Wicked!

Wow, it only took up about 3 months of my thoughts, but I've decided on an exterior paint colour.  13 colours tested which I'm very glad I did as what you see on a paint chip can be very different in reality.  Last week walking the kids to school there was a newly renovated house on the different route we took, what a beauty!  I went up and rang their doorbell on Friday to see if they would mind me holding my paint deck up, but no one was home.  The colour I had pre-selected that I thought was it turned out to be darned close so I didn't need to stand there giving myself a colour consultation.  Good match, I was happy.


Went to General Paint yesterday and got a test pot of "Wicket" a lovely greenish gray or grayish green, depends how you see it.  I plan on doing that with white trim and a sill detail in either darkest colour from that shade or with a British Racing Green - hey it'll match our Austin Mini :)  hmmm, with our white wagon and our green Mini I wonder if we'll look like we're matching our house to our cars.  Give your head a shake Essy, that's a bad road for you to go down!


So here it is, what do you think?  


Oh and with any luck the garage interior demolition will commence tomorrow!  That means we have to bust it out and finish emptying it.  So close now just those few bits we don't know where to put left.

Left chip is a British Racing Green and the right is chocolate brown which might be nice as detail

The rest is General Paint's "wicket"  

Wicked!

Garage and Colour!

It's darn real now... handed over a pretty sizable cheque today for the go ahead of our garage conversion.  We are reluctant to sign off for the house since the hazardous materials test and permits haven't been completed yet, so we've got an amended contract which basically says we're going ahead with the garage now, but will go ahead with the house when those items are settled.  We're finding our Contractor and Designer to be very willing to make things work for all parties, couldn't be happier.


Now the fun part is to completely empty our garage and get rid of any bits laying about by Monday (should happen then or abouts).  Since we nixed the U-pak idea the kept contents of the garage have been moved to the sun room, shed and the kids playhouse!  Still some big items to go, but we'll make room...someplace.


Boy, we should build a bigger house :)


Oh yes, I also found the house colour combo of my dreams today so I'll head out once again to get some sample tins finalise it.  So excited now as that's been really weighing on my mind.


My only disappointed lately is that I went to head over to Ikea on the weekend (4 hr trip away including ferry ride), but a friend luckily noticed their add that they were moving locations.  Phoned to see what kind of stock they had and she said they were down to liquidation.  As hugely fun as that would be to poke through deals, I really did want some particular items.  Try again next month.  Boo.


This post looks lonely so I'll add some photos of my colour choice as soon as I can.  

...Testing

Still at it.


This time I headed to Home Depot for their Behr sample pots and brought home six new ones including the 'Tea Bag' colour I thought I wanted, now not so much.


I am really liking 'Granite Boulder', 'Pewter Grey', 'Ashwood' and still 'Gray Horse' from Benjamin Moore.

First is 'Gray Horse', fourth is 'Pewter Grey', sixth is 'Ashwood' and seventh is 'Granite Boulder'

That second one is 'Tea Bag' is very straw coloured

Nothing to do with anything, but our Magnolia, although giving me wicked allergy attacks, is looking so stunning right now.

Testing

Well I'm zeroing in on a exterior paint colour.  Went and purchased six sample pots from Benjamin Moore to try out, two of which I liked.  I also tried out the trim colour we currently have which is a dark army green.  I think I'll have to nix that idea as when I looked over at the shed painted in the same colour I noticed that it was quite faded compared to what I freshly tried out.  No good.


I really think I'm heading in the gray direction now.  My husband says the gray I like looks like concrete, but done correctly it will look very classy with white trim and black details such as wrought iron here and there and planters.  I would love a glossy black front door, but I don't have the heart to paint over our fairly nice oak door  we currently have.  I can be a bit of a purist in those respects - I like original woods and brick.  


I'm going to head over and pick up a sample of Behr's Tea Bag just in case though and I still haven't excluded the thought of keeping it the same colour we have now - very practical if we're only doing stucco patch work on the garage conversion rather than siding.  It's a constant!

The inspiration...

