The end is in sight (at least for the hardwoods)

Work continues on the hardwoods (picture #1), particularly the tricky part of wrapping the sections of tile around the hearth (picture #2) and side entry (picture #3) and then matching the lines up in the hallway to parallel the wall with the closets relatively close. Ended up running different widths on the west side vs. the east side as the widths were about 3/4" off between the two (picture #4 from the laundry room).

It seems to be going a bit easier now but its taken a good bit of time and dry fitting to make sure all of the joints match up as we had to do some custom milling on quite a few of the pieces. If you compare the pictures from last week to this week you can see where we had to fit in several just to the left of the picture by the wood burning stove.

Also got most of the trim milled up and stained to wrap the structural beam in the game room but its still sitting down in the garage waiting to be installed (more pictures of that later).

Hardwoods continued

Hardwood installation continues at about the pace its been going at (maybe 20sqft/hr), we're getting better with controlling the adhesive so we don't have little dabs of goo (outside of Carson marking most everything he touches) but keeping all of the joints nice and tight has proven to be challenging (still). Clamps in a variety of configurations seem to be consistently the best way to pull in any bow/warp in the wood.... although the 8" wide boards are a heckuva lot hard to massage into place.

We finished up the family room on Sunday (the pic with then smaller pile of hardwood flooring) and got some trim put up in the dining room and knocked out quite a few of the really long runs from the family room to the den/away room last night. We'll have to do quite a bit of dry fitting around the tile on the side entry and hearth to ensure tight fits but have it close enough now that we should be able to get most of that done without putting any additional strips down for a bit.

Semblance of Normality

The latest deadline for action was super bowl Sunday as we had a few folks over for the game.  The game room was the biggest milestone and its fully functional but not quite done as the rock on the fireplace is still waiting in lieu of the hardwoods in the family and dining rooms.  

Heres a shot into the dining room and kitchen from the family room, you can see the hardwoods and a series of progression shots of the kitchen from original mess to latest (2/4/08).

and the floors begin....

Big milestone here as the floors have finally started going down.  Of course, its taking a lot longer than expected to put 'em in but they're here to stay between numerous staples and adhesive.  Going a little bit easier than they first started so at least we may be learning....  The wood burning stove didn't quite get installed but we did get all of the stone sealed prior to putting it in its final resting spot.

And a single picture from the non-renovation stuff we did this weekend.... a birthday party at a local place that has the blow up "bouncy" type of equipment.

Dashing.... and somewhat madly

Lots of progress... not quite on original "best case" scenario but still looking pretty good relative to overall short term plan with focus on the game room.

Drywaller's finished a week ago today (Monday), primed the game room Tuesday night and painted it Wednesday night, carpet was installed Thursday and Friday worked on priming/painting other areas that had some drywall work done (dining/family room, den, and laundry room) as well as some clean up around the stairs and game room..

Weekend focus was mostly on wood burning stove tile work - its come along well and should have been done tonight but had to do two additional cuts and ran into wet saw issues.... of course. Here are several progression pictures of it...

Its very roughly (VERY) based on a large rock formation in the area brilliantly named "Monument Rock".

Slow down before the mad dash...

Well, they've got the first coat of mud/tape up in the game room, still got some drywall to put up in the laundry but hopefully will knock out most if not all of it in the next two days.

Paint and tile are selected for the game room, we went with a slate for the fireplace in a pseudo random pattern.  not entirely sure what we'll end up with for the mantel but this should get us off to a good start... although it's likely to be a bit tricky to put on the wall.  The intent is still to have several key items finished in time for a super bowl party.  The beer is pretty well brewed - need to keg the Scottish ESB and sample the Vanilla Bourbon Porter and still brew the winter warmer but overall its progressing well.  The other main items are going well but it'll still be a little tight to finish in time.   

Timeline looks like this...

Contractors finish mudding/texturing drywall this weekend.  we paint and install at least the hearth tile.  Carpet gets installed next Thursday.  Next week and weekend likely work on tile on the fireplace.

Also ideally need to get the hearth (for the wood burning stove) put down and ideally the background for the same.  It will be mostly travertine with some slate accents.

The wall tile will kind of be another mountain scape - similar to the kitchen but (ideally) closer to monument rock (out of travertine) with a slate accent about 3 ft from the floor.  

The biggest "to-do" will begin after the hearth goes in with the hardwoods.  In a perfect world these would have been installed a long-long time ago but the target date has slipped to around the end of January.

Drywall up... now muddin'

The drywall is up in the game room, now it just needs to be mudded a few times and textured... oh yeah, and then we have to get busy again and start painting.  

We're going to paint the beam a "hammered copper" color... should be interesting, we'll see how it sorts itself out.

Jauna painted the backsplash of the hearth as well, we're not completely sold on the color yet (kind of a dark moss/green baby poo) but it does contrast the travertine nicely and should really "pop" the design once we're done.   AHH yes, that proverbial saying rears its head again.

So we're also considering attempting to do a large Dard Harden rose in the base of the wood burning stove hearth... might be covered by the stove which would not work well but could also do it in the back or side...