When we set out to build seating for our backyard fire pit, Muskoka chairs (or Adirondack chairs for our American friends) seemed like the perfect option. In true ‘Dreamhouse’ fashion though, we put a bit of a modern spin on the Canadian classic. Our Modern Muskoka Chair has sleeker, more angular lines than the original, but all the comfort of cottage life. Here’s how we did it: (more…)
There’s just a few short days to go before Canada celebrates it’s 150th birthday and all across the country people are getting ready for the party. Everywhere you go, businesses & homeowners alike are getting into the Canada Day sprit with displays of national pride, flags & colours. When RYOBI reached out to us to create a Canadian themed DIY in celebration of Canada’s 150, we needed not look further than our own backyard (pun intended)! (more…)
We’re almost through the month of May! How did that happen?? Oh, right – I guess we’ve been so consumed with all things master bedroom that April just seemed to completely pass us by. That doesn’t mean though that we let Earth month come and go without taking some time to make a few energy saving changes in the Dreamhouse. (more…)
We made it to the finish line of our One Room Challenge! We’ve had many a late night and more fast food than I care to admit over the last 5 weeks, but walking into our dream bedroom now, it all seems worth it. (more…)
Well we’re into the home stretch of the One Room Challenge and though most of the previous weeks were filled with lots of planning & purchasing this week we finally started pulling this master bedroom makeover together. We’re in full execution mode and ready to bring the dream bedroom to life! (more…)
It’s Week 4 of the One Room Challenge and if you’re new here you should probably go back to Week 1 and get yourself up to speed. But in case you’re lazy like me let me give you the Coles’ Notes version. We’re 4 weeks into a 6 week challenge where we’re creating our Dream Bedroom. There. That wasn’t hard at all! But with just 2 weeks to go, there’s no time to waste so let’s get down to business. (more…)
It’s week 3 of our One Room Challenge and true to form I’m beginning to feel the stress. Every time we decide to tackle a room makeover, Kes and I come up with these huge ideas & plans for multiple DIYs. Week 3 is usually about the time when I take a look back at the long list of to-dos that we have yet to complete and start to seriously doubt our ability to pull it all together in time. This time around is no exception. (more…)
We made it to week 2 of our One Room Challenge master bedroom makeover. If you missed last week, you can head there now to get up to speed with our vision for the completed space. Today we’ll give you a glimpse inside the bedroom as it is now & fill you in on what we’ve been up to over the last week. (more…)
It’s that time of year again! We’re doing another One Room Challenge. If you’ve never heard of the ORC, it’s essentially a huge online event that Linda of Calling It Home hosts twice a year. Hundreds of bloggers join in to makeover a room from start to finish in just 6 weeks. This will be our 3rd time participating. Well technically it’s our fourth, but we don’t speak of our first attempt lol! In any case we’re really excited to finally have another space in The Dreamhouse join our master bath & family room in the ‘completed’ column. This time around we’ll be tackling our dream bedroom. (more…)
Kes and I love to entertain. One of the things we’ve looked forward to most throughout this whole Dreamhouse journey has been finally being able to invite our family and friends into our home. So when my father-in-law turned 70 a few weeks ago, we took the opportunity to host a small gathering of family to celebrate. (more…)
Valentine’s Day isn’t usually a holiday we really get into around our house. Sure most years, I make valentine cards for Kash, or bake goodies for his class parties, but Kes and I tend to keep things pretty low key. Typically we’ll just cook a nice meal for one another or catch a movie. It’s been years since we’ve exchanged gifts and I can’t remember any year where I’ve felt the need to decorate the house. This year however, with everything going on in the world I kinda feel like we could all use a little more love in our everyday lives. I decided to make this DIY Valentine string art to inject a little ‘heart’ into the Dreamhouse – and to serve as a gentle reminder to show love for one another, no matter our differences. (more…)
The Interior Design Show is hands down our favourite of any of the design fairs or trade shows in Toronto every year. We’ve attended IDS the last 4 years running and though we haven’t always talked about it here on the blog, if you’ve seen any of our past posts you know why we say it’s so much more than just another home show. (more…)
Happy New Year friends! The holidays are behind us, we’ve said so long to Christmas decorations and lazy days. It’s a new year, and with it comes the prospect of new goals and a fresh start….right?! Isn’t that how it’s supposed to be? Well for us there hasn’t been a whole lot of that. Truth be told I had an entirely different post planned for today. Actually if I’m being totally honest, I had a different post planned for last week, but I digress… We’re battling a serious case of post holiday funk in the Dreamhouse. (more…)
Happy Holidays friends! And to any of you who are new here, thanks for stopping by. We’re pretty excited today to be sharing our first Christmas home tour with all of you – and really, our first EVER home tour here in the Dreamhouse! We’ve also teamed up some fabulous & super talented Canadian bloggers to share a whole lot of Christmas inspiration from home tours, to recipes, travel tips & everything in between so be sure to “Have Yourself a Canadian Little Christmas” & check out the links at the bottom of this post. (more…)
You guys!! How is it already the second week of December?! Am I the only one who feels like this month is flying by? Christmas will be here before you know it & if you’ve been following us on Instagram you know we’ve been hard at work getting the Dreamhouse all snazzied up for Christmas. Our tree is up & I’ve been working on a few quick & easy crafts to add to our festive decor. I’m all about crafts that are simple & don’t take up too much time so I thought I’d share this one that literally took me 10 minutes and cost next to nothing – our DIY ornament string garland. (more…)
