We live in a 100 year old home, and we have plastic heat registers. Hey, I am no historian, but I feel pretty confident in saying that that they aren’t original… Not only are they plastic, but they are different colours and patterns. We’ve got white slatted ones, plastic stainless steel look swirly ones, brown ones that are trying to blend in with the hardwood (but clearly don’t) and we have one pretty black metal one.
Fed up with our ghetto registers, I looked into replacing the whole house with reproduction Edwardian ones. As El Granto and I wanted to keep eating for the next year, that was not an option…
We were left with two viable options, live with them or paint em. Of course, I choose to paint. We headed to the hardware store and picked up some Rustoleum Universal All Surface in Oil Rubbed Bronze. Have you painted with this spray paint? It’s freakin awesome. You can spray any direction, on any surface (even plastic!), with no prep other than making sure the surface is clean. The cleaning is the most time consuming part. When our house was reno’d most outside walls and all the ceilings were torn down and re-drywalled. If any of you have ever drywalled anything you will know that drywall dust is the son of Satan. That shit gets everywhere. When we moved back into the house we spent two weeks cleaning up drywall dust and I still find it in strange hard to reach places (tops of kitchen cabinets, under bathroom vanity, caked onto light fixtures). Drywall dust really is my nemesis.
The heat registers were hiding a dark secret; a plethora of drywall dust stuck in all their nooks and crannies. I painstaking cleaned out every groove with my pinky fingers and a damp rag. After that was done and I had a few recuperating drinks, I headed out to the alleyway behind our house and gave 2-3 thin coats of the oil rubbed bronze spray paint. I let it dry overnight and the difference is incredible! They all match…and don’t look like cheap plastic! A $9 can of spray paint gave new life to 7 regular heat register covers and 4 cold air returns. Got mis-matched registers? Paint em!
Oh, and a bit of advice. I googled painting heat registers before starting out and someone suggested removing the flappy thingies. That is a shitty idea. They do NOT come out easily, and they all fall apart, and you have to bend things and it sucks. So don’t worry about it, just open them slightly and make sure you paint them good. I think my mantra should be “if it sucks, don’t do it”. There, words to live by. Now go paint your ugly heat registers.
Before (UGLY)After (PRETTY)Before – Ugly Mis-Matched RegistersAfter – All the same colour!
SOURCE LIST:
Materials:
RustOleum Universal in Oil Rubbed Bronze: Home Depot
Our vacation week was a success! We had a car for the week (thanks in-laws!) so we were able to get out of the city as well as getting some running around done.
Here’s a recap:
Visited family friends cottage in the Muskoka’s. Odin was afraid of the boat motor.
We went for great hikes and Odin swam in the lake.
We headed up to my family cottage waaaay up north on the French river.
We read books,drank lattes lakeside (YES, cityslicker Kristen did bring her espresso machine to the cottage) had camp fires, ate and drank too much!
Oh and we did some hiking too.
Odin celebrated his first birthday at the cottage and got a present of a raw egg followed by a campfire and marshmallows.
We got a lot accomplished around the house including a trip to Home Depot for some big & heavies (wood & cement).
We loaded up on dog food for Odin and took back our beer empties to the beer store (this is one thing that sucks doing when you don’t have a car, you seriously look like a hobo when you’re wobbling down the street overloaded with empty cans and bottles, so we usually wait until we can beg borrow or steal a car.)
We headed to the drive-in.
And went to the beaches for a dog play/swim with El Granto’s oldest friend and his three awesome dogs. We spent time catching up with a good friend in from the UK, and accomplished a few to do’s off the list. All in all it was a great success and I’m terribly sad to go back to work today. Summertime has me wishing I didn’t have to work! It was amazing spending all that time with the hubby and puppy.
El Granto here. My first post on Storefront Life and it’s about something really cool (and hot)!
We’re really consistent with our thermostat settings. We always have it on program and rarely change the settings (unless we’re in the yard enjoying our Friday libations with friends then we shut the AC off to have some quiet).
But when a friend showed me the Nest learning thermostat I saw real potential.
This thing learns your routine and sets it’s self accordingly. Cools or warms the house in the right amount of time before you get home and even takes outside weather and previous cooling/heating times in to account in getting to the right temperature in preparation for you to return. It even knows when you’ve left the house and switches its self to away mode if you’re gone long enough.
I fell in love. But the price was too rich for my blood. Poo.
Enter a good great friend who wanted to repay a favor (actually the same friend who introduced me to the Nest and knew how I felt about it).
