Gates and More Cabinets

With a driveway nearly a mile long, controlling access is an issue. Another complication is maintaining a wildlife-proof barrier around the house without making it too inconvenient for drivers. Last week, our solution was completed. At the street, there is a gate with an intercom and keypad. When we drive up, we can open the gate via a remote. Guests can press a button on the intercom which rings the house phone. We can then open the gate remotely. Alternatively, the gate can be opened by punching in the appropriate numeric code.

Up at the house, there is another gate where the deer fence crosses the road. This one is completely automatic; a well-timed sensor has it open by the time a car reaches the gate and closes it after it goes through.

Gate control

Gate and the opener.

The garage door was also installed this week. Like the shop door, it moves remarkably easily in spite of its heavy weight.

Garage door

The cabinet installation continues in the kitchen and common areas. The cabinets with stainless or concrete counters (kitchen, project room, and pool) take precedence since the counter fabrication can't start until the cabinet installation is complete.

Some of the other cabinets (Susan's and my desk) have tops made out of Richlite, a composite material made out of paper and resin. Richlite was first used as the surface material in skateboard parks so it is quite durable.

Kitchen cabinets from dining area

Kitchen cabinets

Hall cabinets.

The floor in my shop may need one more coat of oil and then it is done. The wood is end grain douglas fir which is pretty much indestructible. I decided on oil since it will stand up to the rough treatment of a shop much better. The shop walls come next which are prefinished plywood.

Shop floor

The finish electrical work has also started with fixtures and switches being installed. We decided very early in the design process that we did not want air conditioning; although the days can be quite warm, a breeze comes up every day at about 3 pm and then disipates around 6 pm. The house is situated to take advantage of this but also has a large whole house fan and lots of ceiling fans.

Master bedroom.

Kitchen Cabinets

The installation of the kitchen cabinets feels like a major psychological milestone. We still have lots of weeks to go before we're done but the finish is in sight. The next week should bring completion of the kitchen cabinets, the garage door, completion of the tile installation, start of the finish electrical work, completion of the shop floor, and more progress on the mechanical system. Once the cabinets are all installed, the final measurements for the counter fabrication can be done. It seems like all the subs are working on site at once and we're finishing up in a tremendous flurry of activity.

Kitchen cabinets.

Kitchen cabinets (refrigerator wall).

Kitchen cabinets.

Pool cabinets.

The landscaping plans are finally complete. Our landscape contractor told us that since he always comes in at the end when most of the money has been spent, people are always trying to cut corners on the landscaping. We're trying not to do that but the scale of the landscaping is so large, we're trying hard to find areas where we can save. One of the details is that all the walkways are actually a very durable groundcover. Our landscape architect specified an unbelievable number of 4" pots of the groundcover plant; our landscaper says we can save a lot of money by using plugs which will grow very rapidly and be much, much cheaper.

My beekeeping course last weekend was really interesting. As much as I'd like to start 2 hives this year, I'm beginning to feel that I've already got enough to do this year and it might be better to wait until next spring. There is a possibility of getting a "nucleus" hive later this spring which might be a good compromise. (A nucleus hive is basically a small established hive.) I wouldn't get the learning experience of starting from scratch but it would get things going this year.

We took delivery of the first furniture this week. Since the house isn't ready, we're storing the new living room chairs in the boxes in the Oakland garage. We're hoping that not too much more furniture needs to be stored here or we'll have to start parking the cars outside.

Garden, Cabinets, and Bees

Friday, Susan and I drove separate cars up so we could bring up the last of the roses. They were all planted in the working garden above the raised beds and brought the rose total to about 60. Earlier this week, 20 fruit trees were planted below the beds. One raised bed has also been planted with 36 asparagus but they won't produce until next year.

One of several rose beds.

Asparagus bed

The landscape plan for the garden around the house (what we are calling the courtyard garden) has been finalized and our landscape contractor is finishing up the implementation plan. The area close in is more formal while the area above the retaining wall has mostly native plants and a more natural setting. When I saw the plant list, it's length reminded me of a Dicken's novel. Fortunately, we can keep the costs down by using smaller specimens of the fast growing plants.

The paper had an article about backyard beekeeping the other day and it sounded relatively easy and fascinating. It turns out there is a store on the way up to the house that sells beekeeping supplies and offers free classes. I'm taking their "Introduction to Beekeeping" class on Saturday. After that, I'll decide if I want to give it a try. With all our fruit trees and flowers, our yard should be bee heaven.

All the horizontal concrete surfaces are being sandblasted to clean them up and make them more uniform. I was amazed at the difference sandblasting makes but it is noisy and messy. The standard comment from the crew was "it looks great but I can't wait for it to be done".

Shop door, barn style.

All the floors in the main part of the house now have 2 coats of finish; the final coat will go on at the very end. The concrete around the fireplace has been installed and the finish trim has been started.

Fireplace

Western deck

The tile work in all the bathrooms except the master is almost complete. The pool shower is really nice because it has a large skylight which brings in a lot of natural light.

Guest bath

Pool bath with natural light

The cabinets are being installed and work is progressing rapidly. The bedroom, office, pool deck, and laundry/project cabinets are almost complete. The ones in the common areas should go in next week.

Kitchen cabinet wood (eucalyptus)

Pool cabinets (richlite)

The furniture we have on order is beginning to trickle in. So far, we have been able to hold off on delivery but I suspect the suppliers aren't going to want to provide free storage for much longer. (We are still about 6 weeks away from being able to bring in furniture.) In several cases, we got outrageous quotes for shipping to the new house so we will have these items delivered to Oakland then we'll hire a moving company to move everything up at once. Since we've decided to keep the Oakland house for the foreseeable future, we actually won't be moving much existing furniture up to the new house.