Category: master bathroom

Kid-Free weekend again

We are on an every-other weekend schedule going out to work on the house and this weekend Alex stayed with her grandparents so we could go out by ourselves and make more progress!  It was a productive day and a half for sure.

Saturday Ryan worked on trim all day – starting with the master bedroom, putting up window trim.  We need to buy more window apron trim but he got what we had up and the windows look great!

3 windows even have aprons!
3 without aprons (plus we need aprons for the back bedroom and master bath)

Next up he worked on baseboards.  He couldn’t finish the uptairs hallway shadow boxes and chair rail because the door for the master bedroom needs to be installed, and before that it needs to be stripped, so we packed it up and brought it back and Ryan will strip it here and we’ll bring it back ready to install.

Had to cut the old baseboard down to match and then put in a new piece.

Notice the blue rug at the top of the stairs is gone!  Floor looks great underneath.  We didn’t take it off all the stairs just this section so far.

Baseboards continue around the linen closet and down the hallway on one side.
And partially around the washer/dryer stand
This is the door to the attic trimmed out (no pic before) and technically there’s baseboard on the right side of it too…

I focused on ceilings and electrical this weekend.  First I hooked up smoke detectors so we now have all the smoke detectors hooked up and connected!  I also put a light in at the top of the back stairs and a bunch of the covers for the HVAC in the ceilings (and recessed lights have covers now)..

Light at the top of the stairs in the back and smoke detector all hooked up 🙂
Covers on HVAC and another smoke detector (had to do upstairs and downstairs but didn’t bother taking pics of all of them!)
Washer and dryer outlets and put the trim piece on the drain/water thing.

The washer/dryer stand is just about ready – we have to put a piece of trim around it and water proof it, then we’ll bring up the washer/dryer and then we can put the last door in place at the top of the back stairs.

On Sunday we worked a few hours on the master bathroom.  We had our neighbor clean up the ceiling in the bathroom and start sheetrocking a bit (just one section) on Saturday.  Ryan put in the ceiling fan/light box Sunday morning and then we ran all the rough electrical in there (outlets and lights).

Sheetrock on one small wall 🙂
Fan installed, just need to hook up that wire.
Wiring for lights and outlets by vanity

We drew out the plans for the vanity and the shower so we’re ready to finish the rough-in plumbing hopefully this week.  We’re going to order what we need for the bathroom this week too (need the vanity placement so we can plan the light boxes exactly).

So the master bathroom has been started, trim work continues nicely and electrical is going along.  I replaced a bunch of the switches with the nice rockers we are using and started putting in outlets in the upstairs hallway.

The next trip out we’ll have Alex so probably getting more trim done and I’ll get a bit more electrical done during naps and such.

OH – and we got the built-in doors hung – they need a tiny bit of sanding down to close nicer and then touch up painting in place, then we’ll put knobs and magnet pieces on and they’ll be done…

They look nice with doors on!

Insulation

Our last chunk of insulation is done!  If you don’t count the windows – we’ll have to insulate around the windows ourselves with cans because their sprayer was broken but we weren’t charged for it so no biggie.  Either way – we are very close to ready for sheetrock now!

Last section of the attic is done!
Coming up the attic stairs we had them cut it back for more head room
Back bedroom done!
Washer dryer room done!
under the master bathroom windows (just the small space) had to be done
Master bedroom done!

Hopefully this weekend we can finish prepping the hallway and get the windows sprayed – then we really are ready for sheetrock!

Demo weekend

This weekend was a nice relaxing weekend with some grimy demolition work.  While Alex napped on Saturday (2 naps) Ryan got the ceiling of the master bathroom, small bathroom and laundry-room upstairs all demolished.  During nap one I got the master bathroom ceiling demo all cleaned up (while Ryan did some dump runs).  Then during Sunday’s nap I did the cleanup of the rest. There is still a lot of cleanup left, but I bagged up all the plaster and insulation (many many bags that have to be carted down to the truck and taken to the dump still)!.  All the lathe is already in the truck or taken to the dump.  Vacuuming has begun but will take a while, the insulation clogs up the filter really quickly so I did a quick first pass but have to clean the vacuum still and then start vacuuming the ceiling before doing the rest since it will just fall down anyhow.

Luckily we’ve gotten used to not using this area so we can take our time cleaning it up.  It’s closed off from the rest of the upstairs containing the dust/debri which is nice and has back-staircase access.

