Video 1 - BEFORE - The Master Bedroom & Bathroom

Hello loyal followers,

As promised, I have attached the video of the "before" version of Phase I: The Master Bedroom & Bathroom. The actual work on Phase I won't begin until after the New Year's holiday, and our plan is to follow this "before" video with more clips of the renovations in progress and then a final clip of the remodeled area. We will do this for each phase.

What you will see and hear in the attached is a brief tour of the master bedroom and bath as it currently exists, with what we hope is a fairly clear explanation of how we plan to renovate the space(s). We have one or two more shopping days with the contractor to finalize some of the materials, but the goal is to start the actual work during the first or second week of January.

I hope to do one more post next week to close out 2009 and hopefully report out on the last of the materials we've chosen. And here's to hoping that the first post of 2010 contains photos of contractors and builders hard at work!

Happy holidays to all. As always, be safe.

Still shopping

We've had three shopping trips with our contractor: two trips to look at tile selections and one trip to look at kitchen and bathroom fixtures. Happily, I can report that we have all the tile, fixture and flooring selections made for both bathrooms, and we also have the faucets/sinks selected for the kitchen. Next up, next week - shopping for countertops.

I have to give major props to our fantastic contractor - Matt Harris of MH Contractors in Houston. Matt has a great eye and knows how to listen to what we say we want and find workable solutions that may not be exactly what we said - just better! Matt is making the process fun and collaborative.

I also have to thank our architect, Jesse Hager, of Content. Jesse drew up all the plans and elevations and has been following the blog. Jesse recommended a tile vendor for our last shopping trip, and we found the perfect master bathroom tile at that vendor (and the tile we chose was a surprise to us both - keep reading, you'll see what I mean later in the post).

As I've long been promising, we are taking the day tomorrow to do a walk through of the house to either put together a photo slide show or video with commentary to document a complete "before" entry. The slides/video will show the interior as it is now, and we will provide commentary and explanations of what we plan to do to each room. We will, naturally, do the same style of slides/video as we update each room and then a final composite of the finished product.

So, rather than bombard you with a long entry describing colors and transformations, I will make a post this weekend that will describe everything but with photos or video so all our faithful followers can visualize what we hope to do.

I can tell you this much: it's been a fun and educational experience so far. I think the advice I can give to anyone thinking of remodeling at this point is to always be prepared to change your mind. We went into these shopping sessions with some very definite color schemes for the two bathrooms, and after these three visits and the fourth coming tomorrow, we've changed things . . . and have even started to rethink other colors for the rest of the house. It's amazing how you can have such a solid idea of what you want in your head, and then be either surprised by finding something you never expected to like or by seeing your idea in material samples and realizing, "Oh, that looked so much better in my head."

Stay tuned for the long-overdue digital house tour. And wish us luck on the next shopping trip. I plan to take my own advice and just dive into countertops with a completely open mind. I can't wait to find something I never would have imagined!

Shopping, the first update

Okay, so I don't have any photos yet, but I am happy to report that we've been out twice now with our contractor and have had some fun looking at tiles, counter tops and fixtures for both bathrooms and the kitchen. We've even narrowed down some choices, though I'll readily admit that we were both pretty overwhelmed by the bounty of options that are available.

Remember the days when your options included white, olive and gold ? Of course, if we're going to go back that far, I'd have to remember the year my mother opted for hot pink as a kitchen accent color, or the subsequent replacement of the hot pink paint with, shudder, vinyl faux brick. That was also the year my parents decided the living room should be olive, their bedroom was done in all shades of purple and they painted the basement floor fire engine red.

And everyone wonders why I like monochromatic design. It's a mystery.

As a result of being raised in a box of leftover crayons, we've come up with a color scheme that incorporate gray, cream and reddish wood tones and are carrying that through the entire house so that there is a natural flow to the design. It will be so nice to live in a space that doesn't look like it was decorate on the basis of, "Hey, this was on sale."

We haven't narrowed down the tiles and counter tops, but today we picked all the hardware for both bathrooms today as well as the sink and faucets for the kitchen. We chose everything from Westheimer Plumbing Showroom (Westheimer between Shepherd & Kirby), which is a fantastic place. They carry everything from the most basic fixtures to a line in which each fixture is hand-made. The choices are astounding.

We stayed pretty simple and went with what the consultant calls "transitional" designs: a look that is halfway between traditional and contemporary. The result is very straightforward, clean lines without being too severe or angular, which really wouldn't fit the 1960's design of the house. The consultant is putting together a picture book of the fixtures, so once we have the digital version of that, I will post it on here.

