Kick off the Shoes! Spring turns to Summer

“Summer afternoon—summer afternoon; to me those have always been the two most beautiful words in the English language.”

                                                                                                             ― Henry James

The weather is getting warmer, though we can't complain about the cold for a couple of reasons. First, we live in San Diego, it doesn't get much better than that! Second, this winter was one of the mildest on record. Nevertheless we are kicking off the shoes, pulling on the shorts and enjoying our beautiful city.

Rishi and Jax sit...only long enough to get a photo!

Going to dog beach at Ocean Beach has been a regular pass time. I swear it is the happiest place on Earth bar none. Too many tails are wagging to deny the intense pleasure of pounding the wet sand and running this open stretch of paradise without a care in the world.

We haven't done much home improvement for the last six weeks, however we did manage to get the vinyl mural up on the 3D wall and we love the results. We custom ordered it from Murals Your Way, an online source with a huge selection of prints to choose from. I was looking for something bold and graphic in black and white, figuring the starkness would enhance the 3D panels we installed. Applying the mural was simple, just follow the directions. Take a look for yourself at the result.

Birch Tree Mural (and Rishi's stash of dog toys)

Note: We also installed our kitchen back splash, but we haven't grouted it so pictures will have to wait until the next post, sorry. It will be worth the wait, however, because it is turning out really beautiful. It's glass, stone and stainless steel--gorgeous!

Old Town Scottsdale

 We have been putting the miles on the odometer in the last few weeks. We met Erin and Renai in Scottsdale in April where we all cleared out our storage sheds in 97 degree heat, pack it in a 20-foot U-Haul truck and headed for California. The kids are staying with us until they are able to get on their feet and get a place of their own. The new digs are pretty comfortable for two adults, a bit tight for four, so I think they are anxious to spread out and start their lives in their new city. We are anxious to get our basement cleared out of all the boxes, but right now there is just no where else to put things so I am having to be patient.

We have been doing some fun stuff however. We have been to SeaWorld, toured our city in GO Cars,

Erin and Renai near the USS Midway

and watched the full eclipse of the sun at Balboa park. We used binoculars to project the eclipse onto white board, and collected quite a crowd of people to enjoy the natural phenomena with us.


 

Half Eclipse 2012

 Another benefit to living in San Diego is the abundance of fresh fruits and vegetable organically grown by local farmers. We love going to the Saturday farmers' market in Little Italy where we gather up our just-picked weekly produce, hit the tamale or quiche booths and savor every bite while listening to local bands play on street corners.

Listening to Tunes

Artisan Goat Cheese booth

Bundles of fresh carrots

If it sounds as though we love our new city, you couldn't be more right. We have some more exploration to do, so...

Until then, May the Force be with you--in 3D!

It's Spring Already! Time for Nesting...

I can't believe it has been nearly four months since we celebrated New Year 2012 and our 21st wedding anniversary. Time has certainly flown by for us for several reasons: First, we have been eyeball deep in several home improvement projects. Second, we are looking forward to Erin and Renai surrendering their ex-pat status for a while and taking on San Diego. The plan is that they will be staying with us while they settle in and decide where to plant some roots, albeit shallow ones. It is a well known fact that we are a family of rolling stones, and we wouldn't want it any other way.

So our grand remodeling adventure started after the New Year on the main floor of the house. The current digs is a three-story attached town home close to downtown and the beaches. We opted for a "lock-and-leave" this time around as you never know where or when we might show up somewhere else. The five year plan is to make this a rental down the road, although it could happen much sooner.

The townhouse is only 7 years old, but was previously bought new and owned by an older single gentleman in his 80s we'll call Tom. When we took the first look at it last October with the realtor, Tom refused to leave the property during the showing because he was afraid people would steal from him. Seriously, there was nothing he had that anyone would want to steal, but I guess value is in the eye of the beholder. Despite that it was terribly dirty, and no real improvements had been previously made since the builder pulled up stakes (aka a blank slate), we liked it and bought it, much to Tom's chagrin.The property had been on the market for quite awhile, and though he had received several offers, Tom had refused all of them. I don't know if he really wanted to sell, but he did. To make a long story longer, when we moved into the place a few days before Christmas, Scott just couldn't seem to mentally get Tom out of the house. The essence of Tom was everywhere, and it just didn't yet feel like "home".

Before we started the work...


Grab your hammer!
Nothing makes us feel more at home than a little (or a lot) demolition! The rule at the Summerills' is "it ain't a project unless someone bleeds!" So far, we had several bona fide projects. We've gone through half a box of Band-aids and several bruises.

We started with the kitchen, because, hey, who doesn't like eating out! We remove the tile floor, backsplash and counter tops and tile around the fireplace. The tile counter tops were seriously heavy to carry down a flight of stairs to the dumpster,especially for two old farts, but happily they are now resting comfortably in the local landfill. We also removed the pony wall for the bar height counter and cut that down to counter top level. That took some doing since the construction of the walls are with metal studs--a first for us. Scott did a banging job on his first try!

Here is the kitchen looking pretty raw:



Here you can see the tile counter tops, but the floor is history:



We laid cork flooring on the entire second floor next, and we have to say, Love it! I have been wanting to do cork for awhile now, and it was a fabulous choice. We like it so much, we purchased more to do the foyer on the first floor. It's Eco-friendly, easy to maintain and beautiful! Even better, we found a smokin' hot deal. (Love those bargains!)




The main part of the second level is the living room and dining room. It seemed a bit like a bowling alley, so we decided to do a pop out for architectural interest. We framed it with 1x3 studs and then sheetrock so I could add a three-D relief pattern.

Here is Scott framing the wall.





Now I am adding the Eco-friendly (bamboo pulp)3-D wall panels, called wall flats.



Here is a close up look at the wall flats. They can be permanently attached using mastic or contact cement, or temporarily attached using two-sided tape. Ours are permanent. Once the mastic dries, they are solid. These will be primed, the seams filled, primed again and painted a glossy white.

We are working on one of the third floor bedroom/baths now, and getting the kitchen backsplash installed. More on these project in the next post.

Meanwhile, Erin and Renai are in Paris missing all the remodeling fun...Next stop, Amsterdam. Poor kids!