California 2 Puerto Rico

Summer and I have been looking around Puerto Rico for furniture since we moved down here. We weren’t necessarily planning on buying anything at the time, but we were getting an idea of what was going to be available to us. Just like in California, there are a lot of junky furniture store that sell poor quality particle wood furniture. Keep in mind, particle wood does not last in the islands. It gets attacked instantly by the high humidity and the ravenous termites.

We found a really cool couch at Rooms to Go as well as the vanity in our bathroom…but I didn’t see any bedroom sets that I liked. I really am convinced that buying a bedroom set from a big furniture company is the wrong path to take. I would love to slowly furnish the house with killer furniture from our travels and explorations of the world. We can scoop up antique mail desks in Rome, hand woven Tibetan rugs from Nepal, authentic statues of Buddha in Thailand and teak furniture from Bali!

POP

That was the little dream bubble popping over my head. There is no way Summer and I will live in a half furnished house for the next 5 years especially since my world travel so far this year has been limited to a 5 day trip to Oklahoma City and a 10 day visit to San Diego for some legal stuff.

OK, with all this said, Summer and I still need to furnish our house. I found a bed online that I like that is hand made out of teak in Bali. It isn’t expensive, but the shipping costs more than our new truck. I don’t necessarily like the head board, but I really like the simplicity of the frame and legs. I think I could build this King Size Platform Bed. Maybe I could find some “How To” instructions online as far as recommendations go on how to fasten the corners and legs on so it is super sturdy.

Teak King Size Platform Bed

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Two days ago, Summer and I went to Home Depot with a truck load of things that we bought for the house that we didn’t use. Some things we bought were the wrong size, wrong color, wrong thread, wrong thickness, wrong angle, wrong, wrong, wrong, ALL WRONG! After paying a 7% restocking fee on a few items that we have had for over 3 months, we ended up with a wopping $350 in refunds. Boy, that could really help pay some bills right now, OR, we could be good little consumers and buy more stuff!.

Summer and I left Home Depot with a 6.5 horsepower Toro lawnmower. This little puppy may help us whip our yard into better shape. After running it for an hour or two yesterday, I have a new respect for the lawnmower. It cuts down some pretty thick an tall stuff. I think in about 3 years we’ll really have this yard under control.

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Well, we have really moved far enough along on this project that we can really make this place look like a house with a little bit of work. But, what should we do? This isn’t a well thought out post, but as I procrastinate here in front of my computer, I will make a list:

• Clean up scrap wood
• Remove scrap concrete around new slab
• Put up temporary Railings on the back deck
• Build the master closet
• Build a work bench in the shed and shelves to store lots of tools
• Put all the tools from downstairs into the shed
• Do something about our mud pit of a driveway (perhaps rocks until we can drop a couple thousand on cement or block
• Get bedroom furniture for the master
• Remove all construction supplies/tools from front porch and scrub it down
• Buy porch furniture for front porch
• Trim floorboards
• Tile downstairs bath
• Hang doors
• Get Satellite Cable?

Aside from the obvious clean up stuff, do you know any small stuff that will make our house look homey? Summer and I don’t have any x-mas decorations up…maybe that would help (but it gives me one more thing to clean up…ba-humbug). What do you think?

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As you all know, Summer and I are designing a walk-in closet that will be made out of cedar. Having a closet will really give us the chance to free up a lot of space around the house, organize our clothes and have a place to put our shoes and belts.

Normally, finding specialty items, like 3/4 inch cedar plywood, in and around Rincon is not the easiest thing to do. Normally, it goes something like this.
ME:(at Home Depot): “Hi, I am looking for a shower drain. Can you please show me where they are?”
Home Depot Guy: “Yeah, we normally stock those, but we don’t have any. Do you want to use this plastic PVC drain designed to drain concrete patios for your shower drain?”
ME: “No thank you, do you know when you are going to get them back in stock?
Home Depot Guy: “No, we don’t know when we are going to get items, they just arrive. Can I help you with something else?”

