Day 4: House of Pane(s)

And now all I can hear in my head is the sound of bagpipes and the intro to House of Pain's  "Jump Around".. but I digress...

First things first...  Today is my sweet baby Olive's 2nd birthday!  I just want to wish the little love of my life a very Happy Birthday in the blogosphere universe.  She is my everything and has given us the best two years of our lives, Happy Birthday baby! ( i love you, i love you, I LOVE YOUUU!)

Best 2 year old EVER!! (Sorry other moms)

Ok, on to Day 4's recap.  It was all sorts of cold on Wednesday and that harsh Chicago weather was in full effect.  Well, at least that's how I imagined it with the old windows being ripped out to bring in all that frigid air flowing freely inside the house.  I confess, I was once again AWOL, on Olive duty, and trying to manage my day job (I'm on deadline!) at our old house.  So Steve was solo at the helm with the JP6 crew and the window guys yesterday.

This was pretty exciting, considering our first energy bill at the new house (15 days worth of energy, to be exact) is way more expensive than what we normally pay at our other house in a month.  And we don't even live there yet!

Just throwing money out the wide open window..

So the promise of energy savings with the new windows, and the added future warmth and comfort is a definite welcome addition to our new home.  Today's chilly forecast only made it all that much more apparent how necessary this was (well, it didn't help that we were sans windows while the new ones were being prepped for install).  

Brrrrr....

We went with a local company, Chicago Window Pros, after the company's president, Dan, actually paid us a visit to inform us of their products.  I think we got a pretty good deal on these too, we placed our order right before the end of last year, and they threw in all the fancy shmancy upgrades for each window GRATIS! -- Neat glass technology that cleans itself with a little sun and a little rain, Low E 366 feature, which is the ultimate performance glass and a good balance of solar control and high visibility, the list goes on and on (check out their site)

more fancy window number talk.. 

We ended up with 13 new single hung R7000 windows (one horizontal slider and an oversized one for the front).  The windows in the additions were fairly new and didn't need replacing, so that was nice.   Our budget took a little bit of a hit and ended up costing us around (drumroll please) $5400!  Now, 5 grand isn't chump change to us (in fact, it is one of our pricier expense to date), but from what we've heard from friends and family, for 13 upgraded windows, that my friend, isn't too bad... right??  (thoughts? honest opinions?)

Anyway, here are some pics of the new windows.

All laid out

Installed: lookin' good

The window guys were even
nice enough to caulk
our old leaded window
to get rid of that nasty draft..

The new house of pane(s). har har

Hooray for toasty and warm! The rest of the house was also going through a warmer transformation as the HVACs were being moved and replaced strategically throughout the house.  We are just that much closer to a more comfortable indoor climate.

this will go under the peninsula,
and out of the toe kick..

They did a pretty good job keeping it inconspicuously close to the wall and hopefully incognito when drywall goes up.  So before we know it they'll go undetected (as opposed to the previous placement right smack in the middle of everything) and it'll seem like the house is being heated (and cooled) by magic!  We'll know they're there, but it'll be our little secret.  

Sleek and narrow vents. Sexy!

And since we are on an energy saving kick, we busted out another fun toy to help with keeping our bills down.  With our Christmas giftcards in hand, we went into Lowe's and bought ourselves a new thermostat.  But not just any thermostat, mind you, we bought the Nest. Ok, it's hard to get excited over a thermostat, but after Steve went on and on about it, I had to do my own research and this thing is pretty neat.  It learns your patterns (big brother??) and learns the temperature according to your lifestyle. Holy smart robot, batman! Not only that, but you can control it remotely with your smartphone and tablet so if you are away for extended periods, turn that sh*t down and save yourself some $$$.  Exciting!

The Eye of Sauron's energy saving cousin.

Of course, the nest, to function optimally, need to be in an area where it can detect daily motion.  And with our current thermostat facing the formal living room (we really are not that formal and don't plan on hanging in the front room that often), we had to switch up the wires to the other side.  There goes another hole to patch, oy vey!

Switcheroo: thermostat edition

We also did a little more switcheroo to accommodate the switches in the now missing walls. So here's another hole we've gained, but only to be patched with a switch plate (by the pros this time since it's in the quote, whew!)






All in all, Day 4 was a success and with mostly just drywall on Day 5, the end may be in sight for this construction.  Of course that's when all the kitchen fun begins and our DIY skillz will be tested.

What a week it's been.. but that light at the end of the tunnel is getting closer.  Speaking of the end, our budget is also getting close to the bottom of our not-so-deep pockets, as demonstrated by the receipt despot below.  Oops!

You bought what!!??

If you guys want to read the rest of this *exciting* remodeling series, CLICK HERE!

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