enJOY it

OKAY! Dropping in to share huge progress from the past few weeks (which is good; our moving truck arrives with our stuff on 6/28!)

First let's check in on the veggie garden (here's how it looked in April!) So healthy! We are going to hopefully be drowning in tomatoes and tomatillos this summer.

And the pool is coming along! They completed the waterline and retaining wall tile last week. There will be steps on either side of that sharp drop off (there was some confusion between sub-contractors on that but thankfully it's happening.) We picked flagstone coping to go all the way around the pool. We got a peek at that last week when the tile guy was there and it's going to be beautiful.

Inside the house the new wood flooring is installed! We had the downstairs flooring replaced to match the wood that was already in the fireplace room. (Shown above cleared out and ready for stain!) The downstairs is all white oak planks and the upstairs is red oak. The treads of the staircase are also red oak.

We decided to have it all refinished the same way and are using Verathane Western Oak stain. (The top right swatch above.) It's a bit dark with a touch of gray/green undertones and I am so excited about it.

Above you can see it on the red oak stair treads (it's the second step).

And then it's the left swatch above on the red oak upstairs. This is in a darker corner of our bedroom and you can see that in some lighting it does go really dark! I LOVE IT THOUGH. It's going to be a major change from what was there AND from our current San Diego house.

All of the drywall was completed in early June and the electrical is in place. My dad has been painting the ceilings and walls Clare Paint's Whipped which is a warm white. (Eventually we may go with different paint colors but for now, white is a nice fresh slate.)

My dad also installed the crown molding in Ellerie's room and it finishes the space so well. I ordered butterfly sconces for both girls that will hang by their beds as reading lights. So sweet right?

I found a marble slab (40% off because it was the last one) last week that we are hoping to use in three different areas of the house. With the right cuts it's going to work as the primary bathroom vanity countertop, the countertop in the laundry room, the island top and the window bench top in the eat-in kitchen. (I know marble "ages" and I am okay with that.)

The last update is my very first project, the powder room, is coming together! My dad hung a light (it works!) and the mirror I found on Marketplace last fall is going to fit perfectly. We are just waiting for the floor tile (hopefully it arrives Wednesday) to go in and then my dad will install the sink and toilet and we will have a…completed room! Amazing.

And that's the update! It's chaos! I am reminding myself that the "goal" is floors and walls. Everything else can and will be worked on while we are living there. We can't wait.

Things are happening! We are moving right along (and just in time). If you want to catch up; here is where we started, here is where we were in January, here were my goals in January, here is an April update.

I had drone photos taken of the property on Thursday because I am The Most Visual Learner and it's nearly impossible for me to figure anything out if I can't see it. As Paul and I have started talking about plans for the garden and the landscaping I thought overhead photos would really help and they do! (Google Earth also works! But the images were outdated and obviously not as detailed/easy to zoom in.) It's amazing to see the whole space including the pool. It's happening!

When I was thinking about a pool I pinned a whole bunch of rectangles. That was 100% the "look" I wanted. And then I thought about the actual space and realized we needed to go with something curved instead to fit with the existing curved patio (which we love). Seeing these photos confirmed it! Perfect size. Perfect shape for the yard. My overall goal is to work with the charm of the house and yard. I hope when it's "done" I have accomplished that.

If you're curious what was in that space before the pool, it was a jumble of bushes. This blurry photo (from late March; look how much the vines have grown!) shows it pretty well.

The steps and cabo shelf are not fully formed (that will happen when they spray gunite) but that should happen next week. There will be a pebble aggregate cement path around the whole pool that will connect to the existing patio. I am hopeful we will actually be up living in the house for the tiling and cement work. Estimated "first swim day" is in August so we have awhile to go.

(Also! A few people have asked about the panels. The solar powers the house and then some. There are also 2500 gallon rain barrels in the corners of the property. Every drop that runs off the house or an outbuilding is collected in a small barrel and is pumped (underground) to the main barrels. Those are our first source of water in the dry months. Thanks to some good rains this winter they are full. I will do a video tour at some point and share more of that; the system is very cool.)

So let's go inside…we have drywall! Above is the kitchen! Our goal for this room is just finished drywall, electrical, paint and flooring. Cabinets will not be arriving until mid-August and then we will have appliances installed and countertops/backsplash added. Maybe mid-September we will be "done" in here.

