Month: October 2009

and sometimes there’s cake…

it’s the last week before my grandmother moves in. there are lots of little finishing projects left.

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(left) this is the original wood switch plate frame in the kitchen. it’s now pretty after all the old paint was removed. (right) a brass plate cover completes the look.

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we had my mom paint this cabinet pink. my dad really doesn’t like the pink but it will be a fun pop of color when you open this cabinet.

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(left) i put a second coat of white paint on this living room wall. (right) mathew and my dad put up this final kitchen cabinet to the right of the refrigerator.

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(left) this is what FRUSTRATION looks like. i can sew a wedding dress, knit a cabled afghan, assemble a model car kit. i thought one of those closet organizer kits from home depot would be simple to assemble. the kit is perfect for an 8′ wide closet, but for this 5′ wide closet it took some design and customization. (right) i won’t even tell you how long it took me to get these 5 silly hooks onto the wall!

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on a happier note, saturday was my mom’s birthday, and she brought ME flowers from her garden! mathew’s birthday was on monday so i had a little cupcake birthday surprise for the two of them.

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we cut each cupcake into 4 so we could all share the vegan carrot and chocolate cupcakes. my dad thought his were very romantic! so cute.

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(left) a safety rail was installed in my grandmother’s bathroom. (right) this is what her shower looks like. (more safety rails.)

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a frustrating evening. (left) i continued working on my closet. grrrr. (right) mathew having trouble and getting mad at telephone and cable tv wiring. “i don’t even watch tv!” maybe the cable wires sensed his negativity?

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sunday: (left) my dad putting doors on that last cabinet. (right) mathew installing picture rail in the kitchen. it’s just what this room needed.

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(left) i finally finished the closet organizers! because of the size of this closet i have left over shelves and pieces. i installed a shelf and rod in the second closet. i may install another shelf in the living room closet. (right) sunday night i painted all the picture rail in the kitchen. (sorry, it’s really hard to see in this photo…)

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on monday, mathew’s birthday, he took the day off work and did various projects around the house. i didn’t follow him around or take any photos. (left) he built this cabinet that will act as a support for the counter between the dishwasher and the refrigerator. (right) because the old vent fan label was really old and messed up mathew had me design a new one, complete with turtle + mole and symbols instead of words.

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that night i made pizza for mathew’s birthday dinner and a yummy chocolate cake.

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are we done yet?

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last weekend my parents were here helping with paint prep in the kitchen. (left) my dad masked off the cabinets with plastic and tape. (right) my mom vacuumed trim, walls and floor.

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(left) here i’m caulking the gaps in this cabinet. (right) on that corner just below my knee in the previous photo, mathew added this little bit of chair rail. he felt like the wall/corner just needed something. only a perfectionist would do something like this!

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(left) after prepping the room we sealed off all the openings so the paint spray and fumes would be contained in the kitchen. here mathew is painting primer on the walls.

before they left, my parents helped me move some of my office furniture from my temporary office (my grandmother’s future living room) into my office. after my grandmother moves in we’ll be working on my office next. it will be a challenge since we won’t have any more spare rooms to store furniture in while we work. we’ll probably have to move everything into the center of the room and cover it like we did with the refrigerator in the kitchen.

(right) later that night i painted the remaining unpainted wall in the temporary office/living room. because the kitchen was sealed off getting to the garage became a challenge, we couldn’t just walk down stairs from the kitchen we had to go through the back yard or front yard first, luckily there are multiple ways of getting into the garage. but things like getting a paint brush, a ladder or the mail became difficult, but that only lasted a few days.

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on sunday my dad worked on the door that goes on that tall cabinet in the kitchen that i was caulking the day before. (left) the family that used to own this house had 5 kids and the boys seemed to enjoy working on old cars, especially chevys. we know this because the inside of the cabinet door had labeled hooks. we like all these old clues about the previous life of this house but it will probably look better to remove this one. (right) my dad sanding the door after all the hooks were removed.

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while my dad worked on the door my mom and i sanded and scraped the door that connects the kitchen and the laundry room. it’s the last door we’ll be refinishing. we’re pros at this now.

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mathew attaching this medallion to the kitchen ceiling. mathew has gone medallion crazy, he loves them and wants them everywhere. this one was actually a gift from our friends jennifer and doug. they had it left over from their remodel and gave it to us when we had brunch with them the weekend before. they were happy it was going to a good home and we were happy because we got a medallion for the kitchen!

