Landscape, Cabinets and Delays

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Let's start off with the fun stuff! Britta delivered the planting plan for the front yard on Wednesday and I love what she's doing. She calls the area in front of the retaining wall the Sun Slope and plans for a California feel. New Mexico Century Plant - a type of agave, New Zealand Flax, creeping rosemary, blue oat grass and a crape myrtle multi-stemmed tree, which features prominently.

In the Upper Garden she has planned a more Pacific Northwest garden featuring, not one, but two multi-stem Coral Bark Japanese Maples, sweet box, lilyturf, hosta, black mondo grass, lamb's ear and Irish moss. Mugo pine and cotoneaster are threaded through both garden areas. The illustration above does not include everything, I just wanted to give Scott an idea of the plan. Yes, I'm totally geeked out. 

I submitted the plans for the front yard hardscape with the City on Wednesday. Two amendments, for the existing Right of Way and Grading and Erosion permits, and I filled out a new structural permit application for the retaining wall. Now we wait.

Floor tile complete in the primary bath, Brian installed the vanity on Monday.

On Wednesday IKEA delivered the insides for the wardrobes in the primary bedroom, laundry, den and entry. I got to work on Thursday and Friday and Scott helped on Saturday putting together the primary bedroom wardrobe insides. On Sunday I installed the insides of the laundry wardrobe.

Primary bedroom wardrobes

Laundry wardrobe

Brian and I worked out some fit issues on the first floor bath vanity and it has been placed in the bathroom for the short-term pending final wall paint.

Just in time for the den shelf cabinets to arrive on Friday. This morning, Monday, Brian opened the cartons to find the shelf cabinets are ten inches too tall. I double checked my paperwork, I ordered the right size. Nope, this was a data entry error by our sales rep. It happens. What's important is how it gets fixed. They could order new cabinets or have a local craftsman fix them. We're trying the local craftsman first, no charge to us, of course. If we have to order new cabinets we're looking at a couple months wait. I don't have that kind of time.

Brandon the tile guy was on hand on Thursday and Friday to tile the entryway (it looks great!) The wall tile seems to be taking the long road from wherever it was shipped. It now has a delivery date of this Wednesday, so Brandon should be here Thursday and Friday unless our luck holds out.

The hearth and wood storage box under the fireplace has been a pacing item for a while. Flooring installation can't continue until they are in place. The week before last we were given finish samples for the hearth and surround. The three samples on the left are various blackened metal finishes. There is an unevenness to the finishes that is typical of a blacked finish which we always thought would be really cool. The far left sample has a gloss clear coat that we didn't care for, the other two have matte finishes that we preferred, but. We tested their durability by scraping wood across the samples. You can see the scratches that were left. This is a problem for three reasons - first, the scratched area will "flash rust"; second, to repair the finish takes sand blasting and an acid bath and several other steps not practical for in home use; and third, the scratches would drive Scott crazy.

The final sample on the right is a matte black painted finish. It is really beautiful and we're told that it's much more durable. It's also much easier to repair should it get scratched. Decision made, the hearth and box were to be delivered last week. From there it's almost a comedy of errors. Monday - bugs in the paint; Tuesday - repair orange peeled, sandblast and repaint the entire thing; Friday - painted with the wrong finish. Plan for Monday morning!

It's really hard to photograph, but the hearth and wood storage box were installed today, Monday, around 3 pm, the fit perfect and it looks great. Now the flooring can continue, flooring Brian says he'll be at the house first thing tomorrow morning. We'll see.