Twenty Two Colors!

UPDATE: After writing this post, I thought it would be fitting to say thank you one last time to Margaret Radmaker, who lived in our house from 1956 after it was first built until selling it to us almost 2 years ago. Margaret passed away earlier this month.  Here's a slideshow of our time meeting the Radmaker's after we agreed to buy the house from them.  She was  lovely and had many lovely bird houses. 

Happy Easter! 

Throughout this overly-optimistic remodel, the thing that has been the most challenging for Paula and I is conceptualizing what this whole thing is going to look like when its done.  Having moved into a 1950's house complete with the colors and style of a '50s home...you know, the blond wood trim, pink tiles, and flowery-drapery.  This remodel necessitates us defining our own style...which is?...well, that's the tricky part for us.  It's made even more challenging when I have some priorities (like buy the most local, sustainable, and 'green' products that are affordable) and Paula has her's (dark cabinets, white countertop, bright colors, and affordable).  It's why we got off to a much later start to this whole thing and why it's taken 22 paint samples to figure out what colors to paint the kitchen!

Back when Paula and I were hunting around for cabinets and countertop materials, we both fell in love with this bright green quartz countertop.  We knew it was too much for our countertop, but Paula likes bright colors and we thought it might be a great color to paint our floating shelves.  Now, we've decided to paint the entire eastern wall a bold greenish-yellow color, but which one?  Turns out there's tons of greenish-yellows made by each brand known to man.  Heaven forbid this be an easy process, right?!

For this blog post, I thought we'd unveil our 'style' for the kitchen, which is definitely a work in progress.  This weekend marks a breakthrough for us though.  We've selected Grape Green from Benjamin Moore for our eastern accent wall with the complementary Dune Grass and Timid White for the other walls and ceiling, respectively.  So, now that we've got the color picked out, we can move forward and get this puppy wrapped up.

Here are some other aspects of our remodel that we've settled on too. We got our cabinets from Pacific Crest Industries, located in Sumner, Washington.  I liked that they're a family business that uses locally sourced FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) wood products, developed a formaldehyde free eco-box of FSC material, and donate money and time to Agros.  However, to keep things relatively affordable, we used their Amero line and stuck with the standard MDF material.  Their MDF is still a pretty good product, but it's no eco-box.  We chose the Wyoming door style, which is pretty much a standard shaker door with slab drawer, and upgraded it to the dark 'Java' stain color. 

For the countertop, we exhausted all of the available ideas.  We looked at several iterations of recylced glass/concrete slabs (this and this) made in south Seattle, recycled glass/epoxy material made on Camano Island, reclaimed wood slabs from urban forestry, looked at butcher block, stainless steel, tile, and recycled paper products.  We stayed away from granite since I didn't want to use anything that came from a quarry.  However, in the end, due to cost, style, and maintenance, we went with quartz.  Quartz is a byproduct of quarry's, so it's a bit better...I guess.  We chose the Chroma line and the Crystal White color.  While this will be a beautiful countertop, I think, I believe its quarried in China.  So, that sinks my locally produced hopes and dreams.

Our next great decision will be the tile for our back splash.  We both like recycled glass tiles and I've scoured this amazing local tile maker (Bedrock Industries) for ideas, but aren't sure its exactly what we want.  What I've recently found and really like are two recycled ceramic tile products made in San Jose and Portland.  The first is Fire Clay and the second is Clayhaus.  I really like the glossy, crackled look that both companies make.  The Debris line from Fire Clay has much more recycled content and more colors, but Clayhaus has some different tile styles that are nice too.  Paula hasn't had time to see these up close and personal though, so we'll see what she thinks.  

Oh well, we've made progress and both Paula and I continue to find new ways to compromise.  She's entertained my expensive taste for 'green'er products and has interjected well to keep us on budget...or at least closer to budget.  It'll be a great kitchen, we hope.

Of course, here's our updated slide show of the house.

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A much needed cure for SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder)

As a native Seattlite, I have never been too bothered by the winter weather.  It's grey and rainy, annoying no doubt but it's what I'm used to.  Even trudging a half hour each way to class in college in something like 81 straight days of rain (a record)...up hill both ways of course...didn't get to me.  But, second year of residency has (this is Paula by the way).  I leave home in the dark, get home in the dark and never get to see out a window during daylight.  My outside time consists of walking to the car in the dark and rain/scraping ice of the car in the dark.  This combination of long hours, lack of sleep and constantly dealing with very sad situations has been a struggle for me this year and, for the first time, the grey and gloom has really tipped the scales.  I'm now a firm believer in SAD and, more importantly, a firm believer in the power of sun, sleep and relaxation. 

Per and I got to head to Cabo for a week (thanks so very much to my parents for sharing their timeshare).  For those that followed our blog while we were in Europe, you know that my ideal vacation does not involve sitting in one place doing nothing.  I like to explore, adventure and get out to see and do everything.  Not so on this trip!! 

Our day: wake up whenever, lay by the pool til whenever, wander the beach and into town til whenever, eat some food, lay by the pool some more, eat some more food, go to bed (AMAZING)!

We did do a few things.  We did a sunset dinner cruise...all you can drink.  A snorkel adventure on a random pirate ship....again, all you can drink.  Whale watching, a trip out to Lover's/Divorce Beach which is by the famous Cabo arch.  While there we saw some dumb tourists nearly drown because they wanted to swim on the Pacific Ocean side in the waves which were 20 plus feet...bad idea (as indicated by the numerous signs that say DANGER! NO SWIMMING) but luckily they were ok thanks to some locals.  We also took a 2 hour trip to Cabo Pulmo which is in a marine reserve for more snorkeling with fishies, sea lions and a school of thousands of skipjacks...craziness.  We saw more whales there too!

It's the only vacation I've ever taken where I don't feel like I need a vacation from my vacation.  I'm back at work now and feeling so much better!!  I'm sure my patients and coworkers appreciate it (I image Per appreciates it too!) 

Here are a few picts:

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