Spring Awakening

It's been awhile since I last posted, but in the meantime, we've been settling into the place pretty well. We're actually coming up on a year in the house, which is ridiculous when I think about it. More ridiculous, of course, is the fact that we have weathered our first winter in Forest Glen with a rather deficient heating situation. I've posted about this before, and since then, there has been very little movement on the issue. We went through the coldest winter in Metro DC in several years, and definitely felt it... downstairs.

The number of times we called, emailed, and texted our contractors is laughable.  Rory, the one who actually gets things done when you need, is now nowhere to be found. Instead, we are left with Mark, who always seems to have somewhere else to be, someone else who needs something, or an ailment of some sort. You know the guy in your office whose grandma died seven or eight times over the last year or two? That's him. Who knows? Maybe he just has a big (ill?) family. But I'm to the point with health issues that I just nod and zone out until they're done being discussed.

What does the Postal Service saw about
snow, sleet, dark of night?
Yeah, they all stop our contractors
from making their appointed rounds...

A few weeks back, we finally managed to set a time for Mark to come out, but there was a "snowstorm." Then, he had to cancel at the last minute for another appointment, which I actually was glad about, since it was pretty warm out that day, and I wanted him to experience the downstairs cold first-hand. Finally, our schedules meshed last week, and he came out. I was relieved that he seemed stumped by the issue of no wind at all coming out of our downstairs vents... But not really, since I'm pretty positive it's because he turned them off when he came back in February when I was out of town and Abby called him for help. He came by two days ago and fiddled with stuff again; presumably, he flipped the switch and redirected the heat downstairs again. Tonight, regardless of the temperature, I'm gonna force the heat to go on, and see if we can feel more than a trickle in the downstairs bathroom. You know, the one that was supposed to relieve my bathroom from the kids' mess, but instead sits pretty much unused because of its frigid temps.

Apart from the heat, Mark finally got Francisco to come over and install the hot-water tap they had to uninstall before our inspection last year. Since then, I've grown semi-fond of our disposal-- Abby still doesn't trust it-- so I wanted both installed. Plumbers off of ServiceMagic quoted us more than $600 (or was it $800?) to do the job, but Mark had said $250 way back when. It went in this week... But not without $150 being added to the bill. Oh, and it's plugged into the same outlet as the disposal, which means we have to unplug the disposal until we want to use it, then remember to unplug it and flip the switch back on afterwards. Ahh, the joys of getting "everything you want" in a house you renovate, amirite?

Speaking of getting everything you want, we got to check out the Swiss Chalet (not the restaurant, sadly) the other night when Lee invited us over. That's right: an honest-to-goodness cocktail party on a Friday night! (The kids were also invited, and played great with his.). Best of all, it was the first night of actual warmth, which meant we went without jackets, and the doors (and windows, I think) were left open. (This at the end of a week that started with a snow day, no less.)

The Chalet now

The Chalet is amazing. For those of you who don't know, it's the house that interested us in the neighborhood in the first place, back in February 2011. But the work was just too extensive (and expensive) for us to handle. Lee, however, has handled it *very* well, and has it on the market now, in case anyone's looking for a place with a genuine wine grotto, beautiful modern finishes, and a super-cool master bedroom suite with cathedral ceilings. My silly-favorite part of the place actually is the door: it's a substantial wood entry door split in half, so you can open just the top if you like, when the weather warrants. You know, maybe set a pie on it to cool or something. Mmm, pie. I showed my parents around in there today during the open house, and they loved it-- although it's got too many stairs for them, which is understandable.  But in my estimation, it's a masterpiece.

The next month has a bunch of stuff coming, not the least of which will be the expected arrival of our state historical tax credit, which will make us feel momentarily rich-- that is, until we remember we already spent that money, and we need to put it back in the mortgage... And of course, I will be able to start outdoor stuff in earnest.  Sure, the deer ate all of my vegetation that didn't die on its own before winter set in, but that was just a test.  In the meantime, I'm planning out the greenspace around my house, and hoping I'll be able to do so in a nice, warm family room, without the need for a heavy blanket, and with the kids' ratty toothbrushes and gunked-up toothpaste tube messing up their own, newly warmed bathroom, and not mine!  (Hope springs eternal, right?)

Squatting No More

It's been a month since I last wrote-- more than a month, in fact. And I wish I could say there have been massive movements in construction. Actually, were it three days ago, I could say absolutely no physical movements have been made. But in the past three days, well, movement. First off, though, is the most important thing to happen since I last wrote.

The reason I haven't written about the house for so long is that I haven't actually been in it. Between a 2,500-mile road trip and a 25,000-mile business trip, I only slept in my own bed four times during the entire month of August. But early last month, while I was visiting friends and family in Buffalo, we got the big news we'd been waiting for for so long: we passed our inspection. So, for the first time on this blog, I can tell you we are no longer squatters in our own home. (I know, right?) And I wish I could be more excited about that pronouncement of officialdom from the good people in Rockville, but the thing is, for the next month, absolutely nothing happened in the house. Oh wait-- they planted grass seed that actually grew. So there, we have a lawn. In the meantime, my closet lay in ruins, having been assembled and active since April; as a result, unpacking after 17 days of leisure, and packing for 18 days of business just 4 days later, was accomplished with more than a little consternation on my part.

