The cold weather is coming! But you might already feel it if your house is cold every morning. Do you have to add a blanket on your bed this time of year because your house is always uncomfortable? Are you dreading the winter heating bills?
Making your home energy-efficient also improves comfort on these cold mornings. Your home is the most complicated machine you own. So where do you start? How do you fix it? As you can imagine, this is a topic I have written about a lot over the years. I found some blog posts in particular that touch on making your home more comfortable in the cool months and listed them below.
The summary is call me for a free energy audit. There are no strings attached. I come and test your home for air leakage and give you a list of things you can fix yourself and some names of people who you can call to help you fix them. I don’t get paid to do this service – I just want you to have the most energy-efficient and comfortable home as possible. If all architects and builders would design homes with building science in mind, this would not be a needed service, but they don’t. My payment for this service is showing you the value of building science knowledge and you telling your friends that need something designed about it. Consider it a marketing expense. I save you money and build my brand. Call to schedule your audit if you want to be more comfortable this winter. Read the blog posts below for more ideas on how to fix your home.
One of the most common renovation projects done in existing homes are the kitchens. It provides a 92.9% return on investment on average according to Remodeling Magazine. It is often a gathering place for the entire family. The kitchen has become the hub of the home. So many older homes still have the kitchen closed off from the rest of the house. The most common goal is to “open it up” to the living space so that “we can all be together and nobody is stuck away from the rest of the family.”
So what should you consider before taking on the kitchen renovation? Where should you begin? We strongly encourage you to contact an interior designer that does not sell cabinets or come with a preconceived bias in the solution they will provide. An interior designer will look at the space, hear your goals, and provide design solutions that meet your budget. Give Rebecca a call at the office with questions.
Is your crawl space working properly? In our area the crawl space is popular and a popular place for problems. From critters to wet insulation these spaces are almost never right. Here are some posts that might help you get your crawl space in order.
The idea of building a new custom home can be overwhelming for someone who has not done so in the past. What lessons should you know before you get started? What questions should you ask? Who should you call? Here is a guide to help:
In order to live you must find joy, otherwise you are just surviving
Last week was a rare honor for me, my seventh grade daughter allowed me to join her class at Eastern Mennonite School on a field trip. I did not get invited to any last year, so I did my best not to embarrass her too much – seems some is a requirement and then some more just for fun. More than just getting to spend time with seventh graders at an art museum, I was looking forward to this trip to the Kluge-Ruhe Aboriginal Art Museum in Charlottesville to see the works on display. Even though the museum is almost directly across the street from our Charlottesville office, I had not visited. Right now they have featured work by Damien Shen who is able to capture emotion and spirit through both drawings in charcoal and photography. His work is amazing and you should go see it before the exhibit closes in mid-December. Outside the museum the trees are artwork as an “outdoor yarn bombing” exhibition has been installed. Yarning in Australian slang means telling a story. This exhibit highlights significant dates from 40,000 BCE to the present.
My favorite work at the museum might surprise you. It was a simple installation with an incredible message. We need JOY to live. The artist, Vernon ah Kee is a member of the Kuku Yalandji, Waanji, Yidinji, and Gugu Yimithirr peoples. Through clever puns and plays on words and objects he fuses the history and language of colonisation with contemporary black/white political issues to expose degrees of underlying racism in Australian society. This particular work transcends all color and race and hits home for me at the core of humanity. We need JOY to live, otherwise we are just surviving. When the students were asked what the installation meant to them, it was my daughter that spoke up and said “we have to enjoy life.” I certainly hope she remembers that message each day. Life is hard and in today’s society we are hard on each other. If we could just spread JOY, wouldn’t life be better for everyone?
The Kluge-Ruge Aboriginal Art Museum of the University of Virginia houses an incredible indigenous Australian art collection. It has paintings from the Papunya movement and Arnhem land artists. The museum collection originated with John Werner Kluge and Professor Edward Ruhe (University of Kansas). It features bark paintings, acrylic on canvas, sculptures, and artifacts.
