Woodswell Blog

W-K9

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 07:23:00 +0000

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 01:46:00 +0000

Beer Goggles - video powered by Metacafe

Our Equinox foal!

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 12:06:00 +0000

Thursday Morning Ralph woke me by saying, "We've got extra legs!" In horse terms that means a foal has arrived and it looks like the mare has an extra set of legs since the new baby is sticking so close to her. I went out and here is what I saw:

A few hour later, here is what the new baby looked like - a little more alert and already growing muscle! We're calling him "Hershey" since I think he will be a chocolate grulla.

And since I had the camera out, here is a picture of the first 2008 foal, "Bob" - he sure has grown and filled out.

First Foal of 2008!

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 14:09:00 +0000

Ziggy (aka Milagro's Smoky Glitz) has had her foal for 2008! He is a red dun colt with a star and snip, socks on the back feet and left front pastern. Big and healthy, "Bob" is doing great!

The Great Thanksgiving Weekend Floor Flood

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 01:44:00 +0000

So the floors were finished and totally gorgeous, the trim work was going in and we were looking at being finished in another week or two. That was where we were the Wednesday before Thanksgiving.

Since we could not get away for Turkey Day, we spent the weekend puttering around the house, putting face plates on the electrical outlets and switches, and generally enjoying the house and the great weather. Until Sunday, that is.

I was moving slow and posting forum messages about how great the floor looked, so Ralph went over to the house first. He came back upset, "There is a leak and the bedroom floor is RUINED!"

I told him where to turn the water off to the house and ran over. Here's what I saw:

Left: The paper that had been protecting the new floor was wet and you could see that the floor was no longer flat.

Below: Water was flowing out of the exterior door to the bedroom!

Left: Here is the source of the problem - obviously there had been a leak at this location. The wood had buckled so much it had broken the baseboard.

Below: Mike, the contractor, checking out the source of the problem.

Below: Mike and Damon the Floor Guy checking out the damage. In these two photos you can see the extent of the damage to the floor. The entire room had been soaked with water.

The source of the problem. The trim carpenter forgot that this was a "wet" wall and used long nails to tack up the baseboard. He managed to catch the pipe twice. The one still in the joint was not really the big problem. The one that pulled out when the floor buckled was the serious problem since it let the water leak turn major.

And here was where we were by noon on Monday. Depressing, isn't it? For comparison, here is what the floor looked like before the weekend:

Kitchen is basically finished

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 01:31:00 +0000

Here's my mostly IKEA kitchen:

Lower open shelves are custom built from red oak. They match better than is shown in the pictures. They will stay open and have adjustable shelves in them.

I particularly love the backsplash. Most of it is Georgia white marble salvaged from the old Florida Capitol Building when it was restored to the 1905 version. But the part behind the cooktop is a photo montage of our farm with our favorite horses.

Cabinets: Ikea Tidaholm oak & custom built open shelves
Counters: Crossville Color Blox Two "I've Got the Blues"
Floor: Daltile French Quarter Cobblestone (18") & Bourbon Street (6")
Backsplash: salvaged Georgia (Alabama?) white marble & custom printed image on Italian tumbled marble
Sink: IKEA Domsjo sink
Faucet: Prestige Sonora in oil rubbed bronze
Fridge/Freezer: Kenmore Elite (Frigidaire Twins)
Cooktop: IKEA (Whirlpool)
Vent Hood: IKEA (Whirlpool)
Dishwasher: Frigidaire
Oven: Frigidaire side opening convection
Paint: SW Meditative

Progress on the house is slow

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 01:20:00 +0000

OK, so I haven't posted here in a long time. August and September, I was busy assembling IKEA cabinets for the kitchen and the bathrooms and other places. October I had jury duty which wore out my knees and I've simply been tired from the pain.

But the house has been progressing - slowly. Trim has been going in, replacement doors had to ordered then re-ordered (first ones were wrong, second ones were wrong, one was broken, etc.)

The pine floors turned out gorgeous! We went with Waterlox with Minwax Ipswich Pine stain and with a satin finish. Here's what they looked like along the way:

Unfinished floor in the living room

First coat of Waterlox Sealer/Finisher with stain mixed in.

