Is the debate over?

My mom had us go by this house in Kingston as it is her pick for a house colour. It captures our desire to have something unique in terms of colour (not the standard taupe/brown siding) but also not too extreme. The colour is green but more of a grey green. The siding colour also works well with the trim tone (a different warmer grey green) and the cedar shingles. What I really like is the colour of the wood shown in the carport. It would work well for any future fencing, staircase rails or landscaping. I don't know if the photos do it justice. We have more if it would help. I still love a blue house but this might be the answer...

P.S. We also love the winter grass....

Happy New Year

This is the blog wishing you a Happy New Year. We have had a week off from the house as we took some time to eat good food and celebrate Christmas with our families. Tomorrow is "house day" so that we can get back on track. More posts to come.

Sunday Report

Our new neighbourhood looks beautiful with all of the snow and with the view of the skating rink in the park! We just need to remember now to shovel our walk.

I have already written about there actually being people working at our house this week. As you can see from the earlier photos, the focus first is digging out the stumps in our small backyard while we wait for the building permit to be issued. Our own time is being spend doing whatever organizing needs to be done before the new year. We have lots of quotes to look over during the holidays.

One selection appointment that I haven't mentioned yet is our one to Boone to look at sinks, facets, showers and toilets. We have a base set picked out so that we can be ponder our selections over the holidays. Wow, there is no shortage of things to select from. As for 'green' selections, we are obviously looking at water efficiency for the plumbing fixtures. The toilets qualify for the "toilet replacement program" put on by the City of Ottawa. We are going to get a rebate on our water bill for going with dual flush fixtures. The only thing that you have to watch for is making sure the toilet you pick is on the approved make/model list and that you get "before and after" photos.

Other than that, the next short while is all about selections and getting the building permit issued. I will keep you posted.

It begins!

This morning it felt like Christmas. Rob and I went to the house to meet with the people from Amsted. I arrived and the street was full of Amsted trucks (sorry neighbours). Steve was walking around showing people the house and making introductions. We talked generally about the plans and about what is going to happen come January.

As for work, they started digging out the tree root mass in the backyard.

My aunt and uncle are here visiting from Prince George so a real blog post will have to wait until Sunday!

Fun, fun, fun.

Building Permit Filed!

As of this afternoon, the building permit application and drawings have been filed with the City. Thank you everyone for all of your hard work.

I am way too tired to write out more details. All I'll say for now is that the City has 10 working days to respond (issuance or with questions) which puts us to January 5th.... Perfect.

Solar Ready

One idea we thought of is making the house solar ready if in the end we do not install solar panels during the renovation process because of the sheer number of things that need to be addressed. The idea is that if the walls are open, this is the time to do something.

The size and material of the conduit is dependent on someone's intentions of installing PV or thermal panels in the future. If it is PV then 1" electrical conduit is fine. For thermal, it should be either 2 x 1.5" or a single 2.5" ABS pipe. For the thermal the run needs to be very close to straight to be able to feed in insulated flexible copper pipes.

Apparently, it is much easier to install the copper lines while the walls are open. With 50' coils of the flexible copper, it means that there are no soldered joints that could fail inside the walls, but they are much more difficult to feed through conduits.

We also were directed to the NRCan Solar Ready Specifications which include:
(1) 2-2" c-vac conduits from mechanical room to attic, to allow for future Thermal and Photo Voltaic installations.
(2) Pre installed plumbing connections to allow for less disruptive future solar hot water installation.
(3) Pre-wired electrical at the location of the future solar hot water tank .
(4) Roof and mechanical room layouts showing future solar panel and hot water tank locations provided to homeowner.
(5) Sticker labels on the mechanical room conduit and the hot water tank indicating the Solar Ready connections.

The Most Efficient Tile Appointment Ever

On Saturday, we went to meet with Vince at Ceratech (Don Reid Drive near Walkley). I have to say that it is nice when you have a company, and a specific salesperson, recommended to you when you consider all of the selections we have to make. When it came to windows, we wanted to shop around more considering the price but with tile, we were happy just to get good service to help make the decision as easy as possible.