But then, there was communication. Yes, none other than Servicez Unlimited themselves texted us, we thought because they wanted to work. But no.  Actually, they just wanted money. You see, we still owe them about $15,000, money that was held by the mortgage company until all work was done. You may remember it as the money they decided to allow to lapse rather than having to deal with us anymore. So, sure, we owe it to them, but they ain't getting it all until we are happy. Abby met with Marc and, while I said she should give him a third of it, gave him half. In exchange, they agreed to wipe away some of the ridiculous charges they had amassed, like a $70 charge for delivering a door.

A week later, still nothing from them. So I texted them back-- seeing as it's apparently the way they communicate best now, although I prefer email because of the more easily-discernable trail. By the end of the day, I've worked out with them that there are several things they're just itching to complete-- do you sense my sarcasm?-- and they can start on Wednesday, and "be finished by the end of the week," if I get back to them by 7pm; otherwise, it'll be another week, for some reason. Interestingly enough, I get the text at 5pm, giving me plenty of time to consider. But consider I do, and within 15 minutes I respond to most of the bullet points as if to say GET YOUR BUTTS OVER HERE. Among those things I don't agree to? A $250 installation of the hot water tap they had already installed, only to remove because they screwed up the plans they submitted to the county. The tap cost about $125, and I know for a fact my dad can install it; I'm pretty sure I can too, which tells you either how easy I think it is, or how little further work I wish to give to these guys.

So Wednesday comes. And voila-- my closet is reassembled. I feel I can step back into the adulthood I had claimed in April.

But then Thursday comes. And all the whining and begging and debating and convincing becomes worthwhile-- at least momentarily. We pull up in our parking space, look up at our kitchen windows, and see it: nothing. Nothing, as in there had been a ridiculously high backsplash blocking half of our window array. And now? At least five inches had been cut off. Abby ran into the house-- I think she forgot she had kids in tow-- and opened the window, yelling for me to come up and see. Walking into the great room, the change is immediately perceptible; there are just so many more TREES visible. Standing at the counter looking toward the glen, you can actually see most of the backyard without having to get up on the counter with your knees. It's the view we fell in love with 31 months ago, when we first stepped into the house. And the icing on the cake? Tiles. Abby chose white subway tile, similar to what we had in our old kitchen, except with beveled edges, to line the exposed walls and what's left of the backsplash, and they look amazing. The look is exactly what she wanted, the installation is perfect-- even along the uneven stone wall backing the fireplace-- and Abby is giddy. She decided it looks so good that she wants one more wall covered in it, rather than being painted. (Being the nice one, she at least feigned changing her mind if I would be upset that her plan would tile over a wall I had painted in my paintathon a couple months back.) For those of you who know Abby, you'll appreciate that she wanted this bad enough the she was willing to drive a half-hour through the suburbs to get an extra pack of tile, and another half-hour back to deliver it to the guys before turning around and driving yet another half-four, getting to the kids' school in time to pick them up. That, my friends, is dedication to design.

So that's where we stand now. Still incredibly frustrated with the contractors, but more and more feeling that it doesn't matter. It's the end of the week, and they're not finished as they had texted, but it's not like I believed them. After all, we're about a year late now-- remember, we were originally shooting for Labor Day 2012. Regardless, only small stuff is left for them to do. The biggest thing on our horizon now is paperwork. Ten days from today is the due date for our submission to the Maryland Historical Trust. As long as we amass all the receipts we can, fill out all the necessary documentation, and get it in on time, we'll get a giant chunk of change back from the State of Maryland as a thank-you for saving a deteriorated old property. I've already gathered about $120,000 in receipts, and Abby was tasked with getting at least $20,000 more from Home Depot today, so we're well on our way. Pushing it, sure, but we'll make it.

What will be interesting is whether we'll be happier about finishing this project or cutting our ties to the contractors. My guess? The latter in the short term, and the former in the long term. But both will be welcomed, and that's for sure!

3.5% Moved In

Originally, we were supposed to get our stuff delivered from storage today, so I took the day off.  Unfortunately, what ended up happening is that Zippy Shell had a technical issue.  The way Zippy Shell works is that they deliver you what is basically a cage in a trailer, or as they call it, a Shell.  You fill the cage, the trailer takes it back to their warehouse, where they keep it until they put it back in the trailer and deliver it to you.  From what I understand, someone is being belligerent about returning one of their trailers-- the same one they had planned to use when delivering our stuff, in our cage.  So instead of getting our stuff this morning, we will have to wait until Sunday.  That said, the owner of the franchise seemed genuinely sorry for the situation, and said he'd waive the delivery charge, so we'll deal...

Can you find Abby under all the stuff?

But the problem was that I had already taken the day off, and didn't want it to go to waste.  So, before we took the kids to school, Abby loaded the car full of stuff to take to the house.  It was frigid outside, so we made a pit stop for apple fritters and hot drinks, but we made it up to the house by 10 to deliver our first load of actual belongings into our home-to-be.  Really weird feeling... After a half-hour of procrastinating by giving a tour to Anique (sp?), the really nice woman who works in the main office, we headed back home to pack for round two.  This time, with no kids in the car, we were able to smash a lot more stuff in, including a giant tub of shoes on Abby's lap.

