Weekend Update & WWL

I've decided to beef up the Monday post to include a general update and what we learned. Since our motto is: "A whole house renovation one weekend at a time" I should probably keep track of what we do over the weekend. :)

Memorial Day Weekend!

Projects in Progress:

• Sand and paint the side stairs turned garden
  
• Refinish night stand
  
  
• Plant final herbs

Projects Completed:

• Install new ceiling fixture in Kari's office
  
• Replace old dryer vent
  
  
• Demo Gitmo bathroom
  
• Cover Gitmo bedroom floor with paper to use for construction storage

Plans for the Upcoming Week(end)

• Final sand and stain nightstand, goal (6/6/10)
  
• Finish painting side stairs, goal (6/4/10)
  
• Measure outdoor cushions for recovering & order fabric (6/4/10)
  
• Finish touchup paint on MBR Ceiling

What We Learned!

1. The robin eggs hatched!!
   
2. The 2nd unused ceiling light fixture in my office isn't connected to the light switch. Currently the only way I can turn it off is with the breaker for the office.
   
3. We had mold downstairs, EW! (It's cleaned up now, don't worry.)
   
4. The windows downstairs are shimmed/framed in with sheet rock pieces and cardboard...awesome.
   
5. 3.5 days straight of renovation is exhausting!
   
6. The DC Zoo doesn't have giraffes and their elephant exhibit is under construction until 2011, lame.
   
7. The toilet and the sink in Gitmo work! Like a virgin...flushed for the very first time...

An unnerving phone call...

{text message beep}

Micheal: Hey, can you stop by HD on your way home and pick up some of the big lawn and leaf bags?
Kari: Sure

{Kari is in HD looking for big lawn and leaf bags}

{ring ring}

Micheal: What'cha doin'?
Kari: Walking around HD looking for bags.
Micheal: GREAT! I need you to get a small piece of sheet metal to patch a hole. And you'd better get two packages of the bags...yeah, I'll definitely need two packages.
Kari: What do you need the bags for?
Micheal: Sheetrock.
Kari: What are you tearing apart?
Micheal: You'll see when you get home.
Kari: {stifling sounds of panic} Okay...

To be continued...

Plants for the Shade

I am generally very overwhelmed about how to landscape my mess of a yard. Between the hills, the random bushes, the trees, the boulders and the endless weeds it's really difficult to come up with a plan.

So for the time being I said "screw a plan" and I just picked one small spot to work on.

One struggle with deciding what to do in this particular area is that it gets only about 1 hour of sunlight a day. I really wanted some colorful plants to put here but unfortunately without the sun there aren't many options. I knew hostas were are a staple plant for shady areas and when they went on sale at Home Depot last weekend I took that as the universe letting me know it was time to make a move.

We went to HD and picked up 3 hostas, 2 pretty flowered plants (I'll go outside to look up the name tomorrow) that are supposed to survive the shade, and two bags of Vigoro rubber mulch, made out of recycled tires. We chose this mulch because it doesn't have to be replaced every year, doesn't mold or break down, and it keeps old tires out of our landfills.

We didn't get enough of the mulch, so I'll be getting more but otherwise I'm really excited about it!

Before:


After:



It's my hope that the hostas will grow to camouflage the ugly old exhaust PVC pipe and the lovely window well covers that are currently bolted to the brick so not readily removable. I'm also thinking about adding some taller decorative grass in the back. What do you think? Would it be nice and add depth or would it make it too busy?

Some Clarification

I've gotten some feedback that would lead me to believe that my last few posts have been kind of confusing. I blame it on that whole "it makes sense in my head" phenomenon and not having more time to read over my posts before I click publish!

Clarification #1:

On Saturday we decided to suit Micheal up so he could begin the process of removing the old fiberglass insulation from the attic, hence the "alien suit." :)

Being the doting and concerned husband that he is, he was pretty adamant that I not partake in this part of the process so he tried to go it solo. This lasted for about 15 minutes before he decided that him baking in a cloud of fiberglass fog for the next 3 weekends was not high on his list of fun things to do. Enter our search for the insulation removal company:


Clarification #2:

This cutie-patooty...

...was at her grandma's house this weekend and after some urging from her older brother decided to jump out of a swing. She may have fractured her elbow. I was trying to poke fun at my brother in the WWL post because he talked me into all kinds of things when we were young.

Hope this helps, if there was anything else that left you saying...HUH? Let me know!

