Pinstripes
Carpet is a big step! Once we have all the flooring down we feel like we can finally start moving some stuff over! We chose the this carpet made of 50% recycled bottles to get some green building credit. It has pinstripes–so fancy. We chose a recycled carpet padding as well–bring on the recycled content…
Backsplashes
We had two quick tile jobs to knock out– ADU Kitchenette and the main kitchen. I was ready with a bunch more cheap white Home Depot subway tile… but hubs said we needed to mix it up a little. It’s much harder to pick tile when you don’t just go with cheap white subway tile!…
All the king’s horses and all the king’s men…
couldn’t put my fireclay farmhouse sink together again. So close, things are finally looking like a real house, cleaned up and ready to go. Faucets are in, appliances are in, outlets are in… and I JUST happen to notice a small crack in the fireclay farm house sink we installed a couple weeks ago. It…
What’s red and bad for your teeth?
Bricks! We needed to redo the brick step in the back of the house because of the new mudroom door. I trolled craigslist and found some old bricks to use that matched our existing old brick patio a little better than brand new bricks. This was one of the only things that actually went pretty…
Pandemic
We are so close to being done (although we’ve been saying this for about a month now…) and in the last week or two before we are set to schedule final inspection… we get hit with the “shelter in place” order. We had been following the news obsessively and knew this was coming. We also…
Kitchen Refresh
Almost the entire house was getting a little refresh with the project. Except the kitchen. So at the last minute the contractor said he would help us install new cabinets/countertops in the same configuration as existing. We got the cabinets super cheap (<$10K for main kitchen, kitchenette, laundry and bathroom cabinets) from NGY Stone and…
Measure Twice – Cut Once
So as we get close to the end, I am trying to make sure I have everything I need on-site or on-order. I have a newish whirlpool dryer that I was planning to use and need to order a new front loading washing machine to match. I noticed that there were two sizes (capacities) of…
Slow Floors
We started with a mix of 90 year old 2 inch top-nailed oak floors in the living room, cheap fir wood floors (probably subfloor?) in the downstairs bedroom, and 1990s quartersawn oak floors in the kitchen and family room. The goal was to tie it all together and match the newest floors. I love that…
Got Power?
I mentioned utilities upgrades here. In order to install the electric service upgrade, we had to dig a giant trench through the yard AND tear up the sidewalk. The tear up the sidewalk we had to get a permit from public works. To get the permit you need the approved electric service application (which SHOULD…
Got Gas?
We have to upgrade our utilities (electric and gas) for this project. The process started during the building plan review process when we had to fill out this form. The form then had to be stamped approved by both gas and electric utilities people at the city. So we ended up with TWO copies of…
Palo Alto Homemaker 