Another window question

When you're short, windows that start high up are not your best friends. The master bedroom windows in our renovation had been TBD all along. We were going to wait and see how things looked up against the 5/12 pitch of the lower level roof. (The peak is off center because the addition doesn't go the full width of the house. There is a basement egress on one side of the house, and we're building on top of the existing wall of that.)

If we'd gone with a less steep on our vaulted ceiling, we'd have had more options for windows on the addition side of the second floor -- our master bedroom and the family bathroom. As it is, the bathroom window will be a casement (crank) window fairly high up. Okay, I can live with that.

But in our bedroom, I would like to see the woods behind our house.

The view from what will be baby A's bedroom is so dreamy, how could I not want to approximate it in my own bedroom?



The windows as pictured in these rough openings have been ordered, though, in this three-panel configuration.





They are a little lower than they were originally built, but I still can't really see out of them without getting on my tiptoes. Here's my eye-level view:


Nice treetops, sure. But no sense of the ground.

I suggested we could just eat that cost (well, try to sell the windows, and if that didn't work, donate them to Habitat for Humanity's ReStore) and buy two slightly larger windows to stair-step them down the roof, like another 4" down and another 4" down. The husband didn't like that idea, and the builder noted that the trimwork might not look so great.

The three windows as shown do have a nice symmetry with the three windows on the lower level, but that's really only visible from ... the back yard of the house we currently live in, next door. And we are not going to inhabit both houses once this new one is done!



The builder's suggestion is to just lose the window closest to the peak and drop the other two windows -- the ones we have already ordered -- down 6-8" inches.



This is not a huge building headache since the framers can just pad the top below the header and frame in the one window. Not free, but not as much as ordering new windows. (I don't have exact figures yet. And of course this still gives us an excess of one window, but maybe I can find a friendly buyer on Craigslist). Here we are with the one window covered up.


Keep in mind that our bed will be along this window wall. One thing I didn't measure or consider is width and centering on the wall. Might need to go do that.

Our headboard is quite low -- just 39" in the middle and 36" at the ends. If we move down the windows, there will still be several inches between the headboard and the trim. But the benefit is that then I could enjoy more of the woods, rather than just the treetops. I don't want this to bug me forever if it can be fixed now for not a whole lot of money. The view is a big reason we love where we live!

Do I spend a ton of time in my bedroom right now? No, not a ton. But with the front dormer space, I am thinking I might stand more of a chance at some regular yoga up there, and I'd like to feel connected to the woods. And eventually, we might even have -- imagine! -- a reading chair up there!

Can you blame a short girl for tryin'?

Hot times in the .... winter? Progress vers printemps

What a week! Temperatures in the 80s, magnolia petals everywhere... and more and more decisions to make. Windows are almost all ordered, HVAC is partially priced out. Ten words there that belie the hours and hours we've spent talking, designing, getting opinions, looking at photos... It's a good thing neither of us had to work this week. (Well, good until you factor in all the money we were spending rather than making!)

The dormers are built and feel pretty spacious from the inside. The new roof is papered. The many mounds of dust and old insulation have been cleaned up from the inside. The contractors had just cut holes in the ceiling and swept it all down through.


We've found two potential French-speaking babysitters and owe two of our daughter's naps this week to one of them. This is more related to the house than it might seem: our failure to get our children to sleep quickly and easily is directed related to our ability to find the time to actually talk about any of this stuff with any semblance of focus.

But who can sleep when it feels like June and there is suddenly an extra hour of daylight in the evening! Circadian and seasonal rhythms be damned!

This post is being composed to the background music of wailing and complaining on the floor above such that we are counting the days until these ridiculous redheads have their own bedrooms. There is tile to choose and flooring to finalize, but before more time goes by, I want to be sure to get recorded how things are going.

So what's up in the air, and what's up out of the ground (besides that hot pink hyacinth and baby girl's elbows?)

The front room -- mudroom and family office
The left side of the former bedroom closet will have hooks and cubbies, probably in an L shape, building out a wall in between the left section and more office-type storage at right

Daffodils in the woods behind our current house (which is to say ten feet from the woods behind our future house)

Family room and dining room looking into kitchen

Front living room looking into kitchen

The place where old and new come together is where I expect to have the family organization station: calendar, bulletin board, etc.

Our magnolia in all its glory!
If it weren't so bright, you might be able to tell that we'll still get to see it from the new place (and we won't have to slip on its slimy petals all over our lawn!)

Back addition windows

Once upon a time, we thought we would have a windowed gable in our vaulted-ceiling addition.

The original plan was this (please excuse the crooked scan):


Then we decided to move the door to the middle and came up with this for the top window config:


Then the framing started, and we learned that a vertical beam above the door was necessary, spilling our pentagonal window in two!

So we went back to something closer to the original plan, but in order to align the two double-hung windows on each side and such, we were looking at a whopping six custom windows. Can you hear the cash register's ching? It was too loud for our ears! If we want to consider a front porch and the kitchen we envision, something's gotta give!

So, how to best bring in the outdoors and stick with standard windows? Remember, you will see this back room right when you walk in the front door! So we do want it to look nice.

