TGIF

In the corporate world they encourage you to celebrate success, no matter how insignificant it may be.

As I was wrapping up another work week earlier this afternoon, I reminded myself how fortunate I was to have a beautiful home to go to after work. There are still so many things missing or not in place, but when I got home, I decided to open a bottle of wine in honor of the house and everything that IS already in place.  This would the first glass of red since we moved back! Cheers and remember to always keep your glass half full!🍷

The Shopping Phase

I am probably one of the very few women who does not like shopping.  So this phase has been very painful (and of course costly) for me!

On a more positive, things are slowly coming together in the house which totally offsets the shopping challenges. The family room looks amazing and very welcoming,  special thanks goes to my dearest Maryam for spending over an hour rearranging various items on the shelves and buying the gorgeous clock!

Post Renovation Updates!

10 days later!

There is still a lot to be done around the house of course; our living room furniture will not be arriving for another month and we are still missing a lot of bits and pieces, from towels to coffee tables, BUT we are home!

Maryam and Mahnaz came over last week to review the expenses for the last time. I am pleased to announce that  despite all the adjustments and upgrades  that we had made throughout the project, our renovation not only finished early but also under budget! Thanks Ladies! Bellavance Home Design Rocks!

Stay tuned for the after pictures!

Home Sweet Home!

The day finally arrived! We were packed and ready to leave by around 10 am. After packing both cars and saying farewell to our lovely tenants,  we got on the road and came back "home" at last!

The house was a mess of course,  and it was hard to figure where to begin. We could not even unload the cars as we had no idea where to put everything.

A couple of hours into the clean up, I decided to sit down and take a break. I think the Tetley Green Tea that I had at that moment was the best thing I had ever had tasted in my life!

I picked up Samy from the school as I didn't want  him to get on the wrong bus and end up at the stop by the rental place where he had been picked up that morning.  He was also excited to come home.

Our contractor only had a few small things to do around the house and left around 6 pm;  Our renovation officially ended today, 3 days ahead of the schedule!

PS, the wallpaper turned out really well, afterall! 

One more sleep

We are moving back tomorrow! Our renovation will officially end tomorrow, as well; 3 days earlier than scheduled!

We have been cleaning, packing and unpacking for the last few days and it is just the beginning.  Despite the moutain of work that is ahead of us to get the house up and running again,  we are excited to move back after 3 months.

I will be posting my next blog at "home"! 😊

Spring Cleaning - Day 1

The first day of cleaning did not go as planned. When we got to the house this morning,  there were already 4 people working away. It was a little uncomfortable (for both parties I think!) to work in the same space.  We tried to stay away, but it was not an easy task,  as they were working on the stairs and we needed to have access to the second  floor. We decided to leave after about 2 hours, however we were told not come back until Sunday morning as they were going to stain the stairs. So we pretty much lost the whole day. 

This is the last weekend before we move back and I am extremely stressed out about the next few days...and how to even begin to sort out this mess...

9 More days....

We have less than 10 days to go, which is great and scary at the same time. We are very excited to move back next Friday, but there is still a lot to do. 

The basement is well underway, the walls have been painted, the floor has been laid and the sideboards are up. The bar cabinet is scheduled to arrive on Friday, we are expecting the basement to be 90% complete by the end of this week. 

The unpacking, organizing and cleaning process will start this weekend, a true spring cleaning! 

We have also ordered most of our large furniture, although some of the pieces will not be ready until May. I wonder how many pages our next credit card invoice will be! 

I am stressed out again, there is so much to coordinate while working full time. We are still missing so many things, it will take a while for our house to become a home again.

It has been an interesting ride so far, I am not going to say that it has been easy, but we are fortunate to have a house and to have the opportunity to renovate it, as Samy keeps reminding us. We have also been very lucky to work with Maryam and Mahnaz. Thank you for being so patient with us!

M&M to the rescue!

