Father's day >> Vacation >> Anniversary

Bonnie, Sophie and lil Neil all went up to the island on Thursday, June 12 for an extended Father's Day weekend. Anna and me joined them on Friday the 13th! The rest of the family (Jill, Bob, Judy, Amie, Scott, Owen and Jackson) came up Saturday to celebrate Father's Day early (actual holiday was on Sunday). We really had a nice time and it was awesome to be able to spend time at the new cottage as an extended family.

Of course, Anna and Sophie talked me into going downtown for ice cream as soon as possible. Here is a photo of them at their favorite ice cream joint - Papa T's.

My baby girls

 

Bonnie packed up the kid crew and headed home late on Sunday. I took the week off for vacation with plans to stay alone on the island and work on the cottage. Bonnie (by herself) came back up on Thursday, for an extended anniversary weekend.

 

Happy 16th year anniversary to my girl!

 

We had a wonderful time doing the island old-school: chillin' down by the lake shore, boat watching and much fine dining.

Bonnie and me - happy anniversary!

We spent some time hanging out with John, Amy and Ethan Pyke who came up to Kelleys on their boat for the weekend.

The cottage progress continues...

One huge outstanding site issue was the catch-basin that is located directly next to the electrical transformer at the street. You can see from the first photo below, this is a friggin' mess and not properly installed by any stretch. This "hole" is where all the rain water, gutter run off and sump-pump termination flows to before eventually draining under the street, along George's property line and then to the quarry.

This is a huge pile-of-crap that needed to be cleaned out periodically because dirt was washed into the hole whenever it rained. When we bought the property (in 2010), the seller promised that this would be fixed and now 4 years later it was still a problem...

Before and during the block work to seal in the catch basin

Fortunately, Chris was having his new foundation built by the same crew who laid our block foundation back in 2012. As part of their job, Chris had these guys seal in the catch-basin with fresh block. Nice.

Catch basin block-work finished

Another nice addition was the installation of the microwave. Every new appliance makes the cottage more-and-more livable. Check-it out in the working kitchen photo below.

Microwave installed

BIG HASSLE ALERT:

One big job that took much much longer than anticipated was the finishing of the skylights. No joke, this probably took me 15-20 hrs over three days. The skylight cavities were drywalled and mudded. They needed to be 1) sanded, 2) re-mudded, 3) re-sanded, 4) tapped, 5) primed, 6) painted, 7) trimmed, 8) trim painted and then 9) final trimmed. The real trick was trying to work inside a 13 inch cavity with the sun shining in your eyes in 100+ deg heat. There was no easy way to get inside these narrow cavities while standing on a 15 ft ladder. Plus it was a pain-in-the-azz slapping paint inside them without painting yourself in the process.

My plan is to not touch these again for a long while, hopefully never. The photo below does not do this effort justice. However, I am extremely pleased with the finished product. You really need to see the trimmed-out skylights live to appreciate.

Skylights primed, painted and trimmed

I  also finished priming and painting the main bathroom. Again, this photo does not make the small room look all that great. The wall color is a sweet medium gray. Uber cool.

Main bathroom - painting complete

 

The entire cottage still needs painting other than the aforementioned main bathroom. I did start the kitchen/main room 1st coat. The color choice is awesome. Cool, light gray. Funny - because you can't really tell what the actual color will look like until you get it on the wall. And of course, it was a non-returnable custom color that was humped to the island all the way from Home Depot.

 Kitchen/mainroom paint started

Yes I did, I have spent 10 consecutive days on the island. I was seriously expecting to get more done between June 13th and 22nd, but I was happy with the results.

Projects completed:

• All remaining closet organizers installed - done
• Chalkboard wall framed - done
• Main bath painted - done
• Microwave installed - done
• Skylights - done (huge job)

Next steps:

• Finish drywall remediation
• Paint, paint, paint



Sophie weekend

Sophie came along with me for the weekend since Bonnie and Anna had to go to Michigan for Anna's school field trip on Friday. Sophie hung out with Christina from next door the entire weekend. I let her eat (or not eat) whatever she wanted for three days, for real. Little Sophie is a trooper and was fun to hang out with...

To kick-off my island trips, I literally bring a "truckload" of stuff and this weekend was no different. Earlier Friday, I stopped by Sears to pick-up the new Electric range and refrigerator. We backed the truck up to the front door so we could slide the appliances from the tailgate into the cottage. Good work.

Back it up to the door

 

Every weekend, I try to make as much progress as physically possible. But having a full size working fridge is a real nice milestone.

 

New refrigerator - friggin' sweet



Friday night I started on the attic access doors. I already had the doors built but I needed to hang some hinges on them and make them work in the attic doorway space. Hinges are quirky and a little unforgiving. You have to screw them in perfectly level or the doors won't swing open or close as expected. Plus once you start drilling the hinge holes, you can't undrill or move them. Anyway, I got the hinges mounted to swing to the inside, very minimal and functional. The next morning, I cut the trim and installed a simple barrel bolt from the inside to keep the left door in place.

Attic access door work-in-progress and finished product

Saturday, after finishing up the attic access doors, I started on the cottage sign installation. Bob had made the sign for us a few seasons ago, but I wanted to wait until I had the lot in good enough shape to finally make it permanent. As usual, this took longer than expected

First, I didn't have long enough 4x4 posts. Luckily, Chris has an extra post that he had to track down that someone actually borrowed and didn't use - weird. Next, I had to dig the holes and set the posts in quickcrete. As you may recall, my least favorite thing is digging holes especially in rock hard soil that is 50% stone filled (Sheesh). Tricky part was to determine the natural height and position of the posts to be in harmony with the size of the sign and the cottage. Last, I cut the top piece and mounted the sign. The whole project took 1/2 the day but the results look awesome!

"Our House" cottage sign and Sophie

 

On Sunday, I finished painting the chalkboard wall and then primed - the bar nook, utility room, remaining kitchen and other missing touch-up throughout. 

 

Next steps...

• Trim-out the chalkboard wall
• Install the closet organizers for both Sophie and Neil's room
• Start the drywall remediation that has been exposed by the priming
• Paint the main bathroom