We’re just a few days away from Black Friday in the U.S.! Who am I kidding, it’s almost Black Friday here in Canada too (since our retailers have insisted on making it a thing), lol! And as all of our inboxes fill up with flyers, deals & door crashers, we thought we’d share a little inspiration to take with you as you head out to all the sales this week. We’ve had so many questions about how we put together the modern industrial vibe for our family room, so we’re sharing a source list to help you shop the look! (more…)
We made it to the finish line!!! I can’t begin to tell you how excited (and relieved) I am to be able to say that. Today marks week 6 of the One Room Challenge and we’re revealing one of the largest spaces in the house – our modern industrial family room. This is the first truly ‘finished’ space on the main floor of our home and it feels so amazing to finally be able to walk in and get that first real glimpse of our vision for the Dreamhouse. (more…)
It’s week 5 of our 6 week family room makeover for the One Room Challenge and I’m officially freaking out! Reveal day is exactly 7 days away and there are still SO many things we have to cross off our to-do list to bring our vision for the family room to life. (more…)
It’s week 4 and we’re into the home stretch of our One Room Challenge. Week 3 turned out to be a bit of a bust for us so we’ll be covering both weeks in today’s recap. Our focus this week has been the family room lighting. (more…)
It’s that time of year again!! And no, I’m not referring to the season where we “pumpkin spice all the things” (although here in Canada it is that too). I’m referring to the time of year where bloggers from all over get just the kick in the pants they need to roll up their sleeves, get creative & come together to be inspired. It’s One Room Challenge time! (more…)
That is the question…. Ok so Kes and I need you to settle an argument. Well..I guess it’s not so much an argument as it is a DIY dilemma. (more…)
![The making of a family room [Inspiration board]](http://thedreamhouseproject.ca/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/family-room-board-1200x550.jpg)
After our very long hiatus from all things DIY, it’s not surprising that lately Kes and I have been feeling the itch to create. So now that this beautiful summer is creeping to a close and shorter days are bringing with them cooler temperatures, we’ve decided it’s finally time for us to trade in our shorts for a few pairs of comfy paint stained track pants. The first space we’re tackling is our main floor, so we decided to start with a little family room inspiration. (more…)
Well hello there old friend…and by old friend I can only assume I’m talking to myself because after over a year of radio silence on the blog it’s possible that I’m the only one still here. Okay, maybe my mom. Hi mom. 🙂
It feels like forever since I’ve written anything or even checked in (nearly 13 months to be exact). A whole lot has happened in our lives since my last post. For starters – after 3 long years on this journey, we finally moved in to the Dreamhouse. (more…)
First of all I just wanted to say thank you so much for the overwhelmingly positive comments on last week’s One Room Challenge reveal post as well as all the love on facebook, & instagram, etc. We really do appreciate it!
We received so much feedback on our hex tile floors, we thought we’d share some details and a few tips to help any of you looking to do something similar. (more…)
It’s reveal day!!! We’re so excited to have made it through to the end of this One Room Challenge to share with you the first completed space in the Dreamhouse – our Master Bath Retreat! (more…)
I just had a feeling things were moving along a little too smoothly….
It’s week 4 of our One Room Challenge where we’re participating along with the 20 designers & over 150 bloggers in the linking event over at Calling it Home to transform a space in just 6 weeks. If you’ve been following along on our progress to complete our #DreamBedroom & #MasterBathRetreat, you’ll know that thus far in Week 1, Week 2 & Week 3, things have been moving along at a good pace. But what challenge would be complete without a few setbacks right?? Well this seems to be our week for that across the board…. (more…)
Happy Thursday! It’s week 3 and we’ve reached the half way point of our One Room Challenge!!
If you missed our previous updates, you can go back to read Week 1 & Week 2 where we shared the before of our entire master suite & the plans for our #MasterBathRetreat.
The bedroom space still looks much as it did last week, with the exception of the windows that have now been trimmed. We’ve also cleaned up a bit & removed all of the drywall pieces left from the wall that needed to be opened for the en-suite plumbing, which should happen next week. (more…)
We’ve made it to Week 2 of our One Room Challenge!
There’s nothing like a little time off work and a long weekend to give you the kick in the pants you need to get going on a reno project. Last week, Kes and I were fortunate enough to be able to take a few vacation days ahead of the Easter long weekend which made for a ton of progress on our space so far. (more…)
Ok. Let’s try this thing again…
If you’re new here and joining us from Calling it Home – welcome! I’ll get to the fun stuff in a minute. There’s just one thing I need to get off my chest first…
So I think it’s pretty clear at this point that we VASTLY overestimated our ability to blog regularly while undergoing a major renovation. (more…)
Well hello there! Happy New Year friends – or at least I hope we’re still friends…we are right?? Ok, This is awkward. It’s been well over two months since we’ve blogged and as I’m sure you realized quite some time ago that week 6 of our One Room Challenge has long since come and gone without a reveal. (more…)
It’s week 4 of our One Room Challlenge and we’re very behind on our progress. If you read our last post you know all about our devastatingly huge little setback. Sadly we still don’t have an update on that front but we’re hoping to find a solution this weekend. Trying not to be discouraged though we’re attempting to move forward and this week we’re talking paint. (more…)
Soooo we’ve hit a setback with the tiling for Operation Organized Entryway. If you follow us on Instagram, you might have already seen this. Remember our beautiful honed grey basalt tile that I love and was ranting & raving over in our last post?? Yea….well…. here’s how it looked the next day once the tiles were set & we snapped off all of the leveling clips… (more…)
We’re into week 3 of 6 in our One Room Challenge which means we’re right at the half way mark. Aaaaannd as I write that I’m starting to feel the pressure. Last week was a bit anti-climactic with all of the researching, material sourcing & shopping but this week we really got to work.