A window-box-full of stuff from Day One

After dropping the second load of stuff off, Abby dropped me off at the kids' school and went home to pack for a third round.  I got off pretty easy on this one-- she's so motivated to get out, that she's perfectly happy to do most of the packing work.  Not complaining of course, other than the fact that I had to stand out in what became the freezing cold playground for an hour (with good company, though) before she came back for us, again with a rather full car.  After a third round, we now have a decent dent taken out of the basement, and have made some rather substantial piles in various rooms throughout the house.

The rest of the weekend looks to be a LOT more fruitful, what with the Sunday Zippy Shell delivery and the appearance tomorrow morning of Abby's dad and brother; they're coming up from North Carolina to help us with moving our big stuff from the basement, like the couches and a giant bureau, with the help of my father-in-law's pick-up truck.  We're also hoping to use them to pick up some stuff from IKEA, like three new desks Abby's had her eye on.  (And if we get some meatballs in the process, it wouldn't be a shame.)  Once the weekend's over, we're hoping to have a bare minimum of belongings in the basement-- basically, the clothes we'll be using for the next week, our two mattresses, foodstuffs, and maybe some cushions from the already-moved couches.  Oh, and the TV; can't forget that.  Then?  It's only a matter of time, because on Monday the plumber is supposed to show up to finally hook up the toilets, the washing machine, the hot-water heater, and the fireplace.  On Monday night, I fully intend to go to the house and pee and wash clothes, maybe simultaneously.  Oh, and maybe dry them by the fire. In the meantime, I'll have to make due with the image of our newly-stacked laundry facilities, just waiting for their hookup.

Hook us up!  Please!

A bonus when it comes to the laundry room will be the fact that, due to erroneous ordering by our cabinet people, we're likely going to be left with several extra kitchen cabinets.  Abby says that, while talking to the installers, she found out that they generally just toss the misfit cabinets, or the installers take them home themselves.  Since to of ours are 90-inch-tall pantries, we're definitely interested in keeping them for ourselves, especially since one of them might fit perfectly next to the washer and dryer if we just push the two machines over a couple inches to the right.  It's not often we get silver linings like that, and I'll take it!

Another silver lining came to us when we found out Freedom Mortgage had officially severed our loan-- or whatever they call it when they cut their losses and run.  We had about $16,000 left in the credit line they had extended multiple times, and they just decided to put that money back into the mortgage and call it quits.  It actually works out for us, because we'd already paid that extra money (and more) to the contractors months ago, and had they written us a check, we just would have put it right back into the mortgage.  What this all means is that we are now officially good to refinance our mortgage, something I've been aching to do for a long time. Our current rate is 5.25%, which is not bad at all for what we had, which is called a 203(k) construction loan.  But now that the construction part is over, and interest rates are still historically low, I felt a need to take a refi and quick-- especially since our loan was FHA-backed, and they require PMI (mortgage insurance) on top of all payments, meaning we were paying an additional $200+ each month that had nothing to do with the interest or the balance, just for the right to have had the loan in the first place.  After 20 payments, I'm ready to shed that onus, that's for sure.

So I called Citibank, which is where we have our DC mortgage, and asked for rates; they told me 4.0%, which was great.  On a whim, I went to LendingTree.com and filled out a form on Wednesday night just for kicks.  On Thursday I faced a barrage of calls from lenders wanting to help us with refinancing, which was really refreshing, since when we bought the house we had to fight for exactly one obscure bank to make us an offer.  We ended up getting the best offer from a local broker with a bank I'd never heard of-- Round Point, which sounds like an oxymoron but I digress-- and locked in a 3.5% rate with no points and very low fees.  That means our payment will go down more than $800 a month once we refi-- hallelujah!  I called Citibank before we locked with Round Point and asked them to match the offer, since I really would rather have all my stuff at one bank, and they told me their rate desk required me to lock in my rate with the other lender first, then send Citibank the paperwork to consider.  I don't know how I feel about that, because it feels a bit like screwing the first guy buy having him do the work, then jumping ship for the too-big-to-fail chain.  I'll get back to you on my decision, but the gist of it all is that my  nearly $3000 monthly mortgage payment will soon be a thing of the past.  Phew!

"Round Point.  Because after all, we don't want you to poke your eye out."

Anyhow, that's all for today.  I'm staving off a cold, and have been popping generic DayQuils all day; about to NyQuil it and hope I won't drop before I physically hit the bed.  Tomorrow?  Progress.

And meatballs.

The Heat is On

Apparently, Glenn Frey
is the love child of
Randy Travis and
Chris Isaak.

Who would have thought that , 20 months after buying this house, I'd be praising the lyrical genius of none other than Glenn Frey.  Yes, Glenn Frey, that guy from the '80s that can't even be classified as a one-hit wonder, but really just the guy that happens to sing that song that goes "the heat is on."  Because, really, do you know any of the other words?  Well, I looked it up, and they are uncannily appropriate:

The heat is on, the heat is on, the heat is on

Oh it's on the street, the heat is on

It's on the street

The heat is on, the heat is on, the heat is on

Yeah it's on the street

The heat is on

I mean, can you get any more spot-on to describe what's been going on with our house these last few days?  First off, I should mention, the heat is on!  Yes, we managed to get Washington Gas out finally to install the gas meter.  That was important because none of the woodwork stuff can happen without at least some semblance of a controlled temperature.  Now, for instance, Mark can go tomorrow to pick up our wood floors; they need to be acclimated to the house for three days before installation, which basically means they'll be going in around the weekend.  And upstairs, the floors have also begun to change.  No need to show you what they looked like before, other than to remind you they are the original 1890s floors that have been on the ground in a house that's been pretty much derelict since the 1980s.  But this morning when we pulled up, we found Miguel and his three floor-doing machines (that's the technical term), each of which, we are told, cost more than $2500.  (Having been robbed back in 2008, and having most of what was taken be contractors' machinery, we told him not to store them in our house overnight.)  And Miguel (with his lovely and cold wife watching) did this to the floors on our upper level:

Yeah, I didn't recognize the floors either.