Next up is framing in the small bathroom’s walls!  We’d like to get moving on the small bathroom, well on everything but taking it one thing at a time 🙂

Demolition Kitchen Part 1

This past weekend was quite productive!  First and foremost we got lots of play time with Alli boo who also took some great naps (although only an hour long, she did a great job putting herself to sleep for most of them and in the crib no less!).  Baby girl is definitely growing up!

On Saturday I started the day by moving our open shelving from the kitchen into the gym (our temporary pantry) and Ryan hung up the tvroom doors.  Our neighbor came over to play with Alex after she woke from nap number 1 and Ryan got to work removing the wall between the kitchen and diningroom.  I helped as much as I could and we worked almost straight through till 1 when the dump closes (ryan had a quick dump run).  Alex and I spent the rest of the afternoon together while Ryan continued taking down the kitchen ceiling (no plaster/lathe!) and cleaning up.  It went pretty well and the cleanup wasn’t bad considering it’s a kitchen we still need to use!

The kitchen was vacuumed but still needed major cleaning so on Sunday Ryan spent his time with Alli while I mopped down the kitchen and everything that was left in it that got dusty.  Then we took measurements of the kitchen and played around with our kitchen layout/design that we’ve been working on with home depot so we can order cabinets soon (4 week lead time).

Kitchen demolished
Kitchen ceiling removed!

I also have been working on the layout for the upstairs master bathroom, bathroom and laundry room because that’s the plumbing that’s going in this weekend so layout needs to be finalized.  So items need to be chosen (like tubs) so we know measurements and where everything can go.  Luckily we have PUNCH 3d home architect (we’ve had it for years) so that works reasonably well for designing this all out!

Here are the layouts i’ve been working on (click for larger view):

This is a possible bathroom layout, although I think we’ll end up switching the shower and toilet and the shower will be a rectangle instead of that diagonal wall (that’s a limitation of the software).
Kitchen cabinet layout most likely, although we have to get this priced out now that we added a few more cabinets than we had before.
In this one I added lighting (just getting started figuring that out) and the beams in the diningroom (we need one support beam to firm up the floor and we’re going to make some fake beams to make it look like it was meant to be that way) 🙂

Insulation! Just in time for summer weather

It is crazy warm out today! But just in case it gets cold again – we now have insulation in the nursery and master bathroom as well as along the sill plate in the basement 🙂 It was great getting work done on the house while I got to stay at my desk and get regular work done. When they do a good job I like hiring people and this place did a much better job than what we’ve had done before.

Anyway – here are some pictures!

Spraying...
Cutting...

And the finished pictures…

Basement sill plate - although the one mistake they made is that there were 2 bays we asked them NOT to spray (i marked under with an X), because we have to still run pipes and electric for the kitchen renovation some day - all well, we'll be cutting that back out.

 

The master bathroom (we didn't have them do around the windows since these haven't yet been replaced).
The nursery and top of stairs.
The nursery including the closet.
The ceiling in the front hallway (front door entrance) - this part of the ceiling is just a porch roof above so we wanted it insulated.
More in the basement - the front and back didn't have actual bays to spray but he sealed up what was there.
Even got into the crawl spaces - uck!

I’m not quite sure what percentage of our house is now insulated – what’s not insulated:

  •  the kitchen
  • master bedroom
  • upstairs bathroom (the small one)
  • what will be the washer/dryer room (small section)
  • back bedroom (sewing room)
  • attic

Not too bad – we’re definitely more than 50% insulated, probably 65% maybe would be my guess.  And I have all the windows open so the smell is already aired out (this stuff didn’t give off very much of a smell anyway compared to whatever the other people used).  Oh in case anyone is interested – we went with GreenStar out of MA this time around.

Spring has Sprung

Although did winter ever REALLY start this year??

Look at the crocus'. I'm assuming these are some of the ones I planted this fall (from mom's extra) - but we always got a few of these so it may just be the normal ones we get.
These are definitely from mom's batch. Although I thought they were supposed to be green - maybe the green ones aren't up yet and we also planted yellow?

Of course Fitz has already killed a few of these 🙂  But they are sprouting up nicely in the backyard, hopefully they sprout in the front/side yards too where there’s less sun. And I’m finding ‘holes’ in the yard where i’m sure the squirrels have figured out they could find some easy food – stupid squirrels!

Anyhow.  This weekend was a mixup of projects.  Saturday we started with 3 runs to the dump to get rid of all the wood and start getting rid of the pile of plaster (in bags).  Once that was done we worked on the nursery – finishing up any demo (all in preparation for insulation).  We also had to clean up the walls of the master bathroom which is also getting insulation – and move stuff around so walls can be reached in there and in the basement.