Photo taken from blog site www.theimpatientgardener.com

I really like the idea of that whole porch window detail being in white, as well as all other trim then the body painted gray

Could one of these be the winner?

The testers

I like the end one and the darker gray (I do really like some of these for the garage interior paint though)

The 'Gray Horse' on the left is pretty good, picture it all with white trim and black accents.

The greenish gray on the right is reminding me a of a McDonald's Shamrock Shake so that simply won't do

...or do we just go with the Montana Tan we're currently sporting, but with white trim, that's a must!

The Kid Test

Boo, another surprise cost - a hazardous material test for the portion of the house coming off.  They'll need to take samples from the walls, floor and structure at the point where the section will be removed.  Here's hoping for no asbestos :/  Doubtful, but with these things you never know, safety for all comes first!  The front half was built in 1912 and the second half (that's coming off) is circa 1980 so it's hard to say what will be found.

In other developments...
I've decided on a carpet for the stairs and second floor!  The best one seems to be Fabrica's 'Denali' in colour 'Ovation'.

I had all my carpet samples out and matched up the right one to all the other selections I made for finishings so far, then narrowed it down to two, then decided on this colour solely for it's kid resistant factor.  It's remained the exact same colour all week while I had it lying in the most highly kid trampled spot in the house.  I'm happy - not that I won't vacuum and clean just as often, but it's nice to know that if I miss a day when company is coming, I don't have to be embarrassed!

Thanks Fabrica!

Fabrica Denali in Ovation DN12

I'm at it AGAIN!

Update - still waiting on permits...still trying to pick exterior paint colour.

I had every intention of going to the paint store today to get some sample colour paints tins, really I did.  Instead I walked by the wall of colours and found myself, once again, looking through them all to see if I like one just that much better.  Well I guess I did as I walked away with another hand full of chips.  Now I know why people hire decorators (like myself) to choose for them.  I can choose a colour for another person in a heartbeat and they turn our very successful, but picking for myself has proven to be very tricky.  I think my problem is that I like so many colours but at the same time find it hard to commit since an exterior paint colour is not something you can't easily change once a year.   This needs to be a 10 year commitment so it better be good!  My husband keeps saying just go with the colour we have now but I'm finding it just too tan, needs to go either a bit more gray or a bit more green. 

While I do have several brands of paint decks I seem to have better success choosing from a store's wall of colour....well maybe I have more success, we'll have to see about that.

The ones I don't really like

The ones that I  like...today.

I use a white sheet of paper to represent the trim since I'll be going white for that for sure

The two above the white piece of paper are looking pretty good to me, below is the 'tea bag' that I liked last week, but now it's looking tan! 

Headache...oh, I mean Headboard

Since the fabric wasn't wide enough to go the width of the board I had to do some match up and sew together work.  All was going so well and I had thought to myself that everything was going so swimmingly then...RATS!  I had cut to size the wrong chunk of fabric.  I didn't have enough extra to correct the problem and I'm too cheap to buy more so I just went with it and decided that I would really be the only one to care about my mistake.  I may always think of that mistake every single time I look at it forever on out, but hey, worse things can happen.

Overall though I think it looks pretty nice and around about October I'll be able to install in onto the bed rails.  No point doing that now as our bedroom is slowly becoming storage space for all that's being moved around for this project.  I'll just wrap it up and store it someplace.

Another day I'll post about the master plan for the Master, but today is just too nice and sunny out to be thinking about that. 

Hope I don't have wrongly cut bird upholstery nightmares tonight :/

1984 Glam Headboard

Sort out where the fabric should go

(those birds really fought with me)

 Remember, I'm frugal so this is an old mattress pad I saw peaking out of the cupboard that I used for some padding for just a little comfort and poofiness

The mistake. 

That wrong side is the piece I should've cut, but I did the main bit underneath by accident.  Anyway, whatever, I sewed these together - one panel on each side

Staple, staple, staple then voila, done!

I reckon those two off center birds will be covered up by shams so I'm not too worried about their position (normally that would make me crazy).  When I've decided on wall colour then I'll paint out the legs so they disappear a bit or else just let the skirt and nightstands hide them.