The schedule for the floors as we move through the week includes fixing any boards that need to be fixed (tomorrow), stripping the stairs (Wednesday), and then applying various ointments and salves as necessary.  Once the stairs are being touched, we won't be able to down them for a few days, so we've been getting as much use out of them as possible, having spent about 27 man-hours painting the lower level over the three-day weekend.  (Is "man-hours" a sexist term?  Well, Abby  painted for more than half of them, so deal with it.)  And, more than Miguel and his lovely and cold wife, we felt the brunt of this weekend's drop in temperatures.  Sure, Glenn Frey says the heat is on, and every once in a while we hear the heat going on, and if you're standing directly beneath a vent you can feel the heat being on, but overall we are very worried about the efficacy of our heating system.  Granted, the heat is currently set to about 55, just so we can have that semblance of environmental control necessary for flooring operations, but there is what Bostonians might call a wicked temperature gradient between the upper and lower floors going on, and it can't all be the fault of the fact that none of the doors or windows have an actual tight seal to them.  (Remember, as Glenn Frey said, "the heat is on, it's on the street."  He wasn't kidding.  We are, as every suburban dad likes to remind his kids, heating the neighborhood.  I happened to get a flyer from a home-efficiency company in the mail the other day, and I will be contacting them shortly to see if there's anything they can do about our windows.  Because we all know that ain't gonna get done with our contractor.

Our contractor.  Yep, the one who pulled all the radiators out of the house, then claims not to have realized there were so many holes in the floor so as to warrant a higher cost of replacing wood during the flooring process.  The one who seems to have alienated all of his subcontractors along the way, many of whom are quite candid in letting Abby know just how they feel about him.  One thing we have learned, however, is that however unsavory the contractor is, apparently everyone's smitten with the workmanship.  So hey, it may take two years to get this thing done, and we may have to send our kids to work in Kathie Lee Gifford's sweatshop, but by golly the work's great!

While talking to Abby about the house while driving to my parents' out in crazy-far Virginia on Friday (they have a "540" area code! "540!" Have you ever heard of that?) I was mentioning that while I really like a lot of what's happening with the house, I don't feel as personally invested in it as I did our DC house, because we did so much of the work ourselves last time.  I mean, I can remember my bloody fingers after applying muriatic acid on the brick, and I can still see the mummified pigeon fall on my coworker Billy's head as he stood on the ladder in Isaac's bedroom.  Yet prior to this weekend, the only things I actually did to this house, besides that very first day of knocking down drywall back on Christmas Day 2011 (2011? 2011!) was pick stuff out and pay for it.  And a lot of that stuff that I picked out never even came to fruition.  However, three days later, I can safely say that those 27 man-hours of painting have taken a big bite out of my worries.  (I can also verify that we listened to DC101 the whole time on the radio, and heard exactly one song featuring a female singer.)  We did some painting, and some more painting, and some more painting.  And now, that downstairs is painted like a mofo, and Abby and I had everything to do with that.

Abby had been going to paint for a week or so beforehand, and I had posted a pic last time with her in Isaac's room, but this is serious stuff.  Since that last posting, she ripped down the carefully placed painter's tape she had put up in his room, re-sanded the wall because she was unhappy with the alignment of the stripes, borrowed a laser-level from Lee, and painstakingly created a masterpiece of stripe-itude that can be marveled at from hundreds of feet away, since it faces out the window.  Seriously, it's impeccable-- judge for yourselves:

Abby's creation on Isaac's wall.
Notice the perfect alignment with the window panes.

Besides Abby's magnum opus in Isaac's room, which eventually will be a Buffalo Bills room, with red accents, she also managed to paint Lola's walls a lovely shade of what we're calling "Cinderella's Dress" blue, based on the sheets and pillows she bought for Lola in what could have been 2011, and have been sitting in storage now since Thanksgiving.  I thought this was going to be more teal than it is, but it's so bright and happy that who cares?

My job on Saturday and Sunday was white.  Abby had done a whole bunch of white prior to this weekend, so anything colorful was her bailiwick.  So I managed to get one coat on every white surface (walls and ceilings) in the family room, the laundry room, the storage room, the guest room, and the guest-room closet.  Abby was at once excited by my progress, appalled by the lack of attention I had while making several only-noticeable-to-her drips, and confused at how I could get so much more square footage done than her during the same timeframe.  Well, one of my wise commenters noted last time that while you want painting done fast, cheap, and well, you can only get two of those at a time, so there's that...  No, just kidding, I think I did a stand-up job.  (And for that, both Abby and I will be completely stiff for the first half of this week.)  

Isaac next to the newly-painted wall in his bedroom.
We let them draw on the floors, since they're just sub-flooring
and will be covered over within the week.

Can you see the white I painted in the family room?
Just nod your head and be nice, will ya?