Well it’s Week 2 of the One Room Challenge where we’re transforming one room in our house over the next 6 weeks along with the 20 chosen design bloggers as well as the 96 other bloggers playing along in the linkup rounds over at Calling It Home. In Week 1, we started things off by revealing our plans for what we’re calling #OperationOrganizedEntryway (if you missed it you can go get caught up here).
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Well we’ve made it into the finishing phase of the Dreamhouse and with so many projects on the go at the same time, we’re beginning to feel a little bit of blogger ADD. With the whole house to finish at once we’ve been having a hard time figuring how to document them all without having the blog to descend into the chaos of multi-tasking that our evenings & weekends have. (more…)
Things around here have been a little quiet of late. But that’s because Kes and I have put our DIY hats on & have been spending most of what used to be our blogging hours working at the Dreamhouse. (more…)
If you follow our blog, you know that it’s no secret that Kes & I are HGTV fanboys (or fanboy and fangirl, lol). So when Jennifer Flores recently approached us to ask if we’d be interested in interviewing Bryan Baeumler on behalf of BlogPodium, our reaction was something comparable to a teenage girl at a One Direction concert. I seriously had to re-write my email response to her three times to tone down the number of “OMG”s and “that’s amazing”s!
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![#IceBucketChallenge for ALS Canada [Video]](http://thedreamhouseproject.ca/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/IMG_9162.jpg)
Unless you’ve been living under a rock somewhere, I’m sure you’ve seen countless people – friends, coworkers & celebrities alike – dousing themselves in buckets of ice cold water & then uploading the videos to their various social media accounts & challenging their friends in order to raise awareness for ALS. So when Kes & I saw the ice bucket challenge begin to make its rounds in each of our facebook feeds, we knew it was only a matter of time before someone called us out.
If you’ve been following along you know that we’ve finally got some walls up in this place & things are progressing. But we realized that we didn’t take any real time to fill you in on all the important stuff that happened behind the walls. So today we’re taking you back to talk about radiant heating. (more…)
![Dreamhouse Update: Construction Progress Report [Video]](http://thedreamhouseproject.ca/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/featureImg-vidWalkthru3.jpg)
Things have been crazy busy lately – which you’ve probably gathered from our lack of blog posts in the last month. It’s been a bit of a struggle trying to strike the balance between our day jobs, being a parent to a 5 year old (Yes our little guy is FIVE now), working on the house, & staying on top of the blog, but we’re working on it.
Thankfully though – this time, our silence here hasn’t meant things over at the Dreamhouse have ground to a halt. Quite the opposite actually. Things have really progressed since our last update & we’re even starting to glimpse that light at the end of the tunnel. So rather than ramble on and on about all of the things that have been happening we thought it might be easier to share a quick video progress report so you can see for yourselves. (more…)
Growing up, my Dad was never the most handy guy. Not to say that he isn’t capable, just that working with tools was never really a high priority on his list. He’s more the phone a friend & “supervise” kinda guy. I remember always having family friends come by to fix various things around the house & bringing with them the most fascinating tools. I quickly became the one who’d hold the flashlight & learned so much along the way. I guess you could say my extended family of DIY Dads probably taught me more than I would have learned having just the one…lol! But when Father’s Day came around I was never the girl you’d find in the hardware store looking for gift ideas. (more…)
Workcation:
work·ca·tion (noun)
1. A period of vacation from normal work activities, not used for rest, recreation, or travel, but rather used to work your house: Eg. Team Dreamhouse is on workcation right now.
This week Kes and I decided to take the week off to knock a huge DIY off our to-do list. We’ll be installing our radiant in-floor heating system. We’ll get into the full details of radiant heating in a more in-depth post in the coming weeks, but right now I just wanted to give you a quick glimpse into the fun we’ve been having so far… (more…)
It’s been over a month a loooong time since my last post and even longer since we’ve given you all a proper progress report on the Dreamhouse. I wish I could give you some amazing reason why like Kes & I have been off traveling and having the time of our lives. Or better yet that we’ve been keeping an epic secret & I’ve simply been too exhausted to write because I’m busy growing a human (a girl can dream right!?)… (more…)
If you’ve been following our blog you already know that we’re huge HGTV fans. Remember our PARA Blog Crew submission video?? Yea….it’s a problem. On any given day you can pretty much guarantee there’s an episode of one of HGTV Canada’s many awesome shows providing the soundtrack to our household.
One show in particular that we’ve been enjoying in this season’s lineup is Critical Listing. If you’re not familiar with the show, you really should get familiar! (more…)
Well it’s finally here! It’s Spring Fever Reveal day & I’m pretty excited to share what Kes & I’ve been slaving over working on!
When I think of spring projects for the home, the first things that tend to come to mind are storage and organization. So when we were tasked with a ‘spring paint projects’ challenge, we wanted to find an area of the house where we could solve a problem while adding a bit of style. (more…)
It’s April!!! And after months of snow, ice and Polar Vortex temperatures, Mother Nature is finally giving us a bit of a reprive (knock on wood) from what felt like the longest. winter. ever! Oh – and let me take a minute to say thank you for the overwhelmingly positive emails, text messages & blog comments I received after my last post. It’s funny how a public online meltdown always manages to provide the most reader engagement. So thanks guys for allowing me to vent. 🙂
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3 weeks….
