Aah! A kitchen reprieve!

Well the plumber came today! The last few nights I have been cooking dinner in preparation for the sink being gone, but today he said that he would keep the sink in, until he absolutely had to take it out! YEAH! And, no this does not mean that I will be cooking again any time soon, but to have a reprieve and be able to use the sink for a little while longer is great! And I will have access to my washer and dryer after tomorrow, so bye-bye fluff and fold, it's been fun! The roof is coming off today and here's what our house looks like from the outside, with only one little bit of drywall coming down in the celing in the living room.

And the skylight is gone too! This creates a tiny problem as there is now a hole in the dining room ceiling! it's a good thing we have plenty of tarps laying around! Everyone say Hi Juan!

Holes, Holes, everywhere there's holes!

Check it out! We have just a few holes in the floor around the house. This is for us to be able to put the new footings that will hold up the new house. Most of you have been to our house, so the walls that separated the kitchen from the dining room will be gone and it will be one open space (fabu!) so we need to put in some serious footings: This whole gets covered up every night so we can walk thru the hallway! This is in the living room, by the front door. And this whole in the kitchen wall. pretty soon that whole wall will be gone.

There is Heaven on Earth, and it's called....

FLUFF 'N FOLD!!!!!

Hello! Ya drop your laundry off, you pick it up, it's all clean! At a dollar a pound, it sounds like a steal! But who knew clothes weighed so much? These two bundles were 22 pounds worth! But worth every penny that I don't have to panic about getting the washer hooked up right this second.

Our main focus right now is our meeting on Tuesday at 2:30pm with the plan checker. This should be our final plan check and we should be getting our permit then. But it is a lot of work that Jack has to do to get to that point. In the meantime i have "cleaned" up the kitchen somewhat so I can have some work space since all the counterspace is gone. And i managed to sort out the counter that you saw in the last posting. And yes, obviously I'm not planning on using my stove anymore, because that's it, under the sheet!!! 8-)

Aah, Lest we not forget that the front door has a 4+ foot drop, so now we have to use the back. This is especially fun when you have forgotten something, but check out what we have to maneuver around in the backyard. This is what was done on Friday...

At least someone seems to be really enjoying it......

He's lovin' that dirt pile! OK i have to get back to work, those nails aren't going to take themselves out of the walls! Peace Out!

That'll teach me to leave town!

So much has happened over the last week I bearly know where to begin! With the story about me stepping in dog pooh in Lizzy's garage? (thank goodness she's like a sister to me!) or the huge bruise on my ass? Anyone, anyone? So last Friday I went to our annual Sonic Sales Summer Summit, my company retreat. This year we went to Paso Robles to Lake Nacimento with my partner Mike and his boat. That is what the huge bruise on my ass is about, (the boat, not Mike!) but I digress...... Upon my return on Sunday from the summit, my entire floor was gone! We gave it to Pablo and his family because we want to put in someting different when we are done. That floor was great to us, enjoy! On Sunday, I unpacked my bag, re-packed my bag and went to Las Vegas early Monday morning and returned on Wednesday. What a difference a few days can make! Everything seems to be dwindling away! The front porch, Gone.... Even that little bit you see there in this photo is gone today! And let me tell ya, that's one hell of a step down! Hello! Roof of the garage, Gone... The laundry room!, Gone.... Again, even that little bit of concrete outside the open white door? Gone today too! But what came along with the laundry room going, was that a lot of the electricity that ran thru our house ran thru a box that was attached to the laundry room. So, when Jack came home on Tuesday night, there was no power! And there was no one here to help him either, not even to hold the flashlight 8-( Of course he pulled it off and it's all good now! Then, comes the really bad news! The Kitchen! The part I have been dreading the worst is about to come true. On the wall where my sink is, the cabinets on the bottom and the countertop, (can ya say it with me?) Gone... This is all the counter space I am reduced to .....

I guess i need to get to sorting it out?

The plumber came today and started his work. The uglier news is that next week, Wednesday, the sink will be gone and that will be the end of that! Please, stay tuned to see how I deal without having a sink for months on end! Should be fun.....oh yeah and p.s. the TV doesn't work anymore either! The Satellite dish had to be taken down and there is no where to put it back!!!

