For all of you who have been checking this, I'm playing around with changing formats. Please see our new site:

http://wblqueen.wordpress.com

I'll try to keep posts going on both sites, but as of right now I'm planning on trying out Wordpress. I think you'll like some of the changes I've made on the new site. Let me know what you think!

I'm working on some new templates and improvements for the blog - so I apologize for a few missing/bad links and confusing changes in the coming weeks. Hopefully I'll have all the changes made and the kinks worked out by the new year!

Thanks for your patience,

Dave

I'm going to try and insert some photos I took of our blueprints for all of you. I'm not sure if you'll be able to see them or not, but this is the best I can do right now. The floor plans are fairly accurate as to how things will actually be. However, there will be a couple changes with the master bathroom as well as the laundry/mudroom downstairs. The last picture is a cut-away that shows how the new addition will connect with the existing house. It's actually going to be a pretty cool room. We're excited about the potential for it being really unique.





















If you'd like to compare the new plans to the old ones, you can find the old layouts here:

1st Floor
2nd Floor

Last, but not least, here are the elevation drawings of the addition. Because this is a National Historic Register house, there are nine special conditions we have to deal with as we build this addition. Because it must be differentiated, we're trying to make it look like a carriage house:

Nate posted some great questions that I'll try to answer quickly here!

1. What are we going to do with the exterior?
   
   That's a great question! I'd actually like to toss that one out to all of our readers for input. I'm going to make a poll that you can access and give us your input. We're really struggling with this. Ideally, I'd like to strip off all the paint and return it to the original brick color, which you can see HERE. There are actually two bands of limestone or sandstone detailing that run around the building just below the windows. I think it would be gorgeous to get that back to it's original state with white windows and some other accent color for the trim work as well as the Victorian gingerbread features on the exterior. However, what's the best way to do that? I've heard over and over that sand or media blasting just destroys the integrity of the brick, so I want to stay away from that. The best fix seems to be a product called Peel Away. I'm not sure how long that would take or how expensive it would be, but I'm guessing that project would take REALLY long compared to just giving the house a facelift with new paint colors. The new addition will certainly be painted (Hardy-siding), but it will be a different color than the house and it'd be fun to have it stand out from the brick! So that's the dilemma: repaint or Pell Away?
   
   
2. What colors have we been considering?
   
   I think that we will repaint in a clay red color. And perhaps do the addition in some earthy brown-tone. We like rich colors, so I could see doing some regal Victorian colors that would accent the brick red - like purples or greens to go along with the white window trim. I think that we will probably try to use the red color of the house as an accent color to the brown on the garage addition. But we're still discussing this with our designer - so I'll let you know what we decide when we get there!
   
   
3. Are we going to replace the missing turret?
   
   In short - not a chance. Frankly, it was really ugly! I'll try to find a picture of it so you can see it... but it just didn't do anything for the house and didn't serve any useful function as living space, either. However, we ARE going to replace the missing dormer/gable on the South face of the house above the front porch. It got blown off in the same tornado and I think it'll really help balance out the house. It'll be designed to look like THIS window on the East face of the home: The only difference will be that it will go all the way up to the 3rd story roof, allowing for a small walk-out porch off of the attic space that we plan to renovate. It will be a great place to hang out and enjoy the view of White Bear Lake, which is less than one block away from that face of the house! The house was originally situated so that the South and East sides both had spectacular views of the lake. The property was parceled and sold to developers who built between the lake and the house, so the view is slightly obstructed by newer homes and some trees now. It's still a great view, though!
   
   

You hopefully saw the pics of the progress on our addition in the previous post. If not, check it out!

It was quite a process getting to where we are. I was out of town for 12 straight days prior to us getting this going. We had finally received the blueprints from our architect just before I left to give to the city for approval. I was really hoping that the plans would get approved quickly and they would have started on the project by the time I returned. Of course, that was not to be. Turns out that any time you are building a secondary garage structure in downtown White Bear Lake, you need to get an administrative variance from all your surrounding neighbors. And this ended up being more complicated that we expected.

I'm not totally sure why, but a couple of the neighbors had a difficult time understanding why we wanted/needed this addition. It may have been because each of them had to have a hearing when they did projects for their own homes. Or perhaps it was b/c the people who lived in the house previous to us were so beloved by the town and it's just hard to see us making changes to the home. Whatever the reason, it was a bit of a challenge to get all the signatures we needed. Jules did a great job of building support with a couple of the neighbors that we hadn't met yet. She is so sweet... I can't imagine anyone saying no to her when she pours on the charm! (I know I sure have a tough time!!!) Once Jules explained why we were asking to do this project, people seemed to come around and be open to the idea. I honestly can't imagine why not - b/c it's going to be a beautiful addition and I think it will do nothing but raise the character and value of other houses in the area. We sure didn't go bottom rung with the design. We probably could've done the project for less than 1/2 of what it will cost us. But we wanted to do it the right way!