While Isaac's striped wall may be the most technically difficult paint job we completed this weekend, definitely the boldest, and possibly the most likely to provoke ire, is in the family room.  The picture I posted directly above this one is purposely taken from this angle so as not to show you the wall to your right-- the one that you see when you come down the stairs.  It was Abby's opinion that this needed to be a "statement wall," because otherwise the room was apt to become a boring giant box.  Therefore, I give you Behr "Poppy Seed."  If you think Abby was proud when the stripes were done, you should have heard her giggling like a little girl when this color was going up.  And as for me?  I'm Mr. Color when it comes to walls, so it makes me very happy as well.

"Poppy Seed" going up on the family room "statement wall"

The completed "statement wall"

The wall's actually a smidge lighter than the black on the windows.
Lola's "Cinderella's Dress" Blue is in the doorway.

The downstairs shower, with the
floor tiles doubling on the ledges

I mentioned earlier that we were en route to my parents', because they were awesome and took the kids for the weekend so we could get all of this done.  We drove out to Sterling last night to have dinner and grab the kids from them, since they didn't have the day off today like I did.  That meant we couldn't tag team the paint job today, so I took the kids to Jump Zone in Columbia while Abby painted from 10-5.  On the way, we ran two errands: one was just a normal Target run; the other was a drop-in at Home Depot to buy our second five-gallon white eggshell container, but also to return three boxes of tile we had over-ordered.  And how did we know we had over-ordered, you ask?  Why, because the tiling in the bathrooms not only has begun, but is almost complete!  So besides our paint-stravaganza this weekend, there was a tile-fest going on in the bathrooms.  The first-floor bathroom is complete, with three different kinds of tile up and done.  Abby decided a couple weeks ago to use the flooring tiles on two different ledges in the shower, and that turned out to be a great decision.  (See for yourself below.)  Unfortunately, the tiles that went up on the vanity wall, while all coming from the same boxes, had a slight color variation that wasn't caught right away.  It won't matter once the vanity is up, because it'll block those either in shadow or altogether, but I mention it here because when you look at it below, you might think "ugh."  Yeah, we know, but it's okay, unless you plan on laying on the floor in our guest bathroom.  So just don't do that.  The floor tiles in the upstairs bathroom have also been laid, but I don't have a good picture to show, since the lighting was really poor when I took it.

The vanity wall.  (Don't) notice the four mismatched squares of tile.

So what we have here is a very, very positive week, workwise.  I apologize for not getting more information up during the week, since some of these pictures were taken on Wednesday when we came by for the draw inspection, but we've just been so busy lately.  You know, with the house.  I mention the draw inspection, and some of you may be wondering what's up with the loan and our "drop-dead date" of February 15.  Well, we had the draw inspection on Wednesday, and the paperwork went through, but I have a feeling there may be a bit of consternation upcoming between us and the bank.  Because our idea is that, since we have spent the amount of money the loan had designated, they should give us the remaining balance and close it all out.  But I have more than a sneaking suspicion that they're not happy we decided to go above and beyond the amount of the loan on our own-- which was our only recourse, given the state of the house, and was the plan from the start.  So I don't know that we'll ever see the money from that last draw-- which'd be fine, because it'd just get deducted from the total on which we're paying our mortgage.  But we'll see.  However, what is definite is that we no longer have a mythical "drop-dead date" for a loan, and we're looking at a matter of weeks for the finish.  Yeah, I know I said that before, and no, we're definitely not going to be living in the house come March 1, but it's coming, and it's coming soon.  The floors will all be done by the end of next week, the cabinets will be completed by February 28, my closet can go in once the floors are done, and the plumbing fixtures can probably go in next week as well.  I'm going on another short business trip next week, and I am 100% certain that the house will look livable, even if it may not be 100% livable, by the time I get back.  At dinner last night, my parents asked me where I wanted to go for my birthday, which is the Saturday after next.  I would really love to have it at my house, but I know that's not going to happen.  But you can bet your ass that we'll be eating dinner at  Anyu's dining-room table, in our house, on Abby's birthday, 20 days later.  And those aren't famous last words.  Glenn Frey?  You'd better start writing a song about it.

What Happens (When I'm) In London...

I was in London for four weeks-- about 675 hours-- this summer.  And you all know what happened on my house during that time: pretty much nothing.  Sure, we purchased our appliances and had them delivered, and "finalized" (ha!) our cabinet order, but that month was basically the first of several months that can be viewed as a complete waste in this process.  So you can imagine my surprise when this week, during my 34-hour stint in London, major headway was made Stateside.