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i wanted to paint the kitchen an off white beige, similar to what had already been there. mathew wanted a warmish yellow similar to what we have in the entry and hall. what did we do? mathew took a couple gallons of leftover white and yellow paint from previous rooms, added 20 drops of red acrylic art store paint and this is what we got, sort of a lighter version of what’s in the hall. not exactly what either of us wanted but cheerful and close enough. and the price was right. (right) we’re still not sure what to do about this crazy orange lamp. i suggested painting it a different color or getting a new one. we’ll see… this house is full of color!

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another post?! aka the final lap

okay, so this doesn’t really have much to do with the house. except to prove that we do actually get out and have some fun occasionally…

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last friday we went to see ingrid michaelson play at the great american music hall. (i bought tickets back when we thought we’d be done with the house by now.) ingrid’s one of my favorite artists. we even had dinner there before the show! mathew calls her “ingrid michaelperson” he wanted that to be the title of this post, but that makes no sense.

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(left) this is a photo of the ceiling. this is one crazy, ornate building, built in 1907. (right) the opening act was matthew perryman jones, all by himself with his guitar. we’d never heard him before but we loved him unplugged, impressive guitar skills with a voice that sounded like bono. during the break i wandered downstairs to meet him and tell him i liked his performance. he was very nice.

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and then ingrid and her band played: THE MOST FUN CONCERT EVER.

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lots of audience participation, stories and zany performances. mathew and i were cracking up the entire time. we can’t wait till she’s back in town. here’s a taste of what she’s like on youtube (but a little more subdued since it’s a morning radio show.)

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the next morning we had brunch at jennifer and doug’s. sorry no photos! but they made us yummy breakfast burritos and smoothies and we stayed a little too long, talking and catching up. (left) that afternoon our friend mae came over to help with some paint stripping. she didn’t want her photo taken. i was going to blur out her face but it’s so small, it’s already blurry. (right) mathew buzzing away with the sander in the kitchen.

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that night after dinner mathew went back downstairs and tsp’d the kitchen ceiling. (left) here mathew is showing how dramatically different the ceiling looks when cleaned. (right) so shiny! doesn’t that make you want to get up on a tall ladder and bend awkwardly backwards and clean YOUR ceiling?

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on sunday the parentals were back to help. (left) my dad filled around the new outlets with grout he tinted with yellow paint to match the “vintage” grout. (right) my mom, big surprise, did more sanding.

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(left) mathew stained doors in the garage. (right) i sanded in the kitchen. sanding seriously goes on forever.

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the kitchen coming together… outlet cover plates! when we first moved in, this kitchen counter had one electrical outlet. ONE. and everything in the house was on this circuit, so if you used the toaster the lights dimmed. if you used the coffee grinder the lights dimmed. you get the idea.

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whenever i think i’m going to take a spontaneous photo of mathew doing something, he moves! (left) classic mathew working photo. (right) please hold still. thank you.

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that door that mae and i stripped has a big glass window that mathew wanted us to avoid with our heat guns, for fear of cracking the glass. he used chemical paint stripper on one side. not only is it a gross, smelly, toxic mess, but it doesn’t even work that well. mathew is thinking we’ll risk it and use heat guns on the other side.

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mathew took tuesday off work and worked on the house. (left) i found him in the garage polyurethaning 3 doors. i tried to get a photo of all three at once but couldn’t fit them in. (right) the bathroom door in place. it is possibly the narrowest door i’ve ever seen.

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(left) really pretty ORIGINAL door knob plate that was hiding under 95 years of paint! sorry, the photo is blurry. (right) mathew filling and putting the finishing trim pieces on this kitchen window frame. looks like there was some sunlight after a crazy, rainy morning.

delayed post

for a couple of days this week you might have noticed our blog was just a blank white page. what did it symbolize? complete neglect! not really,.. but we’re back!

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mathew paint stripped most of the trim in the kitchen in one day. (left) door, window and chair rail trim. (right) i’m not sure what he’s trying to capture in this photo of the door trim, maybe how thick it is with almost 100 years of paint?

sometimes we wonder why we go to the effort of stripping the paint just to paint it white again. but it does make a difference especially when we fill all the cracks, dents and holes. afterwards the trim looks crisp and new again.

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my parents sanding a door that will be stained and polyurethaned. these doors used to be white and become a rich reddish brown. very noticeably different!