We got the last signature (with the great help of our neighbors for which we were very thankful!) on the day before we were supposed to break ground: the day before Thanksgiving. It took me some time last week to go around and meet with people, discuss the project and try to push it through the city's red tape. One of the planners, Sam, was REALLY helpful in pushing it through. I'm not sure it would've gotten done on time without her.

But in the end, we had a variance signed by all 5 neighbors that would be affected by the work as well as an approved permit! This week we should receive the final floor plans for the existing house. We're meeting with our architect, designer and cabinet maker this week to finalize things and get the drawings completed. I keep on teasing you with promises of floor plans, but each time I do they end up changing or I don't get them from the architect on time. So hopefully this time it won't be a tease. I want to show everyone what we are up to!

I FINALLY have something to report. We've actually got some progress! It's been months since anything of note has happened on our project. I've been out of town for several weeks in a row and unable to work on the house, our architect has been diligently (but slower than hoped) working on plans for the addition and existing house, and we've been just killing ourselves in the last week getting permits approved. But they are approved (by a miracle) and we're finally moving forward! We have a big hole in our yard and footings poured on the addition. Here are some pics:

And they didn't waste any time after getting the footings done. The next day they were on site forming up the frost walls of the foundation:

I'm going to get back online a bit later and try to upload some pics of our garage addition floor plans and share a little bit about how this whole saga has played out over the past week as we finally got some motion!

I know, I know...

It's been a month and i haven't made a single post. Truth is I couldn't bring myself to make a post because absolutely nothing tangible has been accomplished. We've been busy working on the plans for our garage addition as well as the interior remodel. We've been back and forth, and back again. Sometimes it seems like we're just spinning our wheels, but each time we go back around we come up with a better plan.

We are getting very close to having finalized plans. I think that the garage addition will be completely finished and ready for permit approval this week. Hopefully we'll be able to say the same about the interior by the end of this week.

I've been thinking about what i could write about - and I thought i'd throw it out there to anyone reading the blog. Here's what I'd like to do:

• - Ask me a question you're wondering about our project.

• - I'll respond as thoroughly as i can to your question and elaborate on it when appropriate.

Let's see how it goes!

Looking forward to your questions...

Dave

Do any of you out there have ideas or thoughts about good places to get creative "inspiration" for kitchen designs? I found THIS SITE to have some pictures that really capture the feel of what we want in our kitchen, but I'm still looking for more ideas. Same thing with bathrooms. Any input from you readers and fellow renovators is very welcome!

Cheers!

Dave (& Fam)

Julie and I met with our design team yesterday - our Architect: Tom Blanck & his assistant Sonja & our designer: Nancy Roth of "Perfect Design Solutions". We FINALLY have some floor plans that are beginning to make sense so that we can get this project on course!

It took 2 weeks and significantly slowed down the process we were hoping for, but I have a piece of advice for anyone thinking about restoring an old (especially historic) home: GET BOTH TRADES ON BOARD WITH YOUR PROJECT!

I know, I know - "architects and designers are just professional shoppers / spenders." Yes, but if you get the right people this can help you SAVE money! Our architect has already proven extremely valuable by helping us realize our goals for the home without destroying / demolishing a lot of the infrastructure we 'paid for' when we bought the place! One of his mottos (I'm finding out quickly!) is "Don't dump it if you paid for it". I'm going to upload pics of the new/final floor plans this week - which are (happily) very much in keeping with the existing structure of the home (which saves on cash and is more sensitive to the heritage of the building). He's also finding great materials to build with (e.g. Lexan Ceiling Panels in the porch) that are very inexpensive but add great features (natural light!).

This is finally starting to come together! I'm hoping we'll be able to break ground by mid-October and be wrapping up within a few months! We'll see how it all goes...

Here are some AFTER photos of demo work near completion in the kitchen. Demo work is such a therapeutic process. Just think of anything that has upset you in the past month and visualize that thing/person on the wall - then swing away! I had my first couple of "oops" moments during this process. Let me just summarize those events in these 2 capsules:

1. Never put a sledge hammer through a wall without thinking about what is on the opposing side of that wall. Especially when that something is a toilet!

2. Have you ever seen what will happen when you put a chain saw through electrical conduit? Awesome show!

I'll have to get those into a "safety 1st" type entry soon :).

Enjoy!

I thought I would upload a few 'before' pics of the amazing olive-colored kitchen (pre-destruction). That way you'll understand why it was so necessary for us to have at the walls and give it a nice refinish. Keep in mind that this kitchen actually has 9' ceilings that have been dropped to 7' soffits around the perimeter, and there's been about 3.5' stolen for a stairway that just isn't necessary!

