The House Work Resumes

So we decided we took a long enough break. We started working on the house again last weekend. Hubby did a lot of little odds and ends, one of which was to organize the garage a little better. It made a HUGE difference.


I spent the weekend working on the new office. We decided to move the office into what was going to be our guest bedroom. We decided we're going to install a shower in the half bath that's attached to the current office so that guests will have a private bath to use.


The new office had a white shelf going around half of the top of the room and a wallpaper border above it. I had to pull all the shelves down and then get the wallpaper down. I got a tip that fabric softner worked well to help dislodge the wallpaper. I also bought a little thing that pokes holes in the wallpaper so that the liquid would soak in.


I thought it would be easy since I'd removed some wallpaper round the window in the bedroom and it worked like a dream. This was a LOT harder. It took me the whole weekend to remove the wallpaper.

The last wall only came off in tiny pieces...

I thought I would have the wallpaper removed and the room painted before the weekend was up.


*sigh* I forgot to multiply the time I THOUGHT it would take by three!

Here I was almost done...I hate wallpaper!

New Dishwasher and Little Mookie

If any of you recall, when we moved into our place, the dishwaser didn't work. The bottom water thing didn't spin and the water didn't drain. We called our home warranty people (thank you again Kevin Dalzell) and had them come out to fix it. You know it's old when you're told your dishwasher is an antique and gross and the fix it guy would just buy a new one.

So we did! It's a Kenmore Elite (#3 on Consumer Reports - Thanks Tige for turning us onto Consumer Reports). It was a little expensive, but worth every penny. You can't even tell it's running it's that quiet. It even has a delay so you can program it to start later...We've had it since last Thursday and I love it!

Here's a few Little Mookie pics and a video. He's so stinking cute sometimes I can barely stand it!
I'm not quite sure why he does this sometimes, but rolling back and forth is amusing to him...


An action shot, he'd be so embarasses his butt is showing...

Introducing the Great Room

And it is done! I cannot tell you the joy we feel. We've been able to clear out the sunken room as well and get that set up. If you can't remember the before, go back to the Jamestown Court post from September (http://muscolinofam.blogspot.com/2008/09/jamestown-court.html)...all the before pics are there...
Every morning is full of excitement and wonder when we wake up to our new house.
There's still so much more work, but we're ready to take it on now that we've accomplished our first room...here we come yard!

The housewarming party is on November 15th, if you're in the area feel free to stop by...it's a combo housewarming and Dirty Thirty for me...I'm planning on wearing all black.

It's good to see Little Mookie enjoys the new set up just as much as we do!!!
Can I just tell you how comfortable the bay window seat is?

Ceiling Fan...

So the only thing that was holding up the Great room was the ceiling fan...what a pain for hubby! There's not crawl space access above the great room addition so he had to cut a hole in the ceiling to mount the bracket since the big beam was taken down and we couldn't hang the ceiling fan from that as it was originally.


Then he had to patch the hole which involved joint compound and spackling.


Then it had to be re-painted.


Then he could finally hang the fan.



We bought one of those remote controls so you can control it wirelessly and don't have to use those awful pull chains (I really don't like them!).


During the process we realized the receiver is quite large and has to be stored up in the ceiling...hubby had to cut back some of his beautiful patching job to mount it. He now has to spackle it back up. Luckily, he didn't have to cut much back.


Didn't he do a good job?

First Fire...

We cranked up the wood burning stove and then learned the flue was broken, the arm has come off...the smoke wasn't too bad, but no fires for us this winter until we get it fixed.

*sigh* and it gets so much colder in the new house than in Point Loma...we're talking 50's!

Almost there...

It's almost done!

We still have some small things to do here and there, but Saturday night hubby and I opened a bottle of champagne and drank the whole thing down and started moving furniture in. It had been 2 long months of blood, sweat, and tears, all built up to that one moment...and it was satisfying.

The installers have to come back this week and fix the hallway leading to the master bedroom. It's high in the middle and low on both sides (about 1/4 of an inch) and somehow they thought we wouldn't notice. So they have to come back, pull the floor up and then level it, prepare it, and then re-lay the floor. I feel bad because they have to buy extra supplies and eat the cost, but they should have done it right to begin with!

