Here it is! I drew my inspiration from a design I found online! As the saying goes, "Ken can cook, why should I?"!!!
Friday, July 22, 2011
Kitchen Glass Door..my INSPIRATION... :p
Yes! The kitchen glass door frosted decal is finally up!
Here it is! I drew my inspiration from a design I found online! As the saying goes, "Ken can cook, why should I?"!!!
Here it is! I drew my inspiration from a design I found online! As the saying goes, "Ken can cook, why should I?"!!!
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Home Sweet Home
Woah...time flies and it's coming to almost ONE month that I've been staying in Jadespring. I shall sum up my overall stay as succinctly as I could. First of all, what had taken place lately in my new home? Here's a list of touch-ups by ID:
1. Aircon problems are finally resolved! Phew! I almost felt I've been staying in a furnace for the past 3 weeks boy! The air-con company had sent its workers down twice and not only did we not see an improvement, the compressor started to protest by making loud humming noises! Finally, the problem was resolved by Mitsubishi and hey presto, the cause of the problem was the aircon company workers had added too much gas, way above the prescribed level! Duh! Anyway with the aircon fixed, I'm beginning to enjoy my living environment better hahaha...
2. The frosted decal for the kitchen glass door is finally ready and will be up by this Friday. Will take a picture and upload here. I conceptualised the design of the decal and therefore feel excited about it hehe...
3. There are still some minor touch-ups here and there but we decided to do them slowly since we still have one year warranty hehe. ID is also very obliging when I requested for some walls to be painted again because we have accidentally dirtied it.
Finally, I think Ken and I have maintained the cleanliness of the house pretty well. I think I have surprised myself haha...I thought I wouldn't be able to sustain that energy and enthusiasm in keeping my new home clean and in tip top condition! Since it's been almost a month's stay here, I think cleaning up the house and doing those laundry have become a routine that I surprisingly kind of enjoy. I also like the unspoken arrangement where sometimes Ken or I would do the laundry if one of us reaches home earlier than the other and that when he cooks, I would wash the utensils. Such sweet shared partnership really makes me look forward to coming home every day. =)
1. Aircon problems are finally resolved! Phew! I almost felt I've been staying in a furnace for the past 3 weeks boy! The air-con company had sent its workers down twice and not only did we not see an improvement, the compressor started to protest by making loud humming noises! Finally, the problem was resolved by Mitsubishi and hey presto, the cause of the problem was the aircon company workers had added too much gas, way above the prescribed level! Duh! Anyway with the aircon fixed, I'm beginning to enjoy my living environment better hahaha...
2. The frosted decal for the kitchen glass door is finally ready and will be up by this Friday. Will take a picture and upload here. I conceptualised the design of the decal and therefore feel excited about it hehe...
3. There are still some minor touch-ups here and there but we decided to do them slowly since we still have one year warranty hehe. ID is also very obliging when I requested for some walls to be painted again because we have accidentally dirtied it.
Finally, I think Ken and I have maintained the cleanliness of the house pretty well. I think I have surprised myself haha...I thought I wouldn't be able to sustain that energy and enthusiasm in keeping my new home clean and in tip top condition! Since it's been almost a month's stay here, I think cleaning up the house and doing those laundry have become a routine that I surprisingly kind of enjoy. I also like the unspoken arrangement where sometimes Ken or I would do the laundry if one of us reaches home earlier than the other and that when he cooks, I would wash the utensils. Such sweet shared partnership really makes me look forward to coming home every day. =)
Saturday, July 2, 2011
1st week in JS [a continuation fr previous post]
Alright, in the previous post, I've shared what I really like about the house and how much I really look forward to coming home every day. In this post, I shall share some of the things which we would do differently if we were to embark on the reno journey in the future again...
Here are some things I would have done differently. I wouldn't say they are my 'regrets' because these things which could have been done better were not that disappointing after all. Okay..here they go...
Things I would have done differently if given a choice...
1. I think I would still go for the same ID except that I would source for many fittings/furnishings on my own to cut costs. I believe all home owners are aware that ID tends to charge more $ when they bring u on a shopping spree to buy lightings, curtains, taps etc. We are no exception and our reno costs are high mainly due to this. So given a chance again I would try to cut costs by shopping for my own curtains, taps and perhaps some of my lightings now that I have the experience in gauging the type of lightings and number of lighting points I need in a house. :)
2. We might have hacked the service yard walls to extend the kitchen table top and cabinets but this leaves us rather limited space to hang clothes. Though managable, it was somehow umcomfortable to hang clothes given the small area.