It also helped that we walked in with images showing what we were looking for. We hadn't decided on everything beforehand but we definitely knew what we were looking for. I have never had to shop for tile for two entry ways, a kitchen, a fireplace and two bathrooms in one shot! We didn't walk out of the door having purchased all of the tile in one sitting but we do now have a selection list and tile samples for every room (not bad).

For those of you who want to know where we are heading in terms of the look, here goes: the two entry ways will have natural tone medium/large square tile to blend in with the beech floor (and maybe with a pattern); the fireplace will probably have 4x4 slate tile (more grey); the downstairs bathroom floor is most likely a red/brown large square tile (think Killarney red stone) with yellow/greenish 1x1 glass tile for the shower (yes, I got away from blue because of the reddish floor which goes with the red/brown beech floor in the octagon); the upstairs bathroom is large square slate-tone tile on the floor with the same tile but 4x4 for the shower floor and walls (but not the same grey slate tones as the fireplace - more colour variation). We are a little predictable (i.e., earthy, natural tones) but in the end, the house is going to look awesome.

Thank you Thank you

This morning we had what looks like our last in-person detailed design meeting with Chuck for the renovation project before the building permit is submitted. We got to look at the detailed design drawings as one package. Thank you Chuck for all of your hard work.

We of course will have to keep pushing through all of the details together (including the exterior colour debate) but at this point it looks like everything is falling in place. The biggest milestone will be the submission of the building permit to the City before the holidays!

For more information on Chuck Mills Residential Design and Development, visit: www.cmillsdesign.com Of course, the other way to look at his work will be our place when all of this is complete!

Rumour has it!

We received word today that there might be some work done on the house starting on Monday! Besides removing raccoons and trees, punching holes in the walls to find out what is inside and removing some stuff from the basement this will be the first real work on the house! Whew!

The Beech

On Friday, we had a flooring expert at the house. We needed someone to come by to tell us whether or not the old beech floors could be refinished. Their fate is promising and it sounds like we are going to sand them and varnish them but not put a stain so that the gorgeous red/brown colour will come through.

As for the octagon and kitchen with the vinyl with brick pattern flooring, it is still a possibility that there is beech flooring underneath. We are going to rip up the vinyl overlay to see what is underneath. Even if it is in the kitchen area, there could be water damage and then in both areas there will be lots of nail holes. The plan is to rip it up to see what we can find! If it is salvageable, we will refinish those sections too. If it is not, we are going to lay new hardwood in those areas. The problem will be that we won't be able to get new planks with the same thin width and colour. They are going to come up with a plan if in the end we have to tie new boards in.

The stairs are pine and are going to get new caps/treads with the risers painted to clean them up. The small bedroom upstairs has a pine subfloor (used as both the subfloor and floor at the time). At the moment, this room might just get a coat of paint on the floor which can get a new hardwood floor placed on top down the road. The master bedroom has a plywood floor right now but it too could have the thick pine subfloor planks underneath. We may go with painting it too in the end if it is under the plywood. It looks like some destruction has to happen before we can make any decisions on the floor.

Window Selection

One of the big items on our list is new windows. As you might remember, the house received a rating of 36 out of 100 in terms of energy efficiency when we did the audit. We need to replace all 17 or so windows as well as replace one with a door (back bedroom) and add a new one to the dining room (south side).

So far, we went to a showroom for Marvin windows. They are an American company with the most extensive green policy in place. I would call them the porche version. We also went to a Laflamme window retailer. These windows are made near Quebec City. On Monday, we are going to see the showroom for Golden Windows which are made in Kitchener.

Having a sense of the exterior elevations helps with this process but as usual there are a million decisions to make (besides just selecting a manufacturer) - thickness of frame, double hung versus casement, opening size, interior prime versus stain, outside trim colour? What we know is that we are leaning towards wood windows with aluminum clad exterior and most likely double hung because of the age and style of the house. We also know that you can't "go cheap" on windows but really that kind of rationalization can be applied to so many things in a house renovation project. Feel free to share any window advice.

Advice from a Friend: Get a Building Permit

Last night we heard a story about a building permit that is worthy of the blog.

A friend of mine bought a house. After a year or so, they started thinking of getting some renovations done. They called a contractor who came over to prepare a quote. I don't know all of the details but apparently the contractor pointed tons of things out that were done not to code -things done by the previous owner. One amazing example is that the Electrical Safety Authority were going to shut off their power if they didn't fix things in one weeks time because the existing electrical work was not grounded! They had gotten a home inspection when they bought the house but nothing was pointed out at the time. Home inspectors have so many disclaimers in their reports that there is nothing my friend can do about this situation from that angle.