First off, I got a voicemail upon my arrival at Heathrow Airport from Estes Express, a private shipping company, that I had what sounded like "600 pounds of stone" ready to deliver to my house.  Now, I had no idea what the guy was talking about, but I was game; after all, someone wants to deliver something!  Turns out it was our bathroom floor tile, 600 pounds of it, and it was coming a week earlier than we were told it would.  You may remember it had been on back-order, and we were given a date of February 10 for delivery.  And here they were, trying to deliver early.  I put them in touch with Mark, and he arranged for a Wednesday delivery, "between 12 and 6."  (Why do all deliveries have to have such huge windows?  Do they really not have a smaller window they can work with?)  Now, I'm considering this a success because, even though it is now Thursday and the tiles have not been delivered yet, the process worked... almost.  You see, even though Mark told Estes that there was a low clearance to get to the house-- due to the two little tunnels you have to go through to get by the main NPS building, Estes didn't seem to understand, and they sent a 13-foot truck for the delivery.  The clearance on the higher of the tunnels is apparently 10.5 feet.  So they called me-- at this point I'm in Belgium and it's after midnight, but I'm happy to oblige, since it may mean the delivery of the very thing the whole project needs to start-- and act as a conduit between them and Mark (again) until I just tell Mark to do the calling.  Turns out they can't even put the tile on a pallet, because technically the house is on a hill, and 600 pounds of tile on a pallet is not easily pushed, pulled, or otherwise coerced to move uphill.  (I say "technically" because even though I realize the house is on an incline, I don't think I had ever really considered that it truly was uphill, both ways, to get to the place.  Think of the stories my kids can tell their grandkids!)  So as far as I know, Mark is going to get his pick-up truck or van, park it probably 100 steps from the house, transfer all 600 pounds of tile from the delivery truck to his own, then drive his truck for maybe 15 seconds, park, and do a second complete move.  I don't envy him.  Except, well, it's gotta be done, and it's his job.  But in the end, I'm hoping by the time I get back to DC this weekend I'll be able to see some progress on the bathroom flooring.

The delivery truck couldn't fit through this tunnel.
Looking at it now, I don't understand how.
This looks a lot higher than 10 1/2 feet to me.
FYI, our house is immediately to the right of this shot,
and we see this stuff out our bedroom and kitchen windows.

I probably won't see progress on the wood flooring in terms of it being laid, but I very well may actually see it in the house.  That's because the order has been finalized, Mark talked to Floor Center and arranged to pick up the materials as early as 24 hours after the heat went on in the house.  And with Washington Gas coming by on Wednesday to set the meter and start the service, that could be as early as, well, today!  The part of this all that happened while I was in London, since that's the theme of this post, is the actual finalization of the order.  I went to see a show in the West End, and had about 20 minutes between the time I picked up my tickets at will-call and curtain-up.  So I called Floor Center to finalize the order-- 12,000 square feet, plus three long pieces of matching end-step material and five matching thresholds-- and spoke with Rory about arranging for pick-up.  Come to think of it, since the wood floors could be in the house by today, and the tiles could take until tomorrow to come (and hopefully not much later), I guess the wood flooring work could start first.  Either way, flooring!

And speaking of flooring, there's actually something completed in the house!  The tile Abby bought last week at Home Depot has been laid in the laundry room and the storage room.  Abby said she saw it on Wednesday, before they finished grouting, and she loves it.  I promise I'll get a picture as soon as I get there, and hopefully by then the washer and dryer will have been set in place as well.  Cool thing about this all is that once those two rooms are painted, we can actually start putting stuff in them!  Stuff like storage systems and STUFF-- as in OUR STUFF.  Granted, we just paid the bill to ZippyShell for February's storage, but I'll be pretty eager to get stuff into that area, since it'll be progress we can actually effectuate, as opposed to waiting for someone else.  I asked Mark for a quote on painting, since that wasn't included in our original estimate (to make it come in below the maximum loan amount), and we'll likely end up doing at least a bit more painting ourselves; I can't imagine that we wouldn't be painting the laundry and storage rooms ourselves, for instance.  I wouldn't mind doing some other stuff, and Abby has already been doing the kids' rooms, but there's no way I'm getting up on a scaffold or some crazy-tall ladder to do the great room.



Was I on this bus talking to Patty?
I'll never tell, although I can verify
I did see this building that day.



One last thing that happened while I was in London was finalizing the draw.  I had submitted the paperwork on the way to the airport on Sunday (and got sucked into two hours of work along the way, helping my coworker dig out from a mountain of Embassy Ankara bombing-related stuff, since my flight was delayed anyway) and thought everything was fine.  But on Tuesday afternoon as I left the Embassy in London I got an email from Patty saying I had to submit a lien-waiver request.  Argh.  So I talked to her while riding a double-decker bus in the rain back to my hotel (no lie, she got a kick out of that), and used the business center there to print out, scan, and email the form back to her.  I got an email late Wednesday noting the draw was approved, and expect to have that gigantic check in my hands this weekend.  (Remember, it's just money I've already been paying interest on, so it's not like it's a windfall, but it'll still be much appreciated!)  There's only a few thousand dollars left in the loan, which should be good to go before the end of next week when the loan officially is closed off, so all of that anxiety we were feeling about that issue a few weeks ago is all but gone now.  Now?  It's a sprint to the end-- I really do feel that.

So I would say that's a lot of progress, especially for less than a day and a half.  Not to mention, we had some progress the day before I left as well.  Although we drove up to a closed Acme Stove on Wednesday, we tried again on Saturday, successfully.  It was a breeze to order our fireplace insert-- which is not an insert, so I should stop calling it one.  We walked in, a salesman asked us what he could do for us, and we told him exactly what we had: the dimensions of our fireplace, a gas connection, the height of our mantel, our desire for actual heat, our preference for a traditional look.  He took us to the far corner, said "there you go," and showed us one model among several.  He said there were three sizes, there were three looks, and there was a choice of manual or remote starting.  I love easy choices!  A) the biggest one they had; B) the one that looked like the wood had been burned; and C) I didn't care, but since the remote system cost $350 more and Abby had no issues with turning the manual one on when she attempted it, we went for the cost savings.  There was one system that was prettier, in that the flame danced and flickered more, but the salesman explained to us that that system was not for sale, and was only an example of what people had in their heads, but was a terrible system to have.  Apparently when there's more flickering and more yellow flame, it's a much less efficient system and actually causes moisture in the room due to incomplete combustion-- hence, flickering.  The one we bought has a lot more blue flame (the hottest kind) at the bottom, and has a lot less flickering (denoting efficiency) at the top, and as a result is much better.  He did warn us that we are not allowed to burn it for more than 2-3 hours at a time and, like someone selling a purebred dog, said he wouldn't sell it to us if we didn't understand that.  Sounds good to me.  We put in the order, paid $1200, and should have it ready to install by about next weekend.



