After over two years of work we're done and the house is for sale.
I'm not in town now or there would be a whole lot more pictures of how everything turned out, but the realtor we're using has a great photographer so check it out!
Saturday, January 22, 2011
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
Big Pictures Update
I've been hard at work and have nearly finished the back yard, main bedroom and kitchen. Here are the bedroom pics first, long overdue. All that remains is to clean the carpet.
The picture is finally in. Wish it was bigger, but it'll still do the job.
The mirror is the other thing we were waiting on.
The bed and pic from another angle. I like the high ceilings in there.
Just another angle, looking towards the bathroom.
I sat here for a while trying to think about what would go into a how-to for installing mosaic tile as a backsplash, but there really isn't much to it. Basically you just put thinset on the wall, kncok down the ridges with the flat side of the trowel and put it up. I like to sort of roll it up from the bottom working up because it goes on a little straighter. If you don't knock down the ridges you'll see some of them in the corner of the glass tiles.
Here's how it came out. I don't use anything fancy on the stainless appliances to keep fingerprints off. Just furniture polish.
Here's how the breakfast room came out with furniture in it. Not sure if I've already posted one from here.
And the back yard. Here's what it looks like now that I'm almost done. The squirrels are loving all the fresh mulch because it's easy to dig in, and hating the fact that all the nuts they buried are now 4 inches deeper than they were a few days ago. Tomorrow or Friday I'll trim the bushes that survived the back yard renewal project. It looks a bit bare, but keep in mind what time of year it is. It'll be ready for new plants come spring and protected from weeds by the mulch in the meantime.
The patio looks a lot better after being powerwashed, and with new furniture back there.
The picture is finally in. Wish it was bigger, but it'll still do the job.
The mirror is the other thing we were waiting on.
The bed and pic from another angle. I like the high ceilings in there.
Just another angle, looking towards the bathroom.
I sat here for a while trying to think about what would go into a how-to for installing mosaic tile as a backsplash, but there really isn't much to it. Basically you just put thinset on the wall, kncok down the ridges with the flat side of the trowel and put it up. I like to sort of roll it up from the bottom working up because it goes on a little straighter. If you don't knock down the ridges you'll see some of them in the corner of the glass tiles.
Here's how it came out. I don't use anything fancy on the stainless appliances to keep fingerprints off. Just furniture polish.
Here's how the breakfast room came out with furniture in it. Not sure if I've already posted one from here.
And the back yard. Here's what it looks like now that I'm almost done. The squirrels are loving all the fresh mulch because it's easy to dig in, and hating the fact that all the nuts they buried are now 4 inches deeper than they were a few days ago. Tomorrow or Friday I'll trim the bushes that survived the back yard renewal project. It looks a bit bare, but keep in mind what time of year it is. It'll be ready for new plants come spring and protected from weeds by the mulch in the meantime.
The patio looks a lot better after being powerwashed, and with new furniture back there.
Saturday, November 13, 2010
Office, Kitchen and Back Yard
Three areas, one update. First is the office. Finally after 2 1/2 years I've figured out a decent layout for the office.
It's kind of sad that it took so long, but at the same time it's great to finally have an office that I'm not embarrassed of. It's very minimal, and the only thing I can think of that would add anything would be a low bookshelf in the corner across from the desk; something maybe 3 feet high maybe.
Next the outdoors... a truckload of mulch came late Thursday afternoon that I got to move out to the back yard. Anyway this is what 10 cubic yards of mulch looks like. What you can't see is that it's about a car length from front to back. It took about 4 1/2hours to get it all back there. Needless to say I was tired the next day. Right now it's in smaller piles in the back yard waiting to be spread around where it belongs.
And the kitchen... the granite is in, everything is plumbed in and the backsplash is nearly up. It would be all the way up, but I didn't order enough. Hopefully it won't take long for another two sheets of the stuff to get here. Here's how it's coming out. This is all that's left to do in the kitchen so we're really close to the before / after post.
Tomorrow I'm going to work on the back yard and get back to work indoors on cleaning things up after it's dark out. We're nearly done with everything and it's been a long time working on all of this, but it'll all pay off soon.
It's kind of sad that it took so long, but at the same time it's great to finally have an office that I'm not embarrassed of. It's very minimal, and the only thing I can think of that would add anything would be a low bookshelf in the corner across from the desk; something maybe 3 feet high maybe.
Next the outdoors... a truckload of mulch came late Thursday afternoon that I got to move out to the back yard. Anyway this is what 10 cubic yards of mulch looks like. What you can't see is that it's about a car length from front to back. It took about 4 1/2hours to get it all back there. Needless to say I was tired the next day. Right now it's in smaller piles in the back yard waiting to be spread around where it belongs.
