Kitchen update, and progress towards the tiles

This weekend, we were allowed to take the cabinet fronts home. I figured it would be best to bring together as many of the kitchen elements as possible in order to make a decision.  So, I brought a bar stool into the house, and put the bar stool, floor sample, and paint chip card all together with the cabinet fronts.  Turns out, we were surprised by the outcome:

We agreed that the high gloss was MUCH nicer with the gray beiges that I love!

On Monday afternoon, we went back to the kitchen showroom.  It isn't fully completed yet, but we did make some more headway.  We decided for the high gloss cabinet fronts.  We also discussed our options on the built-in wall.  It turns out that our coffee maker may not be the same size as the oven/ mircowave.  If they are not the same size, we will have a symmetry problem.  The kitchen guy offered a suggestion of a plate warming drawer.  The good about it is that it would balance out the two appliances on both sides of our "breakfast prep center."  But, putting it under the coffee maker is a bad idea because, you'd have to run all around the island with plates of food, and, of course, its 600 Euro.  Joern had an even cooler suggestion though, he asked if we could do a stainless steel drawer underneath the coffee machine, that we could line, so that Joern would have a little drawer for coffee grinds from our KitchenAid countertop espresso machine.   This would be a good solution, because well, Joern is a little bit of a slob when it comes to coffee grounds, and as long as we clean out the drawer once a day, it would be a very clean looking solution, plus solve our symmetrical problem. 
We also discussed the material for the exposed cabinet bodies.  We have quite a few exposed cabinet bodies, especially when we enter the kitchen from the back door or come downstairs.  We also have exposed cabinet bodies in the "breakfast prep center." The two options are high gloss or matte cabinet bodies.  We decided that not only did the high gloss cabinet bodies look better, especially with the lighted shelf in the "breakfast prep center," but also helped to solidify our decision to go with the high gloss cabinet fronts. 
We still haven't made a decision about the drawer configuration, but we will have our final meeting with "Kitchen Guy," next week.  We have until the meeting to decide on the drawer configuration.

Also, this past Tuesday was the last day of tile preparation.  It was a busy day in the house, with all sorts of new and exciting changes!
The plumbers came to install the shower in the children's bath:

They also delivered, but did not install the shower floor for the rinse-off shower in the cellar:

And very excitingly, they installed, although not completely, the bathtub!

Cute tile guy was also super-busy on Tuesday.  He fixed our cellar stairs!

Although it is hard to tell from this picture, fixing the stairs was a huge deal.  These three steps had huge height differences, so that the first step was about 3 inches high, the second was about 8 inches, and the third, was close to 12 inches.  Obviously, the human brain, nor the body, does well with such varied heights in one set of stairs.  Once it all dries, he will tile over the stairs as well. 

You can also see that the Estrich (concretish material,) is darker at the top of the stairs than at the bottom.  This is because "Cute Tile Guy," also applied a primer for the tiles.

Well, this week certainly got off with an exciting start, but I can assure you, it got even more exciting from here on out.  But, that will have to wait for another post!





CELEBRATORY 200th POST

I wonder if the builders read my blog, are counting the number of posts, and decided that today would be a  big day.  Or maybe, just maybe, the building gods are reading my blog.  Whatever, today is Post Nr. 200.  In celebration of this very large number of posts, something really big happened today on the house.  But just to keep you all in suspense, I will tell you the story exactly as I experienced it.

I came home from work today at 4:00.  The whole way home I considered my plan: would I drive home and then come back to the house at 5:00, or would I stop at my in-laws' house first, waste some time there, and then check out the house at 5:00, after the workers left.  As I rounded the bend in the street, I quickly learned that the town made my decision for me.  The street in front of my in-laws' driveway is now completely closed off.  This is the result of the project to replace the pipes under the street that started in late summer.  We learned about this project at the same town council meeting that also included the vote for approval of our house.  We have been dealing with the road being semi-mostly-closed for the past few months, but it was always open to people who live on the street.  Why on earth did the street have to be closed today, when I am "manning the fort," while everyone else is in Hong Kong?  I had the option to drive onto our private road and park in our driveway.  But, there were tons of workers everywhere, and tons of cars on our private road.  So a very annoyed Allison drove home, and called Joern, and grumbled about the town and the road closure.

I finally overcame my inner "pig-dog," which is a German slang term for that internal creature responsible for laziness, and headed back over to the house at 5:30.  Of course it was dark, so I carefully pulled into our driveway.  I guess I should have thought more when I realized that all of the steel mesh that has been residing in our driveway for the past month, was gone.  But, I didn't really think about it. 
Using my iPhone for a light, I carefully made my way into the house.  The first really big thing I did notice was that the plank that was used as a way to get from the foyer up the nearly 2 ft. rise into the house was gone.  All of a sudden, there were makeshift stairs!

I never knew that it would be so incredibly exciting to move from a piece of wood to a much more stable situation!  But the surpises were long from over.  As I entered the house, I noticed it was even darker than usual.  Strange.  Then, I looked straight ahead of me, towards the stairwell. 

The saddest was that I was there all alone, and I couldn't really have a conversation.  But, there was a lot running through my mind, like, "gosh, wasn't there just a wooden ladder there yesterday?" and "huh, I wonder what is on the other side."  So, I ran as fast as safely possible (there are still quite a bit of "things" laying around all over), and found this, most beautiful sight before me:

Which is a HUGE difference from yesterday, and the past two months:

Despite the desire to sprint up the stairs, I called Joern.  I walked up the stairs with him for the first time, Joern was on my ear, but he was there.  I can't believe what an incredible feeling it was to walk up our stairs.  My friend Stefanie commented a few months ago about the picture of me walking up to the first floor from the cellar for the first time ever, with a very simple, but poignant statement, "Imagine how many times you'll be walking up and down those stairs."  I wish Joern and I could have taken the first trip up our steps together tonight, but we were as together as we were going to get.  I think I said something like, "Oh my gosh, you have no idea how wonderful this is," and maybe "this is amazing!"  Then, we walked "together," around the kitchen wall and headed up towards the second floor. 

The second floor was not as easy of a climb as the first floor.  I actually had not been on the second floor unti this past Monday.  You may ask "why?" until you imagie that this ladder perched another floor higher, with a few boards underneath it and some metal "toothpicks," below to support the whole thing.  Well, now, I can run and up and down the stairs to the second floor with agility, speed, and most excitingly, security. 

The stairs are much wider than I expected, which is wonderful.  It is so funny because last night, I was just worried about the width of the stairs, as they are completely walled in.  I was thinking of how we might feel "trapped," on the stairs.  Hah!  They are wide and beautiful!

On the second floor, I found that the builders continued working on the exterior walls today.  The wall of the master suite, is now completed, and the insulated box for the shutters has been installed.

Window in walk-in closet



I also had the realization that our upper level is almost all window.  Here are some other views of the second floor of the house.

Master bedroom

















East wall, shared between bedroom #1 and bedroom #2

Moving down to the first floor

The "Air Filtration Monster"

Steel mesh for the ceiling waiting in our back yard.

The stairs down to the cellar.



A comparisson so you can see the thickness of the floors.        



A few views of the house

From the driveway

 
From the In-Laws' balcony.