Stands

Since most people have the past two days off of work it has been pretty slow. That gave me a chance to play with Google SketchUp and make some plans. Since the stands that go with a washer and dryer are outrageously priced I decided to make my own. These are pictures of the carcass, there is also a drawer and the front will be white melamine to match all the other white in the room. It's going to be unbearable in there. The stands are done except for the melamine drawer fronts.






They are made out of 3/4" birch plywood. They are joined with biscuts and the lower rails are reinforced with screws. A fully loaded washer weighs less than 300 lbs. so me and the gf got on one and rolled it around. That's when it became evident that the screws would be needed for the lower rails. Someday soon I hope to be doing laundry on top of 'em.

And done.

It was actually done last week but I've been lazy. Worn out really but it all looks the same. Also found a picture of the bathroom at it's worst.

That's the insulation under the sub-floor.

Now I'm working on the laundry room. The walls are painted and the cement board is down. Just needs tile and some grout. Maybe some shelfs down the road when I've more time. As usual there isn't a picture yet...

PSA or some such

Despite the work there just isn't anything that looks like progress to report. It's been friggin' cold and I can say from experience that tools in the -10 to 10 degree range make fingers numb. I've gotten frostbite enough times that my fingers and toes are a little sensitive. Why not wear gloves? Well I do with hand tools and the cold still seeps through but with power tools it is just a bad idea. If a finger hits a spinning blade it sucks but just that finger gets hurt. If a glove, or really any clothing, touches a blade there is a good chance your whole hand, or clothing appropriate body part, will get sucked into it. When I should be sanding drywall so that the hallway can be textured I've been messing with a side project. The new washer and dryer are the front load kind and they don't come with the stand. A stand for both is $300-400 and I decided I could make one for much cheaper. So far I'm about $75 into it and I've bought everything. The carcasses are done and I just need to make the drawers. I did a lot of searching on the internet and didn't find any plans for the stands, well okay, I found one plan but it sucked. Maybe there is some free software out there that will let me draw up some pictures of the stand plans to put out there. If all goes right there will be pictures of a textured hallway and laundry room, cement board in the laundry room and finished washer/dryer stands before the assault of commercialism ends.

Time

Everything takes longer than first planned. Snow kept my helpers away. There was a significant delay in the bathroom when I realized how poorly the vanity light had been placed. Rewire, patch drywall, texture, paint and it is finally time to hang the medicine cabinet. There was an issue with the drain as well. I think that had more to do with trying to work while being sick. Had to make several trips to the store and start over twice since the brain just doesn't work to good while running a fever. The sink drain still has issues. The floor and shower tile both need another coat of sealant but the bathroom just about has a fork in it. The laundry room has a properly hung door and all the drywall that doesn't touch the door is done. The plan is to be reporting a finished hallway and progress on the laundry room tile a week from today. Sickness and snow permitting.

Yay progress

Boo old plumbing. There is a toilet and vanity in the bathroom. The drain leaks because I didn't bother checking it while there was no drywall blocking it. Now there is so much in the way that I'm just going to pretend like it didn't happen until the weekend.

Check, check, check

The list is looking better but not as far as I was hoping. Moved into the house on Saturday but the laundry room and hallway still need a lot of work. Oh, and those pesky toilet/vanity things, they'll be installed this weekend. Once the laundry room is done there will be a easy way to divide the house so that dust doesn't get into the living area. Taking a shower in the bathroom felt good after all of the work that went into it. Being in the crawlspace this morning trying to figure out why the heater didn't work on the other hand did not feel so good.

o Bath tile Soap dish
o Smooth bedroom walls
o Bathroom ceiling
o Bathroom floor cement board and tile
o Texture bedrooms
o paint bedrooms/bathroom
o Half bath door
o Laundry/half bath wall
o Drywall hallway and laundry room
o Mud and smooth laundry and hallway walls
o Laundry floor cement board and tile
o Texture hallway and laundry room
o Paint hallway and luandry room

Here are a couple of before pictures in preparation of the finished pictures coming soon.

