Note to Self

Cool website:
http://colorschemedesigner.com/
Color Scheme Generator

Contractors

Today at work I found a few guys that we can have dome over next Tuesday. So while that relieves the stress slightly, I still worry that Sam was wrong and we will have to do something more complicated and expensive for the ceiling.


I've told Tony to try to take as much time off as possible. This project is wearing him down and he needs some time to recover. There's no time to do anything when all of your free time is spent working.

The plan was to move boxes yesterday to the PODS that Tony's mother got to store the left over stuff from Tony's sister's family. The thing is huge BTW. Its almost as tall as the house. But while I was coming home I thought of a flaw with this plan: no sunlight + no electricity + stairs = dead Alissa. The good news is that Tony's mother had already assembled a crew of big strong men to work through the day tomorrow. So they are going to get as much stuff out of the basement as possible for the electricians to start work on Wednesday. Hoo-rah.

This weekend I'm going to try to get the place in shape to start dry walling. There isn't much left of the walls, some nail cleanup (mostly in the kitchen) and a few pieces of stray dry wall. You'd be surprised just how long it takes to get all of those odd little things done. After that I can start on the floors. And then the interesting stuff starts happening :D

Stressed

We met with Mike today, which was both good and bad.

Over the week we did measurements on paper for outlets and lights and laid them out on nice pretty graph paper for Mike (he was actually impressed by my blue print making skills for someone who is untrained :D). The crew is going to start Wednesday. He told us what needed to get done before he started. The bathroom vanity (and the wall behind it) need to be taken out, along with the bathroom ceiling. The shelves in the kitchen need to be taken down and new shelf measurements are needed for outlets on the inside. The last of the walls in the kitchen need to be taken down. And the cabinets need to be taken out.

Mike, however, did make us aware of something. Sam said that he could take out the boards in the living room ceiling to make it a cathedral ceiling, Mike questions it. He is an electrician by trade, but has renovated several houses. He thinks that if there is any doubt of Sam's skill, which there is, that we should get a second opinion with a carpenter.

Problems, problems, problems....

The problem with the electricity will soon be solved but the construction is now a problem. *sigh* This wouldn't be a problem if it weren't for the fact that we are running out of time and that Sam is being paid weekly (until he is paid in full), because that was what was agreed upon, whether he works or not.

Despite the fact that we left a small mess, all the work Mike needs done is done. So the electric is a go. Tomorrow I have to stack Tony's sister's boxes in a pod and get the last of the dry wall up. The house looks more skeleton than ever. At least the time for re-construction is near, even if there are bumps in the road.

So Close

It seems like we're so close to being done, but there is just so much little stuff to wrap up.

I wonder how we picked the coldest, dreariest day to work in a house with no power (and no heat :(). I think its just our luck. I did a few things. I reorganized the living room so that workers can get to the walls to put in electric wires. I got all the trash outside to give us more room. And I helped Tony take out some of the outlets and lights. Why these people put outlets in the floor I don't know. More wood to patch later on.

Tony worked downstairs to try to pull out as much wiring as possible. He said it was hard to work down there with so much of his sister's stuff piled up. We want to get rid of it. But his mother wants to put it in storage. Either way is fine, as long as its out of the way. Of course trashing it would be cheaper. And I don't think they'll come back for it, ever.

One really good thing did come out of today, though. Tony knocked down the retaining wall that used to divide the pantry and the living room. The house looks so much different now. I can almost imagine what it'll be like when we're complete.

And I got to body slam my way through a wall. EEEEEEE!

As I was pulling of some of the remaining bathroom wall (bane of my existence) (so tired of pulling down dry wall). Tony wanted to call it quits. We spent another hour measuring out walls and planning out where lights are going to go. It was so cold in there and getting dark, so we left without fully planning out where the outlets would go. We can do it later on paper since we have measurements.

On Sunday Mike is going to come over and check the place out. He said he can start working as early as Monday if all the demo work is done. We might have power by next week. Yosh!

Fire!

Well, we were all up at 10 today, but there was no sign of Sam. Tony, having previously stated, was not going over, so I was just going to be me, Tony's mom and Sam. We were ready at 10, but when we knocked on Sam's door, there was no answer. We waiting until 11:30, but there was still no sign of him. So, we decided to go without him.

On the drive over I told Tony's mom that Sam had a key and she didn't like that. She didn't want Sam over at the house alone, so she's going to ask for it back later.

When we got there I decided to finish up those damn cabinets that had be bothering me. The main thing that had kept me from getting them out sooner is that the genius who put them in actually ran electric wire through the shelves and bottom of the cabinet above the sink. It had been supported by the cabinets beside it, but was now dangling. I asked Tony to get it out yesterday, but he must have gotten distracted.

