We Are (at least) Double Blessed

HI!

We are at least double blessed to live in the Denver area. We have great friends, an exciting downtown to explore, we are a way station / stopover for friends traveling from coast to coast, and we are creating a wonderful new place for our friends to gather.

It's been a wet Spring so far, and in the afternoons and evenings, the thunderstorms roll in, usually from the West over the mountains. We were inside the car picnicking before a James Taylor concert at Red Rocks and it was raining and hailing and thundering and lightening so hard we didn't know whether or not we'd actually walk up to the amphitheater to see the concert. The storm slid past us and continued on towards Denver, the skies cleared around us and the sun started peeking through the clouds generating a magnificent rainbow. 

While we could see it from Red Rocks, our neighbors in Roxborough Park really SAW it, reminding us that Colorado and Denver are probably the places where we are meant to be!

Thanks Kenneth, Susan, Anthony and Sue for helping us be in the right place at the right time!

"Trouble Right Here in River City"

HI!

Fooled you ...... nothing wrong. Just reminding you of a musical called "Music Man." Dear friends thought Deb had contributed mightily to a home DIY project (and she had!), so they invited us to go to dinner at a nice little Italian place in Littleton followed by a performance of The Music Man in the local theater. We really enjoyed the performance and laud the cast for their professionalism and obvious passion for that musical.

Further, this venue, and a couple of others that we've visited, point to Denver area's passion for small theaters and big performances. It's a little different in the Bay Area. We were used to going to events, concerts, and plays that were held in much larger venues. Most of the time, we had less than front row seats and struggled to hear and see the nuances of the performances. There are a couple of venues (like the Alameda Theater and Berkeley Repertory Theater) which combined small intimate surrounds and a big performance, but in the main, the venues were too big. Here the venues seat 200 or so and one can always get a seat no more than 10 rows away from the stage.

There's a bigger than life outdoor concert scene in Denver in the Summer; it seems like there's five or six venues to choose from each weekend with many more opportunities during the week in the evenings. Many of them are picnic style - come early, lay on the grass, play frisbee, and eat dinner before listening to the various genres - jazz, blues, bluegrass, folk, .....

There are so many choices in the metro area, it's hard to believe we'll ever run out. And if we do, we can always begin to explore the venues in nearby cities.

The home building project moves along. The continuing saga is the tale of our appearances before the HOA "Design Review Committee." When we were thinking of buying and building here, we were told stories of the rough time the DRC had given other residents. There's a lengthy and costly process of preliminary, first and final reviews, and along the way, there are always changes to make to your "submission." We've had our share of comments from the DRC and have made the requested changes, and finally have the last review completed - the landscape design - but not, of course, without the requisite "requests." Of course, we've waited so long (as we wound through the process) that we can't plant anything this year. We'll have to go through Winter this year and the Spring of next year watching the rain and snow melt wash our dirt down our driveway and onto the neighbors driveway (where it pools and dries into the hardest sandstone formation you could imagine!).

The spiral staircase is in and being used! What a blessing not having to climb a ladder to get to the main floor. Deb has always been keen (or so I thought) on making a bottle wall out of the wall under the stairway.

One of the things we struggled with was a feeling of an "entry of doors." In that small space, you'd see five doors and little wall. As the framing took shape for the walls on the entry level, we found that leaving out the wall under the front part of the stairway opened the room up considerably. We expanded one bedroom, made the mechanical space smaller, left out the wall, and ended up with an inviting place to rest, snooze, read a book, etc. in a cozy underneath the stairs. One of my daughters will particularly like the idea of our "cozy," eh? But, the large bottle wall is gone, to be replaced with several smaller bottle walls throughout the house.

One of our friends said that the winters in the Denver area can be brutal, and while I found that they are very much different from the Winter in Alameda, CA, they are really enjoyable! But I do miss being able to barbecue year around. So, in the design of the home, we added a covered area in the right angle formed by the stairs to the party deck. The covered area is accessed from inside the home by going through a door in the wall of the "Great Room," and going under the stairway. So, in Winter, we'll be able to go outside and BBQ even in rain or snow! The framing you see above and to your left of Deb's head is for the roof. We'll put Spanish roof tiles there and supper the whole thing with a pair of peeled log posts. Should look really inviting once the sandstone flagstone patio goes in under the roof. Thanks to Renee and Lynn for the inspiration to create this inviting space ..... with the bar, and the TV, and the dog bed!

For the coming week, the windows are delivered and installation begins, and the roofing continues (even though "they were supposed to be completed by Friday" of last week. Funny thing .... the roofers took a day off, didn't get done on Friday, worked a few hours on Saturday, and a few more on Sunday and were at least at the site on Monday ...... and still aren't done. The good thing is that they are working overhead and not really in any other craftspersons' way. Wednesday is the plumbing walkthrough - a signal that work is shifting from the exterior of the home to the interior.

