Spring is a great time to get started on your home remodeling project. So where is the best place to get started? Who should you call? What will it cost? How long will it take? What is the best solution? Here are some things that I have learned over the years doing many residential remodeling projects:
Have a complete plan before starting construction (or even before getting a contractor to give you a price). There are many variables in renovation projects and you will be making thousands of decisions. Get them out-of-the-way early: know the color paint, counter top faucet, and flooring before getting started.
Don’t make changes (at least minimize them). Having a good plan in advance of construction will go a long way towards this goal. This is the place where budgets get out of hand, schedules get lost, and projects go bad – avoid making changes during construction if at all possible.
Allow your contractor to purchase materials. The last thing you want is to order the studs for the addition and not have enough the day the framers are standing there waiting on the materials or even for the cabinets to be delivered a week early. Contractors know how to order materials, get special pricing from supply yards, schedule deliveries, and at the end of the day, you want them responsible for all aspects of the work being done.
Listen to your professionals. Your architect and contractor are there to serve you and to help you make the best decisions possible. If they say, “you can do it, but I would not recommend it” LISTEN. If it is too expensive, too complicated, or simply not a functional solution, they will tell you in most cases. Take their professional advise; after all that is why you are paying them.
Have a contingency budget of at least 5%. Remodeling work is the highest risk work for contractors. There are many concealed conditions and it is impossible to know what you are getting into behind the drywall before you get behind the drywall. There is almost always a surprise in every remodeling project.
Take a vacation – if at all possible, move out while the work is being done. This will help your nerves and allow the contractor to have full access to the project and schedule without worrying about bothering you by showing up too early or staying too late.
Get out-of-the-way – Again, you have hired professionals to do what they do for a living. Don’t try to micromanage the process. Of course everyone in the process wants you to be happy and wants to hear you concerns. However, there is a means to their madness and letting them do things the way they think is best is usually the most efficient solution.
Design Matters – Don’t just slap something together. Hire an architect to think through the design that will understand the desired function / goals and plan a project that meets your needs. Proper planning on the front end is always less expensive than planning / figuring it out during construction – or worse, trying to fix it after construction is done. Beauty, function, energy efficiency, durability, and healthy solutions are all possible, but not typical in the construction industry unless an architect is involved.
We are always looking for leaders, innovators, and spectacular people in our backyard. Get to know Becky Bartells, Certified Massage Therapist, one of our newest friends in Harrisonburg. Give her a call and schedule an appointment: 540-607-0932.
Give a brief summary of what your company does and who you are as a company.
I am a Nationally Certified Massage Therapist, practicing in and around Harrisonburg and focusing primarily on mobile “home delivery” massage. I practice a variety of massage modalities, and often incorporate them all into a single massage session, based on the client’s individual needs. These modalities include Swedish, Deep Tissue, and Relaxation massage, as well as Aromatherapy, Myofascial Release and Trigger Point Therapy. I also incorporate some Shiatsu, Thai & Cranio-Sacral techniques. My fee is $1/minute (so $60 for an hour plus a delivery fee of $15) and I offer a $15 introductory discount to all new clients.
Give us some background on your company. What do you do and why do you do it?
A year and a half ago, after spending some time in Central America, I decided that I needed a change. I worked for a fantastic company and enjoyed what I did, but it was time to shake things up a bit. I had considered massage many times over the previous 20 years and was Pre-PT as an undergrad at JMU for a couple of years (I eventually re-focused on the botanical side of my Bio major). I found a school in Costa Rica that offered a 4 month, full immersion massage therapy training program. I began to put the pieces into place to make the change. I had to do some work on my house so that I could put it on the market, sell the house (in a tricky housing market to say the least), move back in to a house that I had bought in my 20’s and had been renting out for the past 10 years, find tenants for the house while I was away and slowly extract myself (with the help of my employer) from the company I was currently working for. It was all very exciting… and terrifying… but mostly exciting.