Hubby and I got nice and buzzed off the champagne and then started moving furniture in while we were drinking more beers. We're so grown up now, we spent a whole Saturday night doing this!

It's kind of hard to see it, but as soon as we moved the recliner in, Little Mookie jumped up in it. He's always got to be up in our business!

Once I hung the curtains, Little Mookie started exploring them...can you see him in this pic?I've hung the curtains (except for the center bay window since it needs some touch up paint). I'll post pictures next weekend of it completely done...here's some "in process pics" hubby took while I was gone...You're going to have to wait for the lighted "complete" room look early next week!

Our Floors!

I'm out travelling right now. I'm sitting in an airport in Omaha, NE waiting to get my little tush to Denver, CO. I won't be going home until tomorrow night. Not seeing what is going in my house is KILLING me!

The week did not start off very well. The installers were supposed to show up between 8 - 10 AM on Monday. I thought, "No problem. I don't have to leave for the airport until about 2:30 PM."

At 11 AM I called the flooring company to find out why there was no installer and no call. I was told they still had to pick up the supplies and then they would be right over. I told the flooring company if they couldn't be at my house by 2 PM not to bother because I had to leave for the airport. I also told them I wasn't very appreciative at the lack of communication. I'd had errands I could have run that morning instead of sitting around. They said they were sorry.


They showed up at 1:30 PM. Since it was so late, the tools were dropped off and they decided to start in the morning. They also tried to tell me removing the black tiles would cost extra. It would be an additional $60 an hour to do it. I told them I was told it was included in the price we were paying the flooring company. They told me I was mistaken. I made them call the company. I think they were scared of me at that point. I was about to be double charged and for those of you who know me well, there was no way in hell that was happening.


After that was solved, I tried to give them hubby's cell since I would be out of town and hubby had to stay to let them in in the morning and then head off to work. They said, "Don't worry, we'll be there at 8:30 AM." I tried to give it to them anyway, just in case. They told me not to worry.


Hubby called me Tuesday morning at 9:00 AM. No installers (obviously they were not THAT scared). He called the company and was given the excuse they were in traffic. I then noticed I had missed a call, no voicemail. I'm wondering if it was them.


Huby told them that he would wait and didn't get to work until after 10 AM that day. Hubby told them that this could not happen again with no call. Hubby has to work just like they do. Especially when his wife tried to give them his number and they refused. If they were late and did not call to work something out, then they wouldn't work that day, bottom line.


They were on time this morning...I'm kind of glad I'm not there to deal with it. I tend to lose my temper at people when they're stupid. That wouldn't be helpful in this situation since they have to finish installing the floor.


I also told hubby to inspect the work EVERY night. If there is something even slightly wrong, they need to fix it. I'm an anal person and if I don't think it's perfect, it will bother me for the rest of my life to the point where I will make them come back and redo the entire job because of my dissatisfaction.

I get it from my mom...

The Weekend Before the Big Wedding

BEFORE

AFTER

So our friend Tom is getting married this coming weekend. Many of you reading this may be coming to the wedding. We aren't going to end up having any guests...which is good because we still don't have any floors. We had estimates done this morning.
The cost hurts, but having it professionally done will make our lives so much easier. There's a ton of home improvement do it yourself stuff we'll be able to do over the coming years. Plus, we get to live in our house, FINALLY! The whole process is going to take about 5 days.
We're so close I can taste it! We had great progress this weekend. We really only worked on Saturday. MIL is leaving San Diego in about a week to head to Texas for the winter so we spent most of the day on Sunday with her. It was nice to have family so close to us again. Our friends are awesome and we're our own little family, but lately we've all been a little segmented from each other with different life occurrences.
We haven't made it this far with any help from Little Mookie. ALL of the doors are finally back up on the hinges (including our bedroom). As I had mentioned before, the bedroom doors had to be repainted dark brown since hubby did not like they way the white doors looked with the dark jambs (I did agree with him). Well, we've made it through painting 10 doors, 3 of them twice with no trouble (other than the hanging situation). On the VERY last door, Little Mookie decided to walk all over it and track his little paws through the house. Luckily you can only see it on the part that will be covered with the bamboo floors...You can't see it really well, but he has brown paint crusted to his paw fur now...the joys of pets.
This weekend brought the almost completion of the wall we took the panelling down from. We just need to put the window trim and bay window seat trim back up. MIL reupholstered the cushions for the bay window and even made some accent pillows for us. THANK YOU MARIE! She's even made some drapes for some windows, but we haven't put them up yet because we're thinking the floor install will cause more dust to fly around.

