onward and upward

Our house has a third floor, and we finally got to go up there this morning!

construction: month four

 previous posts: September, October
The November post never happened so this one covers quite a lot of progress.  Since late October, they have framed out the basement interior, framed level one, installed four steel beams and framed level two.  They’ve also done half of the backfill around the basement.  I think they’re holding out on the second half of the backfill so that they can have an excuse to keep the alley blocked off and use it as a staging area.  We have such a small “yard” that they can’t even fit the building materials in it.


Level one floor (with tracks for radiant heat) and walls


Installing the beams


Level two



The last few weeks also brought a lot of rain, as you may recall.  The basement flooded several times because the drains are not yet connected to the sewer.  It’s supposed to be okay, but it’s not a pleasant sight.


The current timeline says it will be done in June.

owner provided

Our construction contract specifies many fixtures and all of the cabinetry as owner provided.  This gives us some cost savings (about %15) and a lot more control, for longer.   However the time for final decisions is fast approaching.  

We recently spent a grueling afternoon at IKEA and the appliance store and Jack has done more modeling of the kitchen cabinets.  We have also picked a floor and some material colors though we still have more decisions to make. 

The highlight at IKEA was discovering some of our chosen cabinet fronts in the as-is room for something like 75% off.   Now they are in D's closet.  

We also ordered one of the kitchen sinks from China.  It was extremely hard to find and I worried it would disappear.  Naturally we are storing it in the extra bathtub. 

the return

I’ve read several articles in the last few years on the relatively new field of happiness research.  If what they say is all true, I’m about to get a lot happier.  Sometime in 2016 my favorite sister will be moving to Seattle!
Having a sibling, especially a sister, and especially one who lives close by provides a major happiness boost!  She left for college over half my lifetime ago and I can’t express how excited I am that she is coming back!
This is made possible by my brilliant brother-in-law’s acceptance to a fellowship program in Seattle.  We’re so excited to see more of both of them!

reflecting on apartment living

 

Last weekend D and I sat on a couch in our building’s cozy lobby and watched the Seattle Marathon runners speed by our window in the brisk morning air.  That tradition and all of the holiday events downtown are making me a little be nostalgic-in-advance for our time living downtown.   What’s more, as we pick out colors and floors and feel closer than ever to finishing our house, I’m reminded of all the perks of apartment living that we’ll soon miss.

• parking place:  On rainy days like this it is so nice to stay dry while loading and unloading the car.   Our future neighborhood also has a fair amount of car prowling so we won’t be leaving anything of value (or that looks like it might be of value) in the car, except for D’s car seat :)
• tiny trash trek:  I love not knowing for certain when the trash, recycle and compost are picked up.  Also, recycling large quantities of cardboard from Costco and Amazon is a not (much of) a problem.  Lastly, a trash chute is a big benefit to the diaper changing set.  Who needs a special diaper trash can when you can easily get rid of small stinky trash bags so conveniently? 
• winter warmth:  In the winter we never really get that cold.  D still doesn’t sleep with covers very well, but it’s okay.  When he was a newborn, I was never tempted to put a hazardous hat on him either.  This winter coziness does translate to nearly unbearable summer heat, so that’s the tradeoff.
• cat corralling:  Emo has no desire to leave our apartment, but many cats do, and going out the apartment door is no big deal for an adventurous indoor cat.
• protected packages: In our building, packages are delivered to our apartment door, package lockers or to a shelf by the mailboxes.  It’s impossible to say which option will be used, and I’m not ordering to the building much over the holiday season after my experience last year, but all of these possibilities are better than just leaving a package out on a wet, highly visible doorstep.  We’re going to have to figure out some alternative once we’re in the house.
• small space simplicity:  This covers all kinds of changes we’ll experience once we are living in a house again.   Yes, we are looking forward to things like the possibility of one person sleeping in a little bit when the noise from D and breakfast can be a little bit farther away or even to both of us working from home at the same time.  But, there are a lot of perks to having a smaller space.  We’ve never needed a baby monitor.  It’s easy to do laundry while working on something else.  When things are misplaced, they are never far away.  When it comes to parenting tasks, it’s easy to get help with a disastrous diaper or the delivery of some needed item because the other person (when home) is never out of earshot.  I think we’ll be a bit lonely when we’re on different floors of our tall futurehouse.