Lots and lots of changes...now that I have some free time

I have had the last couple of weeks off while I switch jobs so rather than laying around I decided to get the house moving along a little quicker.

Here are the latest photos. We should be adding bamboo flooring to the first floor in the next week or two leaving us with some small finishing items.



We have decided to open up our shared wall and insulate it with Roxul...giving us a safer fire barrier and an excellent sound barrier. Lots of dust though.






Here I have started building a bench in our front foyer, I have cantilevered it out of the wall. It gives us a place to sit down and tie our shoes.








Here is the finished bench, I have clad it with bamboo flooring and added some lighting under it.







We have added strips of MDF (medium density fiberboard) around our pillar. It gives it a cool look and style. This idea we got out of Dwell, its definitely the best magazine our there for modern style living.





In the last couple of days I have put down a new plywood subfloor in order to smooth things out for the bamboo flooring.






And finally we have finished painting the first floor (ceilings and walls)...well mostly finished. Cate (a friend of ours) was kind enough to come over and help us get it all done this past Sunday.

Making news

So our up and coming neighbourhood has been getting a little attention lately. The Financial Times of London recently interviewed Melina about Hintonburg, the article should be out in another couple of weeks.

In another recent article Westboro, the neighbourhood next to us has been named the most desireable neighbourhood in Canada....good news as those who can't afford the most desireable neighbourhood in Canada may want to live next door to it....and I might add even closer to downtown Ottawa.

For those of you who fly Air Canada, make sure you pick up enRoute. The magazine has recently featured the hottest neighbourhoods in Canada and to toot our own horn, Hintonburg made the list.

Here is the section on Hintonburg (here is the link to the rest of the article www.enroutemag.com/e/april07/cover_a.html). Helen's is at the end of our street the Carleton is a few blocks away and one of our favourte watering holes, the Cube is also around the corner and is the location of our wedding reception.

Hintonbourg, Ottawa

Named after Joseph Hinton – the guy who secured the first post office here in the mid-1800s – this former down-market district has gotten an upmarket comb-over.

By Fateema Sayani

7:00 With heirloom tomatoes, purple beans and micro-greens from the Bryson Farms stall at the Ottawa Parkdale Market in hand, early birds head north to Remic Rapids Park to watch the sun rise over John-Félice Ceprano’s freestanding rock sculptures. Mind the joggers and dog walkers.

10:00 Shoppers drop the best friend at Dogz, a place for pup pampering and daycare, then head over to Ravensara for collectible tin toys. A Fine Thing has antiques galore, including mid-century favourite Fiestaware.

12:00 The back of the Melrose Groceteria houses Helen’s Cuisine, a lunch counter serving shawarma, tabouli, delicious baklava – and pot roast.

15:00 Upstart galleries abound. Cube Gallery is home to locally established modern artists. The space – an old soda factory – is perfect for lingering. James Robinson, the owner of nearby Parkdale Gallery, paints on-site, while the one-room Pukka Gallery, housed inside artist co-op the Engine Room, changes exhibitions monthly.

17:00 While occasionally reclaimed as a hipster hovel for rock shows, the Carleton Tavern is a good old dive with decor to match.

18:00 Visiting cookbook authors teach the fundamentals of Slow Food or molecular gastronomy at the Urban Element, a retrofitted fire hall with an industrial kitchen. Bonus: Eat your work with your new pals and take recipes home. Don’t want to do the work? Sail over to Hino Restaurant for fine Asian-fusion cuisine.

“If Hintonburg were a person, it would be someone who’s a lot of fun and a great laugh but goes to bed early.”

– Don Monet, curator of Cube Gallery

Just the finishing touches left

The kitchen is nearly done now, all that is left is some of the finishing touches. This past weekend we put in the backsplash and I built a small bookcase to house our cookbooks and a large wine rack.

This coming weekend we will grout the tiles and I will put in the trim around the window.

After that we will have some painting to do, install some stainless steel trim in several areas and finish off a bit of the electrical.



Here are a some photos, they don't quite do the kitchen justice it looks way better in real life.





We have lots of room for wine bottles now.....Del any suggestions?

In some ways I am glad it's winter outside

Now that the cold weather has arrived things seem to be progressing on the house. Summer is great and we love the weather but it is really hard to get motivated to do inside work. Heck I even have time to blog again....hopefully we will be able to update everyone more often in the coming months.