Here is some of the wood we found in Aguada. If you need directions on how to get there…it is really easy and very reasonably priced.

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It may not seem like all that exciting a shot to you, but our landscaping really is coming along. Even with all the progress, when I take this same picture (hopefully minus the flooding from the tropical storm) in two years, all of those little plants you are looking at are going to be going off.

Some puddles from the tropical storm and a great BEFORE picture of our landscaping

Starting from the left side I see Eureka Palms, Christmas Palms, Traveler Palms, Coconut Palms, China Palms, Royal Palms, Ficus Trees, Snake Plants, Caoba Trees, Mahogany Trees, Bread Fruit Trees, Queen Plams….I am going to stop now. I can’t wait to see the AFTER picture in three years…and again in 5 and again in 10…so on and so forth.

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Jamie and Brian came down to Puerto Rico with one goal. Install the tongue and groove teak hardwood floors in our house. We did some surfing and a whole lot of work. Not only did they do a kick ass job installing the floors (in the entire house, my office and the deck) but they also handcrafted beautiful wooden thresholds into the bathrooms and kitchen. Brian also tore down our old “sin tratado” (un-treated) back deck and rebuilt it. All that, and we surfed. Crazy.

It was cool having two of my best friends down here helping me with the house. They taught me a lot as they went instead of just flying through stuff. Thanks to them, I am now much more comfortable using the table saw, miter saw and pneumatic finishing nail gun. I have the confidence to finish the hardwood flooring on top of the closet and bathroom in the master bedroom. I am also going to buy a router and start experimenting with finishes for our baseboard.

Jamie is an artist. He has been working with his hands for a long time repairing surfboards, restoring classic surfboards (pigmenting resins etc), painting, carving and building something for as long as I’ve known him. It is really cool to know that not only am I going to have some of Jamie Kelly’s surf art on my walls, but now I have an entire house with beautiful teak flooring that has the signature of my two buddies on it.

Thanks Brian and Jamie.

You can check out some of Jamie’s handy work at his website. I pirated a few small pictures of his work so you can get a teaser before you go on over to his site: Jamie Kelly Surf Art

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Puerto Rico got hit by a freak storm (tropical storm Olga) last night and our power was out for the majority of today. So, since we couldn’t work (no power = no internet), we decided to design our closet. It took us a little over an hour, but here is the rough sketch.

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We can finally shower in the master bathroom! Yay! Although it’s not complete, here are some photos on the progress:

This is the threshold where the new hardwood floors transition into the bathroom. Looks good with the travertine!

It’s hard to get a good shot, but here is the majority of the wetroom portion of the master bath. You can catch a glimpse of the trim we installed around the window, but we decided not to use it to trim out the top of the marble. Please excuse the $1 shower curtain, we will eventually be putting in tempered glass:

Why, yes, that IS hot water coming out of our dual showerheads, and we get decent water pressure in the masterbath!

We still have not figured out what we are going to trim the top of the marble with…any suggestions? I love our Kohler shower heads/hardware. They feel nice and solid.

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Mark is a good friend of ours, here in Puerto Rico and he is actually the one that tipped us off about this house that we ended up buying. He even knew exactly how much we could low ball the seller ($100K), since he’s been watching the market and well, because he’s the “Mayor” of Rincon. I call him the “Mayor” because he doesn’t actually hold a political office, he’s more of a Peoples Choice Mayor. Everyone knows Mark and everyone love Mark. Guys, girls, Puerto Ricans, gringos, dogs, kids, old ladies, etc. Mark has lived in Rincon for 13+ years and he also hosts the poker games we talk so much about.

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Here is another blog about a couple that just picked up and moved from the West Coast (Washington) to Puerto Rico:

It’s pretty funny to read about them going through many of the same things we have been experiancing…From trying to decide on solar power and getting hot water to our pets adjusting to life in Puerto Rico and new neighbors.

Although, it looks like the Kruses have been having more fun then us! While we are stuck in a major construction zone, they have been riding manatees and climbing trees ;)…

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