Now they have an insurance claim in (thankfully they bought the right kind of insurance when they purchased the house). Normally, insurance companies don't go after the previous owner of the house but because the work required was around $30,000 they are. This is all because the previous owner did not get any building permits for the renovations they had done.

My friend and his family are ok now but more work has to be done. They want to sell the house but do not want to do what the previous owner did and sell the house with so many problems to an unsuspecting future owner.

Not only do building permits provide a road map to what is done in a house but this is an example of how not getting one can hurt you later on as a buyer or as a seller.

Make an Appointment

I will write more detailed posts this weekend about everything that is going on. Busy, busy, busy... this week we have been to two window selection appointments, have gone to the house to measure a mysterious sloped ceiling section in the kitchen for the kitchen layout to be prepared, have talked about cabinets and more cabinets, made appliance selections, etc, etc. If we are not talking about the house, we are dreaming about paint colours and plumbing fixture options. Today I am going to another kitchen design appointment and tomorrow morning we learn about the fate of our floors (stain anyone?). We should get to look at exterior siding colours soon, as well as learn more about the plan for geothermal. Next week, we already have appointments for one more window retailer as well as a tile guy! Fun!

Digging around the basement

As it looks like our backyard is directing water directly toward the back of our house without proper grading, and based on our desire to improve conditions in the house, we have decided to do some digging around the basement/foundation. This would mean removing the old wood walkways (which will be done anyway because of the new exterior siding) and excavating for waterproofing. A new tile drain system would be installed as well as Celfort 300 exterior insulation providing R-10 to grade, a waterproof membrane and clear stone.


The proposed work will also include getting rid of the crazy root mass in our backyard and grading the surface away from the back wall. Our stone wall behind the driveway may be under attack for a while but in the end it will be reinstated. This work will also help with the drilling required for the geothermal system.

The benefit of doing this digging around work now is the long term view of a healthy house. It would impact the air quality inside as well as the temperature. It is also easier to insulate from the outside as compared with the inside. While we are not planning on finishing the basement now, it makes future plans for this a lot easier.

In terms of decision-making, I admit reading Holmes on Homes helped (beside the more obvious good advice from Amsted). I might work on grading issues at my job but I don't know much about house construction. The other good suggestion is to read the NRC book called "Keeping the Heat In" and came with our energy audit information package. We read through this book again when reviewing the quote and it helped us in understanding what the quote included and the work to be done (i.e., membranes, stone, flashing, cold storage, etc). As for when this work will be done, I will keep you posted.

Yeah! Geothermal is a true possibility for our house

Big news! It looks like our little house will get 100% of its heating and cooling needs through geothermal. I thought that our lot was too small but apparently it is not!

I am going to steal wording from a recent Mike Holmes article on geothermal so that I don't miss anything in the description (thanks Mike).

"In the goal to go green with building, there's often a challenge finding technology that pays off quickly in terms of the added upfront cost, and that works for every home. One of the best options is geothermal heating - it can work anywhere in the world, and you don't have to wait years before you start saving money.

Geothermal heating takes advantage of the earth's renewable energy, by extracting heat from underground through a system of tubing that's filled with a liquid refrigerant. The liquid absorbs the heat from the earth, which is then brought back into a heat pump inside your home. The tubing is buried in a loop, either vertically or horizontally, depending on your lot and access (for our house, it will be the more expensive vertical option as we have a small lot).

If you go below frost depth (four to six feet, depending on geography), the earth maintains a constant average temperature. That soil temperature is an average of 5 degrees - much warmer than the air temperature in winter. A geothermal heating system only needs to raise the temperature about 10 degrees (from 5 degrees to 15 degrees) to keep your home comfortable on even the coldest days. That doesn't require a lot of energy to do - especially if you compare it to raising the temperature from 10 below, or whatever the external air temperature happens to be on a winter day. Geothermal systems don't create heat - they harvest latent heat that already
exists underground. They simply transfer heat energy, unlike fossil fuel furnaces, which create heat by the combustion of natural gas, fuel oil or propane.