Kitchen update:

Everyday there is less and less to do. Right now the kitchen is 90% finished with some small details left. Over the weekend we finished the tiling and grouted the entire floor. I also replaced a large section in our maid drain pipe as it is old cast iron that had cracked.

To do:

- touch up some of my dents and dings in the drywall
- install the backsplash....which incidentially are a very nice glass subway style tile....hopefully over Christmas.
- paint ceilings and walls
- install door, window and baseboard trim
- build built in wine rack and bookshelf
- buy and install new kitchen stove...our Christmas present to each other.
- some more drywall and mudding....this is mostly connected with finishing the living room.

Living room

My current project is now the living room, I have spent the last week ripping up the old tile floor and subfloor exposing the original softwood flooring. We are about halfway done that. I have also installed our new dining room casement window, reframed the wall around it and insulated it as well. The pillar containing the mechanical for the second floor has also been framed and is ready to be drywalled.

The house has now been almost completely rewired, I have one bedroom with an old wire feeding it and one bedroom with old wires in the circuit both of which will be fixed when we begin expanding the bathroom.

To do:

- tear up rest of old floor
- patch drwall holes
- mud all new drywall (ceiling and walls, way too much)
- re-work the heating ducts to the second floor and living room
- tear down old stairs
- build new stairs
- lay down new plywood on the living/dining room floor
- install tiles in front foyer
- install bamboo flooring
- install railing and banister system
- lots and lots of little finishing details



Here are some additionla photos you might find interesting:

The beginning of the tiling process. I had to work around an opening in the floor which allowed me access to our drain pipe.






The finished product. All done tiling and grouting....I still love our stainless steel kickplate.








Here is a photo of our shared wall under the stairs to the second floor. We have added sound and fireproofing and are about ready to drywall and mud it.

One thing we are waiting on, is that we are now planning on building a trapdoor over the stairs to the basement. this would give us some more useable floor space as well as take car of any railing issues. One idea we are currently working on is to have the trapdoor lower and raise electrically with an actuator. If any one knows anything about motors and actuators as well as hydraulics please drop me a line (theroltz 'AT' yahoo 'DOT' com). We have gotten one price but it is a little out of our ballpark, we are now looking at used motors as well as other suppliers.

Kitchen - almost done

So here are some more long, long awaited photos.

The kitchen is nearing completion. Pretty much all that is left is tiling the floor and the walls/backsplash.

The concrete countertops have been lacquered now and boy did they come out nice. It really highlighted the textures and their indsutrial look.

We even are now cooking with gas. Out gas fitter came in last week and hooked us up.


All the doors are done as is all the main drywalling and mudding. A little electrical is sill left to do. We have two pendant lights that will hang over the cooktop.


Notice the kickplate? We got brushed stainless steel pieces machined to fit our cabinet base and boy do they rock.
We'd love to hear your thoughts...more photos to follow shortly, I promise.

2 countertop down and one to go

Well now that fall is here and the weather is getting colder, we are a little more motivated to get things done. We are hoping that the kitchen will be done by mid October but then again I'm fairly busy with work and Ultimate.

We have nearly finished building the concrete countertops. After that we will need to do some finishing work to them such as; filling the air gaps with a dark black slurry and then covering the countertops with several coats of a natural epoxy. The epoxy is used to protect the countertops from water stains.

I am very thankful for the help I got from Robin and his son, Brent (my neighbour) and my Ultimate team. Each piece probably weights around 350 pounds.

Things left to do in the kitchen:

- countertops
- cabinet doors
- put down 3/4 inch sub-flooring
- tile and grout kitchen floor
- tile kitchen wall
- install gas for cooktop (hiring a professional)

The concrete countertop form - reinforced



The pour - its upside down



The finished product with the cooktop



The kitchen sink section

Summer brings to many distractions

Sorry for the lack of posts again. Unfortunately things are moving slowly as there are so many distractions in July.

Here are some photos.

Lots of photos today

Today (Sunday) turned out to be very productive. Mel's parents came over and lent us a hand with our front garden and cleaning up our backyard. I spent the day putting in our new French garden doors and boy does it look great.

We ordered the doors last Tuesday from Home Depot and scheduled the delivery for Friday. On Friday I opened up the door cavity expecting that the door would arrive at any point. Boy was I wrong, in fact in never showed. I spent most of the late afternoon on the phone trying to get the issue resolved, one guy even told me that they would send it out on Saturday. Lucky for me I had some plywood here so I could board up the opening.

