Clouds, Cold, Tents and Snow

It’s frequently overcast this time of year in Minnesota. The photos reflect this. I was tempted to brighten them (outdoor fashion shoots will often be done on a cloudy day which results in more even light and then made to look brighter and sunnier) but decided to let the mood reign.

Pedro and a couple of his relatives ‘neutralized’ our house before it goes on the market this winter. I liked the red of our living and dining rooms but the beige brightens it up and is kind of refreshing. It kind of hurt seeing the oak surround and mantle get painted. Our family room was dark hunter green and I’m not thrilled about its new beige look 🙂

Kitchen sink from Shaws in Darwen UK. Ryan said he appreciated us choosing one that was so light and easy to move. 🙂

Shower in guest bath is looking great. 

Trim in our master bedroom. We’re not sure about the vent cover. It may be OK once painted? Need to be replaced with something different?

Terrace is bricked.

A couple of local musicians installing tile in the guest shower.

Tom sitting on top of the elevator cab doing a lot of wiring.

Cody checking the elevator cables.

Lots of work putting an elevator cab together. This is the top of it.

Prepping the back porch for brick. Even without heat it’s comfortable out here (38°f outside) since the plastic blocks the wind. We’ll have two phantom rollers between each column. One will be for insect screen and the other is planned to be shade to block the west sun. Plastic might be a better option since that would allow us to extend the porch season a bit and then we can do rollup matchstick shades or something.

The trim guys cut out the sheetrock above the door so that the door framing for this door will look the same height as other windows and doors in the upper hallway.  This door is shorter due to the lower and sloping roof in ‘Spare Oom’. 

Since we’ll hopefully sell our house while things are still frozen and snow covered we moved a lot of our outdoor stuff already as otherwise it’d be frozen down (likely until sometime in April). If the ground isn’t too frozen already then Scott is going to have one of his guys level out a more out of the way place to put them.

The front courtyard is mostly done and looks really good. There will be a bike ramp on the right side of the steps so that we can get our bikes in and out of the bike parking which is the door in to the garage on the right. I ride to a café every morning for porridge and a latté, and we frequently ride to dinner, grocery, pharmacy and other places. We also have a bakfiets that we use when we need to carry a lot of stuff like groceries or returns to Zappo’s. We also use our bakfiets for hauling bags of garbage and recycling down to the garbage cans near the road. Our bikes and bakfiets are all quite heavy so a ramp is necessary for getting them in and out of our garage.

The shingle siding is looking quite good.

Ben working his way up the highest peak on the north side. He understandably wants to get the higher bits done before the weather turns too cold and windy.

The crew from Topo LLC installing brick on the west porch. Great bunch of guys and very exacting with the work they do.

Using trowels to re-space some of the brick.

Matt ‘Frosty’ getting the door trim perfect.

Engineered wood floor in the master bath. 

And in the guest bath.

The finnished doorway to Spare Oom. Details like this is one of the reasons we chose Hendel, are glad to have Bob overseeing things, and glad to have folks like Matt, Owen and Jesse from GK Millwork.

Ryan installing a shelf above the mudroom sink. Note the laser lines.

Jesse cut out a bit of sheetrock to make sure that the base block lays perfectly flat.

Ryan mounts a little shelf anywhere needed to get his laser in the exact right spot.

Kurt installing shingles on the south side above the conservatory. The plan had been to have the roofing guys flash the packout for the conservatory so that Kurt & Ben could shingle the entire side but that didn’t happen. The conservatory guys begin work on Monday morning so Kurt wanted to get as much done above it as possible before its in place.

José prepping the lower patio. It was 8°f when I took this shot. And the shot of Kurt above.

Ice from the blankets. The lake still doesn’t have any ice at all except in a tiny area on the south end. I think that will change soon.

Ben carrying a box of shingles up. No way I would do that!

The Topo guys working on the west porch are protected from the wind.