Month: March 2010

This weekend Ryan’s Dad came out to help us tile the bathroom. This means that Mark tiled the bathroom while Ryan cut tile and I watched. I’ll let the photos speak for themselves.  Friday night we started on the shower and when we woke up on Saturday, Mark was already back at it.

After lunch it was back to the shower – and it was finished up very quickly. Then on to the wall tiles.

By dinner the walls were about halfway done so we went out for a bite to eat.

When the dark tile was complete Mark started in on the decorative pattern across the top. Here is the detail laid out.

Before bed Ryan cut some floor tile in half so the floor could be started in the morning without delay.

On Sunday when we got up Mark had been back at it again.  The wall details were complete and the floor was half done.

The floor by the door was not level enough so we got some self-leveler to even it out a bit.  We have to wait 24 hours before we can finish tiling – maybe this week we’ll finish up the tile.  We’d also like to grout around where the toilet will go in so we can install it this weekend.

Well it was a late night at work last night – I didn’t get started working on the house until 9:30.  But I got the bathroom sanded and primed!  There are a couple of spots I will touch up but it’s ready for tiling!  I can do the touch ups today and probably even hit them with primer.   This is the only room that won’t have crown molding so most of the touch ups are in the ceiling corners.  Plus they are really hard to sand.

So here is the progress I made last night:

Spackling is officially done!  (except for touch ups).  I finished up spackling the bathroom last night and I’m pretty happy with how it came out.  Then I started sanding the gym.  Got one and a half walls sanded and my arms felt like they were going to fall off.  Tonight I’ll sand the bathroom and get it primed hopefully.  Maybe Ryan can sand the gym tonight.  The bathroom is a little tight to have 2 people in there 🙂

When I couldn’t take the sanding anymore, I got the dust vacuumed up and set up my trim stripping station.  I got a couple rosette’s stripped and cleaned up.  This is what I’ll be doing most of the weekend while Ryan and his dad tile the bathroom – stripping trim.  But I can wear my headphones and listen to my audio book so I’m happy.  If the weather is nice I’ll set up out on the porch so the smoke detector doesn’t keep going off 🙂

One more busy night to go!

And it continues – I had to work a little later tonight (8pm) and Ryan had a town meeting tonight but I got in an hour and a half spackling.

The bathroom second coat is done and the gym ceiling is officially ready for sanding! One more coat on the bathroom tonight and I’ll start sanding the gym.

We’ve gone through 2 5gallon pails of joint compound doing these rooms.  Monday night I picked up a single gallon pail which is almost gone – I think it’s just enough to finish up the bathroom tonight.  So 11 gallons of joint compound to do 3 rooms!  That worked out well.

We’re keeping the momentum going. Now that the plumbing has been tested, we can spackle the bathroom. We’re hoping to tile this weekend if Ryan’s Dad can come out so we’re trying to get the drywall part of the bathroom spackled, sanded and primed before hand.  We’d prefer not to get spackle on the new tile 🙂

So that means a couple of nights of spackling and a night of sanding and priming. Last night I got the first full coat done in the bathroom and Ryan spackled the gym ceiling.

One more coat on the gym ceiling and 2 more coats in the bathroom to go! We need to pick out some paint colors soon.

What a great weekend we had – we are both so exhausted.
We really have a great family, everyone came out to help work on the house this weekend and we couldn’t thank them enough for the work they did.

First up is the plumbing – Jason and Aimee finished up the plumbing for the downstairs bathroom. The pex is now all connected to a manifold and the drains connect up. He even turned on the water to test it out and no leaks!

Next up is stripping! Ryan’s sister Maribeth came out Friday night and stayed through Sunday morning. She spent Saturday stripping the moldings for the tvroom. She got 5 of them done and they came out great.

My Dad patched up the tvroom floor with the new flooring we bought.

