Posts tagged ‘Bathroom’

December 15th, 2008

Boo, hiss

Unfortunately, we didn’t get as much accomplished over the weekend as we’d hoped we would. I guess we’ll be spending the rest of the month making up for lost time, although Kevin nicely padded some of our projects so that we’d have some wiggle room in terms of getting things done.

On Friday, AmeriClean came in and cleaned both our HVAC ducts and our carpets. Because of the nature of our HVAC system, we actually had a greater than normal number of ducts to be cleaned. We also had our living room, hallway, and three bedrooms with all closets cleaned. The jobs were done by two different workers, and both actually used the word “gross” to describe their respective jobs to do at our house. Yikes. The company was able to cut us a 10% deal on cleaning our carpets since the house was vacant (usually the fee includes the worker moving your furniture around to clean the carpets), so the total for both jobs that day was $497. That kinda seems like a lot, but the difference it has made in the smell and air quality is pretty profound, so we figure it was well worth the cost. Eventually, we’ll be tearing up all of the carpeting, and we’ll probably continue to get the ducts cleaned once every few years.

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Some of the concreteboard hung for the tub surround

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The craft room

This is what this room used to look like. Progress!

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New 50s lamp on a tension rod from Artifacts

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Table lamps from Artifacts

On the docket for tonight after work will be finishing hanging the concreteboard in the tub surround, starting to tile, and continuing to prime the walls for painting.

December 11th, 2008

Poop

Poop pipe

Poo!

I think Kevin took some pictures last night, but I didn’t have the energy last night to worry about uploading them, so here’s a picture of the sewer pipe coming out of the old toilet, rimmed with a glorious coating of poop. I know it’s going to make your day.

Last night, there was some sort of snafu with the screws not being long enough to hang the sheets of concreteboard on the walls for the tub surround, along with issues with the wall layers not being the same depth, so I think Kevin and Mark did a lot of standing around and scratching their heads, until they finally decided to call off work for the evening until the next day when longer screws could be purchased. Thank goodness Mark is willing to work on it during the day while we’re at work.

While they were mid-scratch, I set about completing the cleaning of the kitchen. I scrubbed out the fridge with some sort of orange cleaner, finished wiping out the cabinets, gave it a thorough sweeping, and even managed to clean up the filthy window sashes over the sink. It’s ready for move-in! Tonight, I’ll probably spend most of my time running carloads of dishes, pots and pans, and food between the houses to fully transfer the room from our rental to the new place. Actually having some of our belongings in the new place will further solidify that it’s really ours.

I had already scheduled to take tomorrow (Friday) off in order to be there while the duct and carpet cleaners do their thing, and through a happy coincidence, Kevin may be able to take the day off as well. Last night after Mark left, we spent over an hour cleaning everything up upstairs, gathering up the last of the trash, and moving Kevin’s “keep” pile down to the basement. We were able to swing a 10% discount on the carpet cleaning because I told them we wouldn’t have anything for them to have to move when they did it, so cleaning last night meant that once work is done tonight, we can just shove the few items left in the living room into the basement or bathroom to keep my promise. The living room looks so much bigger when it’s empty! Let’s hope we don’t fall into the old habit of filling it with crap.

December 10th, 2008

Progress

It has been far too many days since this was last updated. We’re to that point in the renovation process that we come back to our rental house and just sort of fall into bed after working at the new place, without the energy to upload pictures or to call our friends back. Sorry! The end is sort of in sight, though, and we’re really looking forward to being able to relax once we’ve gotten our projects done and have moved.

Kevin has been busy working on the upstairs bathroom, with a lot of assistance from our friend Mark, who has his own handyman business in town. (If you need stuff done to your house and you live within 30 minutes of Iowa City, use him! He’s good!) On Monday night, the two of them got the new subflooring laid in the bathroom, and last night they were able to get all of the concreteboard for the floor cut to fit, spread some wet concrete on the subfloor, and screwed the concreteboard in place. This will allow us to lay tile and not have to worry about moisture seeping down to the subflooring and causing it to rot. Very important, indeed.

While they worked upstairs, I was downstairs painting the basement walls bright white, a welcome change from the ancient antique white that had been on the walls before, and through the mold fiasco had become stained black in places. Unfortunately, I don’t have any pictures of this yet. Mark’s girlfriend Angela was a big help on Monday night, too, and we knocked out most of the basement walls that evening. It’ll take a few coats to cover everything up, but it’s already starting to look great. I’ll take pictures for comparison tonight.

Subflooring installed

The subflooring has been laid

Never squeak again!

Lots of screws mean no squeaking floors

Ready for bathtime

Kevin's ready for a bath

Mortaring the subfloor

Mortaring the floor

Screwing down the concreteboard

Screwing down the concreteboard

Ready to tile!

Ready to tile!

On the docket for tonight for the boys is to hang the concreteboard for the tub surround and hopefully start tiling that with the white subway tile. I’ll be busy putting another coat of paint on the walls in the basement and finishing up getting the kitchen cleaned up. I’d like to bring carloads of kitchen items over and get it completely moved this week, so that I can start making dinner at night while we work on the house. We’ve been eating out every night, and it’s getting to be ridiculously expensive, and homemade food will be a nice change.