First coat in bedroom after the layer dried.

Floor in the bedroom with a couple of coats of Waterlox.

Stairs with two coats, last coat still wet.

Finished floor in the bedroom.

Finished floor in living room with last coat still wet.

It all looks awesome, doesn't it? More to come.....

Waterlox finish for our floors

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Fri, 20 Jul 2007 04:52:00 +0000

I've decided to do a Waterlox finish on our pine floors. Despite the name, Waterlox is NOT a waterbased finish. Instead, it is a modified tung oil finish that gives more of that old floor look. And to add to that old floor look, I wanted to stain the floors to deepen the color right away.

Here are my tests on some scraps of Southern yellow pine similar to what I want for my floors. This first picture shows various stains and for contrast I also put in the piece that we tested 100% pure tung oil and dark tung oil on.

From left to right:

Top, dark tung oil; bottom, 100% pure tung oil
Top, Sherwin Williams Golden Oak stain applied before any Waterlox; bottom, no stain - entire board finished with Water Lox Original Sealer/Finisher
Top, SW Golden Oak stain mixed with first coat of Waterlox; bottom no stain - entire board 2 coats Sealer/Finisher, 2 coats Satin Waterlox
Top, Minwax Golden Oak stain mixed with first coat of Waterlox; bottom, Minwax Puritan Pine stain mixes with first coat - entire board 2 coats Sealer/Finisher, 2 coats Satin Waterlox
Top, Minwax Special Walnut stain mixed with first coat of Waterlox; bottom, Minwax Early Amercian stain mixed with first coat of Waterlox - entire board 2 coats Sealer/Finisher, 2 coats Satin Waterlox

Same order for this bottom picture but it shows the sheen better. The 100% tung oil (with about 5-6 coats) actually has a pretty good sheen to it, but really is not as shiny as it seems in this picture. Though it does not look like the light is going across the satin finished boards, it is - they just do not reflec the light as much.

In case it is confusing, the first board was done completely with pure tung oil. The second board has stain on one end followed by 4 coats of Waterlox Original Sealer/Finisher. The rest have 1 coat of Sealer/Finisher mixed with stain (where they are stained), followed by 2 coats of Waterlox Original Sealer/Finisher, followed by 2 coats of Waterlox Satin. The tests with straight SW stain versus SW stain mixed with the first coat show that mixing the stain makes it about half as dark as applying the stain directly.

We have decided to stain with half Minwax Golden Oak and half Early American and to finish with 2 coats of Satin.

How about these arches?

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Mon, 02 Jul 2007 14:12:00 +0000

A while back I talked Ralph out of the Craftsman style tapered columns on brick piers, but we both wanted something to make the front of the house look less boxy.

The framers made some sample arches and we liked this shape best. Then I photoshopped it to repeat across the front of the house and added the trim color. So how about these arches?

Lots of Progress!

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Sun, 01 Jul 2007 16:11:00 +0000

Wow! I did not realize it had been so long since I had posted on my blog!
There has been lots of progress on the house - in fact we are on the downhill side now that the exterior is nearly finished. The roof was completed last week, the final window went in Thursday so the siding was finished, too. These pictures were taken before that happened:

The front of the house, which faces north

Here is a view from the northwest side - you can see the patch where the window was missing.

Here is a view from the northeast - oh, that is the front door waiting to be reinstalled - another messup on the door & window order.

Here the how it looks from the south side. The little bump is the top of the stairs - it had to be added to give head space for the landing.

Photos of the house build

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Mon, 30 Apr 2007 13:29:00 +0000

Since I am in the mode of taking lots of photos, but not in writing about them, here is a link to the house build photo pages at my web site. There are tons of photos there which will be updated at irregular intervals.

Appliances picked - almost

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Sun, 22 Apr 2007 04:59:00 +0000

Today we went in to check out a sale at Sears and ended up buying most of our appliances.

The winners are:

Kenmore Elite All Refrigerator and All Freezer pair. They are the same as the Frigidaire Twins, just rebranded for Sears.

Frigidaire 27 in. Electric Single Self-Clean Convection Wall Oven. This model has a side opening door which will make getting large trays out much easier.