I don't know if M&M have been reading my mind (or maybe my blog!), but they sure had some good news for us today!  Although the bar island is still out of the question, they have designed a custom  built cabinet in the entertainment area  that will give us the look and feel of a bar. In addition,  we will have a high side table to compliment the unit.

The basement already looks a lot bigger and brighter now that the pot lights have been installed and the walls have been removed.  I am sure once the new floor is down and the walls are painted, we will notice a big transformation.  In fact the basement will have the biggest transformation as it will have a completely different layout.

The appliances will be delivered tomorrow.  I am looking forward to seeing how the kitchen will look once the appliances are all in.

And the saga continues .....

For the records,  I am glad I am not a designer ... in addition to the lack of talent, I have very little patience for shopping, especially when it comes to furniture. We have been furniture shopping for almost two months and have hardly actually "bought" anything. 

The renovation is still in progress,  although our contractors have been working 6 days a week and they are still on schedule,  I am getting restless. We will be moving back on March 31st but that's just the beginning of another phase, especially if we still have not bought all the furniture.

We visited the house last Wednesday and after weighing all our options decided to give up on having a bar island in the basement as it would take up too much space. That was not good news.

The kitchen still drives me crazy, so I have been avoiding the area every time I have visited the house.  I hope I can at least get used to it by the time we are moving back.

The Persian New Year is also around the corner and for the first time in my life,  I will not be able to properly celebrate the day at home. 

I am sure everything will work out at the end,  all I can say is that it has been a long and stressful journey....

25 More Days..

The family room cabinets have finally arrived and although they are not completely installed,  the transformation is quite noticeable.

The basement is also well underway, the demolition is done and all the walls are up. It is now much easier to "see" what the basement will look like. 

I cannot wait to go "home". The reality is that although we will technically move back in less than a month, our lives will not go back to "normal" anytime soon😢

Mirror, Mirror On The Wall...

I was hoping to get more excited about the kitchen once the back-splash was up....  but.... I am going to listen to Thumper and say nothing at all...

Let's talk about something positive; I have to admit, My favourite place is the en-suite! The mirrors are up and they compliment our spacious and modern bathroom.

Although the mirrors in the second bathroom and the powder room are yet to be installed,  both bathrooms look very promising! 

I can't wait to add some colour ... how about some red🔴🔴? Who is with me?!❤✔

Renovation advice

The kitchen counter top has been  installed and I am actually disappointed. We picked the stone based on a 2X2 sample cut which was the wrong thing to do. My advice to anyone who wants to get a new countertop is to go to the manufacturer's show room and see the large cuts.  I am sure I can find enough appliances to cover the countertop so I don't have to look at it when we move back in.

Move #2

When you go through a renovation, you have good days and bad days; sometimes you give yourself a pat on the back and sometimes you curse yourself and everyone around you.... let's say today was not one of those good days.

We hired a mover to help us move everything  out of the basement today so the contractors could start the work in the basement on Monday.  We got to the house an hour before the mover to plan ahead and do some cleaning. Everything was covered in a thick layer of dust of course.  All of our small appliances that were in the closet, were covered with so much dust that I could not figure out if they were stainless steel or black! Today was not the official "dusting " day but there was no point transferring all that dust upstairs so I took out a roll of paper towel and got busy.

To cut the long story short, it took about 4 hours to empty the basement and now the rest of the house looks as if a bomb has hit the place.  The sad part is that we have at least one more move ahead of us.

Let me give you a piece of advice , if you ever want to renovate your house,  make sure you not only rent a place to stay during the project but move all your belongings out of the house and store it somewhere else. Covering furniture with plastic does not help and constantly moving things around the house is a waste of time and energy.  I have a feeling that we will have to throw out a lot of our stuff once this is all set and done.... did I mention that today was not a good day?!

P.S. every inch of my body aches! 🤕

Phase 2

We met with Maryam at the house last night and she mentioned that the work in the basement would potentially start next week.  The good news is that we are ahead of the schedule, the not so good news is that we will have to clear the basement, which by the way is packed.... and we will have to do it over the weekend 😨😢

There is still a lot of work to be done on the main floor and upstairs, but I believe most of it will be completed by the end of this week. 

