Finishing the interior

The first key activity completed inside the house was the pumbing. This was completed within a week or so (by mid-October), and then the ducting and heating systems were implemented.

Next step is the light installation and electrical wiring.

November 21 and wiring, ducting/heating and plumbing largely complete. Not a lot of walls in the interior of the main floor, and most are load-bearing, so what is available is crammed with plumbing and wiring... oh well, least we only have one place to go if anything ever goes wrong!!

Here is a good example - the small wall between the family room and the office!

Kitchen is windowed, plumbed, wired and ducted... almost ready for drywall!

Serious electrical panels - one in garage and one in the basement. This greatly reduces the wiring runs through the house as each panel can provide wiring for its end of the house. Lots of ducting for high velocity furnaces.

A bath... the first indication that we are transitioning from what's behind the walls to the visible stuff!

Serious home audio and network runs... 8 in-wall 12AWG audio runs through house, 10 RG6 coax runs to most rooms, 40 CAT5e network runs, and CAT5e to 6 keypad zones around the house. Threw a few spare runs in as well. Lot of sites recommend running conduit for extra runs in the future, but it works out a lot cheaper just to run a few extra runs and leave them colied up in attics, basements and crawlspaces for future use while the walls are off. Here's the office of the future...!

January 15 and the insulation is now complete. Starting to look like a normal house! Doors look great too.

Front door and sidelights have been sealed with a clearcoat as well... nice cedar!

Media room has been insulated with Roxul. It feel like recently shorn wool, but just soaks up the sound... you can speak loudly and each word just dies on your lips. Same stuff that sound studios use - so should work well for our home theatre.

January 16 - the drywallers have heaters and dehumidifiers going full blast to dry all the moisture out of the frame. Drywalling starts with earnest tomorrow - that will certainly change the look and feel!

wow - 2 days in and they are 50% complete and starting to tape and mud the walls

View from family room through to hallway and stairs down.

Master bedroom - hip vault ceiling really lifts the room. It raises the heat as well, so being a sunset facing room, it will keep it nice and cool in the summer heat.

View from the hallway outside the master and Hamish's bedroom looking downtown!

Even the garage is starting to look like a garage! Door arriving next week, so that will warm the place up a bit more.

Shallow dropped ceiling in the media room to give the room some intimacy and for accoustics and feel, as well as covering some of the ducting and plumbing. Last area to be drywalled. Drywaller thinks it will be taped and finished by the end of the week. Basically 1-2 weeks for all the drywalling and finishing and its January 26th and we are ready to paint next week. Canucks beat Nashville Predators tonight for their 31st win of the season! Its been an amazing run - Luongo has 16 wins, 1 loss and 5 overtime losses since November last year!! Canucks are the top team in the NHL - hopefully they can keep that up - who knows when the next run like this will ever be!!

Guttering being installed on Monday, while the painters do their thing inside. Cladding on exterior pretty well much done. Interior doors ordered today as well. Cabinet guy Mike is well into his thing... just over a week before things start going into the place (including flooring!!).

Sat, Feb 5th and lots of progress made in a week! All the walls finished, and now windows and beams etc covered in plastic. First coats of paint sprayed on.... looks spooky in here with oversprayed plastic on the windows!

Master bedroom

Going to be awesome... really starting to see what it will look like!

Tiler started yesterday as well. Master shower pan underway!

Garage has been painted now... wow - looks great.... snowfall white on ceiling and pewter colour on walls.

Feb 8 - Interior doors just arrived. Got the hardware ordered. They start going in tomorrow. They'll be painted in place with the casings/baseboards.

Feb 9 - Major miletone! We have LIGHTS!!!!!!!! Awesome. Drove by and the lights were on! Now its really looking great.

Finish carpentry started... some trim around the big windows.

Hardwood loaded and ready to go once paint, tile and casings in. Huge pile.... that'll help settle the main floor!!

Tiles arrived as well. Kids really excited to see it with lights on and starting to look like a house.

Basement bathroom lined with Kerdi system... ready for tiles!

Media room looking good. Note the artificial columns - they break up the stray sound waves going down the wall, as well as giving the light sconces a home and making it look a little more 'theatre" like!

Garage door installed. Love it... wireless keypad entrance and soooo smooth and quiet! Hard to imagine unless you've lived with a clanky noisy one like we used to!

February 19 - things are progressing well. Hardwood almost down. Interior trim and doors being painted.

Interior doors being painted.

Unfinished hardwood.

Bathroom shower tiled and grouted.

March 1st - things really starting to move this week. Hardwood finished. Cabinets being installed. Walls being painted. Doors and hardware installed. Tiled floors being completed. Mechanical being installed... crazy time in the house!

Kitchen cabinets being unpacked and installed.

Master bathroom tiles... HUGE!!!

Not a lot of room in the kids bathroom once the cabinets are dumped in there!

Tiling underway in kids bathroom.

Natasha's room, floored, trimed and ready to paint.

Looking through the new pantry cupboards to the office.

Family room - floor done and protected with foam and ramboard.

Big 20"x20" tiles on the main floor - Roman did an amazing job.

Love the walnut finish on the hardwood. Ed the hardwood guy is a perfectionist!!!

March 6th and its been a hectic week in the house with subtrades climbing all over each other. Doesn't help that all the cabinetry arrived on Tuesday - so the house is crammed full of large cabinets and boxes! Installation has been going well - but its clear that such a painstaking job will run into mid next week.