(That’s how long it’s been since my last post.)
I should probably start by apologizing for the radio silence of late. I’m still here. I haven’t abandoned you guys. But if I’m being totally honest, anything I had posted in the last 3 weeks, you probably wouldn’t have wanted to read. Or maybe you would – sometimes a public online meltdown just makes for good entertainment. Lol! I’m kidding (sort of). (more…)
If you’re lucky in life, you’re blessed with the kind of friendship that spans decades. Through breakups, triumphs, & crazy vacations; loves, loses, adventures & many many glasses of wine, I’ve been blessed to have an amazing friend by my side. Angela of Endless Possibilities Image Consulting is one of my closest friends. Friends from childhood we weren’t always as close as we are now, but as we grew into womanhood together, I came to realize she’s my kindred spirit of sorts. She’s my person. My go to when I want to want to ‘shop, share, heal, hurt, joke, or just be’. So when Kes and I came up with the idea of paying forward our PARA Blog Crew windfall by performing Random Acts of Paint, there was one person who came to mind first. (more…)
It’s amazing how quickly karma can come back around. A couple of weeks ago we introduced the concept of Random Acts of Paint as a way of paying it forward. I’m a firm believer that if we all made an effort once in a while to do something nice for someone else there’d be a little more light in the world. As it happens, not more than a week later, Kes & I found ourselves on the receiving end of a random act of kindness that quite literally brought ‘light’ into our lives…. (more…)
We hope you’re all enjoying the long weekend. I know I am. There’s just something awesome about heading into a Sunday evening and being hit by the realization that there’s still one more day left of the weekend. It’s kind of like putting on a jacket you haven’t worn in a while & finding money in the pocket. I don’t usually post on Sundays but today I wanted to take some time out for a little bit of exciting news! (more…)
Okay…I know that in blogging terms this post is probably a few weeks late given that Valentine’s day is tomorrow, but meh – that’s just how I roll. Actually full disclosure how I usually roll is leaving everything to the last second and then pulling an all nighter to finish just in time for Kash to wake up the morning of [insert school event requiring me to bake, craft, etc.. here]. So in terms of personal achievements, I think being done a full day ahead of time deserves a pat on the back. Plus this project being one that Kash and I could work on together meant that I had to operate within the constraints of 4-year-old bedtime hours. (more…)
I love the idea that when something good happens you to, you should pay it forward. I feel like if more people tried to live by this one simple philosophy, our world would be a better place. Sometimes just a simple act of human kindness can go a long way. (more…)
It’s Thursday again already and I have no idea where the week went! Not that I’m complaining. Any time I wake up and realize it’s almost the weekend is a victory in my book! But I digress… As you’ve probably noticed, the blogosphere has been all a buzz with recaps & highlights from the IDS 2014 this past weekend. Well today I’m finally getting around to writing mine. (more…)
Happy Thursday!! Tonight kicks off this year’s Interior Design Show in Toronto. If you’ve never been & you’re in any way thinking of renovating, decorating or just in need of some inspiration, I HIGHLY recommend you check out IDS 2014 this weekend. (more…)
If you were following along with #ProjectSanta on Twitter or Instagram during our laundry room makeover over the holidays you might have noticed a certain logo that kept popping up in our behind the scenes pics…
Happy New Year! Before I get into today’s post, I want to take a moment to thank everyone for the overwhelmingly positive feedback on the Laundry Room Makeover project we did as a gift for my parents. Thanks also to everyone who took the time to enter the giveaway. Of course there can only be one winner & congratulations to Angela M for winning the gallon of PARA paint as well as the PaintStick EZ-Twist Roller & QuickPainter Pad Edge Painter courtesy of HomeRight. Good luck with your bathroom reno Angela & be sure to send us pics!
Now that all that is out of the way, let’s talk 2014… (more…)
The laundry room is complete. It nearly killed us, but after two weeks, an unthinkable number of late nights, an ice storm, a power outage, a stomach bug, and the final push of nearly 46 hours straight, we were able to pull it off just in time for Christmas.
Happy Friday friends!! Well, Project Santa is well under way and if you’ve been following our behind the scenes progress on Twitter and Instagram you know that we created a workspace in the basement to stage and dry fit everything. By measuring and taping off the dimensions of the laundry room, it basically it gave us a place to plan, construct, & assemble all the elements to see how things would all fit together before we got into the actual space. It also allowed us to do all that, without forcing my parents to go without a laundry room for 2 weeks while we carry out our little transformation.
If you’ve been following our journey, you know that we’ve been living with my parents since we sold our first home last summer to embark on building our Dreamhouse. In the nearly year and a half we’ve been back home, there’s almost never been a time that they haven’t put our needs above their own. (more…)
With just 18 days until Christmas, holiday preparations are in full swing all around us. The malls are full of eager shoppers. Everywhere you look there are strings of lights & holiday decorations. But one of my favourite things about this time of year, is the baking.