And we want to see lots of the woods! Here is the room we're talking about in its current state of construction. If we go with transom windows above the double-hungs, we can raise the header up, and we'll probably lower the window sash. The whole wall will probably be redone.


Our current thinking is something like one of these renderings below. With the first two, I think we'd be in the market for some rockin' art up high in the gable!

A: Four double-hungs:

B: Six double-hungs:



C: Four double-hungs with a taller door and 3 transom windows:

Roof colors

Next up in the decision department: Roof color!

Here we have a Certainteed sample board featuring the many-varied Weathered Wood at left and a sheet of Cobblestone Grey at right. In between is a piece of Hardie plank in Heathered Moss, which we expect will be the color of the whole house.

We're looking for some contrast and something that will work well should we decide to do a purple door or, if not the door purple, at least a purple mailbox and address number and a walkway made all of something like the purple slate you see up against the siding tile below.


The sample board leaning up against the railing is of Silver Birch, which i could live with. The other sample is Mist White. Too light.

Next to Cobblestone Grey is Mojave Tan, which I consider a total no.


We're looking at having the house all in the Heathered Moss Hardie plank, with some accents of shake shingles in the same color at the top triangle of the dormers and the front porch, if our variance gets approved. The metal roof on the porch will be dark brown.

There's a slight chance we might decide to go for the darker Mountain Sage for the shake accents, but we'll probably go with just one shade of green, the light green. (I'm a sucker for the dark, but light is the happy compromise). Thanks to Anila of ALine Architecture for these renderings!


With these Capes, you see a whole lot of roof! So what roof color should we choose for the house?

Framing Day Two and Three

The impressive progress continued, despite insane winds that blew a styrofoam cooler I had on the porch to donate clear into the woods behind our yard!

The dormers in front started to get built in the wrong place, but that got remedied the next day, as seen below.

Framing Day One

Workers arrived today at 8 a.m. to begin the framing. When I left the house at 1:45 p.m., the subfloor was built. When I returned at 5:00, there was suddenly the beginning of an addition!

Work stopped around 6 p.m. when we all went on a post-dinner field trip to check out the new space!

John took the these first two photos during the afternoon.




Below, here is the crew standing where the kitchen island will be.



Left side of the house -- the side that looks out to our current home, which you can't see from the kitchen island. We had good luck with those sight lines!
Here is the right side of the house, the wall that will have the TV and sofa facing it. Not visible from that angle is the neighbor's carport. Another good sight line decision, it seems (we hope!).



Here's the view from the play area and dining room into the rest of the house. Where you see the interior beam will be a wall part of the way across with stove, counter, some kind of pretty backsplash. The front window will become a double window. The fridge will be where the pail is at left.

Musing on design: Upstairs Bath

To the horror of some people we engage in a discussion about our renovation plans, we are building just one upstairs bathroom with a shower and no tub. We're planning to share this space with our kids, even as they age out of diapers and funny-looking pjs.

To assuage fears of hostile teenager years, we remind our friends that there will be a full bath with tub on the main level (like in our current home) and another full bath with shower in the basement. The kids can each claim one of those if they want their own space.

On our modest budget, we're prioritizing one nice full bath upstairs and a complete redo of the main level bath over doing a much bigger upstairs with a master suite and extra bath. To do that would cost us a whole lot more money, and it would mean our first floor addition couldn't have vaulted ceilings. We live on the main level, so we're putting the beauty and comfort of that space at the top of our list.

We like the idea of one wall of glass tile -- probably green, like this one -- and the other walls clear Lustrolite.


We're considering a modern vanity of natural wood in a light stain, like this. We are doing a double, but the sinks will be inset, not bowls. We might bring the tile from the shower back as a backsplash like this one has. Thinking white walls. Not sure about counter material or color.


We like the idea of having storage in between the sinks like this, but I'm not sure we have the square footage to pull that off!

Kitchen planning

After my first post about eco-friendly cabinets, we went to Amicus Green Building and checked out the EcoFriendly line from Executive Cabinets. They were a strong contender, but meeting with Chris Donaghy of Kitchen Brokers opened us up to some other options.

We found Chris because he was one of the first East Coast distributors of Neil Kelly cabinets, which we learned about from the book Good Green Kitchens.

Chris also uses Breathe Easy Cabinets and Cuisine Cabico lines, and he works with cabinetmaker Jeff Dahlquist of Dahlquist Studios right near us the Del Ray neighborhood of Alexandria.

The idea of using a local maker who gets his wood from managed forests one or two states over appeals to me. Cut down on shipping costs, and ensure that we can see the product in process!

Jeff uses water-based VOC finishes and his boxes have no formaldehyde, which is something I care a lot about.

We'll see what prices out to be our best option.

All along, we'd been thinking of getting a maple shaker door, but after talking with Chris about that pesky problem of crumbs and dust settling on the ledge on our current cabinets, I'd consider going with flat panels on drawers!

We've been drooling over this photo of a lovely sage green quartz countertop against birch cabinetry, our current fave look.Next up to tackle: The backsplash/tile conundrum. Where to start? How much to spend?