The ogee and me

Have you ever noticed that when you buy a car, you immediately begin to notice the same model everywhere you go?

That's exactly what has happened to me and ogee (pronounced ō-ˌjē) moldings.

Ogee moldings, or edges, have a combination of curves that form a graceful, elongated S-shape. Furniture trim often has ogee edges, and so do some countertops. (I've tried to find a diagram I could post, but can't--but you can visit http://www.answers.com/topic/ogee to see one.)

Now that I'm thinking about my house in a whole new level of detail, I'm suddenly spotting ogee this and ogee that everywhere I look: in the recessed panels of my doors, in my crown moldings, even in my window frames. My new kitchen cabinets will have recessed panels with ogee edges. The support brackets under the island, where the counter overhangs, may have ogee curves too.

Because of my new obsession, Doyle and I went to look at windows today. I spent the 1990s writing about Pella windows and still have friends in that business, so I am loyal to the Pella brand.

Our window allowance covers Pella ProLine windows, which are very energy-efficient and can have muntins, or grilles, on both the inside and outside of the window. There is a squared edge where the wood meets the glass.

In contrast, Pella Architect Series windows are designed to look like the windows my house was built with. Not only do they successfully imitate the look of many small pieces of glass (also known as true divided light), each sash has an ogee, rather than squared, edge.

That curve might sound like a small detail, but the difference is readily apparent when you look at the windows side by side. Which is why the helpful displays at the Pella Window Store make it so easy to do just that.

Like any upgrade, this one would have a price. And the cost in this case is enough to make you say "Oh, geez!"

Thanks for staying with me long enough to get that.

By the way, nowhere in Merriam-Webster.com is extra expense mentioned:
Main Entry: ogee
Variant(s): also OG \ˈō-ˌjē\

Function: noun

Etymology: obsolete English ogee ogive; from the use of such moldings in ogives

Date: 1677

1 : a molding with an S-shaped profile

Life gets lush

My favorite cartoonist, Roz Chast, has a cartoon entitled "Life gets lush." If I could find it online I'd post it here -- alas. Anyway, my sister Tracy and I reference it whenever there is an unexpected abundance of good things happening.

On Monday, life got lush around here. Doyle and I had scheduled a meeting with our architect, Cathee, to talk about some revisions to the plans she created for us more than a year ago. While she was here, our contractor, Nelson, stopped by. They were able to meet each other for the first time and talk through some issues that were way over my head. It was completely serendipitous and very reassuring to have them both here at the same time.

The plan is really coming together, too. By adding 2.5 feet to the office addition, we may even have found room for a coat closet by the back entry--a previously unattainable goal. I will be thrilled if it works out.

Even though Doyle had to leave on a work trip that afternoon, good things continued to happen. I found a herringbone mosaic tile that will be beautiful for the back entry floor--and it was on clearance! Will and Anna did their homework without any bickering. Dave came over twice to mud the basement drywall (it's painted and I hope to have pictures with the cabinets soon!). Anna went to her soccer clinic without any complaints about the shin guards bumping her knee scab, and Will and I had a nice dinner out after his drum lesson. And at bedtime, Anna decided to read me a story from the new Bible she just received at Plymouth.

It was one small, good thing after another, all day long, reminding me over and over how incredibly fortunate I am. It was a day I'll need to remember on the days when things aren't going so well. I know they're out there. But for now, I'm still savoring the way it feels when life gets lush.

Leader of the pack

I've been packing, packing, packing this past week. I'm trying to safely store everything we can live without for the next few months.

I also emptied the dining room cabinets of china, crystal and vases. For the duration, they'll house daily necessities including Cheerios, granola bars, and a staggering assortment of band-aids and leg wraps (Anna is the undisputed skinned-knee champion). It is an interesting look, with all those everyday items showcased behind glass doors.

Throughout this tedious process, I keep thinking about the nice woman who rang me up at Staples the other day. When I told her why I was buying a roll of bubble wrap big enough to use as an end table, she said, "Just think about how much fun it will be when you get to unpack everything!"

She's so right. It will be wonderful to take it all out again.

So good-bye for now, wedding china, novelty muffin pans, Grandma's tea set, fragile wineglasses, second-tier utensils. See you on the other side.

Times two

The most costly phrase in the English language has to be "As long as we're at it." Suddenly, we find ourselves saying it all the time.

Applied to a kitchen remodel, those six little words can have enormous consequences. And in our case, it has brought us to this: We are expecting not one new kitchen, but two.

It's twins!

It all started with a plan to relocate our range and refrigerator to the basement laundry room for the duration. I've lived through one previous kitchen renovation with the fridge in the dining room, and while it's undeniably handy to get out a gallon of milk without leaving your seat at the table, we are hoping for a slightly more upscale experience this time.

So we decided on a zoned approach: Breakfast in the dining room, so as to avoid disturbing the workers; dinner in the family room, which is in the basement. We bought a mini-fridge for the dining room, for milk, juice, yogurt, and champagne for mimosas. (Just kidding about the champagne. For now, anyway.)

Things went downhill on a trip to Home Depot (and what remodeler hasn't said that?) when we discovered a cabinet display on clearance. Eight feet of white upper and lower cabinets, a stainless-steel sink and faucet, and even a counter, all for a price that could only be called recession-tastic. It seemed like a no-brainer.

"As long as we're putting the fridge and stove down there, it would be great to have some cabinets ... and a sink ... and a disposer," I said.

Our friends John and David contributed the truck, and the manpower, to get the whole thing home. It took two trips, and we rewarded them with a skimpy selection of pizza for dinner. We owe you, guys. Big time.

Then Doyle and Will got to work and ripped out the dilapidated old cabinets, Dave built a wall, and yesterday the plumbing and electrical were roughed in. The goal is to have the basement kitchen installed before the upstairs kitchen is demolished.

All this would have been more than expensive enough. But then came this thought: As long as we're moving the range to the basement kitchen, why not let it stay there as an extra oven for holiday dinners? And teens requiring Totino's Pizza Rolls? And just get a new one for upstairs?

And as long we're getting a new range for upstairs, why not get a dual-fuel slide-in model? Only 30" wide -- so we'll still have room for a cabinet and counter on either side. But still, it's money we didn't anticipate spending when this process started.

Which is, I guess, the nature of the beast. Especially when you're expecting times two.

Let the games begin!

It all starts today: the long-awaited Rood-Karr kitchen renovation. As I begin this blog, siding, windows and storm doors are being removed from our leaky back porch, soon to be demolished.

Our house is a Tudor Revival style, built in 1939 by builder Walter Gilbert for his own family. We admired it for years, and have owned it since June of 2000. During those years, we've lived with a kitchen so dysfunctional it deserves its own reality show. The previous owners confided, "We redid the kitchen, but we've never liked it." Our architect's sober diagnosis: "You have a severely fragmented work triangle."

During the next several months, brick walls will be breached, and the bricks salvaged. Faulty plumbing will be given its first-ever opportunity to vent. Awkward contemporary oak-n-walnut cabinets will be replaced with traditional white, and chipped, burned laminate counters with something else (at the very least, new, unchipped laminate).

And yes, tempers will fray and all of us -- even the children -- will tire of pizza.

But today, anything is possible. It feels a bit like the very early stages of pregnancy, or even Braxton-Hicks contractions near the end of it: slightly uncomfortable and exhilarating at the same time.

I just hope it doesn't take nine months.