End of May - Everything is moving right along and these past 2 weeks have mostly been focused on rough electrical and rough plumbing installation.
Our plumber is Ray Cadotte, with Cadotte Plumbing & Heating in Medford. He is very knowledgeable and pleasant to work with. We haven’t had too much interaction; turns out, there isn’t a lot of discussion to be had around plumbing! It goes where it goes. One question I did have was about the new fridge - it will have an auto ice maker and filtered water (it’s the little things, I know). So I was curious if the water line ran up and over to the fridge, or if they ran it in the floor? The answer is the floor! Which I guess makes sense because if it ever leaks…well you know - gravity!
In New England, heat is also - often - a plumbing issue. We had to move our radiator in the kitchen, because it had been located on the wall where the fancy new fridge is going. So we are now going to have what’s called a “toe kick” radiator, which will be located under the new peninsula in the kitchen. Between that and moving the heating lines to our second floor - part of the stack makeover - there was a fair amount of plumbing work to be done.
Also, as I mentioned earlier, the venting of our kitchen drain was not up to code, so Ray ran a new vent pipe up from the sink, and now we have a nice new pipe venting out through the roof, on the back side of the house (insert eye roll here!) But we’re lucky to be in their hands and have everything safe, fully-functional and up to code.
Plumbing! Left: New venting for the kitchen sink drain. Center: New copper lines to the kitchen sink. Right: New flex pipes to the second floor, for heating.
Electric is a different story; we, as clients, have a lot to say about what goes where. Our electrician is Michael Palmisano from Palma Electric. He is fantastic; he’s super-personable and he has said more than once that he wants to make sure we are happy with all of the lights and outlets. To begin our process, he asked me to make a wish list - which I was happy to do - and then we walked around the room and discussed pros & cons, and challenges & solutions for each work area. It was really an amazing experience. We discussed recessed lighting, under-cabinet lighting, interior cabinet lighting, everything. We discussed heights of outlets along the counters. All of this needs to work for us and the way we cook and use the space.
Turns out, we will likely put USB ports in as well, all along the counter. And we will be installing all recessed lighting, because my DH Clark is 6’2” and we have relatively “low” ceilings. Having fixtures or pendants just aren’t going to work for him, he’d be bonking his head all over the place!
Our electrician also likes to put switches in strategic spots - he didn’t want us to walk into the room and see switches everywhere. We have an area where the beam is that will be boxed in, and that will allow us to put some switches in a discreet spot.
Electric! Left: Brackets for recessed lighting. Center: switches tucked behind our support beam. Right: Switch for a - hypothetical - dining room chandelier.
Mike is also wiring for future needs - if we (or any future residents) decide to hang a chandelier over our table it will already be wired and ready to go. And we have taken advantage of the fact that the back wall of the kitchen faces the backyard, right near our patio and grill, so we will add some outlets and exterior lighting for the backyard, which we have never had (and is so needed!)
As of now we have our rough plumbing and electrical inspection sign-offs and we are still waiting on the rough building sign off. But there’s plenty to do while we wait! More on that, to come!