In terms of cost savings, most homes in North America are heated by burning gas or oil, or by using electricity produced by a power plant that also burns some kind of fuel. Fuel prices are always going up, and probably always will, since fuel is in limited supply. There is an enormous source of untapped heat energy under the ground. It will be there forever and be constantly renewed, and the cost of it won't be going up - so geothermal will save lots of money. It cuts heating and cooling costs by up to 70 per cent (according to Mike). There is some energy consumed by the pump, compressor and fans - but it's just a fraction of what traditional combustion systems use. A geothermal system is more expensive to install than conventional gas or oil system, but you will save money right away.

In the summer months, geothermal systems operate in reverse - heat is transferred from the house and back into the earth, where the cool ground absorbs the excess heat. Cool air is brought back up. It's simple; I like to think of it as a fan in front of a block of ice. And, there's no big noisy AC unit on the exterior of your house.

Geothermal heat pumps also save energy by pre-heating your domestic hot water (note: it does not address 100% of hot water needs but it gets water to a certain temperature - which also means that we won't get solar panels for hot water if we end up with geothermal). A "desuperheater" - part of the heat pump - transfers heat from the compressor. Geothermal systems can adapt to existing forced air ducting or floor radiant heating.

They provide comfortable steady heat compared to the blast of hot air you get from a forced air heating system.

Since geothermal heating doesn't use combustion, there's no release of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. That cuts down on greenhouse gases and reduces the carbon footprint of your home. In the long term, geothermal is one smart way to heat and cool your home.
It's practical for a retrofit, and I think it should be in every new home built (again...according to Mike). In fact, it's really ideal for entire developments, so many homes can enjoy the cost savings. More new home builders should get on board. "

I will write out the details specific to our house soon but I thought that this would be a good start.

Bye Doors

Tonight was our first successful attempt at selling something from the house. As we don't need the kitchen door anymore (it is going to be a pass-through because of limited kitchen space), we decided to sell it on-line. The kitchen door has gone to an old house in Ottawa where the previous owner took a bedroom door with them when they left. The current owners of the house are relieved to now have an old door as a replacement (long metal key and all). The second door is now in a home with a very happy new owner. He and his wife were so excited about the reno project and to have a new/old door for their home. We still have a few other doors and the wall sconces and chandelier to sell but this is a good start.

More Exterior Option Photos

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Call for Thoughts: Exterior Colour

It is time again to think about exterior colour options. We know that the house is going to have board and batton siding with shingles up top and a stone skirt below but what about the colour of the siding? Blue? Green? Brown? Here are some samples (make sure that you also check out the ones from the earlier postings). Remember - think Arts and Crafts...

Question of the Day: Induction versus Gas

A small kitchen equates to less money being required to pay for counter tops and cabinets but it also means more expensive appliances to fit the space. On Saturday, we went to Universal Appliances on Bank St for a lesson in appliances for smaller spaces. Our dishwasher is going to be miniature! There is nothing we can do about it considering that we have less than 4 ft between the fridge door and the dishwasher across from it.

The debate now is whether or not we continue with a ceramic top stove and convention oven or if we move to gas. The recommended model is the new GE Cafe series with matching microwave/fan above (yes, another small kitchen issue). Feel free to email me or post your thoughts on this.

The other option is the induction stove top. We can get a 24" or 30" stove top where the only energy used is for the exact spot where the pot sits. Darryl at Universal Appliances showed us how fast water boiled in a pan that was sitting on top of a stack of pamphlets on top of the stove surface. Speedy and the surface can be touched immediately afterwards! The price difference of a induction stove top with wall oven below is essentially the same as the GE Cafe series (gas or electric) and is a space saver. I can't help feeling that how we cook would change but apparently it is no different. Hmmmmm.... decisions....

Kitchen Designs

Yesterday we went to Deslaurier to talk about kitchen cabinets. I am not going to do justice to our conversation about the green product options right now so I am not going to try. For now all I'll say is that it is about trying not to put a material in your home that contributes to poor air quality (i.e., off-gassing) by looking at how the cabinet box is constructed as well as the cabinet face. We also talked about counter top options and the challenges of a small space. Our vision is for a painted cabinet base (maybe green?) with white-ish cabinets uppers with glass. Give me a call or email if you want to discuss the details.