I met with a guy we've been considering as our potential architect for the project. We had a very productive discussion about the project today and Jules and I are really excited to bring him on board. I'm hoping that he will help us save money we otherwise would've spent - basically paying for his fee just by saving us money on wasted or less useful plans! He's definitely done some great work... check out THIS SITE for an example of his work!

Here's Nathan helping me strip the old lady of her outdated clothes!

Thanks for the help, Bro!

We officially took possession of the house on Friday. Basically since we signed the papers I've been either strategizing or actually at the house trying to get everything ready for the massive transformation.

I've had the great pleasure since closing to get to meet several of the family members who previously owned the property. It's clearly a loving, wonderful family. It gives us so much hope that this home will hold many wonderful memories for us as well. I've been thinking lately that I can't remember being this excited about something going on in our lives. It truly feels like an epic chapter in our lives - one in which we will write the beginning chapters of what is hopefully a long history of love... And we want to put a lot of love in this house!


BUT - before love can be added, we'll need to bring a little bit of destruction!!! :)

I thought I'd include a few before and after pics of the "office":

When faced with a monstrous project of this proportion, I feel it would be any man's response to do the following:

1. Stand, somewhat perplexed, gawking at the thing for hours.
2. Call the neighbors over, and stand in front of the project perplexed
3. Grab a beer, hoping that it will make things less perplexing
4. When all else fails, go to the hardware store and spend money on tools!!!

I haven't had a chance to do the first 3 - b/c we don't own the house yet - but I am planning on doing the last one soon (in fact, it has already begun). As I mentioned in an earlier post, I went to 7 Corners Hardware a couple weeks ago and got a few birthday presents! Here they are:

TILE SAW! The MK370EXP 1.25HP wet tile saw:


This is just the best tile saw we could find for the money. It really is going to save me a TON of time. I considered just renting one, but with me doing all the tile work in the house, I figured this would more than pay for itself - plus it's not used and destroyed by other people and I have it whenever i want it!




FRAMING NAILER - Hitachi NR90AD:


I mean, I'll probably save 1/2 a year with this baby when I'm building the fence and deck. Might also help out with a couple framing chores in the house as well.

But even more than time saved, doesn't this thing just look TOUGH?! I feel like I'm shooting nails with the green goblin or something. Don't mess with the man with the nail gun!!!



7 Corners is having a HUGE SALE coming up soon. Several of the guys from the Wiens clan are going together to check it out (and write out some checks I would imagine!). It's quite the deal, so if you live in the Twin Cities and love tools, don't miss the sale! I'll probably be there maxing out my credit cards, so feel free to say hi :).

I brought the camera along to the house last night to begin taking the 1st phase of our before and after photos (obviously, these are the before section!). I thought I'd start where you would start if you were to come visit us in this grand abode - the entry / foyer. Enjoy!

The BEAUTIFUL, HUGE front door (4x9?)

My personal favorite - the sea shell light:


The grand entry fireplace:


The amazing and noble staircase to the 2nd floor:

And last - but certainly not least - the over caffeinated realtor (who we love):


(notice the green built-in oven/range - more to come on the kitchen in future posts)

We met with SEVERAL people this evening in hopes of getting the ball rolling on this project sooner than later. We found out a couple things:

1. Adding in a designer after you've contacted other contractors and got them making plans really can complicate things in a hurry

2. We're really glad that we're hiring some professionals to help with some of the things that are going on inside this house. it really is going to be a pains-taking process and it's comforting to know that we have good people behind each step in the process.

I think we're really close to signing off on several of the contractors & a designer. We need to see some final prices from them, but hopefully all will fall within the budget we made for the project and we'll be able to use them. I think we genuinely like each person we've had come out to look at the project this far.

The hard part is having a budget. Money sure does suck sometimes! of course, it's great when you have it but even that causes its own complications. In the end, I just really hope that we'll have enough cash to do the things that are really important to us and make the house feel REALLY wonderful and "homey".

I took a ton of before pictures today of some of the atrocities committed against this house, but I'm dog tired from the day - so I'll work on uploading those tomorrow when I have more energy to do it! Thanks for keeping in touch with our project - and make sure to add comments (click the "add comment" link below) as you feel. It's always fun for us to hear feedback from people who are perusing the site!