The primary bathroom is taking shape. That is the shower on the right and water closet on the left. We had a window added to the shower and this photo makes me so grateful we did; it would have been dark in there.

This photo shows the start of the archway to the bathroom. It's coming together!

The girls' rooms and closets have been painted and look so so good. I love this look of them side-by-side. (Ellerie's on the left and she will have crown molding to match Piper.)

I shared the above photo on Instagram and someone said it looked like a dollhouse. AND YES. That's how it feels. Just a magical space we get to live in in just five weeks! I am ecstatic.

Okay so…we are not going to accomplish all of this. I would be happy if we got 1/2 of it done before we move in in June. But it's helpful for me to make lists (on top of lists) so I am going to share a dream want to do list. Eventually all of this (and then some!) will get done but aside from a few things (I put asterisks by them below) nothing needs to get done these next five months.

YARD

The vineyard has to be pruned.* I mentioned in my "so far complete" list that my in-laws and parents harvested the grapes this fall and the vines will now need to be trimmed back. Paul is 100% in charge of the grapes and wine and he has read a few books and has a plan. The trimming should be happening in March.

Have the trees trimmed. We have a few mature fruit trees and redwoods that need some care. We are waiting on a quote from the trimmer to do this and he is going to wood chip the cut branches on site so we can use them for garden pathways. This will hopefully be happening in February.

Plant two garden beds of veggies. These will be in ground (with the wood chip paths) and are a chance for me to see how things grow/get in the habit of maintaining a garden/see where the sunniest spots are for building future beds. This will hopefully happen in late March/early April and my parents will take care of things for the first few months.

Plant my herb garden (after I see how the woody overgrown herbs I cut back do).

Get the pool installed! Technically not a must but at this point permits have almost cleared so it would be surprising if the pool and new hard pathways were not completed by move in day. (I know, I know.)

ART HOUSE

Epoxy the floor.* I plan to move my worktables and some shelves into the art house and so the floors need to be done before that. I am going with a light terracotta color and custom paint chip flecks (just like we did for the garage, shown below). It's going to be beautiful.

Add a clay catch to the sink. We are so lucky the art house is plumbed and has a huge sink. I am going to add something like this for my pottery practice.

Have 220V electrical ran for a kiln. This is not a must but while we have an electrician at the house for other projects it might make sense.

GARAGE

Get more outlets in the garage including high voltage for charging our car.* This is a must!

Have a utility sink installed. We saved the sink from the laundry room and I would love it to be in garage. We installed garage utility sinks in both of our previous homes and they got so much use.

Build out storage for Get To Work Book.* I will be moving my business from one garage to another and I need somewhere to put it. The metal shelves we have in our current garage are GREAT but will probably be staying for the new owners.

INTERIOR (Oofta, here we go.)

Refinish the upstairs flooring.* If this doesn't get done we can't move our stuff in so this will get done. The upstairs floors are about 2.5 inches wide and red oak. We are going to have them sanded and stained in a TBD shade. We do have a flooring guy and I hope to see samples on the floor next month so he can get started.

Refinish the stair treads.* We have one staircase in the house and so this too needs to happen before move in day or we can't use the bedrooms. The same flooring guy is planning to do these as well and I hope we can get a good match with the upstairs and the downstairs.

Paint the stair risers, stringer, balusters, newel post and banister. This is not a must by any means (it would be a hassle to do it while we are living there but far from impossible) but this is a DIY project I hope my dad and I can do. In my head the risers, stringer and balusters are white and the newel post and banister are black (or maybe stained dark?) but who knows. I have made and unmade 8000 decisions in the last six months.

Have white oak flooring installed in the dining room, hallway, entry and kitchen.* This will be installed to match the white oak flooring in the fireplace room (shown above) but I am not sure (yet) how it will be finished/stained. I just know it needs to be in before we move in.

Install new overhead lights. I have ordered lighting for the dining room and the girls' rooms that my dad will hopefully swap out after the floors are done.

Finish powder room.* Install flooring, sink, toilet, light fixture, mirror. Finish papering the light switches. Paint the ceiling, doors and baseboard. Hang art! (What a delight it will be to have one room done.)

Install flooring, beadboard, lighting and sink in the laundry room.* I have the tile floor and the sink in the garage waiting for install. I want to get them in and the beadboard painted before we move in our washer and dryer.