While we had done our homework in what we wanted for a kitchen by looking through tons of magazines, we were not as prepared for the bathroom (times two) discussion - ahhhh. It looks like we have some homework for this weekend.

1920s Lights

I am having lots of fun with the salvage/reuse aspect of our reno project. So far we have agreed to reuse one of the pebble glass doors and then have found a home through sites like craig's list for the other two. They are going to be used in a barn reno project in the area (and we made a little spending money when people said no one would want them).

As for the lights, we decided to reuse the lantern hall light (first photo). I know that it is a little gothic but I really wanted to reuse at least one of the original lights. This light is from the 1920/30s and will cost about $50 to rewire. Faye from Arevco in Westboro was really helpful and told me that the light has been upgraded before but needs to be cleaned up and grounded.

We decided not to update the iron chandelier. Apparently it is circa 1950/60s and used to be used for candles. Someone used 'pitch' (also used in road construction) to attach bulbs in order to have it wired. It too needs to be cleaned and rewired. The chandelier is now posted on craig's list to see if anyone else wants it.

The four gold sconces are also believed to be original to the house (1920/30s) except for the fact that they were painted gold since that time. They are also posted to see if anyone wants them (and are ready for cleaning and rewiring). Any takers?

Headline: Client Confirms Concept Plans

Today is a big day - we confirmed the interior and exterior concept plans. This means that we are now moving onto the 'working drawing' stage of the design process. We have agreed to the layout of the place, etc and now get to work out the details. Feel free to email me if you want a copy of the plans.

Also, just in case the suspense is killing you - we went with board and batton siding with shingles up top near the dormers and a stone skirt. We are working out material and colour choices next!

Things are too crazy and busy to give you too many details right now. I am sure that I could write a lot about why we made certain choices, as well as the green side of things. I will try and post more in the spirit of sharing information but this is going to have to do for now. I will say that we punched a hole in the dining room wall and it was confirmed that the exterior wall has zero insulation. Not surprising considering the results of our energy audit (36 out of 100). We are currently working with Amsted to come up with a plan to make our home as energy efficient as possible.

Stone Skirt

It sounds like our place is going to have a stone skirt - possibly made of ledge/stacked stone starting just overlapping the concrete foundation base. As for siding, it is a tight race. One minute a shingle siding style is in the lead but next the vertical look of board and batton is favoured (looks great and less maintenance than shingles). Horizontal siding is not out of the running just yet as clean lines has its benefits.

The photo of the house with the garage is from a house Chuck and Steve suggested that we go see. The other photo is one of favourite houses in the neighbourhood. Maybe we should just leave the siding type decision in Chuck's capable hands. It is such a tough call that maybe that is the way to go.

A new home for some doors

Now that we have a better idea of the proposed interior layout for our house, we can start thinking about the reuse of some of the existing elements. Currently in the house, there are these three "bubble glass" doors. If anyone has suggestions for where to post informaton on these doors being available for purchase, please let us know. There is always the option to donate them to Habitat for Humanity but first we would like to try and sell things we are not going to reuse. Of course, there is Craig's List - what are the other options?

We love the doors but since the house is going to be opened up more, we probably won't be reusing them. One door is a 3/4 door with 1/4 optional opening on a hinge (first picture). The other two doors are different styles for the glass panes.

Any suggestions?

Interior Layout Concept Plans

After our meeting with Chuck and Steve, Rob and I sat down and put our thoughts together about the first draft of the interior layout concept plans. All in all they are what we are looking for - yey - thank you Chuck! The beauty of the plans is that the centre hall plan and the 'octagon' is honoured. We may have a small kitchen (in keeping with its current location) but it is going to now be properly intergated into the rest of the house. On the second floor, we will have one new dormer for the bathroom area (no more metal shower).

After looking the plans over, we wanted to organize our thoughts though to make sure that nothing was missed. For example, the plans are for the dream product but in light of budget constraints they need to be viewed from the perspective of cost savings (i.e., where interior doors can be saved) and our own green goals. With this list being created, the next step is to go through it with Chuck and Steve to answer questions (great learning) in order for us to be able to make some decisions.

