Construction - Month 12 - Exterior Banister/Corbels/Columns, Exterior Paint Prep, Master Bath Started, Interior Trim Install

Month 12 (Weeks 45-48)

The rain stopped so quite a bit of work got done this month.. We can feel the date where we can move back in approaching finally.

The builder mostly worked on wrapping up the exterior and preparing for paint, and getting going on the interior bathrooms and master bedroom. For the exterior, they mostly finished the banisters, columns, pergola, and corbels. Also the paint guys spent nearly two weeks prepping the outside for paint by caulking everything, sanding certain things, and covering the windows..

The tile guys installed the initial paper barrier and chicken wire, and then came in and floated the floor, shower and feature wall with mortar. So we're almost to where they'll start installing the radiant heat flooring and tile.

before floating everything

after floating everything

We have also been wrapping up some of the interior painting that needed touching up (2nd coats) and painting the master bathroom.. It turns out that the Aura bath version of the paint really does seem to require two coats in the bathrooms. It has a bit of a more oily feel then the non bath version of the paint and it doesn't cover as effectively.

Lastly, we got the interior trim going which I've never done before. Our trim is is 7 different pieces that need to be assembled as I showed previously. We started by deciding to paint (spray) all the materials before cutting and assembly figuring this would look great and minimize brush strokes. So I borrowed a friend's sprayer, bought myself a saw, did some research, and got to it!

my first saw

spray painting the trim outside

First object that i trimmed!

uhg.. not the gap i was going for..

first door trimmed

a set of french doors with trim

what the great room looks like during all this..

You have to pay a lot more attention while doing trim then you do painting. I've gone from listening to podcasts while painting to just music for trim so that I can concentrate. However i'm probably saving nearly $20k doing the work myself and it's actually pretty satisfying albeit slower then i'd like. So far, i'm lucky to do a window and door per full day's work. But a lot of that has to do with how flush the drywall is with the jams and I've gotten more efficient in general. E.g. now I will miter all the end pieces since they're the same in mass since you tend to get in a rhythm when you can build a bunch of things all at once rather then doing just one window or door at at time.

One thing that's half art, half science, and has a good dose of energy is hammering in the drywall around the frame if it stands proud of the jam so that the trim sits flush to everything. I've gotten a lot better and faster doing it now and refined my technique.

In hindsight, the materials get banged up a bit during assembly so I may change tactics a bit and spray the header and footer after assembly and before mounting to the walls. I think that'll work better in the long run. Anyways, maybe i'll post some photos of the process on my next update...

Construction - Month 11 - Rain, Interior Paint, Hot Mop, Trim Materials

Month 11 (Weeks 41-44)

We went ahead and took a week off to knock out the interior painting ourselves. It took the two of us the full week to do it. I actually enjoyed doing it believe it or not which is a first. I don't normally like painting but something about it being my home, watching the colors go up, and getting away from work made it rather enjoyable.

We bought Frog Tape (make sure that you follow the instructions for this stuff), quality brushes and rollers, and the best paint that I could find (Benjamin Moore Aura about $1700 of it for my ~2800sqft home although i have lots extra.. it covers well). My goal was to do it once and only one coat. I have to say it worked perfectly after a little trial and error. It turns out that going slow and taking your time and not trying to paint too big an area each time you apply paint to your roller gets you top notch results. Another good rule of thumb I heard that is true is if it looks good wet, it will look good dry.

I was pretty glad that we'll be putting crown molding up since I therefore didn't have to edge or cut where the ceiling meets the walls. I was likewise pretty glad not to have any trim up yet since there was nothing to cut against there either. We really like the colors so far. Here are some examples..

great room

office

sitting room

downstairs bedroom

upstairs bedroom.. ceiling not done yet

master bedroom

The rain has been hitting us pretty heavily this month which is a mixed blessing. it slows work on the exterior of the house but at the same time, California really needs it. As you can see compared to last year and the average, we're up significantly in the past 2 weeks..

However there were some other downsides.. My basement filled up with 7" of water so I had to run and get a sump pump from Ace Hardware and pump it all out (apparently the drain isn't working)..

  

Also I got to see first hand what a heavy dumping of rain would do to the house. It turns out that the 4 downspouts on the right side of the house are plenty to deal with all the water but the left side of the house only has 2. The front one got overwhelmed and water started coming out straight over the gutter..

 

The shower hot-mop guy showed up and hot-mopped the bottom of the showers. Boy does that smell and smoke up the house (we were there painting at the time). The builder came the next day and filled the showers with water to let them sit overnight to see if they leaked. Thankfully they didn't..

I also went to The Moulding Company to purchase my first order of window and door trimming materials. This, because it feels like i'm getting close to starting on the interior trim although I still need tools. My hope is to get started sometime during the Christmas holidays. We'll see!

I had to run around the house measuring each window and door and built a calculator (excel spreadsheet) to calculate how many linear feet i needed of each of the pieces of wood/MDF. I then went and ordered enough to get free shipping and to get started on the house. I figure it's probably no more then 1/4 of the materials that i'll need to do the interior windows and doors..

(Prior example Window)

(what ~$450 in trim materials looks like (MDF))