Building a deck

Our side yard has come a long way since we bought the house 5 years ago. We have slowly made it more our style and more functional.

Lets start at the beginning, shall we.

When we first bought the house back in April of 2009 there was a giant overgrown honeysuckle attached to the fence, a pointless stone pathway and a lot of gravel.

2011 we removed the honeysuckle, stone path and started moving gravel.

2012 we removed the wall when we filled in the pool.

2013 we added our garden.

2014 we added a big 200 square foot deck.

We also added some ranch rocks and more flowers.

We still have a lot to do to finish this deck but it is starting to come together. We are going to be adding a roof, a grilling station, a built in bench and we are going to redo our gate and fence section at the end. Also, on the to-do list is to build an 8ft table and possibly a sofa. Things are finally looking nice on that side of the house to match the beautiful courtyard.

A little kitchen update

I was just showing the kitchen to a friend using the blog and realized just how much more we have accomplished since I last made an update. It is crazy how fast things change without realizing it or I just need to pay attention to this blog more. Maybe I will make myself a little reminder once every couple days to write a new post, we'll see how long that lasts.

We have tile, a few new drawer fronts and doors, a functioning sink(!), installed dishwasher and trash compactor and a fun chalkboard.

Geoff and I laid the tile with help from my brother and father. SO much easier than I ever expected.

We are incredibly happy with how the tile turned out. The picture below is just after we finished grouting so there is a bit of haze going on there, but what a difference. We are so happy with our decision to lay the tile in that direction, it makes the room fell bigger.

Here is  our awesome sink and faucet, we lover the single basin!

I was able to install all the baseboards, and on the right I started building the shelf.

Dishwasher and Trash compacter are installed.

Still have tons left but we will get there one day!  ;-)

Slowing down

We have been working hard trying to get the kitchen finished before moving on to any other projects. We have finished: tile, appliances, cabinets, counter tops, sink and faucet. Now I am working to get the breakfast bar with shelves built.

The shelf has started off with a few issues. I am having a hard time getting my brain back into building mode again. I have felt very defeated the last couple of days because of this shelf, it has been very frustrating. I forced myself to walk away from the project for a few days because I feel like I am trying to rush the project just to get it done. I need to slow down and look it over more.  Luckily, I am forced to stop for a bit until some items I ordered come in. It is probably a good thing, I am now forced to reconsider some of my decisions. I rushed installing the base pipe supports and definitely paid for it. Garrett and I got them installed  fairly quick and I was so excited to have it finished. I placed a random board on it to make sure it was level and this happened...

We forgot about the outlet and did a perfect job of splitting it in two.  I have considered  lowering the shelf (Geoff says no), raising the shelf (I don't really want that) and finally notching out the shelf for access. We will most likely be doing the third option.

While we kill time waiting on the shelf pieces I have been working on other small but important items for the kitchen. I can now focus on the finishing touches that will make the kitchen unique and feel complete. Garrett and I removed the center of one of the old cabinet doors, that way we can have glass cabinet doors for two of the upper cabinets. I am pretty excited to get these done. 

As you can see here, I still need to sand it down a bit and stain the frame to match the cabinetry. Additionally, I need to route out the back for the glass to sit in. I really feel like this will add some character to the kitchen, well at least some visual interest.