Another project was running the vent from the downstairs bathroom so it later can be hooked up to the other bathrooms.  It took some work to drill through the header with a 2″ hole (poor Ryan – the hole saw was not working at all so he did it with multiple 3/4 inch holes but got the job done).  Then we pieced the PVC pipe and it’s all ready to go.

Next up we ran the outlet feed on the exterior wall, getting it secured so the insulation doesn’t push the wires out and they get cut (lesson learned from the first time).

Vent pipe connected up (where the magic vent used to be) and running up through the header.
Pipe extends into the ceiling of the hallway.
Outlets on exterior wall

We ended with a little more demolition and cleanup in the closet (it also has exterior walls) – so the closet is all ready for insulation as well.

Closet exterior wall.

On Sunday we did some shopping (we bought the bedroom set for the nursery!  It should arrive on April 13th) – not that the nursery will be ready but I will need dressers for baby clothes so we’ll set the dressers up in the hallway outside the nursery at the very least.  I’m very excited.  The bedroom set was actually in the outlet section of jordon’s and that explains why it was much cheaper than their regular furniture – bonus!  We also tested out sectional couches because once the tvroom is done we’ll be ordering one of those!

Once shopping was done Ryan had to get work done (he got multiple calls this weekend asking him if he could work).  So while he did that I did some miscellaneous projects.  First I used duct tape to seal up all the cracks/holes in the exterior wall of the nursery so the spray foam insulation doesn’t push out and affect the siding later.  You can’t see the tape in the pictures probably because I used black tape.

Then I continued wiring the outlets on the second wall of the nursery.  I left the third wall because we have to put a corner nailer in first.  Next I finished vacuuming the ceiling of the nursery really well.  And finally started the process of putting the light circuit in the nursery (we have some holes in the joists from the knob and tube that I could use).  It’s not done because I need 4 holes drilled in order to finish but it’s close!

You can kind of see the outlet circuit (just have to nail the wires down) and the box for the light.
And the nice clean ceiling and fan box (ignore the existing light bulb - that will be removed once the new circuit is hooked up).

Of course Ryan reminded me that we need to run cable/ethernet to this room still – luckily it’s on interior walls.  And so I started mapping that out.  I’ll need more holes drilled (there will be 2 drops in this room) but hopefully some night this week (tonight?) I can get started on those.  I also need to wire the closet light (need holes drilled) and the smoke detector.

The one big project that’s left is screwing in all the firring strips in the ceiling – with ryan’s work load this won’t happen until the weekend.  Probably while Dad and I finish up electrical, Ryan will do that.  Then we’ll do the drywall!

Insulation comes on Wednesday!  We have 2 large things to move out of the way and a radiator to move.  Other than that we’re all ready to go!

Finally a productive weekend to share…

It’s been a while since I posted because we hadn’t done much around the house but this weekend we got a lot done.

First up on Saturday morning we went shopping.  We went over to AcMoore and got the antique maps my dad gave us framed (well we’ll get them in a few weeks – but we picked out frames and mats etc).  This was not cheap but we’re very excited to see how they look and they’ll be preserved now.  One is an old atlas (1905) of NH and the other is a survey map from 1892, it has our street before our house was built.  I’ll definitely show pictures when we get them back framed!

Then we headed over to babiesrus and bought a glider for the nursery (it has to be ordered) – so our first nursery purchase has been made!  We still haven’t picked out a crib set yet but since the nursery hasn’t even been demo’d yet we’re not in a rush 🙂  We had a 20% off coupon, hence the purchase of the glider!

Finally we finished up at home depot, buying the hardibacker for the master bathroom floor.  When we got home we got right to work, I moved all the oak flooring that was stacked in there and vacuumed, then Ryan put down the hardbacker.  Then I put up some plastic over the exposed part of the ceiling to keep insulation from dropping on anyone in there (1/2 of the ceiling hasn’t been demo’d at all yet).

hardibacker laid down ... we still have to remove the radiator when we really refinish this room so we just layed enough to make the room usable, on the right where it's still exposed is where I've now stacked all the oak floor we pulled up.
The ceiling covered
We'll probably put the head of the guest bed up against this wall. Very classy guest room 🙂

Once that was done we moved on to working on drawers for the built-ins (7 left to do).  This was quite a project, first we had to make the blocking for the hardware to hang on (so the drawers could slide out without hitting the doors), then we cut some of our poplar planks down to size and then planed it to 5/8″ (the hardware I bought only fits up to 5/8″ thick wood – oops).  This took a LONG time but once that was done we dado’d the boards (to slide the plywood bottoms in) and I got to work cutting the drawer pieces to length and pocket hole drilling them while Ryan installed the blocking and hardware slides in the cabinets themselves.