The first website below is for a company called Cifial, which is the manufacturer of the faucets we will be using in the bathrooms. The second website is for Westheimer Plumbing Showroom.

Cifial - www.cifialusa.com

Westheimer Plumbing Showroom -www.westheimerplumbing.com

As always, stayed tuned for details and photos - all coming soon!

Shopping, the best part of remodeling

Hello loyal followers,

It's been a few days, so I thought it was time for an update. Though it's not quite as exciting as shopping for shoes, we are set for the next step in Remodeling 1070: shopping for the materials for the master bedroom, master bathroom and expanded master closets. The fun begins this Friday, December 4th, which will be the first of several trips to god knows how many vendors to pick out everything from tile and paint samples to bathroom fixtures, wood flooring and all the way down to new doors and hinges. No pressure. LOL.

We will take these few weeks before Christmas to narrow down all the choices. It's a bit tough, because choices like the wood flooring and doors, hinges, doorknobs, etc will carry through the rest of the house. We want all the internal doors and hardware to match, and it would probably be a good idea to have the same wood floors throughout the house as well. Just seems like the right thing to do. :)

So, as we gather samples and ideas and colors, I'll keep the blog posted with photos and descriptions. Then after we get through the year-end holidays, the work will begin!

Happy week after Thanksgiving. I hope all the tryptophan has worn off . . .

As promised, roof photos

Actually, it's a roof slide show/video (assuming I uploaded it properly). The presentation is brief, but the images provide a decent before, during and after look at the making of a new roof.

As mentioned in our first post, the roof was past its expiration date 12 years ago. It's been hanging on by a thread ever since but has somehow managed to outsmart our hopes for an insurance claim by surviving two hurricanes and a history-making tropical storm.

So, suffice to say, the roof was long overdue, especially since there were wood shingles under the composite shingles you see in the photos. The contractors had to tear up both sets of shingles, re-deck the roof and put down the new shingles. In the process, they added ridge vents for better attic air flow and lopped off the chimney, since the fireplace will soon be a pile of bricks that will be recycled for another phase of the remodeling project.

Stay tuned for the start of Phase II after we digest Thanksgiving dinner.

Cruised home to a new roof!

There is nothing like cruising to the gold coast of Mexico and then coming home to a brand new roof. It's amazing what a difference that new roof makes when you take in the initial visual of the house.

Though the roof color remains pretty much the same, the first thing we noticed is the glaring absence of the chimney. Removing the fireplace is part of the remodeling project. And before you cry "Sacrilege!!," please keep in mind that we live in Houston, aka Hell's Little Waiting Room. The fireplace hasn't been used since the first Bush administration, and we have plans for all those bricks that are basically sucking up valuable square footage in the family room. You will see in later phase photographs that the fireplace is poorly situated in the room. With the exception of providing a mantle for holding the 3 holiday cards we get each year, we are hard pressed to build an argument to save the fireplace from extinction.

The second most noticeable feature of the new roof is the ridge venting that was installed. Again, since we live in a hot climate, an improved system of ventilating the attic can only be a good thing. Add to that the addition of the radiant barrier, which smiles at us in all its silver fabulousness from the garage ceiling, and we may actually realize an energy savings. Good for us, good for the environment. It's a win-win.

Last, though hardly least, we jumped for joy at the disappearance of all of the rain gutters. These aluminum torture devices shall darken our roof line no more. We can say goodbye to hours spent climbing on ladders and digging through wet leaves and tree gunk, and I can stop backing down the driveway and denting the gutter pipe that ran down the corner of the house. Yet another win-win.

So, faithful followers, Remodeling 1070 is off to a solid start. We will post some before, during and after pictures of the roof shortly. Then it's on to Phase II: picking out materials for and beginning the overhaul of the master bedroom, closets and bathrooms. This is the first phase that includes sharing the remaining bathroom with a teenage daughter.

I can now stop saying, "What's the point of having a stocked liquor cabinet?"

Up on the roof top . . .

I think I now know what the thud of 8 sets of reindeer paws sounds like on a roof top. I imagine it sounds like a surprise visit from a healthy-sized roofing contractor in heavy boots surprising you at 9:00am with a stomp across the top of your house to measure for materials. I suppose the consolation is that the contractor didn't realize anyone was home, so everyone got a boost to their caffeine jolt.