Anyway, figuring it had been dangling there for a while now It wouldn't hurt to just cut it out myself. I found Sam's jigsaw and decided to pry the molding off the face of the shelf to save myself some cutting. And that's when it happened. I yanked on the thing and spark flew out of the box.

Remember when I said I came face to face with the hornets pulling the wall apart? I didn't think I could retreat any faster than that. Today I proved myself wrong.

After the sparks stopped the wire caught on fire. And, trying not to panic, I did the first thing they tell you to do when a fire breaks out, call the fire department. And, after a very nerve wracking conversation, ( I didn't know that I actually knew the address of the house until a moment of crystal clarity on the phone (I probably couldn't tell you it now)). I found the fire extinguisher, that I had a feeling shouldn't be stored away when we were moving boxes a few days earlier, and put the thing out. Yeah, I know stupid of me to go messing with electric wire when the electricity was still on. That ugly stupid-little-girl feeling from yesterday came back.

The fire men came and shut the power off. The wires were frayed and likely to cause another fire if left untreated. No power until we get an electrician in. I called Tony and let him know. He said he'd come down and take a look. There was no patching it up. It was just going to have to come down. He spent the rest of the day pulling wires out of the ceiling so that we can get Mike in to do the re-wiring ASAP. I spent the day pulling down bathroom wall. And I got the upper cabinets down after all. I didn't have the will to mess with the lower ones. We have to turn the water off for that.

Sam actually did show up around 2 PM. But since there was no power he couldn't do any work. Guess he shouldn't have been hung over and late.

Oh and did I mention that Tony fell through the ceiling twice getting all the wires out? He caught himself both times, so luckily no hospital trips. We're going back one day this week to finish up pulling out the wires so we can get Mike in. At least the new door looks pretty.

Meet Sam

Today was a test of wills.

We got up early at the request of Sam, Tony's neighbor who will be doing the bulk of the reconstruction. Sam wanted to get up early to get to Home Depot to pick up a front and back door for the house, along with all the supplies needed to get those doors in. I hadn't officially met Sam yet. But I knew I'd like him when we all piled into the car and one of the first things he said was 'are you going to drop her off somewhere?'

First impressions are lasting, buddy.

Despite all that Sam seems, well, he seems sketchy to me. We picked up the doors and a new set of locks. To get the work done in a timely manner, Tony gave Sam one of the keys. I'm not very happy about that. We agreed that when he was done we're going to change the locks. The front door we picked out os really pretty. And I'm overwhelmingly happy that we are going to have something in the house that isn't trashed and ugly.

As if my body decided to play some cruel joke on me, I wasn't feeling at all like working. I really wanted to get those cabinets out, but I was feeling so sore and tired that I didn't want to work. And I was pissed at Sam for being arrogant too. So I went home, feeling like a stupid weak little girl.

Anyway, Tony stayed and he said the new door looks very nice. I'll put up a picture when I get back over. We're getting up at 10 AM tomorrow to put in the basement door. Yay, another early day.

Living Room Ceiling

The first goal of the week has been accomplished. We got the living room ceiling de-nailed tonight. The bad news (seems like we get a lot of it) is that it looks like at least two of the cross beams will need to be replaced. They are pretty rotted. Not, we're-worried-about-the-beams-falling-on-our-head rotten, but they should be replaced while everything is down.

While we were working Tony leaned against the retaining wall in the living room and it shook a lot. The thing is pretty loose. One good whack with a sledge hammer should take it down. All the better for us. I guess that leaves this weekend to get the cabinets out and the map drawn. Shouldn't be too hard.

Two Rooms Complete

Yesterday was a short day. I started to take out the kitchen cabinets but had to stop. Some genius ran electric wires right through two of the cabinet shelves. And I mean, drilled a hole in the shelf and there's electric lines running right through the wood. So I had to stop because I had no jigsaw to cut it out. The rest of the short day I took down slightly more bathroom wall. But I ran into a snag there too. The majority of the remaining wall is right behind the sink. We need to disconnect it to get the vanity and the wall out.


Though yesterday was a good day. We finally finally figured out a floor plan that we can both agree on. We've had a few people now tell us that doing a great room would be a good idea, so the living room, kitchen and dinning room would just be one big room. I didn't like the idea at first, mainly because there would be a big goofy chimney in the middle of the room. But once I started thinking about the idea it grew on me. The house is going to look smaller once we put walls back up. So why make the already small house seem smaller. Plus, with a great room we can have a bar. Yay! Here's the new layout.

