We Are Back

We originally decided not to start work again on the Payson house until the beginning of April, but we needed to spend a weekend at the house to test a recent upgrade to the heating system while it was still cold.  During our stay at the end of 2010, the company we bought the system from installed a new part to help the unit convert from heat pump to heat strip at a certain temperature.  After they did the install, it did not seem to be working properly that same night, but due to the holidays and extreme weather issues the company could not work on it before we left.  I went up for a day in February to meet the service guy and get the unit configured properly and this weekend was a test, while overnight temperatures were still low, to see if the unit worked as it should.  Although the temperatures were not as extreme as they were at the end of December, we were toasty in the house and the unit was not blowing cool air.

While we were at the house this weekend we decided to do a little work and, if the weather continues to be as nice as it was, we will start coming up every other weekend to continue our improvements.  This weekend we did some demolition to remove the drywall and paneling in the short hallway by the bedrooms.  Our original plan was to leave this drywall up, but we found that in order to get the new drywall sheets back to the guest bedroom, we would have to either go through the window or go through the den wall as the 12 foot sheets will not fit around the hall corner.  After lifting some of these heavy sheets, we decided that taking down the hallway drywall was the easier way to go.  As an added benefit, now all the walls (with the exception of the bathrooms) will all have new drywall and all the old paneling will be gone.

We were not able to take down all the paneling as Mike had taken our new Craftsman multi-tool down to the valley and did not think about bringing it back.  It is the best tool to use to cut the paneling in the corners as the recriprocating saw is too unwieldy to use on this.  We will bring the tool back on our next trip to finish the job.

The drywall will go through the wall on the left into the door on the right.

We made a trip to Home Depot for some weed killer (they are already growing) and other miscellaneous items.  We spent some time there pricing out lumber and parts we will need to build a Murphy bed.  We bought a hardware kit from Rockler Woodworking when they had a recent sale.  We are interested in putting one in the guest bedrooms in each of our houses, but to buy one at a furniture store would cost over $2500.  The kit, on sale, was about $270 and comes with a plan and parts list to build the bed cabinet.  The lumber and parts priced out around $370.  All we need after that is a queen mattress and we should have a Murphy bed for under $1000.  We will need to wait until after we get our Jeep back to pick up the lumber and will add the materials to our next Home Depot bid, which hopefully will save us even more.

We spent Sunday relaxing in the morning and then I watered all the plants while Mike sprayed the weeds.  Since the temperatures are still getting under freezing at night, we re-winterized the place before we left in the afternoon.

Stats:  1 Home Depot trip; 1 Walmart trip
Remodeling expense 1/4-3/6: $347
Remodeling expense to date: $26,174