We've completed the electrical fixture walkthrough; confirmed the appliances for the kitchen; ordered the fireplace for the Great Room and the fire pit for the party deck; specified the interior doors; purchased the door through the great room to the BBQ area (a Story in and of itself!); ironed out the sauna specifications; answered the questions about the master bathroom tile floor and dry stack walls; and will complete the cabinet and plumbing walkthroughs later this week. Phew! Whatta week!

Cheers!

The Roofing System is Going On .................

HI!

It looks like the outside framing is just about done. There's a skin of 3/4" manufactured "plywood" over the whole outside, and the framers have given the home over to the roofers.

We're installing a roof "system." First, a layer of shaped styrofoam is placed. Backing up a little ...... when the framers created the parapet walls for the roof, they cut in what are called "scupper drains." These drains are holes in the walls low down, square and placed in the center of one of the walls. The roofers use the styrofoam to create slopes from the outside walls to the scuppers so that the water will flow off of the roof and not pool up.

In this picture, small steel discs about 4" in diameter are used to hold the styrofoam sheets securely down on the roof decking. The styrofoam may be 3 layers on the edges and 1 layer near the drains; but these layers of styrofoam cannot stand up to foot traffic or to the elements, so they have to be covered up.
Once the styrofoam is placed correctly, it's covered with a thin layer of cement board - actually a board with cement poured over a fiberglass mesh. The boards protect the styrofoam from being squashed by foot traffic.

The lighter grey colored section in this picture shows the cement board. An overpayment of EPDM is then placed.

EPDM is a fairly common roofing membrane in Colorado. EPDM stands for ethylene propylene diene monomer (M-class) rubber. It looks like a black rubber sheet that's thick enough to line an in-ground swimming pool. The roofers lay it over the styrofoam and up the walls and the look is of a swimming pool.

So, the roofers started on Monday and is supposed to be done on Friday .... of the same week. So far (Wednesday PM), they have about 80% of one section done. They have another section partially done and three sections untouched. We'll see if they make it!

Next comes the windows and doors. The windows have arrived in town, and the doors are going to be made locally, so they should be on time. After installing them, the home will be weatherproof and work begins in earnest inside.

Cheers!

Hadn't run into this before ........

HI!

Spring is truly underway. The rivers are running high with lots of mud in them from the rains and the snow melt, there are thunderstorms almost daily in the afternoons, and we've had several bouts of hail and more than 20 tornadoes / funnel clouds touch down in May and early June.

As an aside, Arapahoe Basin ski area is still open, and hopes to be open until July 4th weekend. Haven't seen skiable snow that late in the year here for decades and, in my experience, since I skied the permanent snowfields at Palmer on Mount Hood in Oregon. To say it's a good snow and water year for Colorado is an understatement.

There's another indication of Spring and early Summer. The bears come out, move to lower altitudes and start intersecting with the human populations along and in the Rampart Range. Here are pictures of a reader board at the entrance to Roxborough Park ..... and anecdotally, our neighbors tell us that someone they knew sighted a female and her two cubs foraging along the foothills in her backyard. We back up to the Pike National Forest, so we see and hear tales of Fox, Bear, Mountain Lion ....... and the deer are so plentiful and unafraid that they'll let you approach to within 5 feet and the humans complain loudly about them as "pests."

The Amazing Spiderman and Sometimes things just work out .....

HI!

I learned something watching the framers put the sheathing on the outside of the home yesterday, Framing is a job for young men or for The Amazing Spiderman! Able to handle a 4 foot x 8 foot sheet of sheathing with two hands, 20 feet up on a ladder, one foot on the ladder, one foot on the window sill, 10 penny nail gun in one hand, holding onto the ladder with the other and suspended (or maybe kept from falling) by a strap attached to his back, the Amazing Spiderman puts nails about 2" apart in all the horizontal and vertical studs / beams to hold the sheathing on.

Rough Framing is Almost Completed: They are getting close to being done for a while. After all of the parapets and exterior framing (like for the decks) is complete, and all of the interior walls are in place, and the fireplace is framed, and the kitchen cabinetry has a place to land, the framers will go on to other jobs and other contractors take over.

Next to come (probably in a week or so) are the roofers and the window and door installers. As they complete their work, the home is "weather proofed" meaning that we wouldn't expect any water leaks or wind leaks. The plumbers and electricians can then begin rough installation of all the plumbing and electrical runs to the termination points such as where the sinks, faucets toilets, etc are located.

It may be that the exterior of the house has work going on too. Once the openings in the walls are framed and windows and doors installed, the exterior work can begin. Can't wait to see these new aspects of construction get under way.

Granite and Countertops: We went over to the granite supplier's house to check out our last decision on the type of granite for the Master Bath vanities ...... 84" long x 24" wide with two sink cutouts. The granite turned out not to match well with the dry stack rock we picked out for the walls of the shower. But, searching around Deb found a 1/2 slab that was the last piece of granite they had in stock of that type .... discounted by 2/3 or so.

While Deb was searching, I was wandering .... and found a stack marked "FREE"! Lo and behold, a slab 84" x 25" with a sink cutout in it already ...... finished edges, polished, and ready to go was in the pile. We planned a utility sink in the Workroom, and this slab of granite will fit perfectly and provide us with undercounter storage and a great work surface. Who says there's "No free .... ?"