A really cool Frigidaire stainless steel dishwasher:

I've also picked a couple of Ikea appliances. They are made by Whirlpool so they are not exotic European imports.

ELDIG cooktop:

LUFTIG telescoping hood:

The trick here is that the appliances from Sears were 20% off, then it turned out that there are additional rebates from Frigidaire! And the appliances from Ikea get me into their discount of 10% off the kitchen cabinets I was going to buy from them anyway. And every one is about what I wanted for my appliances anyway, so I am very happy getting the discounts.

Revised Kitchen plan

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Sun, 08 Apr 2007 11:58:00 +0000

I've revised the plan for the "Prep" wall in the kitchen. Mostly I changed the upper cabinets and the drawers in the cabinet that will hold all the flatware.

I've started a new kitchen blog over on the IkeaFans Forum since my kitchen is all Ikea cabinets and the people over there will be interested in the modifications I
will be doing. So I will be linking to images here and writing descriptions there.

Excavation and forms!

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 05:46:00 +0000

First day of excavating - March 29, 2007

Second day of excavating - March 30, 2007

First day of concrete forms - April 3, 2007

Another shot of the forms on the same day.

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 05:33:00 +0000

Here is the kitchen plan - some of the cabinets are a little off in their locations. This was done with the Ikea Kitchen Planner which is very buggy and not easy to use.

This is the wall to the left as you are looking at the kitchen, then the sink wall at the end, followed by the cooking wall which will be to the right of the sink wall.

Tidaholm oak is the style Ikea cabinet door I'm using. I'll be using the dark metal pulls to the left rather than little handles. The blue tile will be my countertop.

Below is the French Quarter Cobblestone tile for the floor.

Here is the Ikea Domsjo farm sink and the Premier Sonoma faucet for the kitchen.

House elevations

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 05:31:00 +0000

House plans

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 02:58:00 +0000

Here are the final versions of the house plans - before changes:

Changes are:

Add framed 3'0"W x 6'8"T doorway into kitchen at foot of stairs as close to exterior wall as possible (This is actually so I can put a built in cabinet to use the dead space in the corner that will face the hall and have a pass through to kitchen from the hall)
Take out framed pantry under stairs (I have plans for a pantry cabinet to put instead of a closet style pantry)
Add pocket door under stairs to close off back half of hallway
Change windows in both upstairs bedrooms from a single 6'0"W x 4'0" T slider to double hung windows the center 3'0"W x 5'0"T and windows on each side that are 2'6"W x 5'0"T
Change peaked porch roof with vaulted ceiling on side porch to flat roof with deck above
Change center window in bedroom over porch to a 3'0"W x 6'8" French door (to match style of porch doors?) for access to deck
Change pocket door in half bath to owner supplied door (DH has a neat idea that I will explain later)
Switch washer and dryer positions so washer is on left as you look at fronts
Frame under center window in master bedroom for possible future door (With an ICF house this makes sense in case we ever want a deck off the master bedroom.)

Lighting for living room

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Thu, 14 Dec 2006 16:51:00 +0000

Now I'm chosing lighting. Most of the house is fairly simple - I know what I want and have picked out nice looking fixtures that are reasonably econmical. But the formal living/dining room needs some special treatment.

Here is the layout with the fixtures we're thinking about marked.
The door to the left is the front door and will have a large glass area. the door at the top goes to the library. The double doors in the right are the big solid doors from the old House Chamber and lead to the Family Room.

The blue rectangles are our Karastan rugs. The red asterisks (*) are currently speced as 3" cans with eyeball trim so they can be directed at art or other things. The large yellow asterisks (*) are five light chandeliers from Golden Lighting.

The wall at the top will be a "gallery wall - the 3" cans should light any art arranged along that wall. The wall at the bottom left marked "False fireplace and shelves" is a Craftsman style ararngement with our stained glass fireplace and glass fronted boopkshelves from the Governor's office. In front of that will be the main seating area in the living room and we want effective lighting for that area.

At the bottom of the right wall will be the sideboard probably with some other furniture on each side and art above. In that corner will be our large corner display cabinet with leaded glass. So the eyeball cans are meant to light that area.

