Day 35, and the day’s end marks seven total weeks of having various teams of dudes ripping apart, and then rebuilding our home. With about 4 (or 5, depending – I’m no fool) weeks remaining, the work has begun to take on new meaning, and have new power over our collective moods (finishing something, anything, feels great! – half-done stages feel a smidge omni-present). Each mini-project either intersects, interferes with, or interrupts another project, and planning them out – considering all the things that life throws at everyone (babies being born, deaths in families, various seasonal illnesses, etc.) – has been mind-boggling to witness. Dave has done/is doing a spectacular job coordinating the three ring circus, just as Eric, and Team Tile, Team Electric, Team Drywall, Team Plumbing and Team Frank (ha!) have done amazing work juggling through rings of fire.
Category Archives: before pictures
Baby! Ev’rything is alright, uptight, clean out of sight…
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Day 34 and the gang’s all here. Well, Eric is back from a trip to Arizona where he’ll be moving when this project is over (we’ll mis you, Eric!), and Team Tile and Team Cabinet Hanging were at it in full effect.
I have some unfortunate updates regarding the cabinets. Our cabinet dealer, Artistic Interiors, specifically the owner Jorge Ribeiro, was less than willing to do anything for us regarding the design confusion and the quality of the cabinetry. I would NEVER do business with them again, and would advise anyone out there who is looking for cabinets to look elsewhere. I don’t want to use this platform as a chance to smear businesses – we are very proud and happy with every single other person who’s come into our home – but I felt the need to warn against this businessman, and his inability to put our happiness ahead of his wallet. In the end, his offer of $100 worth of product to alleviate our issues (the actual cost for new materials would have been $230) was reneged, and the time he offered to do touch-ups himself was also withdrawn. I should add that the original total cabinet cost was twelve-thousand times that much, and that such a paltry gesture was insulting (that’s 0.83% for all you math nerds).
Won’t you smile a while for me?…
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Day 33 and the oppressive heat was the star of the day. At one point, around 2pm, the car said it was 101 degrees outside, and yet, the heat did not stop the progress. In fact, everyone even took turns working outside. I guess it was better than rain, or snow, or gale-force winds, but, man, oh, man, was it HOT out there!
Lots got done today, and lots was happening all around. Caleb’s car – which had refused to start yesterday – was being worked on in the front of the house (eventually, though, sadly, it had to get towed after all), Dave was painting in the garage, and J.J. and Caleb were cutting tile near the side fence. The sun just kept pouring down heat, while paint was slathered on quickly (it seemed like it was drying in half the time it normally does), wet, noisy cuts were made by the tile saw, and the dog pouted because we wouldn’t play with her in the heat. (Sorry, baby dog, but you’re not dying of dehydration on my watch!)
And by some miracle, I’ve just got away with it… *
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Day 32, and we had another quiet, hot day. Dave skittered about painting, joint-compounding and finishing things, while Caleb got to tiling. And tile he did. It’s so satisfying to see something that you’ve drawn or imagined come alive just as you’d hoped it would. Lucky for us we got paired with a meticulous, careful, organized and happy tile contractor because he fits not only our expectations, he also fits with the actual project (details, details, details). I feel incredibly lucky, still, again, to have such an amazing team. So lucky.
And we don’t care about their own faults, talkin’ ’bout our own style…
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Week 7, Day 31, and we’re in for a quiet start to the week. With a solo Dave working on punchlist-type details in preparation for a more active end to the week, we were able to NOT set the alarm for the first weekday in, well, 6 weeks. I slept until just after 8, and it was splendid. Dave picked up trim, painted, joint-compounded (spots here and there dinged by construction life), and just generally tidied the spaces. Fussed, I think the word was?