So the areas would all be pretty much the same, but no walls and no pantry. I think we'll put in a pantry area in the basement with the freezer. We're going to brick up the chimney so the ugly cinder blocks aren't showing. And the front part of the house is going to be cathedral ceiling. The bar back will be regular height.

Today we took down the ceiling in the bedrooms and the hall completely. Now the bedrooms are done. And I mean done. 'What's left to demo in the bedroom?' 'Nothing, because they're done, baby!'

During the week I re-discovered a valuable tool for this project, the library. I checked about a few books on house design. Some of them have some really good ideas on projects. I'll post them as I go along.

We don't have that much demolition left: finishing the bathroom, taking down the hall closet frame, taking out the nails from the ceiling of the kitchen and living room, taking down the cabinets and taking down the retaining wall on the living room. We are estimating about two weeks of demolition left. Then we can actually start building. Happiness. Tony's going to call Mike this week about the electric work and show the house to Sam, the guy we are going to get to put the dry wall up. I'm very excited about making the place pretty!

Puzzling Plans

Today I worked alone since Tony had school work to do. I took down some of the walls in the bathroom because I didn't feel like crawling around in the ceiling alone. I didn't get to the wall behind the toilet because it looked complicated with all the plumbing. But the rest of the walls, that won't leave the bathroom totally exposed, are down. BTW for those keeping count there were 4 layers of wall covering in the bathroom: black & white tile, pink/yellow paint, (then a sheet of dry wall), vinyl faux pink tile and finally flower wall paper.

We discussed the new hypothetical floor plan suggested yesterday and decided that though the kitchen would be very nice there, the living room would be too long, narrow and hall like. We spent a hour or so throwing out crazy ideas. So far we've come up with nothing concrete, a few maybe's. Its frustrating. I know I want to fix that funky window and have standard sized counters. And the chimney is in the middle of everything, screwing it up. I just want the problem solved.

If we are taking down wall frames, we are going to need another dumpster for old lumber and to take out the cabinets. So that'll happen eventually. I'm going to spend tomorrow trying to think of a floor plan. This puzzle has kept me awake trying to figure out a solution.

Feel free to sketch any ideas, if you feel like it. Here's a diagram of the unmovable walls:

My Scary Day With the Ceiling

Have you ever played that game 'Don't Break the Ice'? That was my day today.

The mission of the day, get the ceiling down. At first we started picking up the insulation from the attic (this stuff was not the pink roll, btw, it was like stuffed animal fluff). There was a slight problem with this plan, though. The attic doesn't even have enough room for even little old me to stand in at its tallest and tapers smaller. So we were crawling on potentially unstable boards, hitting our heads ever other second so scoop the insulation up. Oh, and there was a double whammy to the insulation too. It was hot out that day, so short sleeve shirts were the most comfortable. But the stuff was itchy to the point of irritating. Uncomfortable one way or another.

It didn't take us long crawling another and causing ourselves brain damage for us to form another plan: just knock the ceiling down with insulation and pick it up on the floor. Now imagine yourself sitting on piece of ply wood suspended on boards that are ten feet in the air. You then do the smart thing and start hammering at the dry wall beneath you, the only thing that may keep you from falling if you accidentally slip or the ply wood breaks. As you watch the ceiling fall out from under you, you do what all experts tell you not to do in this situation, look down. Fun times. Btw, for those of you wondering, the climb up to the stair-less attic, not very fun either (well you get used to it after the first few times).

On the way back from lunch we encountered (by encounter I mean he was driving by and saw us renovating and thought to offer his services) a guy named Bill. Bill is a kitchen guy, but from the way he was talking he was a whole house guy. He threw out a bunch of crazy idea, basically changing things for the sake of changing them. He wanted to add two more sets of doors and move windows. I didn't care for it much. but he did come up with a good floor plan, which I will illustrate below:

The black lines are unmovable, blue are the current walls/fixtures and red would be the future walls.

After a day of work we got the living room and the kitchen ceilings done. We still have a third of the house to go. I don't know if we are going to be able to fit it into the dumpster or if we will have time to get it done.

View the March 8th Album here.

Clean Up

Today we had very little time so we just cleaned up the living room. We took the nails out of the living room walls and dumped a half a dozen more trash cans of dry wall into the dumpster. We got all of the walls down except for one little piece of living room dry wall above one of the windows. It mocks me.

The wood under said window is rotten. It looks like someone left the window opened in a storm (or twelve) and water got in. Its going to need to be replaced. Thankfully its the only piece of rotten wood we've found so far.

So what we have left is to get the ceilings down and finish the bathroom. We're hoping to at least get the ceilings this weekend while we still have the dumpster.