A New Hall Closet

As the final step of our closet redesign, we installed a door from the upstairs hall into what used to be the master bedroom closet. This door install went a lot easier than the last 2. It was not a pre-hung door but it is also a lot easier to cut down the height of a slab door.

The inside required some drywall installation and patching, but at this point I am a pro at mudding. The hall and trim still need to be painted, but that is a job for when the windows can be left open.
And now we know: when you are cutting down the height of a door before installing it, it is just as easy (and cheaper) to buy one NOT pre-hung and assemble it yourself.

No More Bare Bulbs

The chandelier in the dining room was ugly. Brass with frosted glass shades, some ruffled edges and chain, not to my taste for sure. So I tried to improve it by removing the shades. My husband was not impressed; he questioned how bare bulbs could possibly be an improvement.And so we replaced it. On a day we were both sore from a Saturday spent installing hardwood for a friend. It only took an hour and it does make a big difference.

And now we know: if one spouse really hates something and the other wants to wait, best to just replace it, I mean the house is just going to suck all your money anyways, so why try to fight it?

Covering a Sofa

Since we are on a tight budget and I enjoy re-finishing projects, when someone offers me furniture I usually take them up on the offer. So when a friend was getting rid of their couch, I was willing to take it off their hands.

Another friend and I drove to Kemptville with my parents Subaru one Sunday to pick it up. It turned out to be slightly too large so my friend disassembled the top piece of the back and we managed to fit it into the car.

Upon returning home, my husband was not happy with me. He was horrified with the state the couch was in and stated that if I wanted to keep it I had to have it covered by next Saturday. (In telling this story to women married longer than me, they always ask; “and you listened?!?”)

So over the course of 6 days I re-upholstered the couch to a state of 95% completion. At the end of the week there was still some hand stitching to do, but he let me keep the couch.

It is good quality; oak frame and down cushions. Very comfortable as well.

And now we know: the husband does not have a lot of vision and does not always appreciate my thrifty ways of furnishing our home. He is usually happy in the end though.

A Final Wedding Present

A friend made us a beautiful stained glass window as a wedding present. She was in town for the weekend and installed it for us. It is stunningly beautiful.

Replacing the Ceiling Fans

The kitchen ceiling fan was on its last legs and needed to be replace. During a long stretch on a Sunday afternoon (4 hours total) we successfully installed a fancy new fan.

At one point during installation, believing the fan to be defective, we went to home depot and purchased a second identical fan. Upon later determining it was our error and not a problem with the fan, we decided to install it in the back room (much faster to install the second time)

And now we know: Just throw your time estimate out the window; 1 hour? Make that 4 hours…

A Place For My Shoes (or New Master Bedroom Closets)

Really the worst thing about this house is the bedroom closets. I have never seen any that are more poorly designed; the person who installed them must have been on drugs. In a typical closet the rod runs from left to right allowing you to see all but the clothes in the farthest corners. In these closets the bar runs front to back allowing you to see only one piece of clothing at a time.

For this reason, you would end up wearing on the first 5 items over and over as it was took much hassle to look any deeper. We ended up each taking a closet in the 2 bedrooms and I must admit that my clothes lived on the floor as it was easier to find them if they were not in the closet.

To remedy the situation, I decided to re-configure the master bedroom closet and build a new wall of clothes storage.

We spent one weekend (which ended up turning into 2 weekends) framing, dry walling and installing doors for the new closets. As it was our first time installing doors we purchased pre-hung ones thinking it would be easier. Unfortunately we had to reduce the height of the doors by 6 inches to fit under the slopped ceiling. Since there were recessed panels on the doors we had to take 3 inches off each end, so we had to re-install the hinges and handles anyways.

Other problems we encountered were: having to drill pilot holes to be able to screw together the framing, running out of screws late Sunday night, having to run down 2 flights of stairs to cut each piece of molding and framing. Also my skills at estimating timelines are greatly lacking. Each step took longer than I had planned for.

The final product is amazing. Each of us has our own space, we can see our clothes again and my shoes have a beautiful new home.

And now we know: seriously the right tools make a HUGE difference, like could have cut this project time by 50%. Just pay the extra to rent them and spare yourself the grief

Changing the Upstairs Toilet

Mysteriously more water suddenly started appearing in our bathroom. This time it was pooling around the toilet. We peeled back the ugly sheet vinyl flooring and discovered a soaked subfloor that smelled rank. It appeared to be rotting, which seemed to indicate a repeat problem.

Having already fixed the pipes and the caulking we figured it must be the toilet this time. So the night before our EcoEnergy follow up visit, we rushed out to Home Depot and purchased a low flow toilet in order to get the rebate. Installation seems easy enough and we flushed to test. Bad idea, water went everywhere.

Turns out the problem was not the toilet, it was the installation. The previous one was not re-installed properly after one of the plumber visits. So that was 150$ that did not have to be spent. The toilet is nice though J

And now we know: take out the old wax ring before installing a new one. If you put the new one on top of the old one, the toilet will leak.