Good Morning Hallway

So remember how Niall thought there was too much blue in the house and wanted to get yellow for the hallway?  And I wasn't sure about the yellow but Niall said to trust him so we got mis-tint paint?  Well, the decorators painted the hall yesterday.

I wasn't sure about the yellow.

One of the painters asked what I thought and I said I had no comment.  He said something about how the color will certainly wake us up in the morning.

Niall went up to see the house last night and was so pleased with how it looks.  That's good enough for me.  (As a note-can you see that plug with a cord?  Yup, that's right.  The house is fully wired and we can use the plugs! )  And can you see the finial? (One of the round ball we had on the banister.)

The guys are doing the woodwork today.  It has taken two men, working full-time with an arsenal of paint sprayers and rollers, two full weeks to paint the house.  Ha!  I did have a passing thought we could do it ourselves before moving in.  (There are still plenty of things that need to be painted by us, like the inside of closets and shelves.  And stairs, vestibules, storm doors and utility closets.)

So, the loft.  I have mixed feelings about it.  The ladder access really is a bit of a pain.  But once I get up there, I think the space is coming together.

We made the decision to leave the structural supports (I learned yesterday the vertical supports are called oxters, which means 'armpit' in Scots!) exposed.  It does look a little odd, but I feel like it makes the room look more open.  Now we have to figure out how to finish them (we bought a belt sander with the intention of trying to sand them back) and flooring.  

I think we'd both like carpet, but getting around all the oxters means lots of cuts and may not look very good.  We've talked about doing a border of laminate or hardwood behind the oxters and then carpet in the middle. We'll see.  The only bit of the brickwork that was decent enough to leave exposed was a bit of the chimney.  We're still going to have to clean it up and then seal it.

Like I said, I like the loft once we get up there.  But, uh, how we chose to do it is a bit unusual.  I wanted the ceiling to go down as far as possible on the outside wall.  As a kid I loved spaces like this!


But, uh, with a big hole in the floor dropping down 10 feet, I don't know how much time the kids will spend up here.  The joiners put in that little dividing wall so we'd have a place for a light switch when entering the loft.

And the new Velux window gives the room so much light.  Did I mention that Niall's already claimed the space under the window for his desk?

Because the decorators have been busy in the whole house, I haven't been able to do much work physically.  I did manage another sand and coat of the cabinet doors, but they still need some more.  And we've made a list of things that we need to do to move in (or shortly there after.)  The list is currently sitting at 135 items so far.  I've been focusing on doing research/getting quotes/making a game plan to manage the list.

And we're still trying to figure out how to finish the countertops.  One problem is a backsplash (or splashback as it's called here.  Actually, we don't want it very high, so I think it's just called an upstand.)  Anyway, we have 17 of these granite tiles that match the countertops.  They have cement and plaster stuck to the back and I've struggled to clean them.  I think we've found a tiler that will grind off the backing and put in the tiles.  We only have enough to cover part of the countertops...


And the front steps!  They're a mess and need to be replaced, which we knew.  We planned to replace them a little later, but they are not holding up well so we're getting quotes to get them fixed before we move.  I had big plans about putting in sandstone steps with a bullnose, but Niall has convinced me to follow a more economic route.  (We'll basically going to have the steps look like this.  Except cleaner and more structurally sound.)