There will be some other lighting in this room from table and floor lamps.

Here is a picture of the chandelier style we're using for both locations in the room:

Unofficial last version of house plan

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Thu, 14 Dec 2006 16:44:00 +0000

This is the unofficial last version of our house plan - at least for this week. ;-)
We've cut the corner of the library at an angle and added windows to improve the view (that is the part in color, done by the designer to help us think about it). I stuck in windows over the bookcases in the living room. This is not the designer's final version, but we cannot think of an additional changes we'd want to make.

I'm taking this version around for lighting and plumbing quotes. That is the next message!

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Mon, 20 Nov 2006 23:21:00 +0000

Here are larger versions of the draft floor plan - the first floor particularly is a VERY LARGE file!

Some of the special things that will be built into our house

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Sat, 18 Nov 2006 06:14:00 +0000

We've got some special items we've collected over the years that we want to build into the new house. The most problematic will be the sand blasted glass piece made by Robert Bischoff:

We've got to figure out how to mount this as a fixed window - with glass on the front and back to protect it - AND edge light it for the best effect. Front lighting as seen here is just not very effective.

These are book cases made from a set that came out of the Governor's office when the Old Florida Capitol Building was restored to the 1905 version. We want to use them to make a faux fireplace wall with a stained glass "fireplace" that was made by Bischoff Studios, possibly by George Greene.

These are some doors from the Old Capitol - the little narrow door is only 18" wide - I think it would be great as a door for a tiny coat closet in the living room. The double doors were the entrance doors to the House of Representative Chambers. Of course, they need to be completely refinished, since the guys demolishing the Capitol were not very careful, plus they've been in storage for over 25 years.

We also have some other doors that we may take apart for the mahoganey paneling and molding - they were "hidden" doors and have paneling to match the rooms they were in. And we have eight exterior lamps from the Old Capitol - those we'll have rewired and cleaned to use around the outside of the house.

First draft of floorplans and simple 3-D view

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 03:34:00 +0000

MH (the contractor and designer for our ICF house) has sent me the first draft of our plans. This is the low-res version, so the measurements are not readable.

The side with the wide porch is the north end of the house and the formal entrance. Our entrance will be under the carport/porte cochere.

Panorama shots of the house site

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Wed, 08 Nov 2006 17:26:00 +0000

Here are a couple of huge pictures that are panoramas of the house site. The first is taken from about where the north end of the house will be. The second is taken from about where the south end of the house will be. In both, the gate at both ends of the panorama is roughly due north.

Our barn teardown and salvage project

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Tue, 07 Nov 2006 18:55:00 +0000

In 1979-1980, we built our first horse barn out of freshly cut cypress lumber. Unfortunately, we let a know-it-all convince us that cypress logs would last as the posts for our two story barn. They didn't. So the old barn was becoming unstable and dangerous and we knew we had to tear down at least part of it.

Here is what the barn looked like before we started:

You can see how the upstairs front "porch" is sagging. What you cannot see is how rotten some of the posts are!

Here are the sides of the barn showing the beautifully weathered cypress siding. We salvaged almost all the cypress and will sell it for the first reasonable offer.

Here are the guys tearing down the upstairs.

We tore down the entire loft and eight of the fourteen stalls, leaving me a six
stall barn - plenty for our remaining four hourses!

We still have some cleanup left to do, but the smaller barn should be easier to maintain. And if I need more space there is always the newer twenty stall barn down the hill.

noreply@blogger.com (Anne) — Sat, 04 Nov 2006 04:39:00 +0000

Here is an older aerial view of the upper 30 acres of the farm. The curving line on the left side is the county road along our frontage. The two large buildings at the top are our barns. The planned house site is about a third of the way from the bottom straight south of the larger barn.

Here is a large view of the house site with a "cut out" of the current plan placed on it. I've angled the house slightly off straight north south the take better advantage of the views and the slope of the site. The red lines are the topo lines - heavy are every twn feet, light ones visible if you zoom in are every two feet.

The drive to the house site will come through a gap in the trees just north of the porte chochere. We'll have a turn around on that side of the house which will provide guest parking. Although the front porch is on the north, the approach will be from the west side.