What We Learned this Weekend

1. Our weed whacker wasn't broken...just lazy. And still is lazy.

2. Always check to make sure you have kitty food before you start partaking of the adult beverages for the evening.

3. It takes us about an hour walk to make the 1.2 mile trek to the Safeway, buy Fancy Feast, and get home. (Don't drink and drive people!)

4. It's okay to admit defeat.

5. While those peat pots that plants come in now are biodegradable, they stunt the growth of your plants. But also make it really easy to replant in the early stages as the roots are all still in the pot.


6. You should never listen to your brother (I think Olivet would agree with me.)

This is my awesome brother Jason acting like a spazz on Christmas. My niece Olivet, acting on behest of her older brother Ezra jumped out of a swing this weekend fracturing her elbow.
Doesn't he just look like trouble? ;) I could have told her big brothers are just always out to get ya...

7. A little landscaping goes a long way!

You gotta know when to hold'em... [edit]

...and know when to fold'em

Below is what I posted as Micheal was heading into the attic:

---

I just locked my husband up in what can only be described as a heated death trap...but he's well prepared!




Wish us luck!

---

An important part of DIY is knowing when a job is out of your reach and being willing to call for help. While it would be humanly possible for us to do it...it would take days and days, bags and bags, and gallons of sweat. So instead:



Our friend Kevin is coming out to give us a quote on using their big vacuum truck to suck it all out next Saturday! On to bigger and better things...

What We Learned this Weekend

What a beautiful weekend!! The first weekend in a long time with perfect weather and we took advantage of it. We mowed the ENTIRE lawn - didn't even skip any of the hard spots like we normally do! I worked on the infernal door and made progress and we also hung the curtains in our bedroom - all in all, a great weekend.

So here's what we learned:

1. Always keep back-up forks for when you've used all your "matching" silverware but the dishwasher isn't full enough to run.

2. We've got some new family members at F2F!


3. Our neighbor's idea of lawn maintenance is to weed whack the REALLY tall spots. The rest is - ah-nat-u-ral.

4. New tools are awesome.

5. The thrift store by my house puts the other two we visited to shame - orange fondue pot, Scattergories and Connect 4 all for $13!! (The Scattergories is for me the Connect 4 is for when I grow up and become a real child therapist.)



6. I am always amazed at the amount of furniture people are buying when we go to IKEA. I've never gotten the whole IKEA "craze," while I like their accessories their furniture to me is an enigma. Either it's SUPER cheap and lasts all of a year or it's expensive...and still really lasts for only a few years, maybe more if you treat it really well.

7. Side ponytails are coming back!!

8. It's much harder to get things done on the weekend during the summer because you have to mow the lawn too!

Major Project #1 - Remove and Replace Insulation - May 22nd/23rd

Up to this point we really haven't undertaken any MAJOR projects. Those major barriers of time and money have kept us to smaller renovations and projects. The task of removing the old disgusting fiberglass insulation in our attic and replacing it with nice green blown cellulose has been a long time coming but is very daunting.

A lot of people simply blown in the new insulation over the old - however, this insulation is very nasty, has mold in it, and causes Micheal to have breathing problems when he goes into the attic so we're just getting rid of it altogether.

The product we're choosing to use is GreenFiber blown cellulose insulation:



You use this blower/hopper to blow the insulation into your attic:


(Image from About.com: Garages and Storage Spaces)

Home Depot regularly offers the rental of the blower for free if you purchase $200 worth of insulation - as luck would have it, it will take about $200 to do our entire attic, SCORE! We're wanting to do this before it gets too hot, to help with our A/C bills and so we (and by we I mean Micheal since I'll be manning the hopper) don't sweat to death doing it.

We will pick up the insulation this week, and are planning on completing the project on the two weeks from now! Hold us to it because this is one that NEEDS to get done!

What We Learned this Weekend

Hmmm.....this is going to be a tough one. We got a bit done but I don't think we messed anything up!

1. Sometimes retail therapy helps, sometimes you just walk out of the store with a bunch of random junk and still feel like crap.

2. Always have a back up can of spray paint.

3. Maryland allergy season SUUUUCKS.

4. The Easter Market in DC was pretty cool, good vegetables although we'd probably drive next time. We spent more time on the metro than actually at the market!