All of a sudden I get an email stating that my Nest order has been received and to expect my new thermostat in a few days. I first had a moment… “WTF!? Waaaaaait a minute… Have I been shopping online in my sleep again?!” Then I realized what my buddy had done and I was ecstatic! There was definitely some man hugging and maybe a tear.
Fast forward a few anxious days and my (oops our) new Nest arrived!
OMGOMGOMG!
I couldn’t wait! As soon as Kristen got home I set her to dog watching and started the install.
I already knew that the Nest was compatible with our system because we have a newer HVAC installation (thanks in part to the Holmes crew). This is something you will have to check though. Last thing you want to do is dish out almost $300 to find out you bought a really fancy looking $300 paper weight.
Step One:TURN OFF THE BREAKER TO YOUR HEATING, AC, AND THERMOSTAT! Whenever you’re dealing with anything hard wired always turn off the breakers! Safety first! Now remove the old thermostat. It’s probably just screwed right in to the drywall without anchors or anything because no one expects you to be swinging on the thermostat like crazy monkeys save that for the light fixtures. Your new Nest comes with convenient little labels to stick to your old wires to ensure you don’t forget what goes where. They have strange code letters like Rh, W1 and, O/B. Use the included screwdriver to remove your old thermostat. This thing is handy and a great include to the Nest package. It’s so handy it’s earned its self a spot right beside my computer for future office related screwdriver needs (removing cases, drives and the occasional deep nasal scratching).
Our old and yucky and stupid thermostat.Remove the old thermostat and use Nest’s nifty stickers.The awesome Nest screwdriver (yes that’s Kristen’s hand not mine, mine are all calloused and hairy and manly not dainty like a princesses).
Step Two: Make preparations to patch the holes from your old thermostat and find out that your spackle has turned hard as stone.
This spackle is no good 🙁
Step Three: Mad dash to the hardware store with the dog in tow to get there before it closes to aquire new spackle. I picked up DAP spackle because we had such good results from the caulking. (As a side note: I love spackling. I find it so much fun and I get very excited when I get to do it. It’s the little things I know.) This stuff is cool because it goes on pink and turns white when it’s ready to sand and paint. Two applications and sands left the old holes invisible. (Also don’t forget to be so excited about getting to spackle something that you don’t take pictures of this part for your blog.)
Step Four: Pull the wires through the Nest base plate and screw it to the wall. As Kristen is the paint master we chose to paint around the Nest after install allowing the spackle to set a little longer. The base plate includes a handy built in spirit level so you can’t install it crooked! Ingenious! Last thing you want is for your thermostat to be unlevel as many depend on being so to do their job. Use your new screwdriver!
Step Five: Hook up your new Nest. Using your reference stickers just plug in your wires to their new homes and snap that sucker on to his/her base plate (his/her to be explained soon).
Base plate, spirit level and screwdriver. A trifecta of awesome product design.Wires hooked up! Ready to go!
Now just flip those breakers back on!
Your nest will run through a few seconds of boot up and then scan for WiFi. That’s right this little beauty hooks right up to your WiFi for everything from weather reporting to firmware updates. Yep Firmware updates! This means that the Nest team can add new features to your Nest without you having to do anything! Ladies and gentlemen it’s 2012!
Stick in your WiFi credentials and tell the nest where you live this allows the Nest to get weather updates so it knows if it’s hot or cold out. If it’s an abnormally hot day your nest will turn its self on earlier because it knows that it will take longer for your house to cool before you get home. So smart!
Got WiFi?
The setup will take you through several steps like setting your away margin (fancy terms!). This is the acceptable levels that your house can be at during your away time. Because our little red devil is home all day we set ours to between 16c and 25c. That’s not too cold in the winter and not too hot in the summer. We know that our house will never reach those temperatures though because of the awesome insulation job that the Holmes crew did. You also get to NAME your thermostat. It’s a little funny but the name shows up in the app (available for iPhone and Android. Sorry BlackBerry users!) and that’s just cool. Being that I was doing the setup I had to take the chance to put some nerd in to one of the coolest things in my house so I named my our Nest Jarvis after Tony Stark’s computer in the Iron Man movies (also real life butler in the comics but you’ve got to admit this thing looks like it’s straight out of Iron Man).
Welcome home Jarvis.
After this Jarvis went in to learning mode.
During learning mode I THINK it’s best to keep your temperature changes to a minimal and on a schedule. So when we wake up I go downstairs to feed the dog and turn the AC to 22c. Then when we leave we turn Jarvis to away. When I get home I turn Jarvis back on and set the temp to 22c. Then when we head up to bed we turn Jarvis down to 21c (we like it cold while we sleep). Jarvis learned quickly the first few days of having him and had a vague schedule right from day two. But then we messed it all up by going on vacation during his learning phase and setting him to away for seven days. We’ll be switching him back to learning mode so he can reset to a proper schedule on our next work day.
