We went on a bit of a wild goose chase this morning looking for a piece of wood to transition the kitchen floor to the step that leads to the sunken TV room (in the addition). I’d purchased a strip at Home Depot, which I thought would work, and although it looks great (it’s an L shape) it isn’t deep enough to cover up the transition on the top. We went to Hardwoods today, only to find they were closed. It’s the details that really can be hard to find.

We did, however, make it to Sears to purchase a mixer. For some reason we’ve never bought a mixer before, but decided our new kitchen really should have one - and besides, baking is the only kind of cooking I actually like to do.

I finished painting the butcher block yesterday and I like it SOOOO much better.

And I also planted this palm I found at Home Depot for only $10. It really helps to fill in the dead space behind the living room chair.

Yesterday we finally passed the electrical inspection! Hooray!! Just in time for the tile and countertop guy to begin work on Tuesday.

I started painting the butcher block again. This time it’s going to be yellow, and I think I’m liking it - at least right now I can say I like it better than the black stain.

It’s raining here like I cannot believe. It’s felt like a Nebraska rain for about the past 48 hours, just a downpour. It rains a lot here, but not usually this hard - I’m thinking there is going to be some serious flooding fairly soon. The dogs hate rain, so we’re having to really coax them to go outside. Our house has really big eaves, and Cassidy avoids the rain by walking around the backyard under the eaves. She also doesn’t like walking on the grass, and with all the broken and discarded concrete in the backyard she steps from chunk to chunk. I’m wondering what she’ll do next year, when we’ve cleared out all the old concrete.

Hooray! The table we have been waiting for for six weeks is finally here. And I LOVE IT! It is so friggin’ cute. It’s from American Chairs . It was a bit of a challenge to put together since it did not come with any directions or pilot for the legs…but after drawing a lot of lines and measurements directly on the underside I finally figured it out and it is done!


In addition to receiving the table, we had a busy day today:
1) Eric finished up the wiring. It took him approx. 5 hours to finish adding the new circuit and fish the wire through the wall. While helping with the wiring, I lost a wire hanger somewhere between two studs in the insulation. In 20+ years someone will be surprised to find an old wire hanger in the middle of the walls.
2) I went to Home Depot and returned the toe kick and they ordered a scribe rail. The service was frustrating, because nobody seemed to know how to do this…I can’t believe this doesn’t happen all the time - we’ve placed two orders now, and it’s happened both times.
3) I went to city hall and the library to do some research on the house and found the following:
Sereno Baldwin built the house in 1951 for $9,500.00
The 1952 directory was missing.
The 1953 directory lists a Geo Harvey at the residence. Geo works as a metalsmith, he hops around from job to job, until finding employment with the US Agricultural Dept. Geo retires from the U.S. Ag. department in 1970. And in 1973 they are no longer listed in the directory. I also got some more names, along with a drawing of the original house plan (which helps to explain the unusually shaped addition on the backside of the house).
We’ve heard this place was a wreck before the owners before us bought it - I also found out that there was a complaint made to the city about “bad smells” in the backyard several years ago.
4) We went to dinner with friends.
5) Oh, I also worked some on a website I’m creating - as a labor exchange. One of our friends, who is a drystone waller, is going to help us with our landscaping in exchange for building his new business a website. The yard will eventually look spectacular!

Alright, first here is a picture of the “code” offense area. As you can see, this would have been easier to deal with before we put up the drywall and cabinets. Eric did not work on it today (he spent the entire day cleaning out the garage which hadn’t been done since we moved-in in August).

This is the butcher block that goes to the right of the breakfast nook. I wanted to paint it black, but Eric thought I should stain it and varnish it black, finally, I agreed to stain and varnish. Now neither of us like it, and I think I’m going to paint it yellow to match the floor. I’ll probably do it in the next day or two, because now it really bothers me.

And finally, this is the breakfast nook in progress. You can see I’ve painted the 4 windows on the left with one coat of white. I am going to paint the remaining peach window as soon as I shim out the bottom casing a little bit. Then I’ll do a second coat, and maybe a third. Also, you can see the 7.25″ primed baseboard we added.

Eric is upset at the moment. This morning we had the “final” electrical inspection. Due to a minor goof-up in the wiring of the kitchen, Eric forgot to install an outlet above the small 12 inch wide countertop beside the sink. Since it was only 12 inches, he was hoping it wouldn’t be a big deal - think again. He was just told that he has to get an outlet into that location, and on its own circuit. I was hoping we could do something enjoyable on his day off, but no - it’s back to his most hated activity, wiring. Which will create a delay in my most hated activity, painting trim (I have found it’s best to avoid working in the same physical location when one spouse is highly irritated).