Progress report -- Week 4

Progress made this week:

--Concrete blocks put in for foundation of addition and garage
--Old bricks removed from exterior of garage and side of kitchen
--Garage doors removed
--Conduits for plumbing/utilities to be rerouted put in place
--Termite pretreatment of addition and garage
--Lots of decisions made. In addition to the critical fake tiny window panes style, I also chose:
(a) the style of brick to use on the addition and garage. We could not find an exact match to the existing brick, as the house was built over 30 years ago, but we found a set that comes pretty darned close. Wagner also managed to save a fair number of bricks from the portion that had to be removed, so he can mingle the old brick with the new to make it blend better;
(b) the whirlpool tub for the master bath;
(c) faucets for the tub and bathroom vanities; I chose the Lahara line from Delta, which I like for the sleek modern look and ease of cleaning/repairs:


(d) undermount sinks for the vanity; and
(e) shower head, faucet, and diverter for the master bath shower. I stayed with the Lahara line for this, too:



(f) hand-held shower on bar for master bath shower. I didn't care for the look of the Lahara hand-held shower, so I chose another more contemporary Delta version:


(g) finish for all faucets. I knew I didn't want polished brass or chrome, but it was harder to pick from all the other remaining choices. After 15 minutes of wandering around Ferguson's (the plumbing supply company we're ordering from), holding up various faucets against whirlpool tubs in biscuit (the color I had chosen to go with for our sinks/toilet/tub), I narrowed it down to "aged pewter" or "brilliance stainless" (which is what Delta calls a finish that other people call "brushed nickel") and finally decided on "brilliance stainless" for everything.

Obstacles encountered this week:

--When looking at front windows during the window pane decision process, we noticed a large crack running diagonally from the gutter. Wagner said, "that doesn't look good," and checked it out the next day, whereupon he discovered that whoever had replaced the roof last (this occurred before we bought the house five years ago) had not installed flashing properly at one point, and water had gotten in and damaged the wood. I'm a bit disgruntled, as it seems to me that the home inspector we hired before we bought the house should've noticed that, as well as the gutter company we had hired a year before to install fancy new "ever clean" gutters. Wagner says it is not a major problem, but we will have to replace the damaged wood and flashing and fix the crack.