Headboard Idea

I'm thinking to maintain my sanity while I wait for things to get going I should really start on some projects that will be used in the new house. 

I have this dream of a bedroom retreat that the kids will only be allowed in with strict rules applied to their visit.  With our house being so tiny right now, our master seems to be the destination hiding spot for hide 'n seek.  Makes me nuts.  Especially when the freshly washed laundry is in a pile to be folded.  Somehow that pile ends up in a mass on the floor once they're done.  Grr.  Anyway, the new master will be a grown up woman's oasis (my husband will be allowed in, but it'll be all ME).  I see fabrics of all sorts of patterns and textures, real furniture (not random hand me downs that we just have just cause), soothing paint and white where ever it can go.  I need to be practical and know that may not all happen right off the bat, but I'll see what we can do about that!

I've had my parents circa 1985 headboard for a while now.  It's been with us for a while, then a friend used it, now it's back to us as of today.  I reckon tomorrow's job will be to head to the fabric store for some batting so I can reupholster it.  I ordered the fabric from Tonic Living some time ago so now is a good of time as any to ger 'er done. 

It's a pretty simple job, but I'll do a before, during and after shot so you get the idea.  I'll post that once complete, hopefully sooner rather than later.

Here's a teaser of the fabric I'll use.  Too bad it'll have to wait about 5 months to show itself off. 

Tonic Living's 'Vintage Blossom in Jade'

$20.95 USD/YD

Sakura

Today it was a refreshing change to not think about the renovation too much.  I did take the time in the am to have nice stroll to the park with the kids and really have a look around the great neighbourhood we live in.  March and April are a particularly pretty time around here.  Our area, as well as much of our city, has the most lovely looking and smelling cherry blossom trees in bloom this time of year.  Our street are lined both sides with them, including a great big one right outside our front door. 

Cherry blossoms, much like peacocks and art nouveau, are also a huge decorative love for me.  I get pretty jealous when I see little girl rooms all decked out with blossom decoration (not that I don't love my boys and their want for a BumbleBee and Bowser room).  You'll see blossom touches here and there in the new place I'm sure...I'm sure.  If I don't then I may just have to plan a trip around the Cherry Blossom Festival in Japan.  Hey, we need that here.

Pretty easy to see why we don't want to move...Now to get the city to remove those unsightly power lines, phft!

Our street

Around the corner (a great oceanfront park right at the end of this)

Can't beat that

Carpet While I Wait

Carpeting seems to be my major thought for the renovation today.  We're still waiting on the appraisal so may as well spend my time picking finishes now to speed things along later. 

Gabriel Ross is a retailer to a very good make of carpeting so I thought I would work with that product first and see if it fits our budget.  So far, so good, but I'll need to order some samples first to make sure what I like on screen is just as good in person.  Gabriel Ross is in the process of moving locations so all their sample stock is in storage for the time being.  No worries, they can easily order the samples that I'm interested in.

Fabrica, out of California, is the company for the carpet.  They carry nylon and wool carpets as well as rugs and with heaps of selection.  Not only that, they are highly involved with efforts to be as 'green' as possible by using reclaimed water in their carpet making progress and was named the premier mill in the United States by top retailers.  Not too shabby!

We have their carpeting in a couple of our rooms now and for the last 3 yrs they have held up very well to the extreme traffic our household creates.  I definitely chose the wrong colour though as stains and daily dirt show up very easily so I need to clean them often.  Also it's a cut pile with loop so it must hold the dirt tight.  Next colour will be a cut pile and the same colour as dirt!  These guys have 72 colours to choose from in the cut pile I like :/ 

Fabrica's 'Denali in colour Ovation'

Seems like a good colour to mask kid happenings

'Denali in Spiced Curry'

'Denali in Pretzel'

+ 69 other colours to choose from in this pattern alone!

Designs in Bloom

I just have to share the talent of my friend Cathy and her "blooms".  She is mastering the Japanese art of Tsumami Kanzashi and making a business of it as well.  She first mentioned what she was up to about a year or so ago that she does a fabric folding craft.  I had no idea as to how amazing they were until I saw them in person.  I know I don't have the patience to be so careful with such tini bits of fabric so I am in awe.  Talented family over there as her husband is a photographer and has been doing the photo shoots for her blooms and they look wonderful.