And the kitchen... the granite is in, everything is plumbed in and the backsplash is nearly up. It would be all the way up, but I didn't order enough. Hopefully it won't take long for another two sheets of the stuff to get here. Here's how it's coming out. This is all that's left to do in the kitchen so we're really close to the before / after post.
Tomorrow I'm going to work on the back yard and get back to work indoors on cleaning things up after it's dark out. We're nearly done with everything and it's been a long time working on all of this, but it'll all pay off soon.
Monday, November 8, 2010
The Great Outdoors
Since I don't have so much to do inside anymore I've been able to work on the front and back yard some. This is something I really should've done when we moved in, or maybe later that year when it wasn't over 100 degrees out for what seemed like every day until December. Anyway on with the show.
The front yard didn't need as much work as the back and I was able to take care of all of it in maybe an hour. Here's the before / after.
The back yard though - it's pretty bad. It's hard to convey the level of neglect it seems to have had since the 1990s, except for the grass anyway. Here's a short video of what it's like.
I spent at least 8 hours or so clearing it all out. So far all the overgrowth is gone except for the bushes next to the house. I hate to cut those down but they've become so overgrown it's impossible to trim them back and have them look even remotely normal within the next year or so anyway. The one fault I could find from what the original owners did was that they planted too many of them. Otherwise they made a wonderful layout that's given me a canvas to make something new from. The short trees have really matured well on their own.
Here's a brief count of things found so far:
Shoes: 1
Acorns 300,000
Beer cans from a nearby high school student or their friends: 1 (this one is on the house but any more are getting returned via their mailbox)
Lost dog toys from someone in the past: 2
Pirate treasure: 0
Huge broken pots that are now part of the landscaping: 1
18 year old RC Cola bottles: 1
I can't do as much when night falls so I go back indoors to pick up where I left off. So far the upstairs is nearly complete. Tomorrow it all will be, except for a couple of things I have to pick up at Target. By complete I mean absolutely nothing at all left to do. Staging, cleaning, building - it's all done. Here's how bedroom #4 and the hallway came out. Bedroom #3 from the last update is the room angling off to the right in one of the pictures.
The front yard didn't need as much work as the back and I was able to take care of all of it in maybe an hour. Here's the before / after.
The back yard though - it's pretty bad. It's hard to convey the level of neglect it seems to have had since the 1990s, except for the grass anyway. Here's a short video of what it's like.
I spent at least 8 hours or so clearing it all out. So far all the overgrowth is gone except for the bushes next to the house. I hate to cut those down but they've become so overgrown it's impossible to trim them back and have them look even remotely normal within the next year or so anyway. The one fault I could find from what the original owners did was that they planted too many of them. Otherwise they made a wonderful layout that's given me a canvas to make something new from. The short trees have really matured well on their own.
Here's a brief count of things found so far:
Shoes: 1
Acorns 300,000
Beer cans from a nearby high school student or their friends: 1 (this one is on the house but any more are getting returned via their mailbox)
Lost dog toys from someone in the past: 2
Pirate treasure: 0
Huge broken pots that are now part of the landscaping: 1
18 year old RC Cola bottles: 1
I can't do as much when night falls so I go back indoors to pick up where I left off. So far the upstairs is nearly complete. Tomorrow it all will be, except for a couple of things I have to pick up at Target. By complete I mean absolutely nothing at all left to do. Staging, cleaning, building - it's all done. Here's how bedroom #4 and the hallway came out. Bedroom #3 from the last update is the room angling off to the right in one of the pictures.
Sunday, November 7, 2010
Blinds - How to + One finished bedroom
It's time for a 2 part post... yeah I've been too busy to make a new post this week so now I have do double down on them. My apologies for some of the pictures turning out bad. I didn't realize there was a fingerprint on the camera lens until I was halfway through.
Part 1 is something that should help anyone out who inherits an otherwise good set of blinds that have a bad color of fabric (tape) they would like to change to something normal looking. From a cost standpoint it makes total sense because tape can be found for about $1/foot, if not less and it would easily run hundreds to replace the entire set of blinds. Materials came from Fix My Blinds. Anyway on to the how to.
First of course, you'll need to remove the blinds from the wall. You should be able to figure this part out on your own.
Next you'll need to remove the clip at the bottom of each piece of tape. Untie the knot in the string underneath the clip you just removed. Now you should pull the string up past the top slat in the blinds. Once you've done both of them you can now slide the slats to the left or right leaving the tape behind.