3. Regarding lightings, though I love my downlights a lot, I still think that I could have gotten better pendant lighings for dining and rooms hehe..shouldn't have just bought all lightings from one shop...hmm..then again given my impatient nature, I might really just do such things again hehehehe
4. Master bedrm - actually I can't tell the difference between laminated flooring and timber flooring...wished I had gotten laminated flooring instead - cheaper and looks gd too. But this will never happen cos my hubby just prefers real wood for whatever primitive reasons.
5. If I had known I could remove some 'stopper' thingy in the shower head to increase water pressure, I would have removed it before installing the rainshower..my poor rainshower has very low water pressure...this rain is always a drizzle, never a heavy downpour. Good thing we still took out the stopper for the hand shower and this increases the pathetic water pressure by a tiny notch. Sigh HDB...what can I do??
6. Maybe it's my fickle nature...I kinda begin to wonder if my place will look better with other choice of laminates..in particular the colour...I start to self-doubt and wonder if there's too much brown and cream tones here and there in my entire house. Maybe it's time I buy a chair for my dresser that is of a different colour? Perhaps a change of bedsheet colours will help? Hope so. I seriously need to see a bit of green, orange, red or anything more exciting LOL. Hmmm...saw this in one school today...thought it may help to add colours to the 'BROWNIE' house of mine hehe...just showed it to Ken and he's definitely not fond of it...here it goes anyway...
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Here are some things I would have done differently. I wouldn't say they are my 'regrets' because these things which could have been done better were not that disappointing after all. Okay..here they go...
Things I would have done differently if given a choice...
1. I think I would still go for the same ID except that I would source for many fittings/furnishings on my own to cut costs. I believe all home owners are aware that ID tends to charge more $ when they bring u on a shopping spree to buy lightings, curtains, taps etc. We are no exception and our reno costs are high mainly due to this. So given a chance again I would try to cut costs by shopping for my own curtains, taps and perhaps some of my lightings now that I have the experience in gauging the type of lightings and number of lighting points I need in a house. :)
2. We might have hacked the service yard walls to extend the kitchen table top and cabinets but this leaves us rather limited space to hang clothes. Though managable, it was somehow umcomfortable to hang clothes given the small area.
3. Regarding lightings, though I love my downlights a lot, I still think that I could have gotten better pendant lighings for dining and rooms hehe..shouldn't have just bought all lightings from one shop...hmm..then again given my impatient nature, I might really just do such things again hehehehe
4. Master bedrm - actually I can't tell the difference between laminated flooring and timber flooring...wished I had gotten laminated flooring instead - cheaper and looks gd too. But this will never happen cos my hubby just prefers real wood for whatever primitive reasons.
5. If I had known I could remove some 'stopper' thingy in the shower head to increase water pressure, I would have removed it before installing the rainshower..my poor rainshower has very low water pressure...this rain is always a drizzle, never a heavy downpour. Good thing we still took out the stopper for the hand shower and this increases the pathetic water pressure by a tiny notch. Sigh HDB...what can I do??
6. Maybe it's my fickle nature...I kinda begin to wonder if my place will look better with other choice of laminates..in particular the colour...I start to self-doubt and wonder if there's too much brown and cream tones here and there in my entire house. Maybe it's time I buy a chair for my dresser that is of a different colour? Perhaps a change of bedsheet colours will help? Hope so. I seriously need to see a bit of green, orange, red or anything more exciting LOL. Hmmm...saw this in one school today...thought it may help to add colours to the 'BROWNIE' house of mine hehe...just showed it to Ken and he's definitely not fond of it...here it goes anyway...
Artificial Gerberas - don't they look sweet & inviting?
7. And finally, I kind of regretted choosing this block and unit. Firstly, it's rather far from the multi-storey carpark :( Given that both of us drive, I think it's really an oversight on my part to have chosen this block (okay, maybe I'm just lazy to walk that extra distance). Secondly, I really didn't know the wind direction and so our unit happens to be one that doesn't receive the 'wind' :( The only consolation is our unit is not facing the west sun directly. Yet again, our laundry takes a super long time to dry - yawnzzz....
Okay, that's all I could ramble about now. Hopefully the next time you read my post, I would have more nicer comments about my Haven haaaa...till the next post...
1st week in JS
Okay...thought it's time for me to write a post after soooo long! Oh well, I started this blog but my hubby was the one who updated it since he's the 'photographer' and later, I made him the scribe as well haaaa. Okay, let me cut the crap and just describe to you our 1st week in JS.
My 1st week in JS
Though we've spent a bomb on the renovation and furnishings, I'm beginning to enjoy the 'returns' of our investment. ROI I must say is pretty high haaa. I really look forward to coming home every day after work. I almost felt as if I'm an expatriate who works in a foreign country only to return to my 'hotel' every night for a good rest. Here are some things I like about my reno:
1. I really love the lightings a lot. I believe the LED downlights (with warm white lightings) really made my place feel more cosy. The comforting lights, as opposed to glaring bright lights, soothe my senses the moment I step into the house. This is one investment I really feel is worthwhile. Somehow the downlights that come with diffusers really sort of reduced the 'glare' yet provide sufficient lighting to the entire place.
