The Good, the Bad, and the Crapper

Evidence of the plumber's work on Friday

A trip to the house on Friday revealed water in the toilets. Pretty exciting, I know. However, Friday night also revealed water coming through the kitchen ceiling (bathtub above). Not so joyous. We marked the spot and it doesn't seem to be spreading, so we hope it's not anything serious. I did stop packing things in the nearby cabinets in case they have to come down to fix the issue.

Stairs to basement- shelf along back wall finished

Other evidence of work showed that Rob and co. also worked on the stairs, balusters, railings, and the trim around the stairs, and John sealed part of the floor during the day. John was also over Saturday morning setting the footings for the side entryway. Plenty of happenings, but I kept feeling like it was all things that should've been happening last week, or perhaps Thursday at the very least.

No more worries about falling off the upstairs landing

side entry footings

I have to say, my master carpenter, Anthony, has been doing stellar work in the middle of the night. He cut a beautiful hole for our new sink and secured all the counter tops. I think he likes the fact that the new sink has such right angles- easier to cut the top for it!

Kitchen sink in and ready for the plumber

We've also started moving things over as much as possible. As I previously mentioned, we have to move out of our rental by the end of the month. We may not be ready, but at least our stuff can live in the new house in the rooms that are done (like the upstairs bedrooms).

Anthony and Kevin moving our stuff.

Kevin is a major trooper to help us move out in December and then back in again now.

He even brought his own beer this time.

After moving the washer/dryer out in December, Anthony and Kevin decided it was pretty heavy and called in a third helper, Dave.

It's a little extra work on both ends with this move because we have to be careful to keep our stuff at the new house out of the way of any workers, we have to restore the rental house to its exact previous glory, and we have to keep out a set of items for us to live off of wherever we end up until we can really move in. Fortunately this will be our final move!

Kevin has his own dolly.

I think that pretty much pegs you to help people move.

We're very grateful for this.

-J

The Kitchen Sink is Our Fat Lady

I think with house building it can't be over until the kitchen sink is in and plumbed, and ours is sure toying with us enough! Let's recap yesterday (Thursday 6/23):

This is where we left off two days ago.

The stairs are stained and ready for their railings and balusters.

Again the day started promising enough with a truck in the driveway. Rob, our contractor's "guy", was supposedly in the house doing his work on the stairs. Then *poof* he was gone by 9:30, although he did leave all the lights on. (Apparently he didn't have my parents growing up-always asking who pays the electric bills and reminding him to turn the lights off.)

So nothing happened for a while and then he came back an hour or so later, turned off the lights and left again. We later found out that he was taking himself to the ER because he hurt his ribs.

Since the house was empty I spent part of the day moving kitchen wares over to our new cabinets so that I could reset the rental kitchen to the way it was. That's the hard part about renting this "summer house". It came furnished and we had moved all of "their stuff" out of the way to use "our stuff". Resetting it involves studying the pictures I took when we moved in and trying to return it to its original state.

The DPW guys came back in the early afternoon and told me they'd pave their patch of torn up sidewalk/driveway near the street today or tomorrow. That would just leave another little patch that we would be responsible for repaving. I shared some brownies with them.

Anthony had some phone conversations and discovered that the kitchen sink and faucet had indeed not been ordered by anyone and that the upstairs bathroom faucet had been ordered with the wrong finish. Yes, we have tried to let other people take on tasks and do their own jobs, but really it comes down to if we want it our way we should just do it. Sooooo off I went to pick up the kitchen sink and faucet.

This picture was taken today (Friday 6/24/11).

Our new classy driveway.We are thankful for the whole thing being patched.

Yes, there are workers at our right now, including a plumber! Rob is also back to work.

Lots of activity over there, so although this post may be dismal, we can sill be hopeful.

We returned home to the entire hole in the driveway repaved and some pinkish floor stain around the edge of the utility room on the basement floor. It wasn't supposed to be pink. It was supposed to be tannish-gray. Also, concrete floor stain is nothing like wood stain apparently. It went on more like paint. It was not what we had intended at all. So we back-pedaled and went back to the idea of just sealing it and calling it done. Anyone need two cans of concrete floor stain?