Fireplaces and Open Flames: We had the pleasure of attending our friends' first Evening on the Patio a week or so ago. They had work done to create a new patio space and it's spectacular. Located on a hill near the tee for one of the fairways of the golf course, they have an unobstructed view of the Rampart Range mountains to the West as well as the lakes and rivers closer in. But the best part of the evening (in addition to the great food, home tour, meeting new friends) was sitting around the fire pit and talking. The fire pit was so nice that it inspired us to change the Party Deck fireplace to a fire pit.

Parapet Walls and Photovoltaic Cells: Bye the way, as framing was being completed, the parapet walls went up around the various "boxes" that make up the house. These parapets define the roof segments for the various sections of the house, and hide the roofing materials from views below. As it turns out, these roof areas, which are essentially flat, would be perfect places to spot in photovoltaic cells taking advantage of the sunshine to produce electricity. We're not going to pursue that right now, but it is something to think about in years to come.

Expanding the Party Deck: And, in looking at the framing for the different roof sections, we noticed that there was an opportunity to expand the Party Deck area. The plans called for the Party Deck to cover only the area above the Great Room, but the Great Room and the areas over the stairwell and the hallways to the Master Bedroom / South facing deck are within the same roof "box." As the plans laid it out, we'd end up with a parapet wall in the middle of the Party Deck that looked out over a 9 foot x 16 foot area of roofing membrane. Rather than upset the views to be had by our future guests, we decided to expand the area of the Party Deck by 1/3 to a total of about 600 square feet.

What's Next? We're actually going to build something for the house here in a few days. there's a wall in the powder room off the kitchen that has a low wall installed in it. The wall has been designed to have a small section of "bottle wall" imbedded in it, so we'll take a run at making our first bottle wall. Should be an interesting little project!

Cheers!

Starting a lasting relationship

HI!

Kenneth & Susan

We promised our new neighbors, Kenneth and Susan, that we'd be good neighbors, collaborating in landscape design, watching each others' cats, watering the gardens when they need it, watching the house when empty, .......

And, every stellar relationship starts with breaking of bread and sharing of wine ....

So, flank steak marinated in Rosemary, fine Bordeaux wine, a tossed green salad, and artichokes, ....

Fine company, good conversation, a warm evening, and a grand view made for the perfect start to a lasting relationship!

Spiral Staircase, Fireplace, Ceiling Beams and Roof Decking

HI!

The home is moving along with four "milestones" this week.

Milestone #1: The ceiling in the kitchen (here) and in the great room have wood beams in the ceiling. Here you can see the pattern they form on the kitchen and dining room area.

Installation of the beams is a milestone ... they have to be installed before the roof decking can go on because they are fastened in place with screws from the top - before the decking goes on.

Milestone #2 is the beginning of the framing for the fireplace in the great room. You wouldn't believe the number of times we've changed the style of the fireplace (traditional kiva, double-sided, heatilator, etc.) and the placement of the thing.

We've moved it to a corner of the great room and tilted it at 45 degree angle rather than putting it along the wall. Because of the way the spiral staircase comes up from the main level, there's a triangular place that we set the fireplace into. It now faces the "conversation" area (aka two barrel chairs, a couch, etc.) in the opposite corner of the great room. So, the questions about the fireplace are resolved, with the exception of the design of the portion on top of the primary framing. Deb is still working on that design!

Milestone #3 is the receipt and installation of the spiral staircase that connects the entry level and the main floor. I can't decide ....... red velvet on the treads? Gold balusters? Sapele hand rails ... or maybe Birdseye Maple? Still a few decisions to go, but Deb says that the stairs make the two parts (lower and upper) into a home.

We still have to create the bottle wall (thanks to you all who have sacrificed so much to supply us with beer, wine, vodka, and other unique bottles). It'll fit under the stair treads, going from the lower left (where the opening starts) to the right where the post is. At the right end of the stairway there's a vertical wall that will house "niches." A niche is a place to display any and all sorts of things. Frankly, I don't remember what we sent to storage in Pittsburg, CA when we left, so filling all of the various niches will be a little like decorating the house for Christmas.

Milestone #4 is like the crown jewel ....... because now that the beams are up in the kitchen and great rooms, the roof decking can go on.

Here's the area over the master bedroom. It's not a walkable deck, but you can see the parapet that goes around each of the sections of the home. The one I was really waiting for was the one that'll be the party deck ...... on the North side, looking down the valley toward Chatfield Reservoir and Denver in the distance.

As recently as Friday night, Deb saw a fire pit that she really liked. So, today we have a fire pit instead of a fireplace on the party deck. My view? A good change. The fireplace is a good idea, but we can create a place for people to sit, talk, enjoy the view, sleep overnight (just like a certain houseboat on a certain lake in the late summer of Northern CA!).

Lots of fun now that it really looks like a home.

Cheers!