The Costa Rica School of Massage Therapy is an American run school, located in Playa Samara, Costa Rica. It was the opportunity and experience of a life-time. Our professors were flown in from all over the United States to teach us their area of expertise. It was an intense, terrifying, stressful, unbelievably beautiful, exciting, life altering time.
The result of this time in Costa Rica was a new and refreshed perspective on life and living that I hope to share with my clients. My new career is one of helping people feel better in their bodies. Keeping people mobile, reducing their anxiety, helping sooth their aches and pains, and preventing new aches and pains is a very special experience. Helping to bring my clients to a space of calm and general well-being is extremely gratifying for me and I deeply appreciate every single person that welcomes me in to that sacred space. I am relatively new to the profession and am working on building a client base, primarily through word of mouth. My clients have written some very generous testimonials that can be seen on my FB page.
Do you have an ideal client? If so, what do they look like?
I can’t really say that I have an “ideal” client. Massage is physically demanding work so I do try to keep my client base balanced. My clients range in age from 10-75 and in size from 85-250+lbs. I’m not a large person, but I hear that I have strong hands and I feel like I can deliver a fair amount of pressure when needed. That said, I do try to keep my Defensive Line Coach clients to a minimum though I appreciate them tremendously as well… I just have to space them out on the schedule 🙂
I am offering a mobile massage service, so I do I feel like I could best serve some of the populations that may not be able to get around as well, such as the elderly, physically disabled, and people suffering from conditions such as MS, ALS, and HIV. I also feel like I could be a great service to new mothers or fathers who are house bound and sleep deprived. Basically, I am happy to have anyone as a client, and variety keeps my new career interesting.
What is your favorite success story in the past few years?
I would have to say everything that has happened over the past year and a half to bring this new dream to fruition would all be part of my success story. The ease with which everything fell into place was consistent confirmation that I was on the right path.
What do you like to do for fun? Favorite restaurant? Favorite place to spend a Saturday afternoon?
For fun, I enjoy spending time with friends, whether that time is spent just lounging about and catching up, exercising, making dinner, sitting around a fire, hiking, visiting new places, etc…
I struggle a little bit with “favorites” questions, because I appreciate variety, I LOVE to eat and I try to support downtown Harrisonburg as much as possible. I love the Local Chop & Grill House for excellent everything, El Sol and every taco truck in town for sopes & tacos, Rick’s Cantina for nachos & margaritas, The Joshua Wilton House for wine on the porch, Clementine for great food & live music, Jack Brown’s & Billy Jack’s for their originality (and their burgers), The Artful Dodger for morning coffee and my new favorite activity… Thursday night Salsa Night J. I love Earth and Tea (now closed) for curry chicken salad or paninis and pots of tea, and I regularly crave the buffet at Blue Nile and Paneer Saag and Raita, specifically from Indian American Café. Thai Flavor is my favorite for Green Curry or Pho and Mexi night at The Little Grill is pretty great though I don’t get there often enough. I’m sure I have overlooked some great restaurant, but this was getting a little long.
Right now, I am trying to give massages on Saturday afternoon, so I’ll call Sunday my Saturday and I typically spend the afternoon with Leslie, my little sister through Big Brothers and Big Sisters. We have been together for 4 years and though I try to come up with new things to do, she prefers to be at my house, watching a movie or cooking something, or both. Warmer weather will mean parks and hiking and wandering around downtown which we enjoy as well. I have also recently purchased a 1973 Argosy (white Airstream) travel trailer, and am enjoying slowly working on that in my free time. This will keep me busy for a very long time…
What is on your (iPod, radio, phone) while you work?
I listen to instrumental massage music when I’m working… Anugama and Liquid Mind on Pandora during massages, Thievery Corporation and Cinematic Orchestra when doing office work. Other favorites include Yarn, Mana, Jack Johnson, Ben Harper, Mumford & Sons and MC Yogi
What is your favorite book?