In terms of green goals, there are a few examples where one puts something down on a list as needing to be considered but with a retrofit it is not an option. For example, we wanted to consider passive solar in our design. This works for window placement as we need to replace the existing windows and siding but doesn't work for overhangs. Apparently, using a calculation that considers the weather in Ottawa and its location geographically the overhang size for optimal passive solar heating/cooling is 19 inches. Well, with a retrofit project and shorter overhangs, that would mean adding extensions or sleeves to our roof to make it happen. We are replacing the roof but not the second floor structure that the roof is supported by so this is not really an option. I still got what I wanted though - for the optimal overhang size to be considered! For a new house, this is more of an option.

All in all, the interior layout achieves the balance of respecting the old while bringing in the new.

P.S. Mom - you would be happy to know that there is now going to be a door to the backyard!

The Concept Plans are in!

We met with Chuck Mills (our designer), and Steve of Amsted, today to talk about the concept plan. Fun, Fun, Fun.

This is a busy week so I may need some time to put a blog posting together that does the designs justice. Feel free to email me though if you want to see a pdf of the concept plan and I will send you a copy. While you won't get the benefit of hearing directly from Chuck on his thoughts on the place, it would be fun to share the plans in the spirit of sharing ideas and getting the best place possible.

The plans are of the interior layout. The next step is to get a drawing of the exterior elevation. Board and Batton versus shingle siding? Any thoughts? How about a stone skirt?

Plastic Wrap Your Place

The photo is of the 'not so pretty' side of our home. It is so tempting to go and powerwash the siding but patience... one day there will be a new exterior material - I wonder what it will be!





This past weekend at our current home, we "plastic wrapped" our windows again for the winter season. $40 for the shrinkable plastic and double-sided tape plus about 2 hours of our time equates to energy savings on our utility bill. It is not worth it for us to replace the windows in our current home so we put up with plastic seal which doesn't look too bad if it is done well. The motivation is counteracting the puddle of water on the window sill from the condensation and the feeling that we are making a condo built in the late 1980s a tad bit more energy efficient.

Over the years, we have been watching the energy consumption stat on our utility bill decrease. I would attribute this to such actions as: a power bar for the TV and computer to reduce "vamp" energy use when the electronics are not on; new energy efficient appliances; and, air leak seals on outlets situated on exterior walls to name a few. I won't try and decipher how the energy usage has changed with different housemates but it would interesting to see how other behaviour changes factor in.

For the new house, funds are going to be directed to energy efficiency measures in the form of insulation and quality windows (yeah - no more hair drying your windows to create a good seal). One idea is an all-off switch that you have near the door that turns off all non-essential energy draws when you leave the house (like the power bar idea but more thorough). This one is on the research list as we don't know how economically feasible it is yet, or if behaviour changes would achieve the same result.

A Big Night for Amsted

Congrats to Steve Barkhouse and his team at Amsted. At the Greater Ottawa Home Builders Association Awards last week, Steve's team won 'Renovator of the Year' (x3), a Green Renovation Award and two others! Not bad... We picked Amsted as a Contractor to work with us on our renovation project for many reasons but this is a cherry on top.

Visit http://www.amsted.ca/ for more information about the company.

Ottawa Citizen, Thursday, Oct 16th

On Thursday Oct 16th the Ottawa Citizen is coming out with its first article in the three/four part series on our renovation project. Last week we did a photo shoot because apparently the million photos we took during the house inspection didn't cut it for publication so they had to come take more photos!

The interview with the reporter was all about retrofitting an old home and how the reality of 'green' fits into everything. I can't wait to see how the first article turns out.

Trees be Gone

We now have a backyard and sunlight into our house. There may still be a root mass but this is at least a start. Backyard BBQs here we come.

The 3 trees out front are going to stay with their new haircuts to get them off the roof. With the one maple in the backyard, this means that we went from 7 (plus cedars) to 4 large trees on our property.

Solar Panel Installation

Lucky timing lead to Rob and I getting the chance to visit a house on Huron St North (Hintonburg area) to see solar panels being installed. Peter of Isolara showed us how the panels will be used to meet the domestic hot water needs for this house (plus apartment unit). In this case, the conduit down to the basement where the tanks are to be located is being installed outside of the exterior wall (in our case, it would be interior). From the photo, you can see that it looks like a typical downspout. This installation apparently also includes remote sensing so that the resident can track the savings from installing the system.