Have the opening between the primary bedroom and the den (shown above) drywalled. This should be done but it's not a must. That den is going to become a library/office eventually.

Complete our primary bathroom remodel. Our bathroom has been demoed and I would really like to move into it complete but who knows! What is time?! We are moving around a lot of plumbing, adding a window and doing some drywall work (plus tile, etc) and I am still waiting on hard quotes and a timeline from our contractor. More on this project very soon. I have a build back plan I am so, so excited about.

Paint the hallway and the primary bedroom. Eventually we will do something fun to the ceiling of the primary bedroom but not yet. A fresh coat of paint would be nice, especially with the drywall work. That toilet will probably move.

Somehow make the girls' empty rooms look exciting.* I have HUGE plans for the girls' rooms (I may have promised the moon and the stars) but I realistically I am not going to spend enough time up at the house to get much from my DIY list (wallpaper! beadboard! fancy built-ins! reading nooks! canopies! hideouts!) done. Those beds above (from Facebook Marketplace) will be painted and in there day one and I cannot wait to spend my summer building them magical spaces.

Get the kitchen electrical, drywall, ceiling and plumbing in.* We hired Stoffer for the cabinets and will be chatting with them about the kitchen design in March. The earliest we could see cabinet install is August. That's ok! We have lived without a kitchen for much longer than six weeks but I would like the space to be less of a demo zone when we move in. (We are waiting on appliances anyway.)

And… I think that's it?! There are a zillion more projects in my head but most of them we will do while living there (girls rooms, our room, our closet, the dining room, the den/library!!) over the next few years. I am so excited. I feel like I say every time I post but it's true! Moving home to this fairy tale property is a dream.

We are about five months away from moving up to Northern California and living in Cripe Cottage! That is so so exciting. I have been making a long list of everything that needs to be done before June and thought it would be fun to share the giant (truly impossible!) list here on the blog but before I do that that, I wanted to share what we have accomplished in the past six months since we got the keys. You'll notice how much of this is thanks to my parents and my in-laws who live up in the area. We are so lucky to have them.

First though, if you missed it, here is a video tour of the inside and yard.

Inside:

My dad epoxied the garage floor! Remember this amazing project? I love it so, so much. What I didn't talk about in that post is that the garage smelled…awful. A huge part of the epoxy process was also cleaning out previous pet odors from the cement. Now it looks amazing and smells like nothing (an actual dream).

My dad also painted the garage walls white and removed the shelving.

I painted the beadboard and wallpapered the powder room. Was it a good idea to do all that before we demoed the floors and turned the house into a construction zone? Absolutely not. But the powder room DIY project was an important one for me to do to "start" the house. I needed to put my stamp on it and dive in.

I met with a floor guy about having the upstairs and staircase treads refinished.

We had the tile floors throughout the downstairs demoed. (They will be replaced with 3.5 inch white oak planks to match the fireplace room, shown above.)

We ordered tile for the laundry room and powder room.

We had the kitchen, hallway cabinets and laundry cabinets demoed. (Our original plan was to wait on the kitchen but decided to move this project up because it made more sense to get as much demo done while the house was empty.)

We ordered kitchen appliances and hired Stoffer to do the cabinetry.

We had the primary bathroom demoed and have come up with a build back plan (hopefully starting in the next two weeks!)

I ordered wallpaper for the dining room and a chandelier for in there as well.

Exterior:

My dad cleared out all the gutters and fixed the water collection barrels (all the rainwater from every gutter on the house and outbuildings is collected and stored in giant 2500 gallon tanks at the back of the property to be used first during the dry months).

We had the garage door fixed.

Yard:

Paul and I transplanted a few fruit trees and planted a few new ones to hopefully start producing in the next three years.

We had an irrigation specialist come out and replace any broken fixtures throughout the yard.

Paul's family harvested the grapes and made the first batch of wine! (It's still in process.)

My dad fixed the tension wires holding up the rows of vines.

My parents have been cutting back the overgrown plants throughout the back and front yard (it's a process).

I started clearing up the herb garden and revealed those pretty rocks!

I started clearing an area for the garden and made a compost pile. (The veggie garden will be a big project over the years but this spring I would like to plant two in-ground beds in the area above.)

We started the process for adding a pool (it's currently going through the permitting process) and picked waterline and retaining wall tile (shown above).

And that's our "done!" list. I will be back to share the "to-do" list later this week.