Words come later

Tile, walls, walls and more walls

A lot of progress was made last weekend. Most of the shower tile is in, the soap dish was the wrong color so that isn't tiled in yet. The cement board for the floor tile was installed. The walls are damn close to being ready for texture too. Putting the mud on the walls took me about 20 hours, sanding and sponging down the topping compound took me, my parents and the gf about 30 total hours and there is about 5 or so hours of work left. That was just for two bedrooms and a bathroom. There is a refrigerator (cooling beer and leftovers at the moment) plus an oven and dish washer that aren't connected yet. On top of all the progress last weekend cost considerably less than the previous weekend buying appliances and there is internet at the house. The WHOLE internet! The biggest disappointment to the weekend was that the 3 doors I'd spent so long hanging and trying to get perfect are out of alignment again... time for the hand planner...





As for the shrinking list,

o Bath tile Soap dish
o Smooth bedroom walls
o Bathroom ceiling
o Bathroom floor cement board and tile
o Texture bedrooms
o paint bedrooms/bathroom
o Half bath door
o Laundry/half bath wall
o Drywall hallway/half bath
o Mud/smooth laundry/hallway walls
o Laundry floor cement board/tile
o Texture/paint hallway and laundry room


By the end of tomorrow I'm hoping to be ready for texturing.

Walls!

Just a few long-assed days ago the walls looked like this.




Then there was 3 days of doing nothing but smearing joint compound on the walls and now they look more like this. But not really since the picture was before the topping compount.



I've got some time off in two weeks. The house has to be ready to move in at the end of it. Texturing all of the walls, tiling the bathroom and getting carpet in the bedroom are all that is left to move in but by no means all that is left.

What's not is sight?

Like there being no 'i' in team there is no 'end' in sight. Work, work, work... Back in the attic to wire up lights for the closets. Back in the crawl space to wire up the hot water heater (yeah, not my first choice either.) It never seems to end. On the bright side most of the sheetrock is done and the bathroom is ready to mud, the heater works, there is insulation, the wiring is done, the closet has a door instead of a hole cut in the wall. Only 14 days for working on the house left for me before I've got to move in. Panic! I haven't even bought the tile yet.

Drywall

There is new drywall hanging on some of the walls. It's a good feeling. Even though they are a blatant reminder of how much work putting up mud is they still look kinda like finished walls. Like progress instead of demolition. Don't get me wrong, there is still plenty of demolition going on. The kitchen and fireplace for example. But yeah, drywall, it's better than nothin'.

inch by inch

The bathroom is finally ready to put the sheet rock back up. There is a new sub-floor and a new bath tub. There is a ceiling light and fan now too after hours in an attic with less than two feet of head room. The shower is going to get the new mold resistant yellow board and the rest of the room gets the regular green board. It seems like so much else has happened but it was mostly prep work and trying to track down the electrical wires. That involved putting a new hatch into the attic. The old one was no where near anything that needed to be accessed in the attic and in the middle of a bedroom. The new one is in the laundry room and near the wiring, the swamp cooler, even the heater flue. The tile I want for the bathroom floor has been hard to find. It looks like I'll have to order it off of the internet. White hexagon tile with black highlight tiles seems to be a restoration specialty that the blue and orange box stores or the tiles stores don't carry anymore.

Only 6 weeks left until I need to be living there. Ack!

So much

The bathroom is gutted and ready to start being put back together. There was an elaborate window dance last weekend. Removed a small window from the second bedroom and put it into the half bath in place of the two single paned windows. Removed four single paned windows from the main bedroom and replaced them with two low-E energy star windows. All that also involved redoing all of the siding on that side of the house. There are two more windows that I want to replace and that will be it for the windows this year. After that nearly all of the drywall in the two bedrooms will be removed so that insulation can be put in the walls. That's right, there is no insulation in the walls. The attic could use some insulation too but first there is some wiring and fan vents to install. I've got seven weeks left to finish the remodel enough to move in. Kumbaya!

jalepenos

It is hard to believe that this plant is over 5 years old. It has nearly died on a number of occasions but somehow it keeps powering on. I repotted it a couple of months ago and it has rewarded me with a bumper crop of jalapenos. Previously the bush had only produced four fruit total and now there are over ten at the same time! As you can see through the window winter is still in full force. About a month more of snow.