While I have mentioned the Sustainable Ottawa H20 grant before, I wanted to mention it again. Visit http://www.sustainableottawa.ca/ for more information on an additional grant that is available in the Ottawa area for the installation of solar panels for heating domestic hot water (additional because it is above and beyond the NRCan energy audit grant).

Progress Update

Last Friday I had a breakfast meeting with Steve of our design-build team. It was a good chance to talk about timing and where we are at today. As you know, we are in the design stage of the process. Drawings have to be created first summarizing what we are going for in the renovation so that we can write up our contract with the guys doing the actual work.

The plan right now is construction starting early January with us in the house in late June - exciting. I will keep you posted as I learn more.

As for this photo, we had the tree guys back on site this week. If you zoom in, you might be able to see one of the guys up in the tree with his harness and chainsaw on a rope. This shot shows our backyard with one tree already done. Two are still to come out with the one tree in the fence to remain. If we remember, we had an arborist come first who informed us of the poor health of the trees. As foreign, diseased, invasive Norway Maples (those were the descriptive words used), it was recommended that the trees come out. More photos are to come showing the end result.

Thank you Neighbours

This post is in honour of our neighbours Janene and Jeff for the new dining room set (and to Jamie for helping carry it over) - thank you very much!

We are happy to provide a new home for all of the pieces - especially if it means that you will have room for your own Thanksgiving celebrations.

Just think of the dinner parties we are going to have when the renovation process is complete - the table seats 12!

Ottawa Citizen Interview

On Tuesday, I gave a writer for the Ottawa Citizen a tour of the house. She wants to do a series of articles on the renovation process for the 'In and Around the House' section of the Citizen. The idea came through a friend of mine that is also a member of the OTC (go Louise go).

I knew that if she saw the house then she would definitely want to do the articles. There is a lot of material to write about there! I think that the plan is write about the renovation experience including the 'green' side of the project (decision-making 101). I think that there is a lot to be said about retrofit projects - not just about green and new home construction. The articles will keep us on our toes.

I included this photo as another example of the current state of energy efficiency in our house. This window was the worst one during our energy audit.

I will post the date when I know when the first article is coming out. As for the latest changes to the inside of the house, we no longer have the wood paneling in the basement (ceiling or walls) or the very, very temporary old wall stuffed with newspaper. If you ignore the mold, it almost looks clean down there.

Volatile Organic Compounds

I just wrote out the full name for VOCs to get my Dad, the science nerd, to read this blog entry.

The use of materials with low VOCs is a common tool used in sustainable design projects. We did not make the effort to use paints with low/no VOCs in our kitchen reno for our current place and I am still not 100% sure why (laziness?). While research still has to be done for the big reno project, I am inspired to now not just ignore the issue but to learn what I can about off-gasing (please don't let the lack of enthusiasm and delivery for our last reno project detract from your confidence in our commitment to follow through this time).

At the Home Show today, the following was said: low VOC paint means white paint because VOCs are associated with pigment. Is this true?

For substances that off-gas from the material inside cabinets (formaldehyde in OSB), one solution is said to be to paint all cabinets on all sides with a low VOC paint to "seal" them off. This would be instead of buying cabinets that do not off-gas in the first place which is a cost and sourcing issue.

Plan Ahead for a 'Green' Project

Today was the Ottawa Fall Home Show where we attended a seminar put on by our Design-Build company. Watching him talk about "what you really need to consider when building or renovating green" made us even more excited about our project. I really don't think that we are "thinking green" to be part of the trend. I really think that we are committed to the challenge and opportunity.

During the presentation and under the heading "Plan Ahead for a Green Project" the audience was asked to think about establishing priorities for their project - is energy efficiency the most important thing to you? indoor air quality?

My gut reaction is energy efficiency first, but with indoor air quality as a close second. Maybe I want (and expect) too much. In our case though I think that we can follow through with this if we make the effort now. I recognize that we are in a unique situation due the fact that we can enter this game in the first place (old house in a great neighbourhood with a great location and the ability to actually undertake a renovation). The upfront costs may be high but the pay back is there. The example I heard the other day has to do with commuting. By living where we are and not having to drive long distances to work (even walk/bike to work) then we are paying the upfront costs for the location instead of paying for it over the years in gas, etc.