2. I love my study room's full height cabinets and tables. These are all custom made. When the carpentry was done, I finally understood why my quote was so high. We practically had custom made two long rows of tables that form an L shape. These two rows of tables also come with a total of 8 drawers with soft-closes. My ID listened to our needs and gave us 'compartments' with sockets inside to hide our wiring. There are also two rows of horizontal shelves with cove lighting to provide ample lighting when I have to scrutinise documents with 'fine print'.
3. I love my TV feature wall. It looks very simple and to me, it's timeless. Most importantly, it came with a full height storage cabinet for us to store DVDs. The cabinet door is also beautifully constructed with a brown tinted full height mirror on the outside, making the tv feature wall look more sleek.
4. I was rather hesitant about overlaying toilet tiles at first because I've heard of stories where tiles will pop in a few years time. Frankly at this stage, we still do not know if that will happen in the near or far future but after it's all done up, I realise that I have no regrets doing up my two toilets. I just can't bear the thought of having a nicely renovated kitchen, living room etc..only to walk into toilets that still remind me that I stay in a hdb. Yes..my aim is for my place NOT to look like an HDB unit (unfortunately some parts of the house, esp those beams, still scream of HDB). Anyway I like it that the ID is thoughtful about having many storage spaces in the toilets. I have three mirror cabinets in the master bathrm and one in the common bathrm. As my ID has aptly pointed out, these storage areas in toilets are important because in many households, due to lack of space, owners would usually buy 'hanging racks' and start displaying their 'barangs barangs' in the toilet and spoil the overall look - how true.
5. Kitchen - this is Ken's favourite place and not mine haaa..so I'll just comment a little on this space. What I like about the Kitchen is the very very deep undermount sink! It really helps to reduce splashes and also make washing bigger utensils an easy task. I like that the bottom cabinets are a distance away fr the floor as this makes my mopping really easy. Oh yes, I love the kitchen and foyer tiles - these are homogenous tiles that look like wood. :)
6. Master Bedroom - I like the good use of space as my bedframe (with storage), wardrobe, side table and dresser are in-built. The full height mirrors on the two sides of my bed also gave the illusion that the room is spacious. :) Because furniture is in-built, even with a king-sized bed in the room, there is still ample space in for walking. I like the matt timber flooring but simply hope the varnish fumes will soon dissipate into thin air!
Okay..because this is an unexpectedly long post from me, I shall post some areas for improvement regarding my reno experience in my next post. :)
Oh yes, my ID will be sending a photographer to our place soon to take some pics. As soon as we receive the softcopies, we'll upload them here. :))
My 1st week in JS
Though we've spent a bomb on the renovation and furnishings, I'm beginning to enjoy the 'returns' of our investment. ROI I must say is pretty high haaa. I really look forward to coming home every day after work. I almost felt as if I'm an expatriate who works in a foreign country only to return to my 'hotel' every night for a good rest. Here are some things I like about my reno:
1. I really love the lightings a lot. I believe the LED downlights (with warm white lightings) really made my place feel more cosy. The comforting lights, as opposed to glaring bright lights, soothe my senses the moment I step into the house. This is one investment I really feel is worthwhile. Somehow the downlights that come with diffusers really sort of reduced the 'glare' yet provide sufficient lighting to the entire place.
2. I love my study room's full height cabinets and tables. These are all custom made. When the carpentry was done, I finally understood why my quote was so high. We practically had custom made two long rows of tables that form an L shape. These two rows of tables also come with a total of 8 drawers with soft-closes. My ID listened to our needs and gave us 'compartments' with sockets inside to hide our wiring. There are also two rows of horizontal shelves with cove lighting to provide ample lighting when I have to scrutinise documents with 'fine print'.
3. I love my TV feature wall. It looks very simple and to me, it's timeless. Most importantly, it came with a full height storage cabinet for us to store DVDs. The cabinet door is also beautifully constructed with a brown tinted full height mirror on the outside, making the tv feature wall look more sleek.
4. I was rather hesitant about overlaying toilet tiles at first because I've heard of stories where tiles will pop in a few years time. Frankly at this stage, we still do not know if that will happen in the near or far future but after it's all done up, I realise that I have no regrets doing up my two toilets. I just can't bear the thought of having a nicely renovated kitchen, living room etc..only to walk into toilets that still remind me that I stay in a hdb. Yes..my aim is for my place NOT to look like an HDB unit (unfortunately some parts of the house, esp those beams, still scream of HDB). Anyway I like it that the ID is thoughtful about having many storage spaces in the toilets. I have three mirror cabinets in the master bathrm and one in the common bathrm. As my ID has aptly pointed out, these storage areas in toilets are important because in many households, due to lack of space, owners would usually buy 'hanging racks' and start displaying their 'barangs barangs' in the toilet and spoil the overall look - how true.
