Wrapping Up The Wiring

What has seemed to take forever when it comes to wiring the house, we are finally starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel. As of this past weekend it looks like all electrical, telephone, data, coax cable, and speaker wire has been run throughout the house. Cutting in a few boxes and some of the recessed cans still remains which will still take some time due to the amount of them.


We have spent a couple of Saturdays over the past month at The Lite Company choosing light fixtures for the house. We had a major breakthrough this past weekend when the owner showed us a light fixture series that really fits our wants and looks great with the timbers in the house.


We were really struggling with the kitchen lights. The owner of the company came over and recommended going with indirect lighting. This would have been accomplished with upper and under cabinet lighting on the kitchen cabinets. We liked the idea but we just did not feel that it would give us enough light in the kitchen.

Another option was to go with recessed lighting. This was almost the case until we saw the series of light fixtures that we chose. It looks like right now we will be going with a series of pendant lights, for general lighting that will be placed up higher towards the ceiling, and longer ones over the sink area and over the peninsula area. These will be in conjunction with under and above cabinet lighting.

A week or so ago we managed to finally get the terrace door installed that leads out to the balcony. The hold up on doing this was the weather. We wanted a little warmer weather so as not to lose so much heat while doing prep work to hang the door. The biggest challenge with this door was getting all of the wiring in place prior to closing up the the rough opening with framing material. Once in place it sure made a difference on the natural light being let in, in the loft area.

We have pretty much chosen a drywall contractor to do the taping and texture and also hang the remaining Sheetrock. The rather disappointing part of this process was we had five contractors look at the house and only received two quotes. I guess the building industry is still thriving up here?? Anyway our main reason for going with the one that we chose was he came with good recommendations from the owner of the timber frame home that we helped raise south of Flagstaff last Summer. Our thoughts are that he has had some experience working around the timbers and the challenges that they create.

As I mentioned in my last post, I wanted to talk a little about the new washer and dryer. I have very mixed feelings on new technology and its benefits to society, but here is one case where technology has really helped save money and also the environment.



The biggest difference is water usage. 13 gallons for a larger than normal load of clothes. This compared to three times that much in the old conventional washing machine. This water will also be collected into a grey water tank which will be used primarily for irrigation once the tank is in place.

The next very noticeable difference is the final spin cycle. When clothes come out they feel 50% lighter due to the amount of water that has been spun out of them. This equates to only half of the drying time. Our first load we checked 25 minutes into the cycle just to make sure the dryer was working properly and found all of the clothes already dry.

With all of the snow we have received this year and with a fair amount of rain this past weekend our rain catch tank is now about 3/4 full (7500 gallons). In fact we have easily been replenishing what water we have used each week with snow melt and/or rain off of the roof.

Our goals are still to have the Sheetrock contractors in by the later half of March. This will be an aggressive schedule to shoot for but our hopes are we can be ready.