Eventually we will refinish the entire room’s floor so it will look more uniform but for now we’re enjoying having a full floor!
We also took out the radiator pipe since we’re going to switch to radiant heat in the future and Dad patched up this section with some of the old boards he pulled up that will be under our builtins (we replaced that area with plywood.

[note to self – get “after” picture] 🙂

On Sunday we all got an early start (so everyone could go home at lunch time). Jason hooked up the plumbing and Dad started work on the windows. First he built us some new sills.

Then he built some jam extensions for all the windows and the exterior door in the tvroom so when we have all the trim ready to go up we can just attach it!

And while Dad and Ryan worked on window trim I continued the never-ending job “stripping trim”.

And the weekend didn’t end there (although everyone I’m sure was very happy to leave after lunch) 🙂 I cleaned everything up and then started back on the spackling projects.
I got a coat on the ceiling in the gym and finished up the corners (got a coat on the corners Saturday morning as well).

Then I taped the bathroom. I used this fiberglass tape that adheres, it’s great, I stuck it all on there and then spackled over it. It went very quickly.

Now it’s time to relax with a cup of tea and go to bed early. The house is clean, my feet are sore and after 5 trips to Home Depot and 1 trip to Lowes I’d say we had a very complete weekend!

Last night marked 10 years that Ryan and I have been together.  And what better way to celebrate than to work on the house 🙂  Ryan worked on the shelves in the basement wednesday night after picking up more wood and needed an extra pair of hands to finish it off.  So we finished up the shelves after dinner and put the plywood on them!  Then I moved a bunch of the extra trim we are saving onto one of the shelves to make room in the basement for Jason this weekend.

We got a lot done this weekend – and quite a bit of relaxing time too so the weekend stretched out nicely.

Friday night Ryan helped me spackle the ceiling so we got the seams all taped on the ceiling (and 2 of the ceiling corners). Then I got the first half of a coat on the wall corners and a second coat on the wall seams.

Saturday we went shopping for the plywood for the built ins! There’s a lumber yard in Brentwood so we drove over there, got the plywood and checked out their hardwood supply. We’re going to order the hardwood in bulk (500 board feet) but the plywood we only needed 10 sheets so we picked that up and rushed home before the rain! Then we headed over to Brookline with our moldings to see if they could replicate them for us. Luckily for a knife fee they can! So we left that with them and plan to call in an order for the exact number and lengths of boards we need for moldings.

Finally we ended with a trip to home depot to get some wood to build some shelves in the basement to store our new plywood. Unfortunately by now it was raining so it was a rush home and unload job for sure. We spent the rest of the day in the basement, Ryan building the new shelving unit while I cleaned up the basement so I could help out when he needed me.

Saturday night I also got another coat of spackle done – I finished the wall corners first coat and got a third coat on the wall seams and screws so the wall seams are now finished and I just need to get the corners and ceiling done!

Sunday we headed out shopping again – this time for some suits for Ryan and jeans for me. Then once home I set up the tvroom to strip the moldings/casings we plan to reuse. They are very detailed but I finally got a system together that is working out well. I even have some pictures of the “finished” pieces – I got 2 pieces done – I’m not even going to say how many we need to do total!

See – LONG weekend. I also finished my book this weekend – “The Dead Travel Fast” by Deanna Raybourn – it was awesome! And I love my kindle 🙂

Last night was a late night getting home, by the time we had eaten dinner it was already 9pm but I started working on the ceiling. I got the ceiling double screwed (which is no easy feat for me since I can barely reach it!).
Then I got the first coat on the wall seams and got the top half of the wall screws with the second coat. So the walls have a coat on them now and hopefully tonight I can tape the ceiling seams.

I got home a little later than the night before but I still had a good hour to do some taping. Ryan helped me move all the tile out of the gym so I can use the scaffolding in there now. Then I taped the corners and hit the bottom section of wall screws with a second coat quick after that.

Tonight I hope to hit the ceiling! It still needs to be double screwed so I’ll see if Ryan can help with it. I’d also like to get a first coat on the wall seams since the corners will be dry.