santa claus is coming to town

This is how everyone starts their holiday decorating, right?

i can see clearly now

Today it was Aaron's turn to stay home for the windows. He's a man of few words, so there isn't really a story to go with this post. But he did document the whole process with pictures . . .

 Perhaps it was better that this all happened when I was at work. Apparently things got a bit chilly in the house, with the giant gaping holes in the wall.

When I got home, this is the view that greeted me . . .

I was immediately in love. The window looks huge! Even thought it is the same size as the old one, it feels so much bigger. After my initial excitement, I thought, "we really need curtains."

Here's a shot Aaron took from the inside:

And finally, here are the garden doors (we plan to build a deck next summer):

Just for fun, here are some "before" shots:

Now that the windows are in, we want to do a happy dance. But we can't, because the neighbours would see. Maybe when we get some curtains.

baby, it's cold outside

Yesterday was the first truly cold day of winter. It also happened to be the day our new picture window and garden doors were scheduled to be installed. I had booked the day off work, and was so excited that they were finally here. (I was like a kid at Christmas - I even had trouble sleeping the night before!)

We ordered the windows over two months ago, and there had been a bit of a delay in getting them made, so we weren't expecting them until January. When the window guy called last week to book our appointment, I'm pretty sure I was the most excited customer he had talked to that day (possibly ever).

I was just finishing breakfast when the window guy called to say it was too cold to do the installation. (Seriously? It's Polar Windows. They have Polar in their name. Surely they can handle working when it's -20C.) I was so disappointed.

But at least the day wouldn't be a total write-off. We also scheduled a pick-up of all this:

Renovations create garbage - that's junk that has been hauled out of our living room, basement and garage.

Shortly after the window guy called to cancel, the junk guy called to say he was on his way. Yay!  One minute later he called back to say he couldn't get down our back lane because of all the fire trucks. Of all the days for my neighbour's garage to catch on fire.

Unlike the window guys, the junk guys were willing to come back in the afternoon. Which is a good thing, because with garages in the neighbourhood catching on fire we didn't want a giant pile of wood and garbage sitting next to ours.

As for the windows . . . we're still waiting.

project 760 - day 282

After living in a perpetual state of renovation, you start to get used to the half-finished look of things.

Like light switches without covers.

Or ceilings without light fixtures.

Doors without trim.

Closets without doors.

 Walls without baseboards.

 And pictures not on walls.

Three quarters of the way through our first year in the house, things were looking a little unfinished. To motivate us to get moving again, I sent out invitations for a family dinner to be held on the third Sunday in November. These photos were taken a few days before our guests were due to arrive, and I am pleased to report that over the course of that weekend we got a number of things done. Not everything on the list above, but enough to impress our guests. (They don't need to know that Aaron was putting up the trim around the hall closet half an hour before they arrived.)

bye bye blues

The May 2010 issue of Style at Home featured a living room with a wall colour very similar to ours. It's true what they say . . . eventually everything comes back into style.

But we are not that stylish. The robin egg blue had to go, to be replaced with a soft white.

Choosing the right white was agonizing. There are hundreds of different shades of white. Some are bright white. Some are creamy white. Some are more gray.

After much soul searching (by me) we settled on Cloud White by Benjamin Moore.

Covering the blue took a lot more paint that we originally anticipated. The staff at the paint store promised we would only need two coats, and 4 gallons. It took three quotes, and over 8 gallons. We kept having to run back to the store to buy more. By the end, the staff recognized us when we walked in the door and started  giving us the discount normally reserved for interior decorators and professional painters.

In the end it was worth it. Painting the walls was the most dramatic change we made to the house.

before . . .

. . .and after

I love the second photo because it shows how far we've come. Look how smooth the ceiling is; how shiny the floor is; and how bright the room looks. You might notice that it's not completely finished - there's a baseboard is missing. But that is a whole other story.