On Sunday we started making drawers, unfortunately they didn’t quite fit where they were planned to fit but they all fit someplace so 3 are done.  It’s possible we’ll have to cut the fronts and backs of one drawer fresh at the end from the one plank we have left.  Not sure why since the measurements aren’t different but something is off with one of them (the blank space).

3 more drawers done and installed (still need face frames but we're saving those for last)
4 more drawers ready to go!
The last cabinet, ready for the hardware to be hung!

The absolute worst part about all of this is that we have to hang the drawers to make sure they all fit properly etc.  However then we have to take off all the hardware so we can paint the built-ins – ugg!  But we’re getting close now, only 4 more drawers to make and the hard parts are done.

The rest of sunday we relaxed (ryan had work to do) so we put on some movies (ending the evening with Emma!) and I stitched.

Royalty ABC - I had previously finished the large queen stitched diamonds and backstitched row below it so Sunday I did the long arm row and then scrolled...
And this is the bulk of what I stitched on Sunday. The next part of the alphabet, a satin stitch design row and the start of the large flower. This is now page 3 of the design! More than halfway done!

I really love having some time to stitch again, it’s been so long and doing a piece like this where each row feels like a little ‘finish’ is really easy to pick up with just a little free time.

The only downside about this weekend was that poor Fitz got an eye infection (dogs can get pink eye evidently).  Luckily not contagious to humans, I felt bad for him and after a visit to the vet this morning he’s on antibiotic drops a couple times a day for a week.  It’s already clearing up and he’s definitely acting himself.  I’m undecided about daycare tomorrow (i need to call them and hear what they think) but might just postpone and do daycare on Thursday this week instead of Tuesday, give him more time to fight it off.  Even though he’s acting normal and definitely needs an energy outlet!

That was our weekend!  With 4 drawers left to build, face frames for all 10, then the doors to finish the built-ins are getting closer!  Let’s see what next weekend brings (besides the super bowl of course).

Stomach bugs…

What a strange weekend we had.  Saturday I was feeling so much better from my cold finally so we worked on the house (knowing we had only one day this weekend since Ryan had a bunch of work work to do on sunday).  First we ran to the dump to drop off the final loads from last weekend, then over to pick up our new windows from Marvin.

Home again we decided to continue the demolition in the upstairs diningroom so we could put up the new wall for the hallway.  It was very messy demo due to the insulation in the ceiling and we only did half of the ceiling (just enough to put up the new wall), since the master bathroom will not be done for a long while and i’d rather get the floor down before we demo the rest (it’s not fun cleaning demo debri from the upstairs and downstairs due to cracks in the subfloor).  The demo went pretty quickly (poor Ryan had to do all of it) but I helped with bagging it all up and now we have another dump load for another weekend waiting outside (hopefully before it snows!).

With that completed I spent about an hour vacuuming up the exposed insulation and the debri.  Finally we started the new wall.  We left a few of the studs out so there’s a makeshift doorway to get through for now (since we’re not finishing the bathroom for a while we’ll use it as our ‘guest room’ while we work on the nursery – need to put the bed someplace!).

Finally with the wall in and secured to both the upper and lower joists it was time to remove the jacks to see if the floor had any less movement or not.  It has definitely improved, it still moves (the joists included) if you jump on it so we may need to take future measures but there was definite improvement over before.

Ceiling demolition

 

And the other side
New wall started (still needs 2 more studs and blocking but it's enough for now).

Unfortunately on Sunday, even though we knew Ryan wouldn’t be able to work on the house I still had hopes to get a few things done but I woke up with a sore throat and headache (cold really doesn’t want to go away).  The sore throat was probably due to not drinking enough water on saturday because staying hydrated sunday certainly helped.  So while Ryan worked I crashed on the couch with some Pride & Prejudice and stitched as well as napped.

Stitching Progress update. Making good progress on this piece.