5. Kitchen - this is Ken's favourite place and not mine haaa..so I'll just comment a little on this space. What I like about the Kitchen is the very very deep undermount sink! It really helps to reduce splashes and also make washing bigger utensils an easy task. I like that the bottom cabinets are a distance away fr the floor as this makes my mopping really easy. Oh yes, I love the kitchen and foyer tiles - these are homogenous tiles that look like wood. :)
6. Master Bedroom - I like the good use of space as my bedframe (with storage), wardrobe, side table and dresser are in-built. The full height mirrors on the two sides of my bed also gave the illusion that the room is spacious. :) Because furniture is in-built, even with a king-sized bed in the room, there is still ample space in for walking. I like the matt timber flooring but simply hope the varnish fumes will soon dissipate into thin air!
Okay..because this is an unexpectedly long post from me, I shall post some areas for improvement regarding my reno experience in my next post. :)
Oh yes, my ID will be sending a photographer to our place soon to take some pics. As soon as we receive the softcopies, we'll upload them here. :))
Friday, July 1, 2011
Week 1 - Moving in and tidying up
It is almost a week since we moved into our new home. We are still in the midst of slowly transferring our stuff from our old place to the new; but we intend to take our time on this.
There are a few things I hope to share with new home owners who are like us. Some may be relevant; some may be not but I hope it helps.
1. If you are doing timber or parquet flooring, the varnish of the flooring is toxic. Hence, if possible, allow ample time to air your room allowing the varnish to dry and odor to evaporate before sleeping in the room. It takes about a week of continuous airing before the stench is acceptable.
2. When choosing tiles (especially fancy ones), try to choose homogenous tiles whenever possible. This is so that when chipping happens, they won't look 'off' compared to the original color of the tiles comparing to ceramic tiles.
3. When customizing your kitchen's fridge compartment, it is also advisable to predetermine the size of the fridge you want to buy. If you have a few choices in mind, use the one with the biggest dimensions and work with that. This will ensure that you have ample room left when putting the purchased fridge in.
4. In choosing lighting, there are numerous choices suitable for different taste and budget. The one thing I feel that is universal is to ask the question 'How bright I would like my home to be when all lights are on?'. This will help you determine the total brightness in your home (e.g. Living room) and you can work on the moods from there. I guess the simplest solution to brightening up the place is using 'cove lighting'; and it works brilliantly (choose the mood that you like). Next up will be to select lighting that will create different levels of brightness or moods. There are a lot of choices from here on, i.e. downlights (LED, T5, halogen, etc), spotlights (LED, bulb, etc), feature lighting (bulb or tube based, etc). It is ideal to be able to create a number of levels of brightness in your home, either with dimmer functions or various lighting switches controlling lights from various points. Share what you have in mind with your contractor or designer and get them to do up the lighting to your needs.
...to be continued
There are a few things I hope to share with new home owners who are like us. Some may be relevant; some may be not but I hope it helps.
1. If you are doing timber or parquet flooring, the varnish of the flooring is toxic. Hence, if possible, allow ample time to air your room allowing the varnish to dry and odor to evaporate before sleeping in the room. It takes about a week of continuous airing before the stench is acceptable.
2. When choosing tiles (especially fancy ones), try to choose homogenous tiles whenever possible. This is so that when chipping happens, they won't look 'off' compared to the original color of the tiles comparing to ceramic tiles.
3. When customizing your kitchen's fridge compartment, it is also advisable to predetermine the size of the fridge you want to buy. If you have a few choices in mind, use the one with the biggest dimensions and work with that. This will ensure that you have ample room left when putting the purchased fridge in.
4. In choosing lighting, there are numerous choices suitable for different taste and budget. The one thing I feel that is universal is to ask the question 'How bright I would like my home to be when all lights are on?'. This will help you determine the total brightness in your home (e.g. Living room) and you can work on the moods from there. I guess the simplest solution to brightening up the place is using 'cove lighting'; and it works brilliantly (choose the mood that you like). Next up will be to select lighting that will create different levels of brightness or moods. There are a lot of choices from here on, i.e. downlights (LED, T5, halogen, etc), spotlights (LED, bulb, etc), feature lighting (bulb or tube based, etc). It is ideal to be able to create a number of levels of brightness in your home, either with dimmer functions or various lighting switches controlling lights from various points. Share what you have in mind with your contractor or designer and get them to do up the lighting to your needs.
...to be continued
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