Come on over, in a few weeks, and warm yourself by our
RH Peterson RealFyre G-18 Evening Fyre Split Logs in "Charred."
If you remember the whole name, we'll let you make some S'mores.



There are still a few more projects that need a kick in the butt.  I don't know what's going on with the cabinets, and have to check that out.  (Note to self, send email before bedtime tonight.)  It also seems as if the four missing window frames, which were supposedly being manufactured by a company in Wisconsin, are not; Lee, the contractor from the Windmill, Pagoda, and Chalet, recommended a company in Baltimore, and Mark's going to get in touch with them to see if they can help us.  The floors on the second story are going to be finished, but only once the downstairs floors are delivered and laid.  The bathrooms can be finished, but only once the bathroom floors are delivered and laid.  And then there are doors.  Abby found a bunch of doors at Community Forklift, a place that deals in used housing materials in Hyattsville, and we've gotta see about getting them-- up to 15 of them!-- this week.  And a few other things as well, like doorbells and a kitchen sink.  But we're getting close, and now my inability to sit still is being caused less by complete nervousness and more by complete fidgetiness brought on by the light at the end of the tunnel growing considerably bigger and brighter over the last ten days. 

If only I spent a day and a half in London a long time ago.

20 Months, 7,000 Hits, and a $25,000 Check

Kids and, more importantly
at this point, cabinets!

Before I start, I just wanted to marvel in my own awesomeness.  Seriously, folks, I have 7,000 hits on this thing now; that's pretty awesome. :)  Thanks for reading along.

Anyhow, it's February.  Today marks our 20-month anniversary of Maryland homeownership.  Twenty months of paying two mortgages.  And we're not quite destitute yet.  Actually, we got some good news today at the draw inspection: we're going to get a reimbursement check of just over $25,000 this week!  Granted, it's not like the money we'll actually get back at the complete end of this process from the Historical people, because this is money we spent already and have been paying interest on for these past twenty months, but still, it will make my bank accounts look and feel so much better... at least until it's spent again all too soon.

The reason behind that "windfall," however, is because stuff's actually getting done.  More than half of that is to reimburse us for the kitchen cabinets, which started going in yesterday after that slight delivery glitch earlier this week.  Yeah, but don't get too excited.  They do look great, but there's an issue: apparently, even after having been measured twice, our crazily-shaped room has thrown the installers for a loop.  Between their measuring tapes and the computers, some of the cabinets don't fit.  I have no idea why not, but I do know that, most importantly, it's not our fault, and will not cost us any money.  Phew!  What it does mean, though, is that the kitchen won't be truly complete for a few more days, and we possibly won't be able to measure for the countertop until it's all fixed.    It was pretty cool, though, to walk into the house the other day and see half of the great room stacked up about eight feet with enormous cardboard boxes.  Not to mention, Abby and Lola had a ball today when they got to pop probably 50 linear feet of bubble wrap.

Nothing else has gone in this week, which is slightly annoying, but things are being delivered like the dickens-- that is, if things can be delivered like the dickens.  Earlier in the week it was the vanities and the cabinets, then the sconces for the kitchen and porch, then tiles.  Yesterday, Abby went to Home Depot to pick up the toilets, and couldn't pick me up from work because every square inch of the car that wasn't filled with her or the kids was filled with toilet.  While there, she found some clearance tile that she thought was perfect for the laundry room and storage room-- finally, something on clearance!-- so she put six boxes of the stuff on hold overnight and went back today to pick it up.  That might be the first flooring that goes in, which'd be fine because it'd mean we could get the washer and dryer installed, and start moving stuff into the "basement attic."  We've been watching this microwave online for a while at several different stores, and the price has fluctuated up and down from about $325 to $400.  Finally when we're ready to buy it, pretty much everyone has a 3-week wait for it, whether we want it delivered or picked up at a store.  But I found a Sears about 45 miles away that had a new floor model marked down 20% so I grabbed it, and hope to pick it up tomorrow.    Sure, I've gotta drive all the way out to White Marsh Mall (which is the one where we discovered we didn't need to bundle Isaac up like all of our older female relatives were instructed during the winter, because he turns bright red and screams...), and I'll spend ten bucks on gas, but the price difference will be about $80, and we'll get the thing tomorrow instead of who-knows-when.

Isaac's wall will be Bills colors.
Let's Go, Buffalo!