I thought I might as well pass along the ideas we have for change in floor plans. Let us know if you have any thoughts or input! We're still finalizing the planning phase, so there's still time to change some things! The only thing that I think is sure to change from our renovation layout is that we are going to remove the staircases in the middle of the house and build a new staircase in the garage addition to access the upstairs. This will give us more room on the 1st floor for the kitchen - which i think we'll really like. We're also hoping to finish off the attic for usable space - which will require the addition of another stair up there! Here's what we have:

The Layout:

1st Floor Currently:

1st Floor Renovated:

2nd Floor Currently:

2nd Floor Renovated:

Tomorrow we meet with the cabinet maker to get final ideas around the design of the kitchen. We're also meeting the contractor and a designer to go over timelines and ideas for doing the complete renovation of the main floor and a few upper level living areas. Looking forward to that - things are really starting to move along!

On top of that...

Julie sure hit the jackpot with this order! Check out the great appliances that will be gracing our kitchen in a few short months:

Our new fridge: The Sub-Zero 695F Series!






















Our new oven / Micro Wave: Jenn-Air 30" Convenience Oven & matching wall oven:










The fantastic new Wolf 36" cooktop:

And a new Jenn-Air dishwasher to boot!























It's definitely looking like some "boy toys" are in order soon!!! :)

Today we were supposed to be in Iowa with my family, but my nephew (who is a serious stud of a little man) got sick. We ended up deciding that it might not be wise to expose our little girl to a potentially contagious situation - so we're at home for the weekend.

I called through several of our contractors to begin the process of finalizing bids last night. We have a meeting set up with our cabinet maker and our potential general contractor on Thursday of this week. I'm hoping to meet with an architect this week as well. Turns out that the architect that designed most of the local buildings of any import whatsoever happens to have his offices just a few blocks from our new house. He also happened to be the guy who designed the 'house on the isle' of Bald Eagle near our current home! We'll see what it would take to bring him on board. Do any of you have any experience working with architect/designer types on these kinds of projects? It's a bit uncertain whether or not we really need one, but it feels like it would be a good idea with all of the custom touches and period detail we'd like to put into this remodel in the hopes that the house retains its old world charm. If you have any advice or thoughts on the architect issue, make a comment at the bottom of this post. i'll check in with it.

We got a bid in on kitchen & laundry appliances from Warner's Stellian today. ugh. My wife loves nice things (she's rubbing off on me slowly over time) and those appliances sure look REALLY, REALLY nice :).

I'm heading to 7 Corners Hardware - the world's greatest hardware store - today with my father in law to pick out my birthday present. I haven't decided what it should be yet. Perhaps one of those sweet Paslode cordless nail guns. I figure I'm going to be doing a LOT of framing myself to save money, as well as most likely building our fence and our deck. This little baby should come in VERY handy on those projects! Plus I can terrorize squirrels with them. Just kidding. I haven't done anything that evil to an animal since High School (ask my cousin Adam about that one). If not that, possibly a tile cutter (for doing the bathrooms) or a dust collection system for the garage. I'm DETERMINED to have the shop in this new place be awesome... something I'm actually going to want to use because it's laid out well.

As soon as Ella wakes up (I suppose she will first have to stop talking and rolling around and then go to sleep), we're going to Lumber Liquidators to check out different flooring options for our main level. We're debating between something exotic (like Brazillian Cherry or Koa) or going with a good old standard oak. All the exposed woodwork in the home, albeit a small amount, is in oak. Any thoughts? Soliciting advice is going to be a standard practice in this blog.

I think that's about all we'll accomplish today on the home front! It should be a good time! Rarely would I use the words shopping and fun in the same sentence, but in the case of 7 Corners both those words apply! Have a good weekend!

Well, today is the day!

It's the first full day since we bought and sold our house. Yes, bought AND sold. It's hard to believe how everything is aligning. I'm sort of waiting for the proverbial sky to fall - it all just seems to be working out far too smoothly at this point.

That'll probably change when we introduce contractors to the equation. :)

We did it - we bought a beautiful old house in the town we love. Here she is:



The house is on the National Historic Register - the "Cyrus B. Cobb House". It was built by a local entrepreneur (sort of serendipitous, eh?) from 1885-1889. It has only been owned by a handful of people since then. It's built in the "Queen Anne" Victorian style, which was popular around the turn of the century. It's a behemoth - solid brick, probably 250 tons worth of it. The amazing thing about this house is that it's one of the last of its kind in White Bear Lake. And it probably shouldn't be there at all - a tornado came through town years ago and devastated many of the old homes in the area. This one lost its front porch and gable, as well as the turret that was nestled on top of the angled windows you can see in the picture above. We hope to restore both of those features... eventually :).

Like in most old homes, there have been several atrocities committed against this old lady. I'll get into the details of the bad news later - today is a day for celebrating the past and looking forward to the future. We can't WAIT to dig in and get dirty. Closing is set for the 14th of September! If you want to come and be part of "DEMO DAY", email me and let me know!

Unleash the chaos... 'cause we don't know any better :)