Coach House Progress

Hi all -- Dianne here.  

No travelog this time...the above photo pretty well sums up our life right now.


Our workers have made great progress on finishing the inside of our coach house, so I thought I'd get us up to date.   Our time has been spent on trips back and forth to Lowe's, Home Depot, and Sears, and also researching and ordering things on line.  It's all coming together, so here's the latest:

The framing, wiring, and plumbing is done now, except for the main circuit box.  They've installed the water heater (in the attic!), the bathroom vent fan/light/heater and the plumbing is roughed in for the washing machine, ice maker in the fridge, sinks, water softener, and shower.  

We originally thought we'd get an "on demand" water heater, but since Raul can put one up in the attic out of the way, we decided to save our money.  No worries about frozen pipes down here, either!

We're excited about the tray ceiling Raul has constructed, with its rounded corners.  The border will be bright white with recessed can lights.  The middle will have thermoplastic panels that look like a copper tin ceiling, with a ceiling fan/light in the middle.  I had a fake copper tin ceiling in my Indiana kitchen remodel and liked it a lot.  That was a LOT more work, though, because it was Armstrong ceiling tiles and I had to paint them to look like old copper.  Now you can buy panels already finished and ready to just glue up, and they aren't as fragile as the ceiling tiles were.  

Here's a photo of the brochure, showing what they will look like.  These are used in a backsplash, but ours will be in the tray ceiling.

We already have the fan and soon the lights will be installed.

Our bathroom faucet came today (the UPS man is my new best friend).  I can't wait to see it installed, with our Talavera Mexican vessel sink, which is also on its way.  I picked the hummingbird pattern.  Here's a photo from the web site that I printed out of what the sink will look like:

The most exciting thing so far is that the framing is in the wall to install our stained glass panel that we've been lugging around the country in our motorhome.  In Indiana it just hung in a window; in Texas it will be installed in the wall between the kitchen/living area and the bathroom, so that we can leave a bathroom light on to illuminate it. 

 The "bird" theme is perfect here, because we are right next to the World Birding Center in Mission, TX.  I saved all my wooden bird houses to decorate the bathroom with.  Can't wait!

The expenses just go on and on, though...two of our much-used items decided to die as soon as we arrived here in Texas:  Roger's electric shaver and my vacuum cleaner.  So we each got new toys.  Roger loved his old shaver, so we replaced it with an updated version of the same thing. 

 He especially likes the way it looks at night when it's charging (the whole "Star Wars" thing guys have).

We've picked out the floor tile that we want, and the paint color.   Roger has already designed a nifty threshold design using the stone border and smaller tiles, then the rest will be 6" x 6" diagonal tile.


 Tomorrow the guys are coming to install insulation and drywall.  Raul said he'd be ready for paint by the end of next week.  I kept my Ellen Kennon paint samples from our kitchen remodel, so we were able to narrow colors down to match the furniture before we left Indiana, then match the tile we picked out here.  It's "full-spectrum" paint, which should really show its full potential down here with all the sunshine.  


We've picked out appliances at Sears, and will go next week to finalize our order for that.  (They are on sale next week until the 19th).


This is happening so fast that we really haven't done much of anything else.  The only non-remodel activity I had this week was to walk over to the RV park next door to visit the "Veggie Man" who comes once a week.  I published a photo last year of all the items I was able to buy for a few dollars.  Here's a photo of my trip this week:  

I spent a grand total of $8.50!  


Roger went to his first "breakfast with the guys" this morning.  He said more than twenty guys showed up, and they all went to breakfast to a local Mexican place called "Chuy's" and had a delicious authentic Mexican breakfast.  He's still talking about the fresh, warm tortillas.  Guys + Food = A good time was had, of course!  


Tomorrow night we plan to venture out to the Retama clubhouse to attend the wine and cheese get-together.  We each bring cheese and a bottle of wine to share.  We have some bottles of wine left from Paso Robles, so we're all set.  Should be fun!

The whippet picture of the day shows Chaplin laying in soft grass heaven.  Our new sod has no deadly spurs or fire ants.  After four months in a desert climate, he's a happy camper now.