Today is the final day in our Design Week series! We’ve taken you behind the scenes on the exterior, from inspiration, material choices, and the many, MANY decisions on colour. Now it’s finally time to see how it’s all coming together. So without further ado…here it is!! (more…)
The amount of colour choices that go into the exterior of a house is ASTONISHING! I always anticipated that the interior design decisions would be hard but it never crossed my mind that choosing colours for the exterior materials would make me want to tear my hair out. Grab a cup of coffee cause this might take a while…
After narrowing in on the look we were going for, we set out to finding the right materials to accomplish it. As it turns out – we simply live on the wrong coast. Who knew?? Apparently the exact type of house we love is so popular on the other side of the continent that it’s coined it’s own style. A quick google search of ‘West Coast Modern” and you’ll know what I’m talking about. We found a ton of information on expressed joint panel systems, & cedar cladding materials in the Pacific North West, but were hard pressed to find building practices & materials for that style of home locally. (more…)
Today kicks off our second Design Week and this time it’s all about the exterior of the Dreamhouse. When we left off last time, we revealed the conceptual elevation drawings & first colour renderings of the exterior. Of course drawings are easy. The hard part is bringing the drawings to life to achieve the look we want within budget. (more…)
Happy Thursday folks – and Happy Thanksgiving to all our Ameri-friends!
First of all, I feel like I should apologize for the radio silence over the last couple of weeks. Between broken laptops, business trips, a sick pre-schooler & some much needed family time, there hasn’t been a whole lot of room left in my schedule for the blog. I know…BAD blogger!! Not to worry though cause I promise to make up for it. (more…)
Last week we gave you a little peek into our Halloween costume making obsession. I have to admit that even I think we go overboard sometimes – and this year was no exception. But honestly, when you ask your 4 year old what he wants to be for Halloween & his response is: “Da bwack Jedi Angwy Bird fwom Angwy Birds STAR WARS!!” you simply CANNOT disappoint. I mean…ok yes – he’s obsessed with Angry Birds. But he’s 4 and knows the words ‘Jedi’ and ‘Star Wars.’ I must be doing something right… (more…)
If you remember last week was all about the window install (I know, how could you forget right?!). Well this week we were all geared up to kick off another Design Week & talk about all our plans for the exterior of the house…
And then I spilled coffee on my MacBook.
Halloween is in exactly one week. And we haven’t started working on our costumes. Aaaaaand cue panic!
Anyone who knows us well, knows this is the time of year where we go all out. There’s just a certain satisfaction that comes from taking a cool idea, applying some brainpower & a few crafting skills and executing an EPIC costume. The fact that I was blessed with a partner that feels the same is nothing more than kismet. (more…)
Remember how excited we were when our windows finally arrived?? Well now we’re even more excited (if that’s even possible) because the windows are being installed and they’re even sexier than we imagined they would be! That’s right I said sexy…and I’m talking about windows. Have a look at the pics below and try to argue with me… (more…)
![The day we pretended to be on HGTV: Our PARA Blog Crew Submission [Video]](http://thedreamhouseproject.ca/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/blog-crew_feature-pic.jpg)
This is going to be embarrassing…
When we attended BlogPodium a few weeks back, one of the announcements we were pretty excited about was that PARA Paints was launching the search for their 2014 Para Blog Crew. We knew instantly that we wanted to apply because we thought it’d be fun to shoot the submission video – that AND we do have an ENTIRE house to paint, so figured we’d have no shortage of content to blog about should we be chosen. (more…)
See that?? That right there?!?! That is me doing my happy dance.
After nearly FOUR MONTHS of sourcing, quoting, choosing frame styles, then re-sourcing, re-quoting, picking colours, making custom orders, manufacture lead time, and of course what felt like ENDLESS waiting…. (more…)
Ok guys. It’s that time. In the spirit of keepin it real, we’ve decided to address the screaming purple elephant in the room because frankly, a lot of people are nosy curious. Seriously, we’ve had neighbours see our house going up & do everything from dance around the issue, to flat out ask what we do & how much we make! So today we’re talking about money.
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I have a confession to make.
Well a few actually. But the first is I’ve spent the better part of this week in a post-vacation funk. Does that ever happen to you? You spend a week in tropical bliss – away from the stresses of your daily life – only to return & have it all come crashing back down on you?? Surely I’m not alone in this. Well today, I’ve made a decision to pull myself out of the funk. I’m back to blogging today because writing always makes me feel better & I’m choosing to let go of the “everyone else’s recap is already so much better than yours is going to be so why bother” mentality that has been stifling me & keeping me from writing this post. (more…)
5 years ago today on a rainy afternoon, perched on a cliff at the edge of paradise, I married my best friend. Although we’d been together as a couple for many eight years prior, that day was the beginning of a new chapter for us. (more…)
As some of you know, this Saturday Kes & I are attending BlogPodium, a conference for Canadian design and lifestyle bloggers where we’ll get to meet & network with 250 professionals, & fellow house obsessed bloggers like ourselves! This will be our first blogger conference so I’m incredibly nervous excited!
My name is Tash & I’m a shoeaholic. There. I said it. Anyone who knows me well will tell you that this isn’t the most shocking admission I’ve made. And anyone who’s met my mother will tell you that I come by this affliction honestly, lol! So when good friend & Image Consultant Angela of Endless Possibilities Image Consulting (EPIC) invited me to attend the Christian Louboutin exhibition at Toronto’s Design Exchange, you can imagine that it took me all of half a second to accept. (more…)
With the window wait nearly over & the basement prep work complete, we’re finally back to focusing on our plans for the main living space. We thought we’d take a break from all of the heavy construction talk & get a little bit into some of the fun stuff.
