A 2nd Roof Leak

Here’s the breakdown of our weekend:

Saturday night: oh look at that the drywall behind out TV is all wet and the floor has a pool of water on it. The roof must be leaking on the other side of the house now. In a panic I call my parents and Tom starts calling around to borrow an axe. My parents volunteer to come over and help (at 9pm on a Saturday!), Tom leaves to go purchase an axe. After a couple of stores with no luck (walmart: we do not sell axes as they could be used as a weapon…right then), Tom resorts to borrowing one from his grandparents. In the mean time, my father has spent ½ an hour on the roof clearing the snow and the axe is no longer needed. We decide to call it a night.

Sunday morning: My parents and brother head over to help with clearing the roof off. This becomes a long undertaking due to the massive ice damns that have formed on our gutters. About an hour in I get sick and spend the rest of the day on the couch. After many hours of chopping and shovelling, they caulk the area above the leak and call it a day.

The saga will continue in the spring when it is warm enough to properly assess the damage to the roof. Winter has been tough on our back room. I choose to think we have been blessed as the damage is in the form of a cross ;) Tom just worries and anticipates the mess replacing the drywall will be.

And now we know: we seem to have an insulation problem, as in not enough, that is contributing to the downfall of our roof. I see roof repairs in our future.

New Sump Pump Installed

Pretty spiffy! The old one’s float was too high and didn’t turn on soon enough….plus it was really old.

And look at those lovely PVC pipes!

And now we know: this was a lot cheaper than we predicted, closer to $200 when we estimated $500. Excellent.

Assembling the Outside of the Dressers

Since the big cuts were done, I started building the outside box of the dressers. As the plan is to paint the finished units white, I went with glue and finishing nails then strengthened with screws. For Christmas I received a fun drill bit that creates a countersink hole and I finally put it to use.

Decided to build both at the same time…not sure if this is the way to go or if I should have completed one first to work out any problems…guess time will tell!

Corralling the Basement Chaos

The basement is out of control. Stuff is everywhere; tools, wood, summer gear, skiing equipment. You can’t find anything in this chaos.

So I spent family day cleaning it up. I put up an existing bookcase, sorted things into like groupings and organized all the tools. Doesn’t it look nice:

Light bulbs can now be found in one of these lovely clear tubs!

And now we know: I already new that cleaning would make working in the basement more enjoyable and I was right!

The Start of 2 New Dressers

We figure that people buying a house would want to have a dresser in the master bedroom. Probably a correct assumption, right? Currently we have 2 dressers in the 2^nd bedroom and can’t find a layout that suits us for moving one into the master. The best way to work dressers in would be to have 2 small drawer units as bed side tables. Furniture costs money, which we are trying to save and/or prioritize on ‘more important’ so I thought I should build them. Did I mention my husband was away on a boys weekend and I miss my mitre saw?

Here is the plan for the dresser (x2):

Total for the wood for both was about $100. The sides, tops and fronts will be solid pine. The drawers and back will be pine veneer plywood. So far all I got to was some of the cutting. Wood is so fun.

And now we know: a 4’x8’ sheet will not fit in my parents SUV. My brother is more fun to shop with for wood than my husband; he understands the importance of taking your time and selecting good boards.

Happy Valentine's Day Your Roof Is Leaking

On Valentine’s Day we had just finished dinner and were sitting in the back room watching an episode of Top Gear. I’m not sure what caught Tom’s attention, but he went to investigate and discovered paint bubbling on the ceiling in the corner of the back room. I slit them with a knife and water started pouring down.

After putting a bucket under the damage, there was nothing else we could do but stress and wait for daylight. A couple of days later, we were at home in the afternoon and Tom went up on the roof to clear off the snow. Two hours later much snow and ice was removed. He discovered an ice damn under the flashing where the roof of the extension meets the roof of the main house. Since this is pretty close to where the water appeared inside, we are assuming it was the cause.

Besides monitoring the situation, there is little we can do until the spring. At that time we can do some roof and drywall repair. How I’ve missed having a hole in my ceiling!

And now we know: there is always something with a house. This is fairly minor in the big picture; the roof is still in good shape there just needs some repairing done which we can do ourselves (that is ‘we’ including my lovely father and brother!)

Finishing the New Dining Chairs

The final step to the new chairs was re-upholstering the seat. I removed 2 layers of fabric and the stinky foam to get to the bare wood.Using the left over fabric and foam from the other chairs and many staples, the seats looked brand new. The new chairs are great, much sturdier that the other.

And now we know: the hard wood of the seats (wood veneered plywood) causes the staple gun to jam frequently causing re-upholstering to take longer than usual.