Bye Bye Patio

Going... Going... And there goes my patio! Yes Jack and I had made that patio, but when it was made it was a little off and it always bothered us, so bye bye patio. The only thing that I am bummed about is the tile on the patio. We really can't save it, and I love it! We went back to the place where we bought it, and of course they don't have that same tile anymore. Oh well, I'm sure we will find something fantastic anyway! They should be done taking out the patio tomorrow and if they have time my front porch will go too!

Do you see that pile of wood?

DO YOU SEE THAT PILE OF WOOD?!! Yeah, that's what I said! Tonight, Jack takes me to Home Depot to pick up some stuff on a list from Juan, mostly wood. He needs 2x6x16, that's 16 feet long and 30 pieces! Plus other wood etc... I am relatively unsuspecting at this time and we go to the wood. There it is stacked up about 6 high, 8 across and Jack says to me, OK it's this pile except the last two rows! So I'm looking at this pile of wood saying to myself "are you kidding me with this", do you see that pile of wood? Well i think my face kinda said it all! I came back this morning, rented a truck from Home Depot, had the guys load it all up and we moved on!

Back here it's a lot of ditch digging getting ready for the footings of cement that will pour my new foundation! Check out my garage, look ma no roof, well almost!

We finally received the plans back from the structural engineer. This is one person i will be glad is out of my life when this project is over! So now there are a lot of corrections that Jack has to do on the final plans before we can get our permit. We have a meeting scheduled for Monday afternoon for our plans to be checked, but the structural took 5 days longer than he said he would and that has now put us back. Oh well, you just roll with it! Now we will most likely have to postpone that appointment and make another one when we are ready!

Week One, over and done!

Hello! Well we made it thru our first week with barely a scratch! Let's hope the rest of the project goes this smoothly. As you can see most of the stucco is off the house and they are starting to measure out where my new house will be. I am so excited i can't even tell you!

This area, on the left will be our new powder room under the staircase and the front door!

On the right, is our front door and the formal living room. All weekend long i kept sitting on the dirt saying, "look at me sitting in my new living room". Yes i am crazy!

My new sinks arrived on Friday as well! these two sinks will be in the new master bath. Hopefully they will sit on an antique credensa with the sink spouts coming form the wall. These pictures are a little dark and sorry, I've already packed them away so that's the best i can do. They are gorgeous, made of travertine! Check 'em out...

This weekend has been all about getting some order here in the house! Basically this is how I have been living for the past week:

Jack on the other hand has been able to do much better than I:

Really irritating! It took me about an hour and a half to get my desk looking sorta like his! it's not fair. This weekend we also had to move the weight bench. This was an unbelieveable task, but somehow we managed to get that done! So this is where we will be working out for the next several months! Sweet! See ya next week!

Day 2 & 3

OK so we're moving right along! Just a few snafu's so far! Like taking an ice cold shower this morning! When i called Jack, he said "Yeah there's some sort of imbalance in the water", I said " A Yeah there's more than just an imbalance, the shower was ice cold". Come to find out that with all the hammering against the house, the earthquake shut-off for the gas turned off (sidebar-good to know it works, in case of an earthquake!) The whole process of figuring out what has going on, turning the gas back on, getting all of the pilot lights lite again! it took us about 45 minutes, so that was at 8:30 pm! But anyway, we are going at if full speed. There's a lot of dirt hauling and stucco coming down! You can see below this is the back and side of the house minus the stucco.

Today i had to do several stops at the plan check office! I have to say i think i got out of there pretty easy, in about an hour with 3 out of 4 things from the checklist done! and $11.25 poorer for parking in downtown L.A. The city amazes me! You stand in line to get some silly thing checked off your list, it's mostly about fees. "We want to make sure you are________ so pay us _____. Ok move on". Really that is what it feels like. And then it's do this on the third floor oh this needs to be taken care of on the 7th floor. then you have to go back down to the 3rd floor, but you really have to go to the 4th floor at customer service and get a number to go back down to the 3rd floor! Somebody get me out of here! But i managed to come away unscathed!