Upon closer examination of the cabinets, we noticed some issues with the paint finish – due in part to the fact that not all of the protective shipping pieces stayed on as they should have, so some of the cabinet doors were a tad bit dented, cracked or scratched at the corners – so we had a meeting with the cabinet people. A few door fronts are being re-ordered, and we’ll try to touch up some of the other spots where the finish looks like it’s been rubbed off (or chipped off) already and some bits of raw wood are exposed (not what we expected for brand new cabinets). Some of these issues are apparently common (but not foretold to us) to white painted cabinets; others are special, just for us! Hooray! (Voice thick with sarcasm, here.)
Praise for the singing, praise for the morning…
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Day 30 and Phase 3: Finish has officially begun. Cabinets are on the wall! What a transformation! Seriously, it makes such a difference to have furniture (so to speak) in the room. We went from concept to reality in about two hours. It was wild. While I ran some errands in the morning, Dave and Eric conquered the range-top side of the kitchen (the east wall, left side). When I got back, we had a kitchen! Well, sort of. But compared to how I left it! Wow! Of course they didn’t do the whole room in two hours, that was just how long I was out. The installation will take a few more days to be complete, but they made good headway, especially considering that they started on the least plumb/level spot in the room. Nice work, dudes, as ever.
Inch by inch, row by row…
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Day 29 and the weather couldn’t have been more perfect. Sunny, breezy, warm, but not too hot – spectacular. And it came just in time. The dreary weather had taken its toll on the Team, leaving them listless, tired, and just plain exhausted. Yet they persevered, rallied, and managed to turn out a day full of detail work, full of intricate measurements, and full of hauling themselves up and down ladders in search of a finished exterior. Success! Despite the stain (which we will apply), they finished the exterior! Brad finished his exterior electrical (save for the last doorbell – hey, a potential movie title!), and Dave and Eric finished shingling around the windows (including moving some fragile, antique shingles from one part of the house to another for continuity’s sake), and painting the trim on the new windows. What a relief to have one part of the job wrapped up! I know they needed the sense of finish more than we did (we’re no where near normal inside, so we didn’t so much mind the exterior as it was), and the knowledge that they got it done was not unappreciated. Good work, dudes!
Satisfy my soul, satisfy my soul…
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Day 27 and work cruised along steadily. Floors were sanded lightly to give the next coat of poly something to stick to, and a second coat of poly was then applied. The west bedroom closet floor was coated as well, and finish trim was installed inside the closet. Primer was applied, and the room was cleaned within an inch of its life (He even mopped! Thank you, Eric!). Durock was installed in the master bath, shelving niches for bath products were set in place, and the floor for the shower was packed into position. And, electrical work continued in the basement and upstairs main bath (where detective Brad found that previous electrical work we had done was NOT done correctly. Grr). Slow and steady was the name of the game today, and, appropriately enough, we had a reggae mix on to soothe the day along. Groovy.
Things that make you go “hmmm”…
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Week 6 (!), day 26, and the weather matched my energy level. Gray, heavy, damp, cool. I would probably rather have been making soup, baking bread and watching sappy movies all day. Instead, there were three teams working – with three separate music choices – in three separate areas of the house. In the attic, we had Brad and his helper, Ian, completing the smoke detectors, and replacing all the floor boards; in the master bathroom, we had Caleb preparing the shower floor, and setting the in-floor (radiant) heating pad; and, on the first floor, we had Dave and Eric brushing the first coat of poly onto the stained kitchen floors. Busy, busy, busy.
If a problem comes along, you must whip it…
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Day 25 (Friday) was long. For everyone. The sanding continued on the densest floor known to man until after lunchtime, taking longer than had been hoped for (so it seemed). No matter, though, as the Team managed to get a coat of stain on the floor! Likely the only coat of color, the process will continue with at least 3 coats of polyurethane to seal and protect the floors. The process seemed the most physically taxing on the guys – so much crouching, bending, squatting, being on their knees on hard surfaces, reaching, scrubbing, you name it – but it also seemed to elicit a different kind of excitement. An excitement at seeing the early stages of a finished room? Perhaps. Excitement at conquering the antique floors? Possibly. Let’s just say, the enthusiasm poured into their work, and the floors came out beautifully (from what I can see from the doorways and the outside porch – we can’t walk on them yet).