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mathew stripping the window frame and i take over so he can work on other projects…

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…like making this wall above the kitchen cabinets pretty again! there’s new plaster above the kitchen entrance as well.

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my parents again (left) filling, gluing and sanding, the same door? a different door? my dad says they’re smiling underneath their masks. (right) finally released from the garage, more sanding for my parents…

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(left) for some reason the kitchen window sill and frame had been abused beyond recognition. we think the previous owners cut part of it to fit their refrigerator in. nice. but we can’t guess why the front edge looks like it suffered from years of gnawing. as far as we know there were no pets in this house, but there were 5 kids… (right) after filling, sanding and replacing a corner piece we’re bringing this window sill back to life. once it’s painted you may never know its past life.

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another effort in our environmentally conscious remodel: resizing closet doors to fit the new smaller opening. yes, they’re cheap, (ugly?) hollow-core doors but with a little of mathew’s time they are resized. money is saved and nothing ends up in landfill.

enjoying our city

when we have house guests we usually manage to take a little time off and enjoy our beautiful city. this is what last week looked like.

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mathew’s godfather sebastian and his wife eva were visiting from scotland. we showed them our neighborhood and lots of our local murals.

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we braved a windy evening (crazy weather, we’d had a heat wave the day before!) and walked to cafe gratitude for dinner.

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the following day we saw more murals and spent some time in shops downtown. the guys bought suits (sebastian needed one for a wedding and mathew took advantage of the “buy 2” discount.) we had lunch and drinks at blue bottle coffee.

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we took the bus to the new and very popular california academy of sciences in golden gate park. (a building that mathew’s company, arup engineered.) sebastian is an architect and was an influence in mathew’s decision to major in architecture/engineering, so of course there were lots of conversations about architecture and engineering.

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there was so much to see and we got there 90 minutes before closing. i’m looking forward to returning and seeing everything we missed. after the academy of sciences we took a walk through the botanical garden then enjoyed dinner at a really excellent chinese restaurant, san tung (and i don’t normally like chinese food!)

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we’re so glad sebastian and eva took the time to come and visit us and our city. it was so unusual to see them relaxed, on vacation and somewhere other than scotland. we had a great time with them and hope they can visit again in the future.

on wednesday morning my “little sister” elissa arrived just as sebastian and eva were leaving. catching up was first on the agenda, we talked for 6 or 7 hours straight! i used to babysit elissa and her sisters in palo alto. even though the family moved to washington state, her family and i have stayed close after all these years.

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our neighborhood is full of murals, they cover walls, fences, buildings, alleys and interiors, even ceilings…

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later in the week i introduced elissa to philz coffee (a very local addiction) and my favorite sandwich shop, jay’s cheesesteak.

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after dinner we explored the local shops and found a block party in progress on balmy alley (just parallel to our street.) the murals looked amazing in this light and live music played till 11pm.

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(left) having fun in elissa’s new favorite “no-name, no-mirrors” clothing store. (right) enjoying a vegan dinner at golden era.

elissa is a painter and hopes to attend the san francisco art institute in january. i really hope she gets in. she wants to live in our neighborhood and i can’t wait to spend more time with her!

test run

there was a heat wave last weekend and we thought my parents deserved a weekend off. so mathew and i avoided the heat and spent saturday down in the garage stripping paint, sanding, staining and polyurethaning doors.

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(left) mathew staining the downstairs bathroom door. (right) yet another door that i paint stripped. i think this one will go on the downstairs bedroom. or is it the closet?

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(left) original 1914 hinges that mathew stripped and cleaned with a heat gun. it’s magical that something so pretty is hiding under all those years of white paint. (right) mathew painting the hinges and screws with black enamel. i find the process humorous. mathew uses an old 2-by-4 with lots of random leftover holes to hold the screws while he paints their heads. it’s funny because it’s a long 2-by-4 and the screws are placed randomly throughout it, individually and in clumps. maybe it’s not that funny… guess you’d have to be there, reminds me of badly planted trees.

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besides my grandmother moving in, we had an even more pressing deadline: more house guests! mathew’s godfather sebastian and his wife eva were visiting from scotland and we wanted to have the downstairs bedroom and bathroom ready for them on monday. we worked late sunday night installing the toilet, sink, faucet, vanity top, lights, window privacy film, temporary medicine cabinet, sealing the shower grout, adjusting the shower door, hanging curtains, towel and t.p. bars… phew! we got it done and our guests got to do a test run for us.