She's just launched her new blog site so stop by and have a browse!

http://designsinblooms.blogspot.ca/

Sure, this has nothing to do with our renovation, but renovating is all about creating and seeing things a certain way.  Working with colour, form and function, it has the same principles.

'Blue Flower Hair Clip, Brooch, Kanzashi Accessory'

Doesn't that just say lovely warm summer day to you?

Tea Bag

I think I've got it...I think.  I've chosen an exterior paint colour.  The lucky paint is Behr's Tea Bag UL180-8 and I would pair it with white trim, but still need to decide on detail colour and front porch floor colour.  The kids actually let me browse through Home Depot on the weekend so I got a few ideas cooking for things including floor selection for the garage.  I will definitely get a sample pot for this colour choice just to be sure and knowing me I'll keep on looking just in case something better comes along, but for today (and yesterday), this is it!

Now, I've got 2 1/2hrs all to myself this morning so it's time for a nice quiet tea with some Food Network R&R.  Food Network is another guilty pleasure for me, I love learning new recipes, most of which I never make since I'm a vegetarian :/  Whatever.

'Behr, Tea Bag UL180-8'

It's a fairly neutral shade with just a titch of green

'Allure Vinyl Plank in Milano'

This vinyl plank has to be the most amazing product for high traffic homes.  It's very easy to install and can be cut to size with just a metal ruler and blade.  From there it's just place the edge over another's sticky side to lay.  With heaps of kids running through here all scratches made have just disappeared (except the one where my husband dragged a huge tv across the floor, ahem).  Also, it's very easy to keep clean and is ideal for any water spills that can happen.  We've fooled many into thinking it's actual hardwood since at first glance it's very convincing. 

Just $47.76 per 24 sq ft box.

More Colour Love

With May fast approaching that means exterior colour choice should happen in the near future to ensure no rash decision is made on the fly.  I could listen to my kids and either do a red, bright blue or rainbow house, but I think they can do that on their own houses someday (not that I don't appreciate colourful homes).  As for me, I flip through my paint decks daily, looking for that IT colour that will just speak to me. Today I take inspiration from my living room drapery fabric choice and see what I can come up with.

I just have to give praise to Tonic Living. They have the most amazing on line collection of sophisticated, modern, fun and all purpose fabrics I've found in one place.  Price points are amazing, often at just $9.95/yard.   We'll be doing most of our fabric buying through them.  All those choices I'll talk about another day.

For now, let's get crackin' on that exterior paint!  To save about $13000 we'll be doing all the painting ourselves.  As my husband puts it - "she loves to paint, I tolerate it" so I think I'll be the foreman on that job.  I do not do ladders so that means all the siding will be delivered and we'll paint off each strip one at a time then they can put it all up pre-painted.  I have fewer daycare kids here in May so I can bust it out then...I hope.

I'm using Farrow and Ball for my paint deck today.  Unfortunately, their price point is a little beyond our budget but their colours are so wonderful so if you can afford it, go for it!

Which reminds me, I need to check my 6/49 ticket.

Tonic Living's 'Grand Tapestry' will likely be the living drapery, $9.95/yd!

Using this to draw from for today's paint selection and see how I like it.

Cooking Apple Green No. 12

This would look so nice as the house body colour with can white trim and Olive below as sill detail

Olive No. 13

Sill detail

Stone White No. 11

Perhaps an alternate to Cooking Apple (my monitor is making this look crazy bright but the actual sample is quite subdued.

Zoo Break

It sure has been a pleasant day - not weather wise as it's pretty chilly out, but that didn't stop us from heading to Beacon Hill Petting Zoo.  It was nice to take my mind off all the things happening this week and just have a good time with the kids and my daycare baby. 

Got the call from the home appraiser to come on Wed for their inspection - glad I mowed the front boulevard yesterday for some better curb appeal.  I know it doesn't matter too much about how things look as they're just after what homes have sold for in the past and the general state of the property.  Fortunately for us, two houses across the street sold for a pretty decent price in the summer and there is another house for sale down the street for $679000!  Not that ours compares to that, but it's an indication of market value for our neighbourhood.

I wish I could post the kitchen plan ideas I've done on Ikea's Kitchen Planner, but I can't make it work (remember, computer dumb) but I'll find a way to show you what I've been thinking about.  We actually are a little torn about how to set it up.  Since we can't have a renter right away we don't want to sink a lot of money into it, BUT if renters can happen soon then it'd be nice to be ready.

Anyway, here's a taste of what I saw today.  How's that for inspiration?!  I must throw it in here that I completely and totally love peacock things - pillows, colours, shoes - whatever has a peacock on it.  Guess that is a nod to the style of Art Nouveau that I also so adore.  Charles Rennie Mackintosh is my creative hero.

The loveliness of Beacon Hill Park

(sure wish I had a better camera, his colour was amazing)

A Little Luck

Lucky St. Patrick's Day seemed like a good idea, but maybe a garage sale in March wasn't the best.  That's OK we got rid of a few things and made a few bucks.  It's always strange to me how people choose one item over another.  The things we thought would go in a flash were the camping gear and the toddler shoes.  Both are still here.  There are always those sneaky types too ie.  I was out there before my husband and an older fellow came along and wanted to know the price of an oak swivel chair.  I said $10 and he told me it needed repairs, ummm no, $10 is the price.  I went inside for two seconds when my husband came out and that stinker offered him $5 which he accepted, not knowing I had said $10.  That guy knew darn well what he was doing.  Grrr.  I gave him a head shake but I doubt he cared.  Oh well, one less thing to store or find a home for, but when counting our days end tally I felt gypped that we should've been $5 richer, that's 1/10th of a new lamp for the new house!  I have to say though most people through today were extremely pleasant so overall we're living in a pretty decent society. 

We'll have another sale in April when the weather is more appealing to sale looky loos. 

This week's series of events...waiting for the bank to look over our numbers then she'll order a home appraisal, then the appraiser will let her know our homes current market value, then we can get the deal signed....oh and hand over a honkin' huge cheque to the builder, gulp. 

While the kids are otherwise engaged in new McDonald's toys (bought with their Grandparents on their outing today), I think I need to hit some Pinterest for some interior design eye candy. 

That's it?  That's all we have to store from our garage clean out?  This U-Pak is being unloaded into the sun room of the house, no point storing this amt of stuff for $98/month.  Unfortunately, we're out the $143 it took to get it here, but better to send it back and save 4 or $500.

Must be Fate

That's pretty cool beans when you stumble upon the fact that your most favourite house (in the average income category) in the city was done by your own house designer.  I had sent them a photo of this house way back when we were talking about exterior finishes, then after looking through their website's gallery I saw the house I so in fact love was done by them.  I had driven by it some time ago thinking if I ever get a new house this is what I would want.  Unfortunately, shingles are crazy expensive so we won't be going that route but it's nice to dream.  A little cottage on Hornby Island perhaps...one day...after retirement.

Lovin' that porch

Success!

Well that went pretty well (estimate presentation) and looks like the project will be a GO!  Numbers were looking fantastic, but then we saw the 'HST not included' under the price.  *GASP!  Well we could wait a year and a half for the HST (harmonised sales tax) to be abolished or just suck it up and do it.  Do it.  I can't live in this wee house much longer without losing my mind.  Is it because it's a house full of boys???  Not sure, but if I don't have a second washroom soon things may get ugly.

Anyhoo, put the word to the bank that we're ready for a home appraisal so we can get our loan then looks like May is start date (and after permits go through).  Yahoo!

Almost had a wrench thrown into works this afternoon when I looked out our window to see a 'for sale' sign on our neighbours newly renovated two story 6 bedroom house!  Meltdown averted when we learned the price and that two of the bedrooms were part of a suite.  That would bring the living space to what we're in now so someone else can have it!  Lucky they will be too though as it's a nice house on the best street.

To boot, I almost had another wrench thrown in my house colour choice when I learned that Hardie Plank siding boards were pre-coloured and that I didn't really like any of those colours.   Thankfully they've changed how they do things and we can paint whatever colour we, correction, I like.  Phew. 

I need a whisky...drat, don't have any.

Light Blue No.22

Sure, I'm about 5 or 6 months ahead myself for this, but I had my first glance through exterior paint colours today and have fallen in love.  This is what I'm loving today, next week it could be something completely different.  I did, however, just have a thought that since we're doing the garage first (hopefully) they may put on the siding at that time as well or... they may just do it all at once when the project nears completion.  Anyway I may head over for some sample pots and try out some colours.  Watching paint dry.  Fun?  Heck ya!

Presenting Farrow & Ball's 'Light Blue No. 22'

I love the narratives F & B do on the back of their samples, it's such a civilized way to shop for paint.  This is what they say for this particular colour...

"Neutral.  All colour cards must surely include a light blue, but it is one of the peculiarities of the colour blue to build up in intensity when painted in a room.  If you wish for a slightly light blue room, this, rather than the more obviously blue blues, is the one to try."

Mixed Bag

Excited and somewhat nervous is what today's feeling is.  The designer and builder are coming by tomorrow with our estimate!  Nervous just incase the house is a little too steep to be able to do the garage within our financial comfort limits.  Excited cause hopefully we can!

Garage clean out is about 3/4 complete.  The massive truck load of garbage left this am ($50 to dump it!), the U-Pak is 2/3 full, the garage sale pile is looking decent and the remaing work to be done is just bits and pieces so we're doing well.

Off to the grocery store for soup fixings. Might be a good idea to make extra of things to freeze for those busy days of packing and renoing ahead to have food at the ready.  Still a wintery, rainy day so soup seems to fit the bill but I suppose in 3 months time that won't be quite what we're wanting.  Whatever.

Bitter with a Giant Scoop of Sweet

Bitter/sweet happenings this coming week...Bitter as we've got an awful lot of work behind those doors, things to purge, memories to store in mind instead of things. Sweet since for the first time in 6yrs we'll see this space empty again and ready for a new life.

Tomorrow am we have a U-Pak storage container being delivered to house all the “things” we “need” to hold onto for either actual use or items that are too meaningful to actually rid ourselves of. We've got our old fridge we'll want to hold onto, a washer/dryer that we need to fix to be able to use again and a whole bunch of other stuff. The how ever many ago owner's decided they needed to store every piece of dowel they ever found and hold onto metal venting in the rafters so that'll be fun to get down!  Our local elementary school is holding a scrap metal drive in May so we'll be able to donate which is nice.

The idea behind the garage was originally to use it as an income garden suite, our municipality won't allow detached suites and wouldn't allow it to become attached as that opens up a whole lot of problems with the set back rules for the house as well as the size allowance for the lot. So we've decided it's best to go ahead and finish it now and use it for ourselves to live in while the main house is renovated. We believe after the house renovation is done we'll have to remove the stove to abide by the bylaws of this structure. After that we can then use it for our personal fun – cool hangout spot for the kids...or the adults. We will keep the front part as a spot for the car with garage door and close it up properly when it can serve as a proper bedroom. Then when detached garden suites are allowed we're good to go (hopefully it will come to light). I'm not completely jazzed on being a landlord but a suite that size would generate about $800-$900/month in this area which basically covers the whole cost of the entire renovation over time. As my favourite home renovation show 'IncomeProperty' tells us – “get those cheques to the bank”!

So today while all the kids are either napping or quietly playing I'll head over to the Ikea Kitchen Planner and see what I can come up with for a little kitchenette space for us to use for a few months. It's such a drag, we are no where close to an Ikea so we have to plan it all via catalogue and computer then take a ferry over to the nearest one. Makes for a fun day trip anyway.  It's etiquette to tell all your friends you're going so they can give you a list of what they want you to buy them - 'An Ikea Run'.

Better dust off and put on my decorator cap and start designing!

Seems harmless enough doesn't it?  Wait until I open the door for you, mwa ha ha ha ha!  Maybe I'll show you - it's quite embarrassing in there.