There’s no place like Home Show

I love going to the BC Home and Garden Show.  Even when our home renovations were restricted to painting our hallway — just going to the show made us feel like we were “real” home owners.

This year, of course, we had a legitimate reason to be there.  We are building a home!  We wanted to look around at, well, everything, but there are a couple of things that we paid close attention to.

Home security: Currently we have an alarm system installed in our condo.  We enter a few digits on a keypad and arm or disarm the system.  This was the first alarm system I’d ever used, and I was pretty impressed with the system and the motion sensors tucked into the corners.

Seems pretty old school now. Now the smart systems can be armed or disarmed by your cell phone while you are halfway around the world.  It can be run through your laptop or ipad and control your TV, stereo, heat and lights.  My little carrier bag is stuffed with brochures from the various distributors, and it’ll take some serious on-line investigation to even get started on deciding what we need.

Window Coverings: It was great to see all the window coverings laid out before us.  We got to see them up close, and we think we will go with Hunter Douglas Silhouette.  We really love the way you can get full coverage, but also even with the blinds open the sheer outer panels give you UV and heat protection, perfect for our upstairs sitting room that faces full south.

Naturally, they can be installed to open or shut with the flick of a switch or a remote.  It’s nice to dream about, but we’re talking about two 32 x 48 inch windows and one glass door — I think a pull on a couple of cords will not be too onerous.

Of course there were lots of other things to see — from celebrity appearances to basement bathrooms to roofing options plus grdens and fountains, but we just poked our heads into the booths that we related to.  Although we also tried out every bar stool we saw, just to see what they felt like to sit in.  We will need to get two stools for our kitchen counter/table.  They will have to be a little higher than regular kitchen chairs,  which are usually 18 inches high for 29-inch-high tables.  Counters are usually 36 inches high, so we’ll need to accommodate that.  Regular bar stools will be too tall, but we were just checking the comfort levels of different styles. Note:  lushly padded seats are too precarious, your bottom wobbles on them.

Update:  Here’s what four editors of BC Living magazine found to love at the BC Home and Garden Show.