Furniture, Pillows, Lighting, and Paint

Fall is here!  It's been three months since the last post so there's a lot of updating to do.

First of all, the last three months have been a struggle and in addition we went for a little vacation in London and Paris. But the work on the house had slowed down a lot while we waited for lighting switches, numerous electricians, paint decisions, and sheet rock repairs.  Sonja Knutzen was busy getting our furnishings and pillows ordered and they all look really great.  Here are a few photos of some of the items.  We still need rugs, artwork, plants, and lamps but the basic furnishings are done.

Another thing completed is the new dining room lighted shelving. It was crafted by Rob Newman and it will look really great once the walls are all painted and we find some pretty glass sculptures and vases to put in them.

Most of the Lutron switches are installed. We still have a couple of places where wiring is hanging out of the walls because some additional switches had to be ordered.  Carrie at Phillips Lighting of Modesto was very helpful in the design and decision making process as was  Sonja, but still it was a difficult process. We selected the Lutron RA system and it has been very hard to find an electrician in our area that knew how to install them.

After 3 electricians came out, some even starting to work and then quitting, we finally found Bruce Trussler at Kirkes Electric in Turlock who knew about these special switches! Done!

We are certainly pleased with the results and functionality, and the ability to control "scenes" of lighting throughout the main areas of the house from our phones or iPad is really cool, but this solution was more costly than we realized when starting out and I'm not sure we would choose it again. On the other hand, I do hope that all the dimmers, using pre-programmed scenes, and adding the thermostat controls will save on our monthly utility bills over time.  Here is what the switches look like.  In every area, we tried to replace large groups of switches with smaller and less.

The upgrade to the under cabinet lighting in the kitchen has also been completed.  We used LED lighting here and so we should never have to change a bulb! Love it.

If you look closely at the kitchen cabinets in the photo above, you'll see how warped and wonky some of the doors look.  We have decided to get all new cabinet faces with new invisible hinges. Rob Newman is working on them now.  He also completed the pull out garbage drawer.  Before it was just an empty space under the counter where we put the trash bin.  Now it is integrated into the cabinetry and when the kitchen is all painted it will blend right in.

A few weeks went by while we had all the holes from the electrical work patched up by a sheet rock specialist, Pro-Drywall Services of Ceres.  I think we are finally ready for paint.

Craig Stringer of Rock Creek Painting will be doing all the painting. We have chosen Dunn Edwards Paints based on his recommendation.  After buying literally dozens of quarts of paints to sample different colors, we finally have decided on 4 shades.  Here were some of the ones we tried, and an example of how I painted samples on walls, ceilings, cabinets.  We've had a real patchwork of colors up on the walls for months.

The selected colors are Bison Beige, Pigeon Gray, Barrel Stove, and Weathered Brown. The kitchen cabinets will be Pigeon Gray, and this photo shows the pulls we've selected.

This coming week the floors in the Den will be stained also.  Here are the stain samples.  We like the ebony ones.. the firsts and fourth samples. Not sure which we will pick yet.

So things are coming together for a fast and furious finish with painting starting the week of October 10th!  I hope all the work on the house itself is completed by the end of October. Then it will be fun shopping for accessories, artwork, plants, and rugs.  More updates coming soon.