Now get your wife to paint around the unit and go have a beer.
This whole install (including emergency hardware store visit took about 45 minutes!)
The idea is that your Nest will learn when we’re coming and going and will think for us about our home temperature and we’ll only have to change it under circumstances that are different to our normal routine.
When I am on vacation I love sipping girly drinks pool or beach side under an umbrella wearing a floppy hat. A bit specific I know, but it’s the truth. On a vacation to Cuba a few years ago the bartender surprised me with a drink he thought I’d like. It ended up being my favorite drink that holiday and one I still love to this day. So on my summer vacation I thought I’d make something to remember Cuba by. So here it is:
Cuban Miami Vice
Ingredients:
Piña Colada mix (my fave is the frozen Bacardi mix available at any major grocery store)
Strawberry Daiquiri mix (again the Bacardi one is ok, I also like the Mott’s one)
Rum
Ice
Fresh strawberries and/or pineapple (optional)
How To:
Mix up a batch of Piña Colada and Strawberry Daiquiri following the package instructions. You will need a blender or food processor. (don’t worry about having extra, you can either make one for a friend or have extra for later). In a pint glass fill half way up with strawberry daiquiri. Then fill the remainder of the glass with Piña Colada. Garnish with fresh fruit and a straw. Find sexy Cuban man to deliver it to you poolside. Say gracias, tip generously and enjoy.
*Sexy Cuban man is optional, but suggested for authenticity.
Our powder-room was newly renovated before we purchased the house, but was very very bland. The fixtures were in brand new condition, but the space was beige and boring. Continue reading “Powder Room Facelift”
I am on vacation from work for the next week. I have scheduled a few posts while I am relaxing. (So you’re not allowed to call me a lazy bastard…)
We will be staying in and around the city for most of our vacation, but we hope to head up North to my parent’s cottage on the water for a few days. We didn’t take a summer vacation last year as we were gearing up for the wedding, so it’s been a while since we were able to spend our days sitting on the dock with a good book overlooking the water. This year we will have Odin to join us, and I am excited for him to swim in the lake, jump off the dock and run around in the woods. We will also be enjoying spending time with a good friend in from London, and getting a few things checked off our to do list around the house.
Here is the plan:
Good Dog + Good Friends + Good Food + Good Drinks = Good Time
I am not a beer drinker, much to El Granto’s dismay. You see El Granto is what you would call a bit of a beer fanatic. He loves lagers and stouts, ipa’s and porters, bitters and pilsners. He likes to bbq with them, cook with them, and he has even made ice cream with beer. He has probably tried every single craft beer the LCBO carries.
Me, I hate the stuff. A few years ago however I discovered something on tap that I did like; Cider! It comes in a pint glass, it looks like beer, and it doesn’t have an umbrella on it. I can hang with the boys while eating chicken wings at the bar and not get razzed. Since the day I discovered cider, I have also discovered that not all ciders are equal. Myself, I am not a big Strongbow fan, so I started asking bartenders for some grenadine in my Strongbow. It took the tartness down a notch and added a bit of sweetness. Since that day I learned that cider + syrup is called an Irish Rose. Here is my favorite version:
Kristen’s Irish Rose
Ingredients:
Can of Alcoholic Cider (my favourite is Sir Perry’s)
1 oz Lingonberry Drink Syrup (from Ikea, can also use Grenadine)
Ice
How to:
Place a handful of ice into a pint glass, fill the glass half way up with cider, then add the syrup (if you put the syrup in first it never mixes well). After you put the syrup in, add the remainder of the cider. It should mix all by itself, not needing a stir. However if it does settle, give it a stir and enjoy! Best served on a deck in the sunshine.
Our main floor powder room needed some sprucing up, and you guessed it, de-beige-ing. We wanted something dramatic, yet still functional. I will be posting the results of our powder room facelift in the next week, but wanted to give you a sneak peak of our inspiration, and our to do list. Even though it was a small room, there are still a lot of things on that to do list! (and they are still not all finished…)
It’s official, we graduated to our own domain today! El Granto deemed my blogging effort a win, and decided to buy me storefrontlife.com.
The truth is neither of us knew if I would take to blogging, and if I would well…actually do it. Turns out I’m not half the lazy bastard we all thought I was.
So if you had your RSS feed set for the old site, please make the switch, and check back here for all future posts!