One of the other priority areas could be water conservation. I am going to dedicate a separate blog entry to this subject....

Of course there are other priority areas such as material selection and water diversion/reduction... what are your priorities in terms of money/effort spent for green?

Central Vac versus a good ol'fashion broom

What are your thoughts on central vac? One thought is that since we are most likely going to have the walls opened up then this is the time to install it. The other thought is that the 30 ft hoses are annoying to store and lug around (even with one outlet per floor).

We found two companies that install them in Ottawa. Supervac sells the Canovac which is made by a company in Owen Sound (founded in 1968). The other company is Vacuum Ottawa and they sell Nilfisk central vacs (Swedish). They have a special on right now for the Fall Home Show (20% off and no tax). Both are comparable in terms of cost to install and would be flexible in terms of when it goes in (i.e., when the walls are open which is who knows when). Is having central vac worth the $1000 price tag?

Still moving forward

I know that it has been a while since our last post. Believe me - we haven't forgotten about the house. Besides fun family member stuff which has distracted us for a bit, we have been securing a design/build team. This was a big first step because you only want to make this decision once. Our living room in our current home is also covered in magazines with stickies indicating concepts that inspire. The laptops are out with spreadsheets and organizational files. All we need now is to maintain our patience in bringing out the jack hammer. It is so tempting to start knocking walls down now but really we have to wait. Design drawings are needed in order for them to be the basis for our contract with the builder. Other than tree removal/trimming and raccoon clean-up, we have to wait. I will keep you posted.

Arts and Crafts Examples

In honour of my mom, here are some arts and crafts example houses from her neighbourhood. Stone porch posts with tapered top (similar to our neighbourhood) and unpainted porch trim.

Green/grey/sage siding is very common which makes me not want to do it - how about blue? Maybe without the band detail...

Cedars be gone

And we have more light and the potential for a backyard!

The Front of the House Revealed

If you haven't already read the entry 'we have a porch' you should before reading this one for the full effect....

On Friday, the trees in the front were trimmed and the house is revealed! We actually have some daylight in the original living room! You can see the park from the porch and from the upstairs bedroom! The raccoons no longer have direct access to our house! Wow!

Now that we can actually see the lines of the house the question is - if (and how) we bring back the arts and crafts flavour of this place.

Design Features

Check out these features! Painted soft pine floors upstairs and the other kind of tribute to the guy upstairs.

Asbestos Day

During our house inspection we learned that we probably had asbestos around our duct work. Apparently, it is only bad for you if it is disturbed and you are working around it daily but we decided to have it removed by a professional anyway. To us it was not only a safety issue for the people working in our house but one of future air quality (a theme you will notice).

A company came today and did a great job cleaning up the asbestos around the duct work. It was a challenging job as the duct work was not very securely attached and the place is a mess. The photo is of the old duct work on the basement floor - asbestos and all.

One thing that we did learn is that we are going to have to take a sample from the plaster in the walls and send it to a lab to see if asbestos was used in more places throughout the house - fun. We can continue on with what we are doing but the removal company may have to come back during demolition. We will see. This relates to the bigger theme of waiting to learn more about what is inside the walls.

First raccoons, now asbestos.

Curved Lines of the Porch

Try and see the curved lines.... the photo with the big white pine in the open doorway is of our front porch. This porch was obviously closed in at some point. There are curved lines in the door and in the window.

The other photos are of other curved lines we found in porches in the neighbourhood. If we end up opening up the porch and keeping those lines, this gives you an idea of what it will look like. Fun.

More Exterior Siding Examples

These are more photos from our neighbourhood. First you have the very common combo brick and siding with dormer windows. This one has a metal roof. Next you have the clean lined stucco house. The third one is a very popular house on the street with its more modern look.

If you have any suggestions about exterior siding, please feel free to comment or email. In terms of green, there isn't one clear leader. You really have to balance the issues of embodied energy, durability, etc, etc.... any suggestions on material and style?

The World of Exterior Materials/Siding

Photo #1 - our house now (dirty white aluminum)

Photo #2 - neighbourhood examples of dark and lighter brick with the typical porch and stone retaining walls

Photo #3 - arts and crafts example (our house is said to be of this style)