Remove one of the pieces of tape from the blind - you'll use this to measure your new one from. This part is VERY important so read carefully. In the picture below you'll see how there are pieces of fabric connecting one side of the tape to the other. These are what each slat from the blinds sit on. These need to all be the same from one piece to the next or else the slats won't be horizontal - they'll be crooked and look terrible.
What I did was measure from the fold at the top of the tape to the first piece of fabric and adjust my fold to make the distance the same from the old tape to the new. In the picture above one part of the new tape is folded and the other is not yet, and it's all lined up so the new pieces will match the old one as well as each other. It took me a while to figure this out and I'm saving you the trouble here. Lining things up like this will also help you to get the other end cut so the new tape won't be any longer or shorter than the old one as well.
Putting the blinds back together isn't hard, but before you get into that go ahead and give everything a good cleaning since it's easier now than it ever will be in the future. The new tape goes in like the old came out, and it's hard to go wrong here. Slide the slats in and thread the two pieces of string back through the holes in the slats. Tie it off at the very bottom, put the clips back on and you're done.
As a side note, if you've ever wanted to see what UV light does to fabric check this out. Once upon a time it was forest green just like the other side is. Tinted windows or solar shades in a hot climate like this are a good thing.
And on to the other part of this post - one finished bedroom. Where are the other two? Not quite there... I need to hang a mirror in one, and do some major cleaning in the main bedroom but they'll be up soon. The office is almost done; I just need to move the desk, hang a few diplomas and evict everything up here that belongs in the kitchen.
This is the room that used to be gold once upon a time ago.
For today I'm moving on to work on the outside. This is a house blog but the back yard needs attention and doing a transformation to the back yard won't take long and will make a real difference to this place. We're still on target for being 100% done with everything next Saturday if you can believe it.
Part 1 is something that should help anyone out who inherits an otherwise good set of blinds that have a bad color of fabric (tape) they would like to change to something normal looking. From a cost standpoint it makes total sense because tape can be found for about $1/foot, if not less and it would easily run hundreds to replace the entire set of blinds. Materials came from Fix My Blinds. Anyway on to the how to.
First of course, you'll need to remove the blinds from the wall. You should be able to figure this part out on your own.
Next you'll need to remove the clip at the bottom of each piece of tape. Untie the knot in the string underneath the clip you just removed. Now you should pull the string up past the top slat in the blinds. Once you've done both of them you can now slide the slats to the left or right leaving the tape behind.
Remove one of the pieces of tape from the blind - you'll use this to measure your new one from. This part is VERY important so read carefully. In the picture below you'll see how there are pieces of fabric connecting one side of the tape to the other. These are what each slat from the blinds sit on. These need to all be the same from one piece to the next or else the slats won't be horizontal - they'll be crooked and look terrible.
What I did was measure from the fold at the top of the tape to the first piece of fabric and adjust my fold to make the distance the same from the old tape to the new. In the picture above one part of the new tape is folded and the other is not yet, and it's all lined up so the new pieces will match the old one as well as each other. It took me a while to figure this out and I'm saving you the trouble here. Lining things up like this will also help you to get the other end cut so the new tape won't be any longer or shorter than the old one as well.
Putting the blinds back together isn't hard, but before you get into that go ahead and give everything a good cleaning since it's easier now than it ever will be in the future. The new tape goes in like the old came out, and it's hard to go wrong here. Slide the slats in and thread the two pieces of string back through the holes in the slats. Tie it off at the very bottom, put the clips back on and you're done.
As a side note, if you've ever wanted to see what UV light does to fabric check this out. Once upon a time it was forest green just like the other side is. Tinted windows or solar shades in a hot climate like this are a good thing.
And on to the other part of this post - one finished bedroom. Where are the other two? Not quite there... I need to hang a mirror in one, and do some major cleaning in the main bedroom but they'll be up soon. The office is almost done; I just need to move the desk, hang a few diplomas and evict everything up here that belongs in the kitchen.
This is the room that used to be gold once upon a time ago.
For today I'm moving on to work on the outside. This is a house blog but the back yard needs attention and doing a transformation to the back yard won't take long and will make a real difference to this place. We're still on target for being 100% done with everything next Saturday if you can believe it.
Sunday, October 31, 2010
Weekend Update
Nothing too exciting this weekend. I just spent some time staging bedroom #3 and #4, wrapping up all the upstairs bathroom work, and touching up paint in the office behind where the bookshelf was. I still have a lot of work in there; not construction but moving furniture and getting a chair. And moving out all the kitchen stuff that's waiting for countertops to show up but at least it's not anything hard.