Note the stain around the edge of the utility room. Even Natalie looks bewildered.

We spent the evening both moving things over and prepping the sinks and counter holes for the plumber. The first sink (a round one for the basement bathroom) went together so nice and easy. (That's why we were doomed...)

Round sink for downstairs bathroom/laundry area

Our just-purchased kitchen sink of course couldn't be simple. It was going to be really big in the space. Do-able? Probably. Ideal? Of course not. So we decided that a tomorrow morning run to Lowe's (they open at 6!) was in the works to try to find a more suitable fit, while still holding onto our criteria of me being able to hide dishes in a deep sink.

So with exactly one week before we have to move out of our rental house, I feel great strides were not made yesterday. Perhaps I should head to the basement of the rental house and see if I can find our tent so we'll have somewhere to live.

-J

Water Valve Wednesday

Somehow I knew in the back of my mind that ending the previous blog post with "full speed ahead" would just make us come to a screeching halt. You know, the kind where you're frowning at a huge hole saying to yourself, "I thought I was done staring at holes on this property" and wondering if it would make more sense to just go get what's left of your money, toss it in the hole, cover it up with dirt and call it all done. I don't think that would help get us any closer to actually getting into the house though.

The day started off promising enough. The stairs had been stained yesterday and there were floor people milling about this morning, although they weren't here long and I'm not really sure what they did. Then the Department of Public Works (DPW) came by to switch out the water valve, and that's where things got more complicated.

A full driveway first thing in the morning always holds such promise.

Apparently, a lazy predecessor neglected to follow the rules and bring their line the entire length under the driveway as everyone previously assumed. (Huh- more corners cut in the previous shack- imagine that!) Options were discussed, sympathies expressed, but really the only choice in doing it right was to call back our faithful excavator, George, to dig up more of the paved driveway to find where the other guys left off and correctly tie into that, so that the entire run would be the proper one inch plastic pipe.

At one point there were no fewer than 9 of us staring at the hole: the DPW guys, George's guy Mike, myself, John the contractor, and a couple of neighbors.

Fortunately George was just around the corner and was over within the hour with his cute red "digger".

George in the hole. John and 2 DPW guys look on. The blue is the new 1 inch pipe we're supposed to have (and thought we had), as opposed to the copper 3/4 inch one that's hidden under part of the driveway.

As our contractor, John, said today, "Nothing's ever easy." Not when you want it to be anyway.

Apparently the DPW guys will be back on Friday to pave their section over the sidewalk. I'm not quite sure what that means for the other section. To think, we had originally debated about moving the driveway, but changed our minds because it was fine and in good shape.

So that's that. It's switched. We've now got what the town considers a proper water line and a more-current-than-1940 valve, so we're ready to go. If there is a plumber at our house tomorrow, I will be very happy.

-J

Will Work for Lobstah

Too busy to blog these days, but at least that means that things are getting done. The stairs are being formed before our very eyes, and so far they look great. We're still in the town's work order queue to switch out our water valve, but we hear Wednesday could be our lucky day. The concrete basement floor staining and sealing is still a bit of a question mark, but we're hopeful that will be resolved this week as well. We're thinking Sandlot Gray for a color, but more importantly we're hoping it'll happen quickly.

Stairs being formed- note the picture printed out and taped up as a guide.

There are some tall places to paint in our house. Good thing Anthony is tall.

We brought in our personal labor force again this week. My parents arrived on Tuesday and the only times I've seen them put down their paintbrushes so far were to help me with school tasks (grading papers and packing up my classroom) and for Natalie's baptism and our Father's Day dinner. Anthony and the two of them have been working non-stop painting the walls, trim and interior doors.

My mom finishing painting the kitchen.

My dad: painting doors is back-breaking work.