Look at those beautiful recessed lights and panelless wall! Hubby did such an amazing job. It may not be perfect, but we did pretty good for amateurs!

Also, here is a couple of random Little Mookie shots, he's so in love with himself all of a sudden it's ridculous. He will lay in front of mirrors staring at himself. Conceited much?
The other night, I woke up in the middle of the night and had to pee. Little Mookie was sleeping on top of me as he always does (hubby is so lucky he doesn't have to deal with a 15 lb cat on top of him every night!) and had to jostle him so I could get up. He sat up and looked at the window and saw his reflection. I think he was still half asleep and the sight of another cat reflecting back at him in the window scared him so bad that he hissed and then crawled under the bed. I laughed so hard I almost wet the bed! Hubby really missed out on that one...

So now we have nothing to do until the materials are ordered and the floors are layed...well, I take that back. We need to start looking at toilets (since we only have the one working) and make the warranty claims on the dishwasher and oven that don't work, but I think we deserve to take some time off until the floors are done...we've earned it.

By the way, remember the up and coming dump in our back yard? Check it out now...lovely dark blue carpet roles, the panelling, and the carpet foam pads have joined the already gross pile. Those are our furnace covers leaning against the side of the house. We're going to paint them. Who knew that was possible?

Slowly progressing, VERY slowly!

I can't believe I finally found this picture...this is our neighbor. The house no longer looks like this, but the first time we viewed the house, this is what was on the garage door. This person was about to lose his house. The next time we went after this, a new note that said A Chritian lied to me. No, I didn't forget the 's'. He did. The next time we went he wrote a little 's' in the right spot. Classy. I wanted a picture of that, but the next time we went and I had a camera, it was painted over. Turns out the bank decided to work with him and help him keep his house. Not sure how thrilled I am that someone that would do this is my neighbor...

Soooooooo...as last seen hubby had removed the panelling from the far wall in the Great Room. This has taken some time. The glue holding the panelling to the wall was very difficult to remove. Hubby tried sanding it down and then I painted over it. On the lighter part of the wall it doesn't look so bad, but on the darker part where the windows are it looks pretty bad. I'm hoping handing the curtains up will hide it.

Hubby also pulled the ugly flourescent light down that the previous owners had installed above the bay window. He is in the process of installing 2 recessed lights and patching the dry wall (final pictures to come this weekend, hopefully).

The good news is, all the tile is up and half the carpet is up. We've stopped pulling the carpet up. That's what we're going to pay the bamboo installers for.

That's right, after all the time this has all taken, we've decided to splurge and pay someone to level and install the floors. It's a very expensive mistake to make if we don't get it right...and we don't feel the least bit guily about taking that project on ourselves.

I've been spending the past couple of weeks painting. OH! The door update. They've all been re-hung and close beautifully EXCEPT for the half bath door that leads into the half bath from my office...one had to be a brat. I don't know what we're going to do about this. But I'm happy my goof is only costing us one door and not ten!

I've continued my painting odyssey. We hung all the doors up and hubby decided he didn't like the door jambs Smooth Coffee and the doors Almond Cream. He wants the doors Smooth Coffee as well. So off they've come for re-painting (will this job ever be done?)...hubby has been really good and taken over the door painting. I'm so sick of painting at this point I'd rather gouge my eyes out than paint anymore right now.

It's just so tiring living in our bedroom only. When will we get to do the floors!?! Originally we thought it would only be 3 -4 weeks, but it's turned out to be 7 weeks and counting. I'd like to have the housewarming before the end of the year, but who knows!

The Weekend Update

This weekend brought a lot of progress, although we still don't feel like it...Tom is getting married in three and a half weeks and counting. We have several friends who will be flying in and would like to offer up a place to stay so we are kind of on a time limit at this point to get some of the things done.