Moving forward to next week I'll be up to more cleanup and grout sealing in the kitchen and main bathroom, then changing out the fabric on the blinds in the main bedroom from green to white. There will at least be a couple of pictures of that because I've never done it before and it seems like something really easy to do that can make a big difference for a room. I also need to regrout the fireplace surround and post pics of that with a writeup since it's another easy to DIY project. Most everything coming up this week is touch up work, then I'll move on to landscaping before long. I haven't posted any pictures of the back yard since 2008 so that should be good.
Moving forward to next week I'll be up to more cleanup and grout sealing in the kitchen and main bathroom, then changing out the fabric on the blinds in the main bedroom from green to white. There will at least be a couple of pictures of that because I've never done it before and it seems like something really easy to do that can make a big difference for a room. I also need to regrout the fireplace surround and post pics of that with a writeup since it's another easy to DIY project. Most everything coming up this week is touch up work, then I'll move on to landscaping before long. I haven't posted any pictures of the back yard since 2008 so that should be good.
Friday, October 29, 2010
Going from Linoleup to Tile - Things You Should Know
I'm done with the flooring in the bathroom upstairs - basically going from a linoleum (cruddy vinyl tile) to real tile. It's a pretty common thing for people to do but there are a few things that you have to keep in mind or else the whole thing will go horribly wrong.
First thing to think about - the whole floor will be close to an inch higher than it is right now. So if you look at the floor in a bathroom and think about what needs to go up you run into 2 things right away. The toilet and baseboards. Baseboards are pretty easy; pop them off, take the time to sand and paint them, and then put them back on once you're done tiling. The toilet on the other hand is something that gets overlooked and at first can look a lot harder than it really has to be.
On an earlier post I put up a picture of a closet flange
It sits on top of the floor and the drain to your toilet goes there. Now that you've decided to tile you're raising the subfloor (unless you're going on concrete) by installing cement board, plus the actual tile. The wax ring that goes on the toilet drain isn't going to fill that gap. Luckily they make closet flange extenders for this exact purpose. They install pretty easily - spread some wax on the surfaces to be mated and screw them in. Now you're ready to install the toilet.
The other thing you want to keep in mind when you go from linoleum to tile is the actual subfloor itself. If you're installing on top of a concrete surface you're good to go. Wood, like on a second floor / room above a basement or crawlspace takes a little more thought. First off in my opinion you shouldn't tile directly on top of typical oriented strand board (OSB). It'll just flex too much and your tile won't stand a chance. It'll crack and break. If you have a plywood subfloor you're doing better but only if the grain runs perpendicular to your joists. But the other part is, you need to consider what's below the wood. Rather than get into great detail about joist spacing and whatnot, just plug your information in here to see what you're good to install. When everything is set up right you won't have to worry about a thing. It's something you can really feel when you walk on it after a while. A good installation feels really solid - almost like a concrete subfloor. It'll last until you're tired of looking at that kind of tile and are ready for something else.
First thing to think about - the whole floor will be close to an inch higher than it is right now. So if you look at the floor in a bathroom and think about what needs to go up you run into 2 things right away. The toilet and baseboards. Baseboards are pretty easy; pop them off, take the time to sand and paint them, and then put them back on once you're done tiling. The toilet on the other hand is something that gets overlooked and at first can look a lot harder than it really has to be.
On an earlier post I put up a picture of a closet flange
It sits on top of the floor and the drain to your toilet goes there. Now that you've decided to tile you're raising the subfloor (unless you're going on concrete) by installing cement board, plus the actual tile. The wax ring that goes on the toilet drain isn't going to fill that gap. Luckily they make closet flange extenders for this exact purpose. They install pretty easily - spread some wax on the surfaces to be mated and screw them in. Now you're ready to install the toilet.
The other thing you want to keep in mind when you go from linoleum to tile is the actual subfloor itself. If you're installing on top of a concrete surface you're good to go. Wood, like on a second floor / room above a basement or crawlspace takes a little more thought. First off in my opinion you shouldn't tile directly on top of typical oriented strand board (OSB). It'll just flex too much and your tile won't stand a chance. It'll crack and break. If you have a plywood subfloor you're doing better but only if the grain runs perpendicular to your joists. But the other part is, you need to consider what's below the wood. Rather than get into great detail about joist spacing and whatnot, just plug your information in here to see what you're good to install. When everything is set up right you won't have to worry about a thing. It's something you can really feel when you walk on it after a while. A good installation feels really solid - almost like a concrete subfloor. It'll last until you're tired of looking at that kind of tile and are ready for something else.
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