The paint decision has been a bit scary, which it shouldn't be since it's probably the easiest thing in our house that we can change. I've been collecting and staring at paint chips for months now, and finally had to commit. Of course, just when you've made a decision someone (like the paint store guy, Ken) has to step in and tell you their dissenting opinion, like that your yellow is too bright. So far I'm really happy with most of the colors. However, I did end up back at the paint store on Saturday to let Ken know that he was right about my yellow and could he please help me lighten it? (He tried his best.) All in all though the paint is making the place feel more put-together.

Natalie in her first-try yellow room.

Anthony's family came in on Friday and his dad joined in the fun on Saturday while Mali, Jeanie, Natalie and I drove up to Ikea to pick up the final piece of countertop, which Anthony and my dad then cut and placed on Sunday.

Anthony's dad filling in nail holes. For the record I did offer him knee pads.

Full speed ahead!

-J

Who's Choreographing this Dance Anyway?

I was on the T last year when it was stopped for quite a while underground. I kept thinking I should've just gotten off at the last stop and walked a little farther (you gotta love hindsight- the only time I can claim perfect vision). The frustrating part was that I was in the front car and I could see the light at the end of the tunnel, but I couldn't do anything about the delay to help us get moving and on our way. Such are our feelings about our house right now. There are little things that are happening, but then there are things that we want to happen that aren't. We just need to get all our ducks in a row.

We'll start with the bright side for a run-down of the latest...

The view came into greater focus when the plastic came off the windows and the screens were put on.

Master Bedroom

The plumber has been in hooking up a jumble of pipes in the basement. I think Anthony's glad his part of the plumbing is over.

Stair parts are finally in and scheduled for the middle of this week. We've been told that part will go quickly, but we were told that about the trim which took FOR EV ER.

We've spent our time doing what we can to get things done. My favorite Anthony-project was crafting a stand for our vessel sink and faucet for the "Kamp bathroom". (Yes, if you give us things for our house we will name a room after you too.) I absolutely love how it turned out. The top is actually the old floorboards from the basement of the house we tore down.

View of mudroom entrance and "Kamp bathroom" with homemade vanity.

Our GE (plug for Jason) range and microwave arrived for the kitchen and Anthony is finishing the cabinet trim and toe kicks and getting things ready so that they can be installed. Apparently this will involve changing the plug on the microwave so it can go into Massachusetts' fancy outlets.

There is still one piece of missing temporary countertop. Remember about two weeks ago when I said the missing piece would be in stock in a week? Yeah, that didn't happen, and like a comedy show we have been running ourselves mad trying to figure out a temporary solution for our temporary top. We were set to go check out a craigslist option tomorrow when Ikea called and CONFIRMED (whatever that means) that it would definitely be in by next weekend. So we're taking our chances and waiting it out again. Which holds up the sink/faucet... But that's okay because it's already held up by the water issue.

Ahh, the water issue. The town won't let us have water until they change a valve. Apparently we're in the "queue" for this. I wonder when that will happen. Therefore we have toilets both in our dining room and our shed waiting to be installed as well.

Dining room with toilet parts and stair parts

It's okay, we can't really put the one in the shed in yet since the basement floor has not been etched or sealed yet anyway. That's why the vanity and washer/dryer for that bathroom are still in the rental house.

I'd be lying if I said we weren't getting anxious.

-J

The Beginning of the End

As both of our readers must surely know by now, we've had some issues with our floor. Over the past 4 months these issues have at times prevented us from knowing what types of wood floors could be installed over radiant heating, prevented us from planning the stairs and stair railings, and preventing us, our builder, the stair guy, the floor guy, the other floor guy, and the other floor guy's installer from having an enjoyable time talking about this process. I've not even mentioned the poor girl from Home Depot that we put through the ringer.

So, when a pallet of boxes containing 1400 square feet of lightly-stained, eco-core, engineered tongue and groove hickory arrived at the house yesterday morning and were quickly opened and utilized...it was very exciting.

Thankfully, the flooring installers did a great job: showing up early, leaving late, finishing a floor a day. Below are some pictures of the job in process and finished.