Phase 2 Begins

We’re back! It is so nice to be back and in our new home, after many weeks traveling. While the sights and smells and tastes and experiences of our travels were well worth it, it always feels good to be home again and sleep in our own bed.

We picked up a nasty cold virus during our travels, and with the time zone changes it took a few days to get back in the swing of things, but the work has steadily picked up and we’ve finalized our project plans and have some exciting announcements below.

One of the first things we jumped on when we got back was the fireplace. You may remember when we moved in, it was only halfway finished. This is a brand new addition to the house, the previous fireplace was inserted in the wall that was removed between family room and office.

If you’ve been following along, you’ve seen it go through several phases already. It is kind of fun to watch the transformation!

It is so rewarding to see it go from Shelly’s mind sketched on a paper while having lunch at Ixtapa to a reality!

We also decided to finish out the remainder of the trim, so we’ve put the miter saw to good use cutting and installing all the baseboards as well as window and door trim throughout the house as well as patching holes and caulking seams before giving them with at least two coats of paint. It is a ton of work, and typically takes a few days to iterate on one area before it is done, but oh what a difference it makes. The new living room window, for example, finally looks complete!

One of the things Shelly has always wanted to do with our house is install wainscoting, and so we also began installing it throughout the entry and front living area. If you haven’t done wainscoting before, think of it as base boards x 10! Lots of precision cutting, nailing, hole filling, caulking, painting x 2. We love the look!

Given we’ll be busy with that for the next several weeks, we decided to parallelize the kitchen remodel and order cabinets. Yes, you heard me, I finally broke down and agreed to have someone else build our cabinets vs. doing it ourselves, something I’ve been itching to do the entire time. We just don’t have the time to do it right at this point, and I don’t want to wait until after the exterior work is done to start this, one can only live for so long off microwave food! :)

The good news is we finalized the kitchen design and it is looking awesome! We are so excited to get our cabinets installed and do the finish work and see the dream come to reality. Here are a few exciting aspects of the design Shelly spearheaded:

The cabinets will go all the way to the ceiling and will be pure white, with subway tile backsplash and all stainless steel appliances. We’re going to feature double oven/range solution against the back wall (not the units pictured here) to provide ample cooking space.

We’ve upgraded all the appliances and extended the back kitchen wall with a new set of lower cabinets with drawers above the right-side window. The countertops will all be a light/white quartz with speckles of dark color.

Standing in between the kitchen and the new open living space we’re installing a newly enlarged kitchen island with seating area and more storage space with pendant lights above.

We’d love your feedback - what do you think?

With some of these big decisions underway, we finally have an end in sight! We’ve set a project completion date of December, 2017! We want to have the house in tip top shape before December, which leaves us about 14 weeks (can you believe it!) to get everything done!

With only 4-6 weeks of good weather left, we decided the next big project to jump on is the exterior of the house. We need to replace a lot of siding and do a complete paint job on the exterior. That is going to have a major impact on the curb appeal of the house and make sure it is weather proof for the upcoming winter season. We’re searching for contractors to help with this task now, if you know anyone you would recommend please let us know!

Finally, we have some exciting news to share. With the end in sight for this project, we’ve begun thinking about what comes next. The past 18 months have been an amazing experience for me. I feel extremely grateful for the opportunity to be home with my family, especially during Andy’s transition from High School to mission, and to spend quality time with Ethan and Shelly. Working side by side Shelly has been really fun too, and I feel like I’ve learned and grown a ton from the experience.

As we’ve prayed and pondered about where our path leads to next, I’ve been talking to various companies to see whether there is a good fit that meets the needs of our family at this stage in our lives. Adobe is one company I’ve always admired, a company known for their world class software for designers, photographers and videographers. In recent years, they’ve also carved out a leadership position in the cloud, building enterprise grade cloud services for marketing professionals, an obvious tie-in to their existing businesses which now generates billions of dollars annually for the company. I feel humbled this week to have received an offer from them to work as their Vice President, Experience Cloud. I will be joining Adobe in their Lehi, Utah offices. As a result, we will be moving to Utah once this project is complete.

Utah is the state Shelly and I grew up in, and we have many family connections still in the area. With aging parents and siblings there, as well as the university destination of choice for our two sons (BYU!) this feels like a great place to be in the coming years. After 18 years of being away, we look forward to being closer to family. At the same time, we’re going to really miss the northwest. This is the home of our adult years and the only home our children have known. We love the friendships we have made here and hope to stay in touch with you, even when we’re gone.

But, that is still several months away, so enough of that! We plan to keep you updated throughout the rest of the project and look forward to hearing your feedback and welcoming you in for a visit anytime you’re in the neighborhood! Thanks!