchen was the biggest challenge. We still need to install the tiles in the entryway, fill a few gaps, and replace the baseboards. Then we can move on to getting new furniture (primarily a couch, bookshelves, and dining table) and working on the baby's room! Things are still a bit in dis-arry in these pictures, but they should capture a sense of what the floor looks like. Painting is almost finished too, except parts of the kitchen.

Floors again

Next installment - I have used about 1/3 of the wood now . . .

Floor Status

Here is what it looks like now . . .

Bowling alley??

Nathaniel helped me work out the logistics of laying our bamboo floor this evening. We have approximately 1/9 of the job completed. It sort of reminds me of a lane at a bowling alley - a long, narrow strip of new flooring along the outer wall of the addition.

We are installing bamboo "floating" floor from Ikea. It looks pretty good so far. There are 31 more boxes waiting . . . the 35 boxes of flooring, plus 6 boxes of underlayment, filled the entire back of the car with no room to spare. Fortunately the car survived the trip home.

Plywood party

Brian and Nathanial helped me install a layer of plywood in the addition today. We needed to raise the level of the floor, so that it would be the same hight as the floor in the old part of the house. We put down a layer of pink rosin paper, and then screwed down the plywood.

The contractor is pretty much done with his work at the house. He finished up some loose ends this week. Now we need to finish the floor and the painting before we can move on to baby's room . .