Then the stomach bugs came to our house.  Kind of.  Fitz was the first to go down.  Sometime after dinner he got sick (right in his bed too), and it was horrible.  He continued to get sick 4 times total over the next few hours and we were on high alert for any sign he might need to rush outside.  I have a nice big load of dog blankets that need to be washed (waiting to see how today goes first).  Poor Fitzy.  I finally took away his water (since he was just throwing it back up) and he was okay through the night.

Of course then later in the evening I got a bit of a bug (or just an IBS attack).   I was up till 3am with uncontrollable shivers every 20 minutes or so.  Not fun.  Poor Fitz and I are quite the pair.  So I decided to work from home today due to my lack of sleep and wanting to be able to keep an eye on Fitz (who is acting fine but wants to eat grass now – can’t find any!  – which makes me think he’s not better yet).  He is allowed a little water (although he hasn’t touched it yet) and I gave him some yogurt with peanut butter  for breakfast so we’ll see how that goes.  If he doesn’t get sick he’ll get rice and chicken for dinner tonight.  Hopefully whatever it was has passed and he can go to his new daycare tomorrow.

I myself am feeling better, I feel like I always do after an IBS attack so that’s probably what it was (from eating too much yesterday?).  I’ll take it easy with what I eat today and stay hydrated.  I should be able to work most of the day (maybe a short nap at some point).  And poor Fitz is stuck in the room with me so I can keep an eye on him.

That was our weekend – so much fun 🙂  I am very excited about the house progress, we can now put down hardi-backer in the master bathroom area and make it into a temporary guest room with sheets for walls  and the bed moved in there.  Then the nursery clean out project begins and eventually we’ll demo that room and get it going!

Happy New Year

It’s a new year – and how did we spend New Year’s Eve?  Well working on the house of course!

We determined that the upstairs diningroom/master bathroom floor had way too much movement to hold a new bathroom at some point.  Just Fitz walking across made it sway (not good for grout).  So today we worked on the floor.  First Ryan and his dad took up the wood floor (we saved almost all of it).  We’ll re-lay it for the hallway but the bathroom will be tiled.  Then we de-nailed all the boards to save them and I cleaned up the subfloor.

Upstairs diningroom floor - gone! (see it piled on the right, that's most of it)
A farther back view - we still need to reframe what will be the entry to the hallway but at least there's a doorway.
A different view (toward the bathroom)
And back toward the stairway hallway
A view of the old chimney way - we're waiting to close off this hole in the floor until we know what we need to run to the attic through here.

Ryan and his dad then worked on supporting the floor joists from below – using 1/2″ plywood on each side of every joist after jacking up the floor a bit.  We have to wait 5 days for the adhesive to dry fully before we take down the jacks and see if the floor feels more secure (it feels very secure with the jacks under it) 🙂

Jacks holding up the floor joists for extra support temporarily
The supported floor joists - 1/2 inch plywood on each side, glued, nailed and screwed in
The other half of the room
And a different view

Suzanne made a potato, bacon soup for the guys for lunch that Ryan has been enjoying the leftovers from today as well.  We ended the evening with a night out at Chunky’s to see the new Sherlock Holmes – love sitting in comfy seats and getting to eat while watching a movie!  Unfortunately probably due to the dust, I was starting to feel like I was getting a cold/sinus infection by the evening and didn’t wake up feeling much better today.  But a day of relaxing certainly helped (as did tylenol for the headache).  I also think the high pressure system we had passed through which was not helping.  By tonight I was feeling much better and got the house vacuumed to remove the dust pretty thoroughly.

We’ll see what tomorrow brings … drawers maybe??

Demo-master returns

The holidays are over and the house work begins!  That’s how we like to bring in the new year.  Ryan didn’t get to take the week off so while I was home by myself Tuesday and Thursday I worked on emptying out the upstairs diningroom and cleaning the house (Wednesday was a stitch day with the girls).

By Friday, Ryan was off from work, his dad and suzanne were out and we were ready to work on demolition.  And demolition they did!  The upstairs diningroom (that will become the master bathroom some day and a hallway) was emptied out and all taken to the dump (3 trips).  It was a long and very productive day!

The new hallway entrance (well this will get reframed out but this is what was uncovered when they took out the built-in)

 

The wall toward the master bedroom
The door toward the hallway of the bathroom (this door frame is now gone too)
The wall that adjoins the small upstairs bathroom - they have a double wall so the plumbing is hidden
And the demolished diningroom - to be master bath!

A great day!  We ended the day watching Sherlock Holmes – the original one, we’ll go out to see the new one tomorrow night at Chunky’s!