Things are moving along in the basement. We decided to use a bench-footing technique to gain more headroom. For those of you unfamiliar with the term, “bench-footing” is similar to “underpinning” which are both basically just fancy pants construction words for the process of lowering the basement floor. (more…)
In our last post I mentioned that we’ve been biding our time until the windows arrive. As you know, up until now, we’ve primarily been focusing our construction efforts on the main living space of the house. But now that we’ve got a little time to burn, we’re switching our focus to the basement. (more…)
You might have noticed things on the construction front have come to a bit of a standstill lately. Well they haven’t entirely – we’ve merely switched our focus from the main area of the house to another. More on that in a bit – but first here are a few of the lessons we’ve learned in the last several weeks: (more…)
It feels like its been a million years since my last blog post – and in blog terms it kinda has been. Sorry about that. But honestly, now that my hand is getting stronger, I’ve been way more motivated to be outside enjoying what little summer weather we’ve had, than being stuck underneath my laptop. (more…)
I’m baaaaack! Did you miss me?? No?? Boo…well I missed you guys anyway. 😉
I know things have been pretty quiet around here since my ill fated GO train trip a few weeks ago. Sorry about that. (more…)
Pardon the pun. Today I’m quite literally blogging singlehandedly – as in with one hand – since my right hand has been reduced to a club confined to a cast for the time being. Sigh…
It’s the long weekend!! So to kick things off right, we thought we’d grab a couple of folding chairs and get a little preview of how we’ll get to spend our evenings once the house is done…
Happy Mother’s Day to all the wonderful Moms out there! Especially mine who didn’t hesitate to take us all in while we embarked on this journey to build our Dreamhouse. Mom, we appreciate you in more ways than we could ever express! You’ve taught me what it is to be a great mom, and I hope I can do the job justice. (more…)
Canada’s wonderland, business trips, shopping, fake birthdays, and new trades at the Dreamhouse. It’s been quite the week! Here’s a “snapshot” of what we’ve been up to… (more…)
The roofer was on site yesterday so we stopped by the Dreamhouse this morning to snap a quick pic of the progress – not bad for a day’s work eh? (more…)
ONE HOUR. From Oshawa to Pickering?? Seriously?!?
Do you ever have one of those mornings where you just want to crawl back into bed & pretend it’s still the weekend? Well thanks to 401 traffic, today is one of those days. (more…)
Today I got to thinking about how those of us that are passionate about our homes can sometimes do silly and irrational things. I read this post on Apartment Therapy & it took me back to when we were buying our first home and before we had even moved in, we ran out and bought both dining and bedroom sets!
Being a parent is a tough job. Kids – especially young ones are unpredictable. One minute they’re smiling, the next they’re saying something hilarious, and sometimes they’re just completely irrational.
We came across this Tumblr today that has been blowing up all over the Internet in the last few days, and I couldn’t help but laugh…like serious, tears spilling down my cheeks laugh. Mostly because I CAN SOOO RELATE TO THIS! (more…)
Happy Monday folks! We hope you had a restful weekend – ours unfortunately was filled with laundry, chores & a few of the other things we’ve been putting off for the last several weeks. And sadly we didn’t even get through it all. Sigh…
But on to more exciting things… Last week we promised that today we’d reveal our choice from the short list of interior designers we met with. So let’s not waste any more time (since if you’re reading this post, you already know who we chose – we kinda gave it away in the title, lol). (more…)
Now that the structure is up, we’re beginning to switch our focus to planning out the interior spaces. With having such a wide open floor plan, we figured we’d need some help defining the various spaces so that they best serve our functional needs.
We’ve walked you through the main floor, as well as the upstairs, so now we figured it’s only fair to show you how it all came together from the outside.
![Framing Walk thru pt. 2 [Video]](http://thedreamhouseproject.ca/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/20130328-092444.jpg)
Its been a busy week but Kes FINALLY found some spare time to edit the video footage from the second floor walk through. (more…)
![It’s another Framing Friday! [Video]](http://thedreamhouseproject.ca/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/IMG106.jpg)
Happy Framing Friday!! Today we’re FINALLY posting the video of the walk through we took last week when we arrived home from vacation to find the framing crew hard at work. We know we kept you waiting a little longer than we’d hoped, but thanks for being patient with us. (more…)
We’ve been having a great time in Barbados all week, but also anxiously awaiting our update from home. This morning…it finally came! (more…)
We’re blogging from Barbados today as we’re on vacation celebrating Tash’s grandmother’s 90th birthday.
The other night we decided to pop by one of our favorite spots on the island for an impromptu dessert. Tapas Restaurant is a great little place that you can sit right on the water’s edge and enjoy the fantastic food and ambiance. (more…)
You may have noticed that we’ve been a little quiet on the house front for the last couple of weeks. Well, you’re right. We have, and the main reason: WINTER.
Now on a normal year, we aren’t winter’s biggest fans, but this year we’re especially bitter as the sudden influx of full blown arctic weather has essentially thrown our construction schedule to the wolves! (more…)
It’s Gameday and along with decorating for the holidays, our SuperBowl party is another one of those things we’re missing about not being in our own home this year. (more…)
It’s been a little while since we’ve blogged and we’ve got lots to update you on – we promise we’ll get back to it next week. Today though, we wanted to take a special minute to share some exciting news! (more…)
Well Design Week is coming to a close. In case you missed it be sure to check out the rest of this week’s posts. We first took you through our search for inspiration, then outlined how we focused in on our full wish list and created our look book. Today we’re finally revealing The Dreamhouse on paper as we go through Kevin’s design and it’s evolution from rough sketch to colour rendering. (more…)
Once we got through the initial research, we took a more in-depth look at the photos we had compiled. What we figured out is that overall we love modern contemporary architecture and we want our house to reflect that in its design both inside and out. That said, we’d still like to maintain a bit of neighbourhood charm because let’s be honest, we’re not trying to create an art installation in the middle of the suburbs! (more…)
Today we’re kicking off Design Week – or probably what will become the first of several recurring ‘design weeks’ as a project like ours just has so many different phases of the design process. This week we’ll be focusing on the architectural design.