Saturday morning I called early to check on the door as we would be out all day playing frisbee. Well guess what, they knew nothing of it. I finally demanded to speak with the store manager. Thankfully he resolved the issue and got us the door later that afternoon and he refunded us our delivery fee.

So with the door delivered, I spent the morning installing it. The installation went very easy as I have done this sort of thing a few times. The kitchen is really taking shape now. I also spent some time sanding my 2nd coat of mud. That means this week I will do a 3rd coat, some more sanding and maybe a 4th coat to make sure it all looks great.

Mel and her parents really did a great job with the garden. Her mom Jacqueline is great with plants and brought a bunch of flowers for us from her own garden. We finally have a very respectable front yard which should make our neighbours much happier. It beats the junkyard that used to be there. Mel's dad Don filled our garbage bin up as well. In fact our 30 yard bin is completely filled and we still have a shed full of garbage bags. Looks like we will need another bin but a least the yard doesn't look like the set from Sanford and Son.

We have also ordered our cedar for the deck the we will be doing. It should be in sometime next week. I am hoping to get the undercarriage done this week and/or weekend. The undercarriage will be done with pressure treated lumber as it will not be seen by anyone and the PT helps prevents rot as these areas have little air flow.

sorry, sorry for the lack of posts.

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. Not a lot has changed, the house is still under construction. One good thing is that Mel has finished her last exam (Architecture). She managed to do 10 exams in about 10 months. Pretty soon she'll be a full blown architect, she should be getting her final results in August or September.

Well the kitchen is still a work in progress. The drywall is all up and I am in the midst of mudding it. Once again I owe Robin big for coming over to help. Tonight I finished the second coat, however I am really taking my time so that it all comes out looking great.

A while back I got bored and tore down our little cold room (off the kitchen). So it's now gone and will soon be replaced by a new deck. The plan is to build a wrap around deck (L shaped). I even ordered the cedar today. In fact I think our priority might be to get the deck done. Who needs a kitchen in the summer when you can BBQ.

Tomorrow we take delivery of our new French garden door. I can't wait to see how the kitchen will look with it in.

We have also finally gotten a garbage bin in. Now we can start cleaning up our yard and keep the neighbours happy.

Hopefully I will get back into posting again and be able to show you some finished work for a change.

Ready for the ceiling drywall

Just a quick update tonight and no photos....sorry.

We have pretty much everyhting done in the kitchen except for drywal on the ceiling. Once I get some help with the 4 sheets I have to put up I will be able to start mudding.

I spent the weekend finishing the strapping and the drywall on the walls. Nothing to exciting here.

Mel and I sorted out our lighting plan for the kitchen. I have a bit of electrical still to do. We are installing pot lights so I will pre-wire the ceiling to make everything easier after the ceiling drywall is up.

I also built the bases for our kitchen cabinets. I am using 2 x 6 as a base in order to support the weight of the concrete countertops. One good thing about getting the bases done is it allows us to easily visualize the layout of the kitchen.

Hopefully later this week I can sucker...err...get a friend over to help with the remaining drywall.

No big changes from yesterday...just a bit closer to being done

Today I managed to get a fair bit done despite a very sore back. The weird thing is that sitting at my desk hurts far more than actually doing physical work.

I managed to get most of the drywall done, except for a small section where I ran out of insulation and the pillar by the framed in chimney, there I have to install a heating duct to the second floor. Hopefully tomorrow I will pick up some more insulation and will then finish off drywalling the 3 walls.

I also started putting the strapping on the ceiling. I am using 2 x 4 as they are the right thickness allowing the kitchen ceiling to now match up with the living and dining room ceiling. It will be a nice continuous flow.

Derl stopped by and we think we have a plan to fix some of the plumbing and to remove a pipe or two. See the top picture, it's the pipe that is currently emptying into the yellow bucket in the right hand corner.

By fixing the plumbing this will allow me to have a pillar that is narrower and thus allows a better view into the kitchen from the living room. The pillar will also balance nicely with the pillar in the half wall near the front door. We will paint them both with a colour that accents them well.

My biggest concern in building a pillar around the chimney is that it would protrude into the kitchen to much and throw of the look a bit. In order to minimize the depth of the pillar I turned the 2 x 4 studs flat and 'tapconed' them into the actual chimney.

Hopefully tomorrow I will get the chance to pick up some more supplies and get most or the remaining drywall and insulating done. Hopefully on the weekend Robin will be able to swing by and help me install the ceiling drywall. After that it's mud time. Wait till you see what we are going to do with the backsplash and end wall.