5. Our shower needed to be cleaned...bad...(I'll leave it at that)

6. That only SyFy movies with one word titles are worth watching, like "Mosquito" or "Manbearpig" (hehe) but if there are two or more words in the title go ahead and keep flipping (Example one: Death Worms, not good)

7. Working with imperfect materials makes for imperfect measurements. But there is beauty in imperfection right?

8. When trying to buy someone a gift just think of what they would buy themselves if given the opportunity, don't make it complicated. Take my mom - I can always buy her books, baskets or candles. They may not be the most creative gifts ever but they always put a smile on her face!

Using Salvaged Materials to Build a Garden Box

As I have previously shared, the landscaping in our yard is generally a mess. We actually mowed this weekend, so we are no longer the embarrassment of the neighborhood but dealing with the larger issues of hills, landscaping, shrubs, is still beyond our current scope of time and money. (And sadly I was confused about the entry period for Most Desperate Landscapes, entries had to be in my some time in January. Sad.)

In light of all the major issues in our yard, my hopes of finding a space dedicated solely to a happy little garden are were quickly waning. So I decided instead to make myself a portable garden to put on our unused side porch with all the leftover building marterials we have laying around the basement!

I'm very excited about this project and have claimed it as my "own" Micheal is helping me with a few cuts but otherwise I have deemed him "hands off" because I want to see what I can come up with. (I hate ending a sentence with a preposition...)

The extra materials we have laying around are several 2x4s from tearing down the extra wall in the utility room:


Extra old shelf boards from the closets:


And some extra 1x1s and 1x2s from the front door/window fiasco:


Brainstorming using these materials I came up with the following plan:

Six 2x4s as the base
Three 1x2s to secure the 2x4s together
Four shelf boards as the walls
Two 1x1s to lift the structure so it can drain appropriately

Here is a sketch of how to assemble the first layer:



Step 1: Measure the space you want to put your box, mine was 4' by 3' so I cut my 2x4's to 4' and cut enough to reach the 3' width, for me with spacing that was 6.

Step 2: Measure your 2x4s and cut to length. Spacing between boards is so that water will be able to drain. Set boards out to your desired width and spacing. Use a straight edge on the cut ends to get them lined up.

Step 3: Measure your 1x2s to the final width of your box (as shown in the picture) cut three 1x2s to the width.

Step 4: When your 2x4s are square and ready to go, screw the 1x2s across the 2x4s starting with the outside boards. One on each side and one in the middle. Continue to re-adjust the boards to square as they will move while until they are all attached to a 1x2.

This is what I have so far:

Ignore the right side, that should also be a 1x2 at the edge like on the left and in the center. I mistakenly used really hard wood (see the WWL post from Monday) and had to supplement with some other wood to finish securing it.

More to come as I continue to build!

Refinishing a Louvered Door...

...what was I thinking?? Oh right, I'm an emotional sap and I'm cheap. Okay, then I figure I need to finish what I started right? I might need some encouragement though, this project is getting the best of me.

This is what I started with:


I took it down and sanded one side with a power sander:


I decided to try a different technique on the other side to see which was most effective. Paint stripper. Generally I HATE paint stripper, and this trial has proved to be no different. I opted to use Citri-Strip, it is a citrus based non-caustic stripping agent.

We put it on and left it for about 1-2 hours, some areas came off great and some not so much. It seemed to be very much related to the amount of stripper put on and how long it stayed moist. I started out using a rubber scraper as suggested by the stripper but it wasn't cutting the mustard so I went with the ancient metal tool we found in the woods and it worked much better. :)




Eeeww....so much nasty old paint.

I got to this point and then quit for the day as it was getting dark. I then learned the lesson that the effects of paint stripper actually wane and it kinda resticks. So annoying. Needless to say when I started working on it again last night it did not go as smoothely.



So I'm going to generously reapply the stripper this afternoon and try to get the rest done today!

What We Learned This Weekend

I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend! We were working on record highs in DC/Maryland so it definitely warm but I loved every minute of it! I still haven't gotten my dissertation back from my advisor yet (yay!) so I've been making progress on some projects, so updates and pictures should be coming your way this week!

What we learned:

1. Paint stripper is not a safe alternative to eye makeup remover.

2. Using a citrus based stripping agent will either make you crave an orange julius or make you never want to have one ever again.

3. There must be a bird seed beacon in our back yard! It took literally 30-60 seconds after we filled the feeder for them to start swarming. How do they know?!

4. We should mow the hill first then the rest of the yard.

5. Someone is moving in across the street! Yay!

6. It is really hard to put a screw directly into hard wood, I should have pre-drilled first. (Micheal already knew this...I guess I should have listened...)

7. I should really write down things over the weekend because I know I had more than this.