Probably the most house-interesting time this week was Wednesday.  Abby spent the day painting Isaac's room and taping the stripes onto his wall, and we came by after I picked the kids up from school.  After hiking down to Purple Playground in the park, Abby picked us up and whisked us out to the flooring store in the driving rain.  There, we finally bought our hardwood floors.  I know, right?!  So the floors are expensive, but we decided to go with them and abridge where they'll be.  So at $10.25 a square foot, we'll have DuChateau flooring's Danube flooring, from their Riverside collection (all three terms sound totally douchebaggy, don't they?) in the kids' bedrooms, the guest room, and the family room.  And the 99-cent clearance tile in the downstairs rooms that really don't need such fancy stuff.  So the kids are running around in the store, the guy's writing up the order, and something truly weird happened: I noticed I was on my phone, texting, while Abby checked her voicemail and actually answered an incoming call.  Seriously, folks, not only were both of our phones charged, but both of us were on then at the same time, of our own volition.  It's times like that that make me understand that, yes, maybe we can get this darn project completed.  Anything's possible!

From there, it seemed like a hop up Rockville Pike to the fireplace store.  But it was rush hour in the driving rain, and an hour later we pulled into the parking lot of Acme Stove, which had closed nine minutes before we got there.  Argh.  No matter, though, because that would have been bonus points for the day, and the fireplace isn't a must-finish.  (Gonna try again tomorrow anyhow.)  So we went back to the house to meet up with Lee, the contractor for some of the neighboring houses.  He wanted to take a look inside our place, and we had asked him for his ideas on what we could be doing.  We're not going to drop our contractors, but anyone who has read any of my blog entries can tell that we're not confident in their ability to be proactive in letting us know what to expect next.  It was nice to talk to him, because even though he brought up a bunch of issues I hadn't thought about-- like when we should be getting the trim, and why isn't there an obvious water service to the water heater?-- most of his comments were positive and constructive and not intimidating.  Seeing that we've really taken control of the direction of things over the past ten days or so, I think we can steer this thing to a good place by the end of the loan period.  (Remember, anything's possible!)

Granted, nothing's happening.  Which is why I emailed the contractors tonight with a list of questions and information for them to use to get cracking.  First off is the paint-- Abby's been picking out colors, and only priming is included in our contract, so if we are cleared to paint, we're going to go ahead and do that, partially by ourselves, and partially with painters.  (I ain't getting up on a ladder to paint no 20-foot ceilings!) We'll get a quote from them, and from a couple other places, and go with the best quote and the best timing possible, which is cheap and now.  And at this point, while I'd certainly have no problem with giving them the business, I'll have no issue with finding another outfit to do the work if it means it'll get done.  So, until that stuff gets sorted out, I'll leave you with the letter and you can judge for yourselves as to whether I got my point across.   Now to go chase a ground hog...

Hi guys: I wanted to follow up with you as to where we stand right now, based on what's been delivered to the house and what can get moving at the beginning of next week.  We also have some questions for you, so if you could get back to us on all of this before the end of the weekend, that'd be great.

1. The cabinets have hit a snag because of apparently faulty measuring.  But it's okay with us, because it's either Home Depot's fault or the installer's fault, but not ours.  So while they sort it out and possibly order one different cabinet-- on them, of course-- there are several kitchen-related things.
• Rory, we're going to pick up the microwave tomorrow.  However, there's a kit to have it fit into the opening that is only sold online, so we'll have to wait for that to be delivered to be installed.
• At what point does the cut have to be made for the range hood vent?  Would that need to happen once the exact placement of the range hood is certain after cabinet installation?
2. What ever happened with Washington Gas?  Are we all good with the HVAC now?  We never heard anything back following the scheduled Wednesday appointment.
3. Can you guys take that horrible smoke detector away from the middle of the joist in the Great Room?  That thing is ridiculously ugly.  I'm sure it will be fine with code if a detector is put somewhere on the wall or something, but it definitely doesn't have to be where it is right now!
4. The tiles for the laundry room and storage room have arrived, and can be installed.  I think it'd be a great idea to get those done, because that'd also get the washer and dryer to the point they can be installed and taken out of the way.  I'm guessing some sort of underlay is needed for those floors before the tile can go in, and that's something you guys are going to have to get, since we can't fit stuff like that in the Prius.  
5. Our light fixtures have arrived for the front porch and for the kitchen-- 2 in each place.  They can be installed whenever.
6. Are the walls all set for painting?  We are assuming so, but wanted to make sure.  Since the painting is not included in the contract, we wanted to get a price from you guys as to how much it will cost before we go ahead and do it.  We might choose to do some of it ourselves.  We're pretty sure, though, that the painting should be done prior to laying the wood flooring, since we know what kind of mess paint is on wood floors.
7. That said, the wood flooring has been ordered and should be in by the middle of this week.  You guys will have to pick it up; the place we ordered it from is in Rockville, right near the White Flint Mall.
8. Do we need to buy a water heater?  If so, what specs?  If that's something you guys are going to do, please note we want something really efficient, but also really capable of pumping out mass quantities of hot water... I do have a wife that likes 45-minute showers, and we often use hot water with more than one appliance at a time.
9. Any word on the windows?  Last Wednesday, Mark noted something about communications with the company in Wisconsin, but nothing more... Those really need to be getting back to us soon, no?
10. Sheyy came by for a draw inspection today.  He just sent us the paperwork, and I am going to try to get it to you by Sunday afternoon.  Even though this entire draw is money owed to us, and not to you, we will still need your signature.  Hopefully we can get it to Patty on Monday.  There will just be one more draw, on or about February 13; after that point, we won't have to deal with the loan anymore, and we can just work on a project-by-project basis until we finish.  We're still very much needing to move in before the end of this month, so let's all keep our eyes on the prize!

Thanks, and I hope to hear back from you shortly.