Again, I can’t say I have a favorite, but ‘Eat, Pray, Love’ and ‘The Presence Process’ (as well as a pile of textbooks) did have a fairly significant influence over my life the past year or so. The last book I finished was ‘Love in the Time of Cholera’ which I enjoyed. Mostly, right now, I am trying to stay on top of my massage trade journals.
What is your favorite app for your phone or iPod?
I have a small TempleRun addiction and I am not afraid to admit it… Other than that, I use Instagram and Google Translate a lot. I don’t really have many apps…
Where is your favorite place to vacation?
Nicaragua and Costa Rica are where I plan to return as soon as I can possibly get there, but I would also like to get to Guatemala and Panama… so for now, Central America.
What historical figure would you most like to have dinner with and why?
Jesus… I just have a few questions I would like to ask… 😉
A few weeks ago I posted a blog about Living Walls as a way to bring life to your building site. So here is a way to bring life to your building walls, fencing, columns, and even parking decks. Green Screen is a galvanized wire screen panel with multigrade alkaline wash, epoxy thermal-set primer, and baked on powder coat finish. In other words, this is not your Grandmother’s wire screen. It will hold up against weather, look good, support the weight of plants growing on the structure, and give you the structure needed to create a beautiful vegetated wall.
We are very privileged to work with incredible clients that want Healthy, Energy Efficient, and Durable designs. This custom home project in Penn Laird that we first told you about in the post “Design of a Home, a process of discovery” is designed to use one of the most energy-efficient wall systems available today, Insulated Concrete Forms. The form is taking shape and the rooms are being framed. Here is a pictorial update, built by Trost Custom Homes.
There are many definitions of what green building is or does. Definitions range from a building that is “less bad” than the average building in terms of its impact on the environment to a building that is “high performance.” My definition is a home / building that meets the budget, is adaptable, durable, preserves or restores habitat, reduces energy and water use, and provides healthy indoor air quality.
It is critical to make the decision to “go green” early in the construction process. The first step is to create a team that understands building science, works well together, and are experts at green design and construction. A balanced team for home design includes an architect, contractor, and a client. All parties have to work together to design and build the project in order to achieve the best solution. Eliminating any team member from any part of the process will result in a building that is not as green as possible.
Radon is estimated to cause thousands of lung cancer deaths in the U.S. each year. The EPA recommends that you test your home for radon and install a mitigation system if the level is 4 picocuries per liter or higher. Radon levels less than 4 pCi/L still pose a risk, and in many cases may be reduced. So what is the correct way to test for radon?
1. Purchase a do-it-yourself short-term test radon test kit from your local home supply store. Be sure to read the directions carefully and follow them exactly. These DIY kits are inexpensive and can be very accurate if used properly.
2. If the test comes back marginal or high, hire a local independent building inspector(here or here) or certified radon tester to do a long-term test.
There is no known safe level of radon, so if there is radon present take actions to reduce it. There are several methods to reduce radon in your home, but the most common is a vent system and fan which pulls radon from beneath the house and vents it outside. You can also try to seal all the gaps and cracks, create positive air pressure in your basement, add a fresh air exchange, or introduce fresh air ventilation into the space.
Spring is a great time to get started on your home remodeling project. So where is the best place to get started? Who should you call? What will it cost? How long will it take? What is the best solution? Here are some things that I have learned over the years doing many residential remodeling projects:
Listen to your professionals. Your architect and contractor are there to serve you and to help you make the best decisions possible. If they say, “you can do it, but I would not recommend it” LISTEN. If it is too expensive, too complicated, or simply not a functional solution, they will tell you in most cases. Take their professional advise; after all that is why you are paying them.
Listen to your professionals. Your architect and contractor are there to serve you and to help you make the best decisions possible. If they say, “you can do it, but I would not recommend it” LISTEN. If it is too expensive, too complicated, or simply not a functional solution, they will tell you in most cases. Take their professional advise; after all that is why you are paying them.
