[kate1234]

We got the permit this week and the contractor is ready to start.

The first thing was to get a decent temporary kitchen set up. We plan to work through Thanksgiving and Christmas and I wanted a nice place to cook and eat. So I had to haul all the junk out of my basement, suck up the crickets and spiders, scrub the floors, paint the walls (yellow!) and put down squishy, clean interlocking foam tiles over the old broken asphalt tiles.

Unfortunately a huge rain storm blew threw here a couple of days ago and, even though I had cleaned out the drain in the basement stairwell just last weekend, we had a flood. The contractor's guys were here and valiently went out in the deluge to clear the the drain so that water would stop flooding in. The good news is that since I had just cleared out the basement, I had nothing on the floor that could get damaged. But that nice clean scrubbed floor with the nice clean new squishy interlocking tile on it has to be taken up and rinsed off. Sigh. Luckily, since the location of shelves and such is temporary, I had chosen not to put the tiles under heavy things so it is easy to pull up.

Here are some basement pics:

[kate1234]

Not sure why those images aren't showing up since they did the first time I previewed the post. I think it is a problem with my site (where the photos are posted) rather than a problem with IkeaFans or with my post. I'll work on fixing it.

[kate1234]

The house is a split level



which I'm not overly fond of, mostly because I find it to be lacking in character. The one big design element that I take from the house is that it is home to many horizontal rectangles. See how the two parts of the house are each horizontal rectangles? See how the glass in the windows are all horizontal rectangles? That is the one design element I would like to be my overriding principle. So when somebody says, "how about a nice arch here" we should all say, "No, but how about a horizontal rectangle."

My tastes tend toward something a bit older; for instance, when I did my windows,first I declined muntins on the windows, because those would have given me vertical rectangles.

For the mouldings I chose something old-fashioned like this:



And I used Oil-Rubbed Bronze spoon locks and lifts on the windows:




The handle on the new french door in the dining room will be similar (this is as big of a picture as I can find)



I plan to replace the current flat doors with flat panel ones, probably two-panel like this:



but painted white.

I'll have white cabinets that echo those flat panel, 2 panel doors, and I'm counting on painting Tidaholm doors to do it (more on that later). Oak floors, soapstone counters, stainless appliances, white tiled backsplash with a thin black liner.

This was to give you an idea of the overall design elements I have in place, 'cause I got questions! I had better post this one quick since I would hate for a crash or something to wipe out all the links.

[greenie227]

I love your split-level, actually. We bought our split-level because it was what we could afford in a school system we liked (otherwise filled with McMansions), and now 8 years later I am completely embracing the split-level.

Are you going to use the horizontal wall cabs in your kitchen? Talk about horizontal rectangles.

I'm going more modern in style with our renovation -- Nexus BB (god willing) -- but I love the choices you've made so far. Good luck!

[kate1234]

Part of the reason it took so long for us to get going on this project is that the kitchen really isn't too bad.

We eat all of our meals at that little round table:






The view from the foyer into the kitchen:



The view from the kitchen into the dining room:



The view from the kitchen, down the foyer, and the front door in the background:



The view from the living room into the dining room. Yes the dining room doesn't actually have room to eat - it has served as Lego central and music conservatory:



The view of the back of the house. The plan is that a new bay window will replace the kitchen door and part of the pair of windows next to it. The rest of that pair of windows will be bricked up. The pair of windows on the left (which are currently in the dining room) will change to an outward swing french door. Right now that door will be closed off because we won't build the new screened porch until Phase 2. When we build the porch we will remove the old steps and stoop.

[kate1234]

Forever, I have planned to get soapstone counters. I didn't particularly want shiny granite and we always have grease flying in our kitchen. I figured soapstone worked with the grease rather than against it. I like the dark, I like the dramatic white veining.

I had chosen the supplier/fabricator and gotten a quote. I went down today to choose, purchase, and set aside the slabs I wanted. The guy was busy so I spent a few minutes wandering around their warehouse looking at the slabs - granite, marble, soapstone.

And I saw a granite that grabbed my heart.

I called my husband who worked about 10 minutes away. He has been an interested onlooker to this whole process, occasionally tossing out opinions, more often not. I didn't tell him I saw something I liked - I just said, "It is about lunch time and the place is near your work; how about coming down and helping me pick the soapstone slabs." He said sure, I picked him up, we went back and I told them I wanted to wander around for just a few minutes first to see if anything grabbed us. DH wandered around, "Nope, don't like this, don't like that." Then he stopped at the one that had grabbed me and said, "I love this."

We bought it that instant.

I was too surprised to take a picture (I had taken my camera just so that I could) so you'll have to wait to see.

[GardenOfDarwin]

That is stunning. Did you get a name on it? Perhaps some of us can root out some pictures until you can get some...you know how we love pictures. Nice documentary, btw -- it will be fun following along with your progress!

Susan

[kate1234]

I believe it was called Brass Blue. I googled "brass blue" granite and found several pictures, but nothing that did justice to what we saw in person. Lots of big swirls and movement. Mostly blue with a little brown - just enough to echo the brown in the hardwood floor.

I realize now that we possibly should have made them take it outside for us to see it in the sunlight, but we didn't.

[kate1234]

Here is a pic from the internet that is the closest one I could find to what we picked. You can see that, like soapstone, we stayed with dark with bold markings.

[DesignDiva]

Kate, what a wonderful story! I love that you both responded to the same granite without knowing it...that's definitely a match made in heaven, both you and the granite, and you and your husband!