Quite A Busy Weekend

We arrived Friday afternoon about 1:00, had lunch, unpacked and got started on the “small” project for the weekend.  We put in the linen closet ceiling and walls that I painted last week.  I ended up putting in most of the screws since Mike couldn’t fit inside the closet.  I don’t have the strength to shove in the screws so Mike helped push from the hall side of the opening while I held the drill.  After that we completed the section of drywall inside the pantry that we didn’t get finished last weekend.  We had to cut an opening for the A/C ductwork.  Since we couldn’t put the duct through the opening, we cut out a U shape and added a small piece of drywall underneath.  Mike also added a 2x4 to the corner of the pantry so he could finish putting in the final screws in the inside corner.  Matt finished sanding Mike’s Father’s day present and we added a new cushion we got at Kohl’s and moved it to the front porch for Mike’s morning reading time.

Linen closet installed.  Needs more paint and shelves.

Last panel installed in the pantry.

New cushion for Mike's chair

Group shot with Mike in new chair

Saturday morning I remembered I needed to cut and put up insulation in the hall before we could drywall.  This took a few hours (messy stuff requiring “special” clothes) so Mike used the time to take out the guest bathroom medicine cabinet as we wanted to make sure the new one fit before we covered the back with drywall.  He also took down the guest bath mirror to attempt patching a hole left by an outlet that was moved in the re-wiring process.  He got the patch in but it still needs taping and texture.  We found that the new mirror is smaller than the old one so I will need to cover the teal paint that was hiding behind the old mirror (which means the whole bathroom is going to need to be painted now).  He then removed the wood cabinet door and frame in the master bathroom to see if there was any work that needed to be done from the back (hall) side.  After putting up the insulation, we went to Home Depot to pick up the new medicine cabinet and some temporary window shades for the front window for privacy (that’s where I sit to use my computer and it feels creepy at night knowing anyone walking or driving by can see me) and the side windows to block the hot morning sun.  When we got back, we hung the drywall on the north side of the long hallway.  For the first piece we used a full 12’ board.  We were able to get the drywall lift in the hallway by putting one of the tripod legs through the den wall.  Since the only cutouts were for the bathroom door and the doorbell wiring, we thought this would be a fairly easy install which it was except for the notch we had to cut out (after the fact) to accommodate the drywall around the top part of the master bedroom door.  The next piece was a small one and only required one cutout for the a/c wiring, but the ceiling was sloped at this end of the hallway and the bottom of the drywall had to be trimmed (again, after it was up) about 1/4” to make a straight edge for the bottom piece.  The third piece was short and had no cutouts and went up quickly which was nice because the last piece was a trial!  The wall and both sides were sloped so we cut the bottom on the diagonal and trimmed the sides after it was up.  We had to make a large cutout for the A/C vent and cut an opening for an electrical box – never a fun task and made more difficult by the fact that we didn’t have a good side to measure from.  Luckily the A/C vent had a large lip so we didn’t have to be extremely accurate.  When we took off the vent cover we found that it was only being held on by three of six screws and the filter was filthy so Matt and I headed to Home Depot to get more screws and a package of filters.  Too bad that I ended up grabbing the wrong screws so Mike put the cover back on with just the three original ones.  While we were out, we tracked down the ice cream truck which we had missed when it came down our street earlier.  Matt and I each got a crunch bar ice cream and we sent it back to our street for Mike. Finally Matt and I moved the short pile of drywall onto the larger one so we now have moving around space in our family room – Yeah!!

Added insulation to some walls for sound deadening

Guest bath mirror and cabinet removed - nice blue color

Cabinet removed from master bath - will be drywalled

Using the lift in a tight space

North wall in hallway completed

New temporary shades added for privacy from passerbys

On Sunday, even though this was supposed to be his “resting” day, Mike decided to install our new pantry door knob and family room ceiling fan.  He thought they would be easy projects, but, of course, there were complications.  He had to adjust the pantry door because it wasn’t closing properly and he discovered that the ceiling fan was going to hang too low with the included 4” downrod.  I could’ve sworn we took that into account when we bought the fan, but maybe it was one of the OTHER several ceiling fans I purchased and returned over the past few months :). We headed out to Home Depot to see if they stocked shorter downrods.  They didn’t (although you can purchase one online), but their electrical guy said you could cut the rod with a reciprocating saw and drill new holes (we did get the A/C vent screws while we were there and Zena got to ride in the jeep so it wasn’t a wasted trip).  Of course it wasn’t that easy and the holes ended up a bit skewed and the shortness of the downrod made the install difficult, but Mike was able to get it done (he always does) and our new ceiling fan is bea-u-ti-ful! 

Door knob added to pantry to complete the door

New and bigger ceiling fan for living room

Matt got off work at noon and we headed to the local theater to see Cars 2.  Very cute and the movie was packed with lots of little kids.  Afterwards we hit Scoops for ice cream – also packed with little kids.  When we got back Mike decided he REALLY needed to get the medicine cabinet installed in the guest bathroom (not sure why because only Matt is using it right now) and that also turned into a bigger than expected project.  The old medicine cabinet was rounded – the new one is square and just a tad bigger so he had to use the multi-tool to trim down the drywall and old paneling and knock around the 2x4 supports that framed up the hole.  He also put the old mirror back up temporarily so Matt can see to shave.

New medicine cabinet for guest bath

Mike headed back to the valley around 6pm. I’m going to stay up here for the next two weeks to avoid the heat and get some painting (and thrift store shopping) done.  Next weekend is a long one.  Mike will be back up Thursday afternoon and stay through Monday night.  We have friends coming Sunday afternoon for a bar-b-que so we will be trying to get our house a little more presentable.

Stats: 3 Home Depot trips; 3 Walmart trips
Remodeling expense 6/20-6/26: $57
Remodeling expense to date: $30,611