By the way,  the closet and island in the master bedroom have been installed,  although the island will have to be turned as it is facing the wrong way.

We had also decided to blow our budget on the closet doors in other rooms and they have been installed ..... they look great, so no regrets whatsoever ... just an empty bank account!

🎶🎶You're never fully dressed without a smile!🎵🎵

This is the new Annie song that we have been listening to for the last few days... and it is rather relevant! 🎵🎵 "It is what you wear from ear to ear ... that matters"!! Today's visit did bring "ear to ear" smiles to our faces!

Let’s start with the stairs, I don't even need to add any comments :

The kitchen cabinets have been installed as well. There is still a lot to be done, of course: the kitchen table,  the counter top, the lights and the backsplash are yet to be placed.....

The laundry room is almost ready,  as well...

Most of the light fixtures are up now...

The ensuite bathroom also looks very different

What a transformation!  It was worth the wait... and the drive in today's snow storm ❄❄

Are we there yet? !

We started the official count down when we moved out, and according to the calendar, we still have 50 more days to go... or is it 49 days? I don't know,  it feels like forever. ...

We have not visited the house since last Sunday and the biggest change at the time was the en-suite shower, it looks awesome with the glass!

We visited a couple of furniture stores with M&M earlier this week. They told us that all the mill-work had been completed and the cabinets, closets and vanities were ready to be installed. However, they advised us to stay away from the house until everything was in place, instead of seeing it while in progress!

Our plan is to go home on Sunday and see the transformation which will be in the kitchen, family room, master bedroom and the bathrooms; do you have any idea how tough it has been to be this patient?!  😩 😭 😢

What is your will?!

That was the title of the letter I received from the Toronto General Hospital earlier today; perhaps they know something about me that I don't, and want to make sure they are making it to my will. I am not sure what to think of it,  but I wonder if they know how broke I am!

We visited the house this evening, they have done a lot of little things, but the changes are not as visible as the demolition phase. All the tiles on the main floor have been laid, including the kitchen, laundry room,  powder room and the foyer. Almost all the interior doors are up now and the fireplace is almost done. I wonder what Dr. Fireplace would think of this transformation!?

新年快乐

Happy New Year to all our Chinese friends, including our contractors who have taken a couple of days off to spend some quality time with their family and friends!

We visited the house yesterday after finalizing and paying for our appliances (one more thing to check off our list).

There were not a lot of major changes since Thursday night of course, but it was great to see the place in day light.  The blue on the main floor is really nice and we are happy with the colour (although I am still nervous about the matching wall paper😓🙈)

63 more days

Not that I am counting down or anything...

Another busy week with lots of things on the go, I am glad the weekend is here!

I visited the house twice this week. Now that the demolition is done, the day to day changes are not as visible. Although the ensuite bathroom looks a little more civilized.And the kitchen floor has been laid.

Our family room still looks like a junk yard, but the fireplace is being resurfaced this week so once the cabinets are installed we should be able to see a major transformation.Some of the interior doors are already up and the backdoor to the garage has also been installed. 

Although I cannot wait to move back, the thought of rearranging everything and setting up the house from scratch scares me. I wonder how long it will take to settle in, how many more days I should be adding to the countdown calendar....??

Mustard.... check!

We went "home" earlier today; Sundays are the only days of the week our contractors are off, so we don't have to feel guilty about slowing them down while visiting.

I was curious to see if they had started painting the walls on the main floor, and they had.  The mustard coloured wall looked nice next to the light grey (although I am pretty sure I am at my limit with that colour!).

They had also installed the side door in the laundry room. The door with the large glass has certainly made the room much brighter! I definitely appreciate the natural light more than ever these days 😢

The bathrooms tiles on the second floor have been laid, as well. I have to admit, the ones in the second bathroom look much nicer than those in the ensuite, probably because the latter reminds of our old white tiles on the main floor😨

Some of the baseboards are also up in the bedrooms. You can now see that the "face lift" is beginning to make a difference! 