We’ve been mentioning Kevin and KW Design a lot on the blog lately and you must be wondering – ‘”who is this Kevin we keep hearing so much about??” Well we thought it was about time we made some formal introductions.
(more…)
Who would have figured that building a house would be so drama filled! So the latest chapter to our story is about blocks. Yes those very same cinder blocks used to build the foundation. The story is a little complicated but we’ll will start at the beginning and try to make it as simple as possible… (more…)
Canada Post said we can’t have our mail. 🙁
Ok, wait…that sounds crazy. I guess I should explain. So back in December, I lost my purse at the Buffalo Bills game in Toronto. Thankfully a kind citizen found it emptied my wallet of the cash, and turned it in to security. So I did get it back the next day, but not before cancelling my credit card.
So the house is gone… What happened next?
Well after tearing down the existing house we brought in a crew to build the forms for the footings that support the foundation walls. This step was originally planned for mid-late November when the weather was a lot better, but because of the permit delays we were a bit behind schedule and the crew we had originally lined up was no longer available. (more…)
![Pouring a little concrete [Video]](http://thedreamhouseproject.ca/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/IMG_10761-e1357668977200.jpg)
Things are finally underway! Now that the site is prepped, the actual construction can begin. We happened to stop by the site just in time to catch the boys pouring the concrete for the footings that will support the foundation of our house.
![After the dust settled… [Video]](http://thedreamhouseproject.ca/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/IMG_1047.jpg)
We’ve been pretty busy with the holidays and enjoying some down time with the family. The only down side of that is we haven’t had much time to update the blog. Just because we’ve been quiet though, doesn’t, mean we haven’t had busy bees working away on site. We’re fortunate enough to have a dedicated crew of guys willing to work almost right through the holidays to help us make up some of the time we lost.
One of the things we love about this time of year is decorating the house. There’s nothing like that sense of accomplishment you feel after everything is all set. You’ve finished putting up the tree. The mantle is decorated. The gifts are wrapped. All that’s left to do is throw on some Christmas music and sit back with a glass of wine (or egg nog if you prefer) to admire the prettiness that comes along with the season…
![The Demolition [Video]](http://thedreamhouseproject.ca/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/image1.jpg)
With the holidays around the corner we’ve been super busy, but the demolition video is finally edited and ready to go!
When you watch the video, it’ll seem like all smashing & crashing, but in actual fact, the backhoe operator was quite the artist. He used the machine like an extension of his arm – in some instances, only removing a few bricks at a time. It was pretty amazing to watch.
Kids are funny. They never say what you expect them to. Sometimes it’s heart warming, other times you wonder what devil spawn has overtaken your sweet baby, but most of the time, the things that come out of their little mouths are just priceless. Now we know we aren’t the only ones who think that our kid is possibly the funniest kid on the planet (all parents think this), but seriously – this kid is freakin’ funny and WAY too smart for his own good…
So we thought we’d share with the world a few of the cute, quirky & random conversations we find ourselves engaging in with our son.
One of the things you don’t think of when you’re preparing for a big move are the seasons ahead. As you might remember, it was August when we packed up our things and decided to move back home. Of course being that it was August, our closets had long been thinned out by the spring/summer edit; our warm weather clothes a distant memory, neatly boxed away and stored in the basement for the following season….
It’s been about a month since our last post which we know is a VERY looong time! You must be wondering what Team Dreamhouse has been up to.
In all honesty…nothing. Well, okay we put up a construction fence. But, otherwise – a whole lot of nothing. We sourced some window quotes & lined up a whole slew of trades, but for the most part, we’ve just been playing the waiting game with the city for our building permit.
Well folks, today is October 31st and we thought it fitting to share this little bit of news today. Apparently we’ve got ourselves a pet cemetery…
The demo crew has been VERY busy while we were away. With the exception of the one load bearing wall frame & the main floor bathroom, this house issue is gutted!
Well we’ve had a fantastic trip! We cruised around the Caribbean islands of St. Thomas USVI, Barbados, St. Lucia, and St. Kitts; celebrated a 35th anniversary, celebrated a 65th birthday, spent some quality time with family and most importantly, got some MUCH needed R&R! Not bad for 8 days huh?
![Let the demolition begin! [Video]](http://thedreamhouseproject.ca/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/IMG_2932-resized-1200x300.jpg)
After having a little fun last night, we decided to leave the rest to the professionals who came in today to get started with the real demo work. Here’s a quick peek at the progress at the end of the first day.
Every cloud has a silver lining…
As you know, our closing got delayed by one day. Boo right? We thought so too. The upside however, is that because of that ONE seemingly insignificant day, our first mortgage payment has now been delayed by ONE MONTH! Woo hoo!!! I guess it’s true what they say – everything happens for a reason. 🙂
Well today was closing day. Sort of. At least it was supposed to be. As it turns out, however there was an error in the mortgage paperwork that caused a delay in the final release of funds between the bank and our lawyer’s office. Despite everyone’s feverish attempts to rectify things, ultimately the clock just ran out before the issue could be resolved.
