Filling Up the Nooks and Crannies

Today we had both our Amish and our "English" wood workers working in the house.

Joe Yoder was at the house bright and early with the command center, master bath drawers, and laundry cubbies.

The big news of the day was the command center. Well, the bottom of it anyway. The plan for this area, just off the kitchen, is have a place to organize all the papers and whatnot that go with running the home: bills, mail, binders, frequently used office supplies, lists, meal plans, our son's art supplies, family calendar, etc. Niels has his own traditional office off the foyer with a door so he can work from home when needed. But this area is for me...and likely our son as he gets older and starts doing homework.

The base is installed. The dry erase background is just leaning on the top for now. I'm hoping that the boards are magnetic as well, but I forgot to bring a magnet to test it. The only change I would have made is to have the pulls smaller. They were made to match the kitchen pulls, which are also a bit on the large side, but it was my own fault for not catching that earlier. Not a big deal in the grand scheme of things though.

We tried to think out how we'll use the space and plan the drawers and cabinets accordingly. One thing I wanted to make sure I had space for was the shredded, so we had this pull out made for it, with a plug in behind the drawer.

The countertop will be the same quartz as the kitchen, which will be templated next week. Once the counter is on, Joe will come back to install the cabinets on both ends, the dry erase boards, and the upper shelves and cubbies.

This is the part that goes over the cabinets. It's upside down here. The cubbies will be just over the dry erase boards, and then there are two open shelves for cookbooks, binders, and favorite books.

There are two tall cabinets for each end of the desk. My son is just shy of 40" tall, so that gives an idea of how tall they are. These will be used for all the home office things I want out of sight.

The guys were sweeping up dust clouds as I took this last picture, which gives the kitchen overview with the start of the command center added, as well as a peek at the mudroom lockers. You can also see that the front panel of the outer island has been installed. 

Meanwhile, upstairs in the master bath, Joe installed our drawers and shelves. Once upon a time and many blueprints ago, our linen closet was inside the water closet. Fortunately, we caught that in time, and decided to make the closet opening across from the vanity. The challenge is that the space is pretty narrow, as seen in this photo from this summer.

We decided the best way to make use of the space was to use deep drawers. We have a lot of room in our closet (neither of us are big clothes hoarders) and a large linen closet down the hall, so these drawers will be used mostly for extra shampoo, conditioner, body wash, TP, and other essentials. The shelves we be a nice display space.

This photo, taken from the tub, shows how well the drawers match the stock vanity we had installed earlier in the week.

We are getting the smaller pulls on these drawers.

Unfortunately, not everything went so smoothly. Niels discovered the first oops last night as we double checked the dimensions of our new double oven. We got a fantastic deal on a Jenn Air 30" double oven that had all three of the features that had been on my "keep on dreamin'" list: dehydrator function, proofing function, and a probe for temperature monitoring.

The oops is that the new oven is ever-so-slightly larger than the old one, and the cabinet is just a hair too tight.

Joe took it well and is confident that we can make an adjustment.

The second oops wasn't totally unexpected, but disappointing nonetheless. When the laundry cabinets were installed, we noticed that they didn't line up exactly with the lines of the floor. Turns out the change in our stock cabinets changed the width of the cabinet, so the laundry cubbies that Joe made are just a little too long. I apologized profusely. Joe shrugged his shoulders and said, "These things happen." I did get a quick peek at the cubbies as they made their way back to Joe's shop to be resized.

After Joe left, I moved on to Chris' work. I think we're all on the same page for the fireplace trim above the mantle, so I expect that'll be done in the next few days. The niche bench, on the other hand, is ready to be stained. I am so happy with how this "oops" turned out. I love the built-in nature of a very practical feature.

Close up of the bench:

He also finished up the vanity top, just in time for us to find the right sink to go on top!