First things first...the doors shut! For the most part. We have only put the foyer closet door, the full bathroom door, and the guest bedroom door on. Of these, only the guest bedroom and foyer closet doors close like they did before. Some of the full bathroom door screws still spin despite the #10 4 inch screws we used so we're going to have to come up with something new (darn me and my door experiments). The linen closet closes, but then randomly pops open. It's scared the bejesus out of me several times today!

Hubby took down the big beam running down the vaulted ceiling in the living room. When we purchased the house, the beam was falling down. It's only there for pure aesthetics, not functional use at all. After we bought the house, hubby pushed it back up and screwed it into the wall, but it had warped and wouldn't lay flush to the ceiling. Although we liked it, we decided to pull it down.

It made a big old crashing noise when it came down, very construction like. We thought it was a solid beam because hubby said it was so heavy when he was trying to push it up (I saw his ginormous muscles tremble at the effort), but when it came down, it was not solid. They made a casing and filled it with two by fours (which is what made it so heavy).

The only problem is, the crawl space in the attic does not go over to this portion of the ceiling. I think it's because there is no room between the roof and ceiling since it's vaulted. Hubby thinks it's just plain stupid.

So, in order to support our ceiling fan that we purchased, hubb will have to cut a big hole in the dry wall, install a support, patch it up, and then hang the ceiling fan. Good thing this all does not need to be accomplished to have people over! We can set up the living room whether this gets done in time or not...it has ended up on the bottom of the priority list for now.

I do have to admit, we're getting a lovely pile of junk in our backyard...1980's fans, yucky shelves, and panelling pieces. I wonder what will be next?

I got the trim in the Master Suite done (it came out wonderfully!), trimmed up most of my office (still have to work on the closet), and trimmed up the hall leading to the Master Suite.

Don't you think the green is much better than the peach? The door jambs and inside of the windows are done in what is called Smooth Coffee. Hubby thought of doing it in this dark color (there may be a little Queer Eye in him yet).

And yes, that's the door to our bedroom leaning against the wall covered in plastic. This was to protect it from the flying tile chips as hubby chipped it up from the hallway.

Hubby was able to get all the tile up in BOTH the foyer and Master Hall! Woohoo! We can now get the baseboards off, the carpet up and we'll be ready to order our bamboo flooring!

Another task that was accomplished this weekend is hubby took that nasty paneling off the wall in the Great Room! It has lightened up the room so incredibly much it's ridiculous. We can't believe what a difference it has made, what do you think?

This has been the easiest home improvement project yet. It took hubby all of two hours to get it all down (maybe less).

It seems who ever added the paneling, glued and stapled it on. We're going to have to buy wall texture in a can and try to cover it up. I swear this exists. It's a spray can and you just point and spray. We haven't tried it yet, but we'll let you know how it turns out.

Next on our list? Finish painting the Master Hall this week and then get that end wall painted so we can start the floor this weekend! Once the floor is completed we'll like we've accomplished something because we'll be able to finally get the living room set up and have company. It will be nice not to have to use our bedroom a living room too.

Then we have to buy new toilets and get them in (hopefully before our buddy's wedding so we have more than one toilet for guests. Hubby will then have to strip all the caulking in the Master Bathroom and re-caulk it so we can hopefully have more than one shower while we have guests.

While this is going on, I have to hurry up and pick some fabric so that MIL can make us curtains for the Great Room and possibly reupholster the cushions for the bay window.

Think we can get it done in time?

Here's a couple of random Little Mookie pictures from this weekend...he's trying to be sly and sneak out. Moving may have been bad, he's not as unsure of the unknown anymore and likes to explore a little too much. He's also fallen in love with the linen closet. Since the door pops open randomly, he has free access if he waits long enough and then he sneaks up on this shelf. I've almost locked him in a couple of times.

We also have a new rabbit friend. He appears everyday and hubby has named him White Rabbit. Reminds me of Alice in Wonderland everytime he says it...I just hope White Rabbit doesn't eat my plants when we get them all planted.

Hubby bought me a new hibiscus plant to go with the one in the yard (such a wonderful husband). I loved this one with the bright orange color and red center. I've never seen a hibiscus like this! We'll plant it when we start the yardwork, but it will live in its planter until then...

We're hoping to have our housewarming soon...hopefully in late September/early October...but may have to wait until after Tom's wedding.