We know it’s been a little while since we blogged and you’re probably as excited to see the plans for the Dreamhouse as we are….well maybe not quite AS excited as us, but still.
Its been a busy month full of settling in with the parents, budgets, drawings, quote gathering & securing finances; all while balancing the day to day of work and raising a 3 year old. Oh yea – and we managed to throw in a couple of trips and celebrating 4 years of marriage.
Well it’s closing day and it’s with mixed emotions that we say goodbye to our first home.
All the hard work and stress of moving aside, and as much as we are looking forward to starting our next chapter with the new house, I couldn’t help feeling a little sad as I took my last walk through the empty house – and with the hubby being away this week, I had to do this one solo.
We are less than 2 weeks till moving day and I just need to get a few things off my chest. You ever notice how websites always show photos of happy, smiling families packing boxes as they are preparing for moving day?? In preparation for writing this post, I did some Googling to find these images and I can assure you that these people do not exist in reality.
It’s been a while since we blogged, and lots to update you on. Specifically what happened with the seller after the inspection…
Well of course – he was anything but reasonable. Essentially our agent Mike went to him with our inspection report of what could potentially add up to $25,000 in repairs – and his response was “I won’t come down one more penny.” That said, we know that the renovation plans we have will address most, if not all of the issues the inspector raised. But the bottom line is, ultimately we’re buying THIS house, in it’s present state, and regardless of our future plans for it we shouldn’t have to absorb all the cost of any repairs that it needs going in.
It’s been a busy couple of days. We got all of the offer paperwork signed and finalized, made a quick trip in to the bank to pick up our pre-approval letter to satisfy our financing condition, then topped it off with a road trip to Ottawa to visit a friend and celebrate the Canada Day long weekend. It was our first time spending the holiday in the nation’s capital and we had a blast! Definitely recommended if you’ve never experienced it before – so much to do and the fireworks on Parliament Hill were a spectacular end to the trip!
Now after a little much needed R&R, we’re back and down to fulfilling the final condition of our offer – the home inspection.
Sometimes to get what you want, you have to be willing to walk away – which is exactly what we did when offer negotiations with the seller of the house we wanted reached a stalemate.
After flat out rejecting our initial offer (which was admittedly WELL below his rather inflated asking price), it was pretty clear that talks between his agent and ours were going nowhere fast. (more…)
Ugh…home owners can be so frustrating!
Don’t get me wrong, it’s TOTALLY understandable to be emotionally attached to your house…but seriously – Pricing a home for sale is a science. You can’t just arbitrarily pick a number that you want to sell for just BECAUSE. These things have to be based in reality. Lot size, square footage, how many upgrades you’ve put in, comparable properties in the neighbourhood and their past sale prices – these are all things that you have to keep in mind when setting the right price for your home if you expect to sell.
So after expanding our search area, we’ve found an interesting property in the West Shore neighbourhood. The house itself isn’t much to look at. In fact it probably hasn’t been updated much since it was built in 1962. Now in saying that we don’t mean the cool ‘retro chic 60s’, we mean circa 1962 textured plaster walls, parquet & vinyl floors, avocado tub in the bathroom – we’re talking full on time machine the second you walk through the door. Not exactly what you might envision us looking for in our dream house.
Up and down in less than 48 hours….and here we were all geared up to endure at least a couple weeks of stress around keeping the house in immaculate ‘show ready’ condition.
When we listed the house, we thought we were a little bit on the ambitious side in terms of our asking price. After reviewing the past sales and comparable properties in our area, we had an idea of what we were hoping to sell for and naturally priced ourselves slightly above that to leave some room for negotiation. What we really didn’t imagine was that the house would go OVER asking or that things would get wrapped up so quickly and easily.
So in between all the property hunting, we’ve been busy prepping our place for sale. Now after several weeks of painting, carpeting, cleaning and de-cluttering, it’s nice to be able to say that our house is officially on the market! It’s been a long and laborious process, but we made it to the finish line. All the papers have been signed and submitted so we should hit MLS by sometime tomorrow – just in time for the weekend!
With our dream mapped out, we set off in search of the perfect property. But after getting outbid on a house in our ideal Pickering area of Rosebank South, we decided to widen our search a bit to include the neighbourhoods of West Shore.
Rosebank South is one of Pickering’s more exclusive neighborhoods that essentially contains one of two things: older, reasonably priced bungalows; and renovated custom homes priced in and around the million dollar range. Because of its proximity to the lake, larger lot sizes, and higher property values, this tends to be a high demand area. Of course, that makes snagging a property pretty difficult – especially at the entry level.
Being that we’re young creative professionals it sort of fits that we’d be attracted to the urban contemporary loft aesthetic. The problem being, the ‘urban contemporary loft’ generally comes with inner city living – downtown core, smaller square footage, higher prices, etc – which is fine when you’re in your 20s and focused on your career. When the time comes to raise a family though, you tend to re-evaluate the things you want in a home; things like proximity to schools and family, having a backyard, and overall wanting a bigger living space.
So what is The Dreamhouse Project?? Simply put, it’s going to be our all comsuming labour of love over the next year. We started this blog to document the journey – our ups and downs, musings and random thoughts on selling our house, moving in with parents, renovations, design ideas and everything along the way leading up to our ultimate goal…building our dream home.
We hope you’ll come along with us for the ride – we can’t wait to get there!