An unproductive weekend

Well I didn't quite get as much done this weekend as I would have liked. At least I have a good excuse, or at least a reasonably good one. This weekend marked Mel's 30th birthday so a bunch of us went out for dinner on Friday and then we hit the town. For some strange reason I was very unmotivated to get anything done on Saturday and Sunday was not much better.

Monday evening proved to be pretty productive and the kitchen has taken another big step towards being done.

I built a new pillar that now encloses our chimney and hosts a new heating duct for one of the second floor bedrooms. Unfortunately the bricks from the fireplace are in poor condition as they have been nailed into many times during the life of the house and have crumbled a bit. That and the fact that we want to keep the amount of finish material (bamboo, black tile and concrete) to a minimum has forced us to cover the chimney with drywall.

I also managed to insulate the 2 exterior walls with fiberglass pink insulation and then added a vapour barrier and some accoustic sealant. The rest of the house may not be insulated but at least the kitchen will be warm.

In the above photo (showing the insulated and vapour barriered shared wall) you can see some additional bracing I installed in order to handle the weight of our Ikea kitchen cabinets.

Next I started drywalling. I can install two horizontal sheets before I drywall the ceiling which means I can get most of the kitchen done on my own. I am hoping that by the end of the upcoming long weekend I will have the ceiling drywalled as well.

Tomorrow Derl comes over to inspect our plumbing. I am hoping he will have the time to do some work for us. We need to reroute the bathroom sink vent, remove another pipe (fingers crossed that it is not being used any longer) and get the kitchen sink plumbing ready for the new sink and fridge.

It's taking shape...sort of.

The last two days have been tough, the weather has been so nice that it's hard to get motivated to work inside. The good news at least for me being productive is that the weather is supposed to be ugly for the next 3 or 4 days.

Tuesday I started to frame in the rough opening for the new French doors. The plan will be to drywall up to the edge of the door for now. In another week or two we will start the demo of the cold room and that is when I will install the new door. Once again I put in a header to deal with transferring the weight from the wall above. On both of the exterior walls I also screwed the existing exterior sheeting into the studs. This has helped ensure a much stronger and more rigid structure....my walls no longer flex. I also now know why our windows don't lock well, they have been bent by the weight of the house and are now curved so the locks no longer align...exactly the reason why the header is so important.

Wednesday I built a bulkhead around the plumbing that is exposed in the ceiling of the kitchen, this plumbing is for the bathroom up stairs. The bulkhead will also house the electrical for both the kitchen and the upstairs bathroom.

I now have to deal with a plumbing vent that runs the length of the kitchen ceiling. This pipe tied into the plumbing vent for the kitchen sink. I am hoping that Derl, my plumber can get redo the vent. There are also a couple of other pipes that need to be moved.

I haven't gotten around to insulating the walls yet, maybe tomorrow. I will also need to frame around the chimney and add some 2 x 6 supports for the cabinetry.

On another note, I have just found out I have to approve the comments for them to be posted. I will keep an eye on them so feel free to post.

Baby steps

Mel and I got a good start tonight and managed to get a lot done. Hopefully if we get a few more productive evenings like this one, we might be drywalling the kitchen on the weekend.

Mel spent the evening putting in the sound and fire barrier. We are noticing a bit of difference in the amount of sound the barrier absorbs. The plan will be to hang plastic as well to help prevent the kitchen smells from next door getting into our space.

I spent the evening framing in our new window. Although it isn't here yet I framed out the rough opening so that I can just pull out the old and insert the new one. The plan is to do the same for the door as well. The new window will be much bigger, in fact it is 52" wide and 44" high. It will be at the same height as the current one but will go all the way up to the header.

Thank goodness I installed a header and framed in a proper window opening, our exterior wall was flexing in and out almost 3 inches. Now the wall is very solid and the weight of the upstairs wall and the roof is now distributed along the header.

I also managed to finish off the electrical. I installed 3 GFI outlets that will run along the countertop. That's pretty much it for the electrical all that will remain is wiring the pot lights and installing Mel's cool Erco Starpoint lights. Our pot lights are from Eureka Lighting (they are the ones with the red inset). Both of the lines are available through our buddy Dan's company Flux Lighting. Now it's up to Mel to do a lighting plan for the kitchen.

Tomorrow we frame in the door and insulate the exterior walls. If there is time I will also add some extra supports for the kitchen cabinets.