That said, the remodeling project took another step forward today, and it's starting to feel more and more like a reality.

I am already learning more about housing construction than all the knowledge I've gathered over the past 45 years, which is admittedly not very much. Let's be honest. The last time I was on the roof of a house was 27 years ago in college, after several rounds of playing Captain Buzz Buzz using sloe gin and beer. Okay, so it was more like 14 rounds, and I lost every single one. What I remember, and what has been verified by several sources who were only too happy to corroborate the story, is that I ended the evening on the roof with a guitar, singing in my underwear. In February, on the New York-Pennsylvania border.

Needless to say, I wasn't discussing the cooling inefficiencies of gable venting systems.

I was today, though, and I learned that the current attic ventilation system is poorly designed. It came as no surprise, having been up in that attic in the dead of August in Houston, that the house was not reaping the benefits of a well-planned cooling system. What I didn't know is that the inefficiencies were due to the fact that the roof vents were placed too high on the structure to allow for proper convection-style air flow, an issue that is further aggravated by gable vents that, because of their equally high placement, essentially don't help cool the attic at all.

So, the November 16th roof replacement is now set to include an updated venting system that, while not making it exceedingly comfortable, should help us tolerate a limited visit to the attic in summer without use of a defibrillator or the need to carry a cell phone to dial 9-1-1. You have to love progress.

Per the contractor, they will be back this Friday to deliver the first round of roofing materials and set up the temporary dumpster. Phase 1 is gearing up!!

The first step is admitting you have a problem . . .

Welcome to "Remodeling 1070." Though it sounds like an advanced class in the interior design curriculum at your local university, Remodeling 1070 is actually a blog/diary that we hope will chronicle the transformation of our house, a sort of day-by-day "before and after" of the ups, downs, victories and defeats of doing a complete home remodel. The 1070 refers to our street address.

We've posted two outside photos of the house, including one with our cheesy but well-deserved Yard of the Month sign from a few years ago. We'll post much more comprehensive photos of the exterior and interior as the project gets underway. We literally just signed the contract a few days ago with Houston-based MH Contractors, and the work will begin on November 16th.

It's a bit difficult to tell from the photos, so let me give you a basic description of the house and an outline of the plans for the remodel. The home is a 2,277 square foot single story structure in an established subdivision in Houston. The house was built in 1965 and is very typical of the designs of that period: the space is very divided and separated, with formal living and dining rooms, small bedrooms and bathrooms and a kitchen that was not laid out with function in mind. With the exception of a few minor updates here and there, the majority of the house stands the way it did back in 1965 - down to the tiny pink and orange tiles in the master bathroom and the wood paneling in the family room!

The plan is to take this chopped up, 4-bedroom house and turn it into a more contemporary, open space 3-bedroom house. A few of the updates fall in to the category of necessity, such as a new roof, but the majority of the remodeling is planned to maximize the space for both functionality and appeal. The laundry list of changes includes:

A new roof - the existing one is composite shingles over wood shingles

Removal of storm gutters - there will be a happy dance on that score alone

All new double-paned, energy efficient windows

New painted hardy plank siding

A complete kitchen redesign with new appliances, custom cabinets, more open

counter space and a walk-in pantry

Conversion of the formal dining room to a working office

Addition of a walk-in hallway closet

Replacement of all carpeting with engineered hardwood floors

Removal, burning and jettisoning into space of wood paneling in the family room

Tear out of back wall of family room to make nearly floor to ceiling windows to look

out to deck and pool

Update and enlargement of second full bath

Combining two back bedrooms to create a true master bedroom suite

Enlargement and redesign of master bathroom

Addition of two walk-in closets in the master bedroom

All new paint, doors, door hardware and lighting fixtures (where needed)

Per the contract, the project is scheduled to take 120 days from start to finish, so we really hope this blog becomes an entertaining and educational journey through the joys and frustrations of taking on such a huge remodeling project. We promise to post photos and videos and let you watch the transformation as we see it happening.

As I said, Phase I begins on November 16th, when the contractors show up to tear off the existing roof and rain gutters and replace the roof that the inspector told us should have been replaced 12 years ago when we bought the house.

Let the games begin. The first step was admitting we had a problem. It took 6 months to get to the second step, which was signing the contract and handing over a cold sweat-inducing deposit (I see lots of trips to the local Mexican restaurant for margaritas over the next 120 days).

STAY TUNED!