coming to life

The most gratifying feeling has been seeing our abstract ideas (in our heads or on paper) suddenly come to life!

For me, the tile has been the most amazing since I spent so much time on it! It's wonderful to see it in reality. I think it evokes the vintage look we were going for, while looking fresh.

the bathroom fixtures and hardware look great too (many of them bought on line so we didn't really know until we saw them in real life).

D'oh. That black plastic pipe is going to be replaced with chrome!

So happy about the penny round feature behind the shower hardware! The tile setter was very impressed with the design! LOL!

inset looks great!

I am so pleased with both the floor border and the wall border! Both our own design!

And look at the fine work these tile setters are doing. Tiny pieces in the corners!

He used spacers for the border

But not for the "field" tiles: but he used a level for EVERY row! That's three bathrooms, in one of which the tile runs all the way up to the ceiling. Slow and steady tile guy!

Love the results!!!

Love it!

Love it! (and grout colour is perfect, btw. Well worth being picky over. Mapei "Frost."

The man responsible for most of it. Hard worker!

Stove put in, gas turned on, Andrew happy!

                                           
Ceiling paint on main floor. Jackie happy!

Girls happy! Cleaning and organizing some of their work-site treasures (tiles and cement chunks). They're planning to build a farmhouse.

Another beautiful day, and yet another beautiful view of the mountains from upper deck.

Auntie Jean and Steph's visit

Together with Steph's daughters, Saskia and Tasha, Auntie Jean and Steph came over to visit and see the new house, another endorsement of our designs and choices that goes along way to making the place seem more like a home. Thank you so much for making the trip!

All the girls off for an adventure! Granville Island and then the putt-putt boat over to Science World! Don't be fooled by F's shyness in this picture: she actually got up on stage as a volunteer at one of the SW demonstrations! Catapulted a rubber chicken!

Beautiful day for it! I was taking these photos as I drove. Anybody who lives here knows how spectacular spring is in Vancouver because of those mountains. They take your breath away.

 

On Granville Island, Katie got to take everybody to her favourite store, the rock and gem store, where kids can buy little zip-lock bags and fill them with little gems. Of course, they have to be cleaned and organzied after.

Then Aunt Jean and Steph and the girls came back for a house tour and dinner: take-out Indian food back at the duplex. The girls had their own picnic table. The cousins sure had fun together!

And Jean gave the girls a bubbly apple cider to toast our new home tonight.

...and something a little stronger for Mom and Dad, something we're really going to appreciate by about 10 o'clock tonight, I'm sure!

Visiting and a bit of shopping

Michelle (my sister!) and Jody came over on the weekend and took all the cousins to the Aquarium, while Andrew and I got a few things done. 

Off they go in the big van!

We found the "door man" who used to be on West 4th, Martha! He's moved to Surrey with all his stuff. It's way out in the boonies, junk yard dogs prowling and barking behind the chain link fence and everything. (Apparently, there's still a store on West 4th, but it's not the same.)

This guy's got a lot of doors and lots of interesting junk.

We passed on the artwork. 

but had fun digging through the stuff, some of it just in piles like this.

As well as the perfect bathroom door, we found these treasures:

A solid-brass antique doorknob in beautiful condition. From a hotel in Vancouver that burnt down, I think he said. Forget the name of the hotel. Will see if Andrew remembers.

This gorgeous light fixture (not sure where it will go but it was too good to pass up). It was really buried deep in a pile! Apparently, people go in search of the little pendant bit on the bottom.

I had to have this pretty piece of stained glass; not sure where it will go either.

If you like hardware, Andrew found a great source for new, vintage-style hardware, The Source in Gastown. Great selection and great prices too!

We are also restoring a lot of the existing hardware; on Sunday, while I babysat the cousins, Andrew went to U-Blast in Langley and blasted some of the window sashes and things.

FYI, there are two types: sand (garnet) blasting and walnut-shell blasting (not sure, Andrew's asleep or I'd ask him). The sandblasting gets it all off and down to raw metal (on the right); the walnut gets the paint off but preserves the patina (which we prefer), but I think it's more work.

He never did get to the register grilles, which was part of the plan. I think he's decided to just go with paint stripper!

Nice to see you, couple of cuties. : )

PS, paint colours

Just a small addendum to my post on colour choices the other day.

Here's the F&B "Cooking Apple Green" we did in the guest room -- very happy with that colour.

And Katie is very pleased with her pink room. She just wants to kiss that colour, she said.

The blue in Fifi's room is really lovely, very soft, but doesn't read as "baby blue," at least I don't think so, Janet!

Just wanted to post my handwritten colour lists for posterity.

Getting down to the wire.

Another move tomorrow! But this time it's into our own home! So exciting! But boy, do the guys have a lot to do today!

Here's some of the last-minute things they were doing over the weekend.

Finishing off the new stairway (they're restoring it to original but the banister had to be raised to get it to code).

Tiling.

Keith and I figuring out the tile border for the upstairs bathrooms.

Peekaboo.

SO pleased with the tile. (This is one of the examples of how awesome Keith is: I had asked for the border to be three tiles out from the wall, with black tiles every second tile. When they were about to lay it that way, he called to say, now that it's going in, it looks like four tiles out from the wall might be better because of wall overlap, etc. Not only was he spot-on, but he didn't just "do what the client asked," but, rather, knew what look I wanted and when the actual work was happening thought how the look was best achieved.)

Katie's pretty pink.

Oooh! Light switches going in! Making it seem real. A lot of them even work!

Kitchen sink's in!

Floor tile in upstairs!

The floor reveal in the dining room! We had no idea this detail was there!

Fir in the dining room, white oak in the living room.

Michelle's feet.

Fridge in place (girls excited: water and ice in door! Mom excited: a luxury fridge instead of the ancient, apartment-sized one we lived with the last 12 years!)

Toilet in d/s bath! Plumber I'd never seen before was putting this in, and looked up at me as I passed and said "where'd ya get this toilet from?!" Um, it's German I think, I said. "It's strange; complicated" he said. Oh dear. Well, at least it's cute, and, surprise! Stylewise, it matches the sink!

Honey (Michelle), Ogie (Jody), Baby Noah and the Little One came to visit! It felt like a real endorsement to have them so enthusiastic and positive about all our choices!  Huge step in making it feel like home.

After house tour, street antics ensued.

And a fun dinner out at family-friendly Famoso.

Instead of colouring sheets and crayons, they give the kids balls of pizza dough to play with. Great idea! They loved it!

Noah mesmerized by sports on the TV.

Cleo apparently has a loose tooth, even though she's barely got her baby teeth in!

Ice-cream fueled hilarity.

Fun times!