New Kitchen Floor

This weekend we planned to lay the new plywood subfloor in the kitchen.  Before we could start, we had to remove the back door to better understand what was causing the leak that damaged the sill boards.  We want to replace the door anyway as it is pretty beat up and Matt found a large crack in the side jam when he replaced the door hardware.  When Mike came up on Friday, he used the reciproating saw to cut the nails holding the door in place and we pulled out the whole door set.  Between the open floor and the lack of a back door, we were very vulnerable to critters coming in the house.  Luckily we had Zena to keep us safe.

Door and floor are gone - watch your step.

On Saturday we started putting in the subfloor.  The original subfloor was installed prior to the walls going up, so the edges were sandwiched between the floor joists and the walls.  As a result, when we removed the flooring, we had to cut around the edges.  Mike used the reciprocating saw again to trim away all the old wood as close to the walls as he could.  Because the new subfloor would not be going under the walls, and, therefore, would not be resting on the outside joists, a new frame needed to be constructed next to the walls to support the new subfloor.  Mike had an idea of how to construct the frame, but there were some issues with the joists that made him not quite 100% positive it would work and it was stressing him out a little.  Our electrician/plumber/framing guy, Craig, has been letting us borrow his pneumatic tools over the weekend.  I had to go to his house to pick up some nails for his nail gun and he mentioned that he was not doing anything at the time.  I asked him if he'd like to help us with the frame.  He was able to give Mike a few more options for the frame and, while Mike cut the supports, Craig nailed them in place.  They finished in time for Craig to make his weekly hockey game at the local high school.

New floor frame in left corner of kitchen

More of the floor frame on the right side of the room

Mike and I then started cutting and laying the new 1 1/4" tongue and groove 4'x 8' sheets of plywood.  We laid out a plan so the seams were offset from row to row, otherwise you end up with weak spots in the floor.  The kitchen and dining area together is about 10' x 21', so we used four full sheets, two 4' x 5' pieces, two half sheets, and one 2' x 5' piece.  Mike used the circular saw to cut off the tongue on the first row of plywood sheets that would butt up to the existing floor in the family room.  Instead of regular nails or screws, Craig left us some special ring shanked nails (there are ridges on the nail for better gripping) that we could use to secure the floor with his nail gun.  Bob had also told us that securing the floor with glue would make it less prone to squeak.  We had to cut the wood, place them to make sure they fit, then remove them to put down the glue, then place them again and screw them in.  These are REALLY heavy pieces of wood so I got my weight lifting exercise in this weekend.  We were able to finish one row before calling it quits for the day.

Making the wood silent - cutting off its tongue

First row of flooring completed

Since we got finished with our work on Saturday after the gym closed, we needed to have a way to take a shower at the house.  We still had the spigot that Craig put in the kitchen the previous weekend, but now the new flooring covered the area where the spigot had come through the floor so it was under the house.  Mike decided to use one of our garden hoses to connect to the spigot and then he ran it under the house and through the window in the hall bathroom.  We connected a standard hose sprayer to the end and moved our shower curtain to this tub.  This gave us a make-shift shower, and even though we only had cold water, after working all day in the heat, it felt wonderful.

Hose for our shower

We have seen a few spiders around the house since we started our work in July, but Craig told us this week he had seen a brown recluse in the crawlspace.  Then we came home from getting something to eat Saturday night and found a huge spider on the ceiling.  We were not sure if this was a brown recluse and found out later from some internet searching that is was a large crab spider, common to the northern area of Arziona.  We decided it would be a good idea to bug bomb the crawlspace on Sunday after all our work is done.  Since I was staying through the following week, I went to my dad's place in Chistopher Creek for the night.

Image appears larger in photo, but it was still big

This past week, the workers also told us that there was still a lot of dog droppings in the crawlspace under the house.  Matt had already made one sweep under the house the week after we started working, but he must have missed some areas.  On Sunday, Mike got all his gear on to do another pass under the house.  He cleaned up all the insulation that was laying on the ground and also removed a lot of garbage that was under the house.  It is a very dirty job, maybe we should have called Mike Rowe to do it!

Before the job . . . .

. . . and after

The rest of the weekend was spent on finishing the flooring.  The biggest snag we ran into was that the floor joists were not evenly spaced.  Because the edge of each piece of subfloor has to be supported, we either had to cut the flooring or put in additional supports through the floor.  We had to be careful not to cut too much of the flooring or we wouldn't have enough to finish the floor so we ended up adding a lot of extra 2x4s for support.  The third row that went up next to the back wall was tough to cut because the walls are not square.  We had to make some angle cuts on each piece, plus we had to make a cutout for the back door.  However, we persevered and forced the last piece of flooring into place.  After it was all done, the flooring was solid, looked beautiful and did not have any squeaks.

The last piece of the puzzle being placed

Our new kitchen/dining room sub-floor

At the end of the day, we covered up everything in the house in preparation for the bug bombs and I packed my bags for a night at my dad's place.  We propped up the old back door into the opening just to keep out any animals and then Mike placed six bug bombs under the house and set them off.  I took Zena and her dog crate to Christopher Creek, which is only about 20 minutes away from Payson.  I needed her crate as my dad does not mind dogs, but not in the house. At night, I put her in her cage on the porch with some water and food.  Just after I went to bed, I heard growling and banging outside.  I found a large raccoon up in a tree next to the porch.  I guess it must have been attracted to Zena's food and when Zena hit her cage trying to get at it, the racoon growled and ran up the tree.  There were no more critter issues that night and the racoon was gone by morning.

Racoon way up high in the tree

Closeup of the racoon - he/she was a cute critter

Stats:  3 Home Depot trips; 1 Walmart trip
Remodeling expense 8/27-8/29: $2,335
Remodeling expense to date: $18,624

Know When to Delegate

After removing the flooring over the weekend, we found the reason behind the leak under the back door.  When the door was installed, the metal flashing between the house and the patio was cut back too far.  That, along with the patio being a little taller than the door jamb, allowed the water to run under the door and between the boards that join the house and the patio.  We also discovered that some of the house sill board under the door was rotted.  Mike knew what needed to be done to replace this piece of wood, but did not have the time or tools to do the job.  We contacted Bob, our handyman, and asked if he could help.  He said he already had the necessary jacks to brace the floor so that he could cut out the bad wood and add a new piece.   We wanted to put in the new flooring on the weekend and Bob said he could get the job done before then.

Rotted sill board under back door

Craig and Dennis continued to work on the plumbing this week.  We ran into a little snag when we could not get the parts Craig wanted to use to setup our new water supply system.  He used a product called "Shark Bite" and needed a couple of manifolds for a distribution center.  We contacted the local Home Depot in Payson and found they did not stock the parts, but they could be ordered and would be in by Friday.  We ordered the parts, but called Mike to see if he could find any sources online or other local plumbing shops that might carry these parts, in hopes we could get them faster. No such luck.  We just had to sit and wait.  Craig and Dennis did as much work as they could so that once the parts came in, they could finish the job quickly.

Dennis working on our kitchen drain

Bob came on Wednesday with his wife and another guy to work on the sill board and finish the shingles on the roof.  They used floor jacks and beams to support the kitchen floor while they removed some of the joists connected to the sill board.  Bob's wife did most of the cutting using a reciprocating saw and I was utterly amazed on how well she did with it.  I personally do not care for that tool as I have seen the construction guys and Mike use the saw and I am always afraid that more will get cut than wