Author: janeen

last weekend

it took me a while to make a post about last weekend… it’s been a busy week and it’s only wednesday morning.

visitorstile rounded corners

(left) midori and andy were in town from portland. they stopped by for a short visit friday morning. (right) a detail shot of mathew’s rounded corner travertine tiles. a labor-intensive project!

vacuuming tilegrout release

here i am prepping the tile for grout: after scraping excess thin-set, we vacuum then apply grout release. these travertine tiles are very porous so grout release is essential. without it, the grout would proabably stick to the tile and become one big, ugly mess.

grouttrim and switch plate

(left) mathew sponging off excess grout. (right) the bedroom door trim with one coat of paint. and a janeen-painted switch plate cover from our old place. its nice to have something familiar.

leoleo and mathew

mathew’s sister leonora called on saturday and said she’d be in town. she stopped by and we went out for burritos for dinner. she offered to help with the house so we put her to work helping paint trim with me in the bedroom. it was fun, we got to talk a lot while painting. after a break with water & “lemon-cubes” and  luna and larry’s coconut bliss (really good vegan ice cream made from coconut milk!) it was too late for leo to take bart back to berkeley so she stayed over.

leo and janeencleaning

the next morning leo offered to paint some more! i think she really wanted to paint that little cabinet door green but there wasn’t time. (right) here mathew is cleaning up the dining area, moving his tools to his workshop and prepping for paint.

shower day

we spent most of easter sunday working again on the shower.

tilehaze

(left) at the top: grouted tile, below: ungrouted tile with a little grout haze. (right) here i’m wiping off the haze after the wall has been grouted and sponged.

thinsetshower floor

mixing more thin-set mortar. setting the shower floor tile.

greenshower curb

we worked fairly late, cutting and shaping the shower curb tile. rounding the solid travertine edges involves cutting a bevel with the tile saw, then sanding it with 3 grades of sandpaper. (left) feeling strong after sanding. (right) the shower curb tile in place.

a full saturday

it was a full day of work that started fairly early.

trimtrim

some picture rail trim mathew used for a paint stripping test. on the left is an example of what the heat gun can produce, if you look closely there are tiny plaster bead details on the upper half. on the right he used a chemical stripper which completely removed the plaster detail.

paintpaint

as i started to paint i worried that this was the wrong color…

friends

our friends (nancy, alex and mae) dropped by with a delicious lunch (salad and quiche made by mae.)

cookiesgift

…and for dessert, yummy homemade shortbread. and as if all of that weren’t enough, mae even brought a gift of towels! they will go nicely in our new bathroom. whenever mae visits, aftwards we always say, “i can’t believe she did all that! we don’t deserve her!” THANK YOU MAE, we truly appreciate all of your generousity.

alexwindow trim

alex gave mathew some great ideas for the bathroom. later mathew finished up the window framing. and while i was painting, mathew installed the ledge that goes above the wainscoting.

paintpaint

i finished my painting, and after 3 coats and a proper drying, the color looks the way we’d hoped. it’s a little unusual for me, but i wanted a warmish-cool color that would go with the blue carpet (staying for now) and compliment our bedding. so we went with a yellowy sage green. it’s called “pale avocado” and looks yellowy in the daytime and more green at night.

groutgrout

we finally got to grout the tile, but we ran out of grout so we’ll finish it today.

paintbathroom

it was a busy saturday. but all along mathew was sad, thinking it was sunday. so now today is his bonus day!

p-words

friday was all about the letter “p.” paint, pandas, pizza, pears, plaster and ptoilet.

paintpandas

our first color purchase! (inspired by potterybarn.) on the walk back, panda and heart cookies from the bakery around the corner.

pizzapears

(left) every friday is homemade pizza night. last night it was tomato + cheese, and potato, onion + rosemary. (right) one of our lemons grew up to be a pear.

plastertoilet

(left) mathew plastered the last (mini) wall in the bathroom. (right) mathew’s solution to the ptoilet size problem.