I do know some folks who were more unhappy about me being gone than me, and that's my "kids". yesterday Mac tore a hole in the metal fence:

The dogs managed to stay inside the fence, but today Tupac got out! When i came home from the plan check, Armando, one of the workers, was frantically trying to tell me that Tupac had gotten out of the fence, problem being he is telling me in spanish. And he seems to talk really really fast, so the few words and phrases I do know, are lost in the quick talking. So I'm looking at him like a deer in the headlights and said What? Somehow thru pointing and an English to Spanish/Spanish to English dictonary we manage to communicate but i tell ya it's a challenge. Thank goodness we have a friend Pablo who actually introduced us to Juan, he speaks Spanish so we call him to interpret! Anyway, I ended up taking the dogs with me most of the day today because poor Whitney is just freaking out with all the noise. Anyone who knows us, knows that Whitney has a problem with noises to begin with. We haven't seen a fireworks show since she was born because she can't handle it and we have to stay home with her. We don't mind though, she's worth it! 8-)

Officially Day 1

OK So today went over with a very small bang! Juan arrived right on time, but they are actually starting the job tomorrow! It all works out anyway because, as usual in construction, nothing goes as planned, nothing arrives when it's supposed to! Our lowboy bin was supposed to arrive today and at about 2pm, they call to say it's not coming today! Something about the dump being closed and they don't have an empty bin. Whatever! These are the kinds of things you have to just roll with when you are doing something like this. These things are bound to happen! Not that the day was a total loss! Jack spent the day organizing the back half of the storage bin, which is going to act as a tool shed during construction. i will have pictures tomorrow, as i am having trouble getting my photo album to be seen on the Blog, but we are moving on! Again another thing you just have to roll with! Tonight we had to re-arrange where our animals are going to spend their time during the day while we are at work and they are working on the house. For those of you just catching up to us, we have 2 dogs, Mac and Whitney Mac is black and Whitney is white!

We also have our new kitty T-Bone Shimizu

And of course, we would not be complete without Tupac ShTortoise Shimizu, our African Spur-thighed Tortoise!

is that a face only a mother could love????

Here is where Tupac used to live, on the left, and here is where his and the dogs new temporary homes will be, on the right:

Welcome!

Hello! My name is Michelle. My husband Jack and I are starting our remodel! We live in Southern California, Mar Vista which is about 3 miles from Venice Beach. You can see what it looks like here, just before construction begins. It is 2 bedrooms and 1 bathroom home with 997 square feet! We purchased our home in Mar Vista 4 1/2 years ago. During that time, the home has fortunately doubled in value, but has not doubled in size! We will have been married for 8 years this coming September and the entire time we've been married , no matter where we've lived, we have always had only one bathroom...Until now! We have been planning this for about a year and a half, maybe longer, and i could tell you a lot of boring details on how we got to where we are today, but we are here today and that's all that matters now! We are adding on 2100 square feet to our 997 square foot house! We are going out and up and over. Jack has completely designed the house himself, with a little help from me, of course! OK, sometimes a lot of help from me. Really i told Jack, i brought him into our current closet, which is pretty big, and said, "look around, you see the size of this place? I want the new closet in our add on to be at least this size, JUST FOR ME!" He laughed, but this is not laughing matter! All of my clothes are squished together on my tiny side of the closet! and if I even think of inching over to his side of the closet, ah I don't think so! So, yes I do have a few requirements! Anyway, our design is finished! We submitted our plans to the city for our permit one week ago and like we paid for, they expedited and the corrections were back to us in one week! Amazing! I took the corrections over to our structural engineer on Friday for him to make the corrections the city asked for. Once we receive those back, next Friday, away we go with our permit. In the meantime, we have been preparing by packing the entire contents of our home, into a storage bin that will live in our driveway the entire time of construction. This was great for packing. we had lots of things with drawers and cabinets, so we filled those with other items to be packed, so there were a lot less boxes. And Jack is the master of packing small spaces. We have put a lot of stuff in a very small amount of space. You can see from the pictures attached. These were taken this weekend while we were packing everything. My old office, completely destroyed to make way for the new laundry room! I am so excited for the new stuff, but I was sad to see my office go. i really liked that space, but my new office will be just as nice. In the meantime, you can see my temporary office space in the corner of my bedroom! That is where i am composing this from! Tomorrow is the big day! Officially Day 1. Juan, our cnstruction guy, will be here at 7am sharp! The "lowboy" bin is set to arrive tomorrow morning along with the workers toilet. Tuesday am, the fence arrives. It will surround the front area of the house while we are under construction. We have to rent it for 6 months at a time, so when 6 months is up, we better be done with it! Jack is going to rent a jackhammer in the morning as well and out goes the patio in the backyard, the front walk etc.....Oh my, wish me luck, hang on and stay tuned!