I can clearly now the rain has gone!

Well, it's October in Vancouver - what the heck are we supposed to sing to make ourselves feel better about Autumn weather? As it happens we can see clearly now but it's not just because the rain has gone, today anyways. The sun is currently streaming through the new windows that have been installed throughout the entire house.
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Replacing the old, double glazed but aluminum windows that let out as much heat as possible was one of those 'should we or shouldn't we?' decisions that had to be made before the renovation project began. The expense was the big issue and we wrestled with the option of having vinyl windows to keep costs (and future maintenance) down. Vinyl has come a long way and there are some attractive options, but we knew exactly what style we wanted and that was sadly just about the only style not possible with vinyl. We could have done a hybrid (part wood part vinyl) or chosen vinyl for those that would open as casement windows (upstairs for saftey in case of fire) or those that wouldn't open at all (in the closet) but in the end we sucked it up and ordered wood for all of them. Critical mass helped a bit with getting a decent price (we're talking 15 extra windows here) but the main influencing factor was knowing we'd regret not going with what we knew and loved. Sorry vinyl, your attractions are many, but wood is king!

The real gem was replacing the paino window in the living room. We imagine that it would have quite possibly been originally of stained glass, but we've only ever known it as aluminum. Once we were given guide measurements we hunted around at antique stores until we found an old stained glass window that would work (we found three actually and had a difficult decision choosing which one). It needed repair and cleaning before a frame could be built for it, and we lucked out at finding a woman who totally 'got' us and who we totally 'got', and who did a great job. It was then taken to our window guy who built the frame. One of the pieces of red glass had been repaired years ago with an inferior piece, but this was impossible to fix at this point and we decided it added to the charm. It also made the choice of orientation clear, as one way the red pieces point up and look like arrows and the other way they point down and look like hearts. We are arrow pointing up kind of people. Now when the sun hits it just so, we get red and green and gold dancing on the wall opposite.

With the windows now in, the house is warmer and quieter, not that noise was ever a big issue at Touchwood (at least from without!). Some work still needs to be done on the old casings and the previous metal venetian blind hardware needs to be removed and we have to figure out what kind of coverings we will get, but we don't even see those things.

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We find ourselves just gazing at them with a sort of hypnotic euphoria.