Happy New Year!

We hope you are all spending this day doing exactly what *you* want to do!

We are! We're working on house projects. We hope to tackle some low-hanging fruit today, and continue to make steady progress on others.

Fireplace Update:
To see the progress pictures, click on fireplace picture.

47 Ranch Dressing Fireplace Remodel

Our fireplace project is coming along great!

After a year in the doldrums on this project, we finally made significant progress over the last couple of weeks. The tile is set, and we are quite pleased with it! We did lots of research on the type of tiles we wanted, and collected lots of photos of some looks that we liked. We really wanted to stay within our limited budget, so while we love the tiles of Laird Plumleigh, we used some that were much less expensive. (I'll try to post a materials list when I get time). It was fun working with the tile layouts. But of course, in surfing the web looking at other sites I recently discoverd this fabulous resource of Batchelder fireplace designs. I'm kind of sorry I didn't see this before we started, but I'm really glad to see that we were on the right track anyway!

For next phase of the project Parker will get the wood for the mantle. I think he's basing much of his design and construction ideas on a book that I got him as part of last year's Christmas present. And I'm happy to note that this project has fallen victim to a little bit of scope creep. Parker has decided that while we're getting wood and setting up the saws anyway, he'll make the 'built-in' bookshelves in the living room and the master bedroom! Bonus! Stay tuned.....

Where the Hearth Is?

Having Christmas on a Monday has really thrown us off the past couple of weekends. We've had so many social commitments that we haven't had time to continue with the fireplace tile project. Parker got the face tiles laid, and they look great. I can't wait to see it once the grout is in. Laying the hearth tiles should only take a couple of hours, but we can't seem to get to it. Maybe once the gifts are opened and the turkey's in the oven...