a very poopy field trip

so we thought we’d quickly pop down to lowe’s tonight to return an item and buy a toilet…

lowes

the lowe’s we usually go to is in san bruno and as we drove down 101 we saw a new lowe’s in south san francisco, right next to the freeway. we quickly exited 101 and thought we’d just cross over and find the store. the red line indicates the first part of our lost journey, the blue line shows where we’ve doubled back on our path, the green line shows still more doubling back and finally reaching our destination. and wouldn’t you know it? when we finally got to their “grand opening” they didn’t have anything on our list, not even the toilet (they carry 3, maybe 4 models and we needed a specific model because of the size of our bathroom.)

so we made a bee-line to home depot and found everything we needed. they had only one of our toilet left in stock. the box containing the entire thing, didn’t fit in our tiny car, but mathew opened the box, transferred it’s contents and we were on our way. (we seem to have a love-hate relationship with both of these stores. mathew mostly shops at our local stores: cole hardware and benjamin moore: house of color. both stores we LOVE.)

toilettoilet

as soon as we got home mathew carried the pieces upstairs to see if they’d fit. only just! he’ll have to make a few changes with the wainscoting behind the toilet, but we’re keeping it!

toilettoilet

if we’d planned ahead we might have placed the toilet at an angle in the corner (for more legroom.) but really! what a bunch of fuss, over a toilet!

mathew’s house of sawdust

mathew spent a good part of today working on the bathroom vanity in the garage.

vanityvanity

(left) here he’s gluing and clamping the bottom end. (right) here it is upright.

panelsink test

(left) because it’s the right thickness, as a backing for the vanity, mathew is re-using paneling that used to be on the bedroom walls (from the 50’s? 60’s?). it will be behind drawers so it won’t be seen, but it’s cool to include the old with the new, even if we’re the only ones who know about it. there’s even a piece of tape on it where a child had written “the end.” (right) mathew is testing how the sink will fit and also testing what happens if you shake your head back and forth really fast while janeen takes a no-flash, slow exposure photo…

busy bee

mathew took the week off from work to concentrate on the house. the house has three levels, so depending on the noise level of his activity, i usually don’t find mathew on my first try. but i always bring the camera with me to capture the moment.

tile

cleaning out extra thin-set (mortar) between the tiles upstairs.

pipe

in the garage, bending pipe to cover electrical wires (using a pipe bending tool uncle ken loaned him.)

compostwoodworking

(left) out in the backyard filling our new composter. (right) in the garage, making a vanity (for the upstairs bathroom) using a cabinet making tool that was a gift many years ago from his brother.

the things i missed: mathew injuring himself (and getting blood on his overalls) while doing some plumbing in the bathroom. mathew painting the bedroom with a final coat of paint. i wanted him to do a “dramatic re-enactment” photo but he just wouldn’t play along.

pretty.

a while back i stopped asking mathew, “when is it going to be pretty?”

helpershelpers

pretty started this sunday with the help of my parents. they showed up this morning ready to paint. my dad even cooked lunch! and there were cream puffs for dessert made by my mom.

tile shelfpainting

while i sanded trim, my dad painted the walls and ceiling, and my mom painted details and baseboards, mathew finished the cutting and placing of tiles.

momjaneen

tilewall

green tilenoce tile

we were still trying to decide whether to use these larger green tiles (given to us by a friend.) now i think we’re going to go with the smaller travertine tiles to match the rest of the shower. the entire shower floor slopes toward the drain so smaller tiles fit the curves easier. but we’d still like to use the green tiles somewhere because they are quite beautiful handmade tiles. maybe in the kitchen?

bedroom

the primer is done. one more coat of paint (and once the bathroom is done) we can move in!

productive saturday

tile cuttingsunset

mathew spent the first part of the day doing woodworking and paint prep in the bedroom. as the sun started setting we got to work on more tile.

shelvesjaneen

mathew cut solid slabs of travertine into shower shelves and figured out how to round and polish the cut edges. he did all of the cutting and i laid most of the tile.

janeentile

we worked on the bathroom for 6 hours saturday night (!) but in the end it was really satisfying to be almost done with the tile and shower.

tuesday

mathew worked from home yesterday and daniel, mathew’s dad dropped by for a visit.

floorfloor

after chai and hot chocolate they looked at progress upstairs and discussed the floors downstairs. (mathew and daniel used to work on hardwood floors together.)

baseboardsbaseboards

after dinner mathew stripped some paint off the baseboards upstairs.