It's a hard-knock life for us....

That's the new Annie song that Samy has been practicing this week... it is really interesting,  except for the part he has to scream and clap.....😨

The good news is that we are making progress in the house, the not so good news is that we all miss home. Living in a small space with no natural light is harder than we thought. Having said that, we decided to extend our stay to mid March; the thought of living in a messy house while the contractors are still working in the basement makes my skin crawls.

We had a meeting with M&M yesterday afternoon to finalise the paint colours for the main floor. To my own surprise I agreed to two ideas that I would not have imagined in my wildest dreams... patterned wall paper and a mustard coloured wall! I am sure it will all come together at the end, but I am not going to deny that I am nervous beyond belief! 😓

I was out of town for a couple of days so I had not seen the house for almost a week. We visited the place after our meeting to pick up a couple of things, including a bottle of my favourite wine (I needed to drink for obvious reasons!!). It was great to see the new floors in the bedrooms, especially next to the newly painted walls.

The stairs looked strange without the carpet and the pickets. I cannot wait to see what the finished product will look like. 

The gas fireplace has also been installed and they are preparing it for the new surface to be placed.

Today we ordered all our appliances so we will be writing another big fat cheque shortly. 

I have to admit, I have been humming "it's a hard-knock life" all day... at least I have been  skipping the screaming and clapping parts!

Annie

It took me over two weeks to convince Samy to sign up for the performance class at school. He attended the first session last Wednesday,  and now we cannot stop him singing "Tomorrow" from the musical "Annie", the show that they will be performing in March.

Today we went to the lighting store to select a few lights and chandeliers for the house. The store had a good selection, which was great and also confusing. Samy loved almost all the crystal chandeliers and wanted to buy all of them! At the end, we managed to buy  everything we needed and stay within the budget.

Sound, Check!  Light, Check!

Action!

🎵🎵Tomorrow, Tomorrow, I love you, you are always a day away....🎶🎶

Happy Friday!

In preparation for the renovation, I used up about 15 vacation days in November and December of last year, which means I only worked 3-4 days a week during that period, which means I had not worked a 5-day week since the beginning of November, which really means this week felt like an eternity.... I am glad the week is finally over!

Samy has been homesick for the last couple of days, which is strange considering we are only 8 KM away from home.... So we took him to see the house this evening. Kids always amaze me, although they don't usually show their emotions, they often say what adults only dare to think! His first reaction was that this was not our house anymore, which may sound silly at first, but when your house is occupied by people you don't know, the equipment you have never seen before and also has a different layout, then such a comment may not sound as weird. He was also unhappy with the colour of the walls, because they were too "brown". He said we were lucky that he had picked the colour of his own room, otherwise we would have ended up with another brown room!

The walls are not brown and the house is still ours; I don't think he is trying to be difficult, he just misses home!

So when he says that he does not like the shower in our apartment, because the water sometimes gets too hot and turns his butt into "shish kebab", you should probably just laugh with him....

The Wall

"The" wall is almost down, so our narrow living room and dinning room are about to open up! I was actually looking forward to this day. There is still a lot to be done of course,  but this wall is one of the reasons why this whole renovation started!

The first coat of paint in all bedrooms (except the master bedroom) has been applied. Samy's room is different, it is very blue! I have to admit, the room looked green when I took these pictures this evening , probably because of the lighting, but he seems to like it!

80 more days.....

That says it all.... No more comments!

Week 1

It has been exactly one week since our move,  it sure feels a lot longer.

In the last few months before the move, we had done a lot to prepare for the renovation, but I don't think we had realized how tough the first week would be.

I know we are not the first who are going through this,  but people react differently and show their emotions in different ways, especially kids. Samy looks forward to visiting the house, and his mood completely changes after each visit.  The empty and broken (as we would put it) house, with all the mess actually comforts him! At the end of the day there is no place like home. 

In terms of the renovation itself,  the work is well underway. The demolition on the main and 2nd floors is almost done. Tomorrow is another big day as they will  be removing the wall between the kitchen and dinning room as well as the one between the foyer and living room.  I look forward to seeing the new open layout.

11 more weeks to go, not that we are counting down or anything....

Back to normal....

The kids are back to school starting tomorrow, so life is supposed to go back to normal, whatever that means.

I have not been back to the house since Friday, even though it has only been two days, it feels like an eternity.

My phone is filled with pictures of sconces and toilets; half of our weekend conversations has also revolved around flushes and toilet features.

My permanent headache is not leaving me and I have not been able to sleep properly for about a week. By the way,  I am not complaining,  just stating the facts!

May be the " normal" life that is about to start tomorrow will also help me go back to my "normal" routines. I also bought a couple of new books today so hopefully I am on the right path!

Simple things....

There are so many simple and silly things that we take for granted until we lose them, here are a few examples:

- Personal space
- A good night sleep
- Your favourite pillow
- Having your own washroom
- Natural light
- A window that can be opened
- Not explaining or justifying everything you do or say to a 10 year old
- A good coffee maker
- A piece of clean carpet with a yoga mat
- Comfotable chairs and table so everyone can sit and enjoy their meals together
- A head-ache free day
- Not forgetting things
- An indoor parking

I know everyone has their own list,  but I think we can all agree that a little peace and quiet is priceless; So if you have it, cherish every moment....

Music, Wine & Books

A much better combination than this morning's trio!We went back to the house earlier today to finalize the kitchen plan and pick the paint colours. M&M had already dusted the furniture in the basement and covered them with plastic sheets so that put our minds at ease a little. 

This has been an emotional roller-coaster, one that I would not recommend to anyone at this point. May be I will think differently at the end of the project. Clearly it is too late to change my mind at this point, so now I am just going to relax and enjoy my wine, music and books!

Old, crazy or stressed out?!

I don't know which one, may be all three  combined!!

It took me forever to leave for work this morning, as I couldn't figure where everything was.... when I finally made it to the office, I realized that I had left my laptop at home. So I enjoyed the rush hour traffic twice this morning.

Happy Friday indeed!

The honeymoon is over...

Not everything is rainbows and sunshine when you go through a renovation. 

The smoke detector went off today and the alarm company almost contacted the fire department. Also, the door to the basement has been taken off which means everything (i.e. all our furniture and personal belongings) in the basement is now covered with a thick layer of dust. You may think dust would not be an issue because it could be wiped off, but not when it covers mattresses or chairs with beige colour fabrics. Everything should have been covered with thick plastic coverings.... "should have" is the key word....  hopefully we will not have to replace all the furniture and incur additional costs.

Samy's comment was " I told you so,  this renovation was a mistake "... may be he is right....

Three Amigos

And the demolition saga continues...

This time I didn't need an excuse to visit our beloved home; I was officially invited to meet with M&M to discuss a few options!

The first thing I noticed was that the white tiles were gone! Thank God I took a picture of them last night otherwise how could I ever prove to anyone how outdated they were!  

The popcorn ceilings on the second floor were also history. 

And the laundry room was nothing but an empty box (and a cabinet!)

All the kitchen cabinets and appliances are now resting in peace and the bulk head is also gone ....

Thanks to Mahnaz, Jacky and Maryam... the 3 partners in crime! 

Demolition - Day 1

We had to go home earlier today to pick up a couple of items that we had left behind, OK, who are we kidding, I was also curious to know what was going on over there!

Well, the house was more like a war zone! All the second floor carpets, drapes and doors were gone. Also the guest bathroom was almost wrecked and of course the one in the master bedroom as well as the walking closet were completely gone.... poof!

I have to admit,  the little window in the master bathroom looked even smaller on that wall!

The second bathroom was hard to recognize as well! 

The main floor was almost untouched, except for the the kitchen, or what used to be a kitchen!

And as I was looking around I realized that our beloved white tiles were almost identical to the tiles in the place we have rented. Oh the joy...