Snow in June ... it can't be

I talked to someone who's been in the area for a long time ... the conversation turned to the weather and that it was going to be 30 degrees tonight ... I was about to start joking about how it may snow in May but he stopped me in my tracks when he said .... "hey, that's not unusual, I remember it's snowed as late as June 9th". 

Since I started thinking of being in a snow parka to get the mail in early July, I thought it best to do a little research for the Northwest Hills of Connecticut:

• May 9^th is the average last day of frost in Northwest Hills   
• October 6^th is the average first day of frost in Northwest Hills   

Not bad ... warm enough from May to early October to really enjoy all the outdoor activity this area has to offer without bundling up ... and maybe, just maybe this has been an unusual winter.

What is this . . .

So, we're settling in.  I had big plans to set up my office in the basement, but that's not going to happen for a while so I set up shop in a large upstairs closet.  Probably the only room in the house with limited power and no Cat 6 cabling!  But ...  I like it.  I'm thinking of building in two desks with some nice recovered wood and hanging three 22" USB monitors on the wall as my screens.

This picture though,  is just a random accidental shot of my desk this afternoon ... a pot of coffee, some club soda and a monitor in the background.

If you look carefully on the right hand side above the coffee pot, you can see the right side of a picture taken from the trip down to Florida in March with a couple of fraternity brothers and our wives.

The Penguin has arrived . . .

And no, I'm not referring to the fact that it's May, the temperature outside tonight is 30 degrees and only a Penguin would feel comfortable up here.  I'm referring to the Christmas present that Grace and Mia gave Kim and I ... it's a Penguin that makes seltzer ... saves money and less recycling!

I made the first few bottles with way too much carbonation ... gas in ... gas out ... that's probably why I'm up blogging and Kim's locked herself in the bedroom.

What focus . . .

Kim is now a non-stop painting and staining machine .... She's painted the master bathroom, mud room, kitchen, upstairs hallway and the guest bathroom.  She's also stained the trim in the guest bathroom ... lot's more to do, but she'll get it done ...

Timber or Firewood?

After a successful day of fire wood gathering,
Wayne now wonders if his easy finds down Gorham Road might have been Carter Smith's house timber ...
















p.s. Anyone in the market for a bulldozer? It's difficult to move on from our 'Construction Period' when this is the first thing we see every morning.

Guest Bath Room Complete!

One room down, nine to go! It all started when I found a consignment shop Lillian August side board and decided that it would make a more interesting base than a built-in countertop. That set the exotic tone for the room.

Next I met with Tom, who did our other cement countertops, and we decided on the color and size of the countertops. We decided on a width of 14 inches, to extend the top of this narrow piece, without compromising on looks. Next, I searched for 14 inch wide sinks - not easy! I looked for an oval shape to make use of the long length of the countertop, and found these recycled hammered copper bowl sinks on the web (www.coppersinksonline.com).

There was a pipe showing in the ceiling above the sinks, which was a problem that created a lighting opportunity. I stained extra pine barn wood we had, and bought some thin molding at Home Depot. The electrician (Ray from Hantsche) added two overhead recessed lights, and Strid Brothers Carpentry cut and installed the piece.

The carpenters also made a seat for the chair in the picture, that Wayne’s Mom picked up seatless at a church sale. I bought a yard of material and some stuffing, and stapled the material to the underside of the seat., and finding an excellent tutorial on youtube.com

We bought the Capiz shell mirrors and toilette light from lampsplus.com. All the other things in the room came from different rooms of our previous home. Any thing that seemed exotic was evaluated, and lots of things, from baskets to artwork fit well. I’m hoping it will be a nice treat for guests.

Door Galore! Barn to Monastery Doors retrofitted

HOUSE FOR SALE excluding Washer, Dryer, and .... Doors?

No, Kim can't take them with her should they ever sell their home. Each door was placed in perfect place for Adoornment... according to Kim. Her love affair with old doors started with a farmhouse cabinet door to hide an electrical box. Next she used doors as desktops, file cabinets as their legs. When they decided to build their new home, Kim's first thoughts were - it's going need over lots and lots of doors!

Kim scoured the area for interesting used doors. Strid Brothers Carpentry did a fantastic job getting these non-custom sized doors to fit, with the changes as seamless as possible.

A barn door was installed on a track for a guest room. The door is old, but the track was purchased new from a web barn supply store.










Below is a old porch door, from Board and Beam in Kent. We wanted to see through the laundry room to outside, and also see the dogs when locked up. This door did the trick. And BTW...Kim is pretty sure that this is the door that landed Wes, the architect, in the hospital... a bit too risky and nontraditional for his, I mean, the GILES houSE. But after installed, Wes admitted with a smile and a nod of his head... 'it works'.



The below two reclaimed doors from Urbanminers (Hamden). One leads to the screened in porch, another to the kitchen pantry.




I'm absolutely smitten with the Bennington knob that came with the door (below left). The name comes from the town of Bennington, Vermont, where in 1849 Christopher Webber Fenton found a glazing method that produced the look of varigated stones. I love the smooth feel, and I think of it as Tiger's Eye jewelry for a door.




Inside the door is an unexplained stripe of green paint which inspired to paint color of the kitchen which surrounds it (right).









The Master Linen Closet came from Stamford Wrecking company. It is thought that it was originally an armoire door. This was a tougher one to retrofit since it does not have a square edge for a regular hinge. At least there was only one of these...














Until Kim found it's 1700's hand-hewn sister....
In the photo to the left you can see the water closet door, as well the antique wood that was used for the base of the tub. This was originally the wainscoting below the chair rail from a demolished lodge in New Haven.



(Right) The laundry closet is an old farmhouse door with MANY layers of paint (from Urbanminers ). It's just getting a clear coat, so each paint layer, yellow, green and blue, can be seen.








(Below) Here is the powder room door. It's a smart, solid oak door from Yale University (bought at Urbanminers).

















AND... the Front Door (below). It was one side of a monastery double door and the arched top was removed to fit our rectangular shaped doorway (from Ken Coopers in Sheffield, MA). Two new boards were added to the top and bottom, because the door was too small for the doorway. To get the new boards to match the old worn crackled door, which I loved and didn't want to touch, I used a crackle paint. First I used a white primer, then an oil based brown paint and then a crackling medium, to show white cracks thru the brown. Quick, relaxed and sloppy, my favorite technique, that doesn't need to look Martha-perfect... and no one can tell that the door isn't all antique...




p.s. It's part shrinkage, and perhaps the monks didn't have a large door fund, so hence, you can see through the door via some of the panels. I caulked abit, and we may put raised panel over the recessed ones inside, to increase the energy efficiency of the door this winter. I also need to do the crackle effect inside but I also like seeing the transitioning... it's no fun if it's all done. The photo below shows how the boards looked, pre-crackle.