Lay it out...

 It's been a busy week. I had a two day stint in SF for work - It was my first trip ever to CA. The weather was perfect! The old trolley cars were so cool!

Our contractor opened up our kitchen floor to start working on the plumbing and gas..

 He also taped out the layout for the new closet! It's nice to see how the space will come together!

When I got back to NY, it was really cold. So cold that on Saturday it snowed! We went to this cool place in Ft. Greene called "Eddie's" to get a 5 panel door for the bathroom and for the new closet. We found at least one door that worked!

 The snow in October was pretty crazy!

 Hudson checked out our new stove  - I think he likes it!

 And the tub looks to be just his size!

It is so exciting to see everything start coming together!

moving in some weight...

So Monday night, Dave and I took in the task to move in the tile for the bathroom and kitchen as well as for the dishwasher and the new ladder for the attic.

We've never really thought of products in terms of weight - until we had to move it up 4 flights of stairs. Let me break it down for you:

Bathroom wall/tub tile = 360 lbs

Bathroom floor tile = 120 lbs

Kitchen flooring = 132 lbs (including adhesive)

Dishwasher = 70 lbs

Attic Ladder = 58 lbs

Bathroom Mirror =32 lbs

Bathroom light = 10 lbs

Toilet = 68 lbs

TOTAL WEIGHT = 850 LBS!

That's a lot of weight (approaching a half ton). My arms and legs are pretty tired. On a more exciting note, the contractor continued demo, taking out the nib wall for the kitchen to expand!

squeezing the appliances in!

So, Dave had wanted this LG fridge - ("At 31cf, it's ginormous! We'll never run out of space!"). I was having problems making the floor plan in the kitchen work, so we settled on a counter depth fridge.  Turns out that was the best decision ever, as we would have had to re-sell the LG if we had gotten it - it wouldn't have made it up to our apartment. We found this GE Cafe fridge on CL from the same guy who sold us our washer dryer and haven't looked back. We love it!

When it was delivered Saturday from NJ, the guys had to take off all the doors and drawers to get it through our hallways. And the hallways are a little worse for wear because of it (we will patch after we're done with deliveries), but the delivery guys were amazing - they hoofed the piece up 4 flights and got it into our apartment and re-assembled it. For the record, it weighed a ton (well, literally 395lbs, but that is a lot for two people). We are so glad that it works, because we are not moving it. EVER.

I love that it has an ice-maker (first time for me since I left for college - 13 years ago whoa time flies!) AND an internal water dispenser (no extra thing to clean on the front!). The fridge I had growing up had this feature and I remember loving it as a kid. And lastly, Dave loves the little red GE...it's the little things in life.

Things are coming together! We decided to go with a matching stove that we *hopefully will have delivered this coming Saturday from LI. I do not envy those delivery guys either. Size wise we should be fine, but the weight? 245 lbs - a bit less, but I don't think you can take off the doors...

demolition surprise!

 So we walked over to the apartment Saturday afternoon to meet the delivery guys for our new refrigerator. We are so excited to no longer have an "apartment-sized" fridge like we've had for the past eight and ten years respectively. Something energy efficient is also a huge bonus. We found the new GE Cafe french door fridge on CL for more than 60% off. As a floor model, it has a dent or two on the side, but no one will be the wiser once it is installed in the kitchen.

We opened the door to a surprise! Our contractor was not supposed to start work till Monday, but his crew started Friday. To our amazement, he had made great progress on the kitchen and bath. Below you see the skyline in the bathroom above the toilet and sink area.

 It's so neat to see the layers of history - see one wall that shows the back of the plaster & laith wall that is our closets on the other side.

 The demo also revealed that the previous work done (18 years ago) was done well. Such a relief, as it is hard to tell with the drywall still up.

 The above view is the kitchen from the future dining area. We are so excited to get a nice sized workable kitchen!

So exciting!! Will keep you posted as the demo continues next week and construction starts! The contractor will have a tape outline for our approval by Wednesday night. Laundry closet here we come!!

how does your garden grow?

One of the things I love about our building is that it has a dogwood in the front bed (dogwoods are the Tennessee state tree - my old stomping grounds). Ivy had taken over the front bed and M+B had given us some bulbs to plant...a perfect excuse to do some gardening. I don't think I have done any gardening in 15+ years...It came back pretty easily - rip up what you don't want, trim what you do want. It actually was fun (did my mom just read that?)!

Hudson had fun cruising along the walk and playing peek-a-boo in the vestibule. Such a cutie!

 We pulled up the ivy and transplanted some across the sidewalk in the other bed that belongs to our building.

Hoping that if we keep watering it, it will take!

 Much better! I hope we can plant some pansies or mums for color...We'll see if we get around to it....

 Hudson was tuckered out and had a good afternoon nap after all of that "work." Maybe there is something to gardening after all!

carpet cutting party

 So Dave and I wasted no time in ripping up the carpet in Hudson's future room last Thursday night. It actually was a whole lot less work than I thought.

 Below all that carpet was plywood subfloor. Hopefully this protected hardwood underneath! It seemed promissing when we looked around the radiator and in the closet.

 Saturday we went back and pried up a panel - score! wood subfloor beneath! We are thinking of sanding, filling and painting Hudson's room only. It will be in contrast to the rest of the house that has parquet anyway - and it should be pretty. We plan on having a rug that will cover most of the room anyway..

Excited for things to start! A week from today, our contractor will start demo!

the kitchen finishes...

We are in the process of procuring all the elements for our renovation. It should be a short schedule - only 4-6 weeks and we have to be prepared with everything we are providing which has meant we've had to make lots of decisions pretty quickly. Below is what the kitchen *currently* looks like:

Don't worry - the ladder is just access to the attic - it's not down most of the time. Also, the pink is nice, no? We debated about keeping it, but then decided to go with a warm grey. We used Ikea's Kitchen planner that I've enhanced a little bit with photoshop for a schematic view. Our dining table will be in front of the fire place and the sofa and lounge pieces will facing the opposite wall.

1. The lower cabinets are going to be Ikea Nexus in dark brown. Dark finishes hide dirt and baby fingerprints... always a good thing! I also like that the wood grain will run horizontal. Add some subtle texture. We also found beautiful pulls from Mockett.com in a "black chrome" finish. They ad a bit of sparkle without standing out too much.

2. Our counters will be Caesarstone - light and airy, but with some texture. Most importantly easy to maintain. We like the look of thin counters so we are using the slabs that are only 3/4" thick. The thinner slabs are also about 20-30% less money! The color we chose was 4600 "Natural White". We are now coordinating with an installer to see if we will need a boom to get the 9' slab into our apartment. We are testing out the size this weekend to confirm it will fit in our stair well (thankfully the ceilings are high!).

3. The upper cabinets will be the Ikea Akurum Abstrakt white lacquer finish. Don't think we'll need pulss, but if we do, we'll do a similar edge pull in a chrome finish from Mockett.

5. The light fixtures are by Tom Dixon and we happened to find them for a deal on ebay.  We have one of each of the shapes below. The inside is hammered brass and the outside is black spun metal. We got them this week and now I am on the fence ( I know I don't have time to be on the fence). We now kind of like these new pendants from West Elm. They would add a bit more sparkle. We mignt now do a cluster of the three Tom Dixon lights in the "office" area (get a new canopy that can accomodate the three lights). Will keep you posted!

6. The flooring we chose was rubber tile from Nora. It is resilient, easy to maintain and adds texture with the round dots. I love that it is a sustainable material as well as "honest." We had considered doing porcelain, but the height difference between the surrounding wood floors and the tile would have been a more expensive problem. This rubber is thin, so the transition will be easy with the new subfloor. Also the grey will break up the dark floors and the dark cabinets (excuse the bathroom picture below - turns out rubber floors in bathrooms is a common thing in Europe).

The backsplash will be white 3" x 6" subway tile with grey grout and we got the kitchen sink and faucet from Signature Plumbing. I am so excited to have a double sink! Last time I had one was over 12 years ago when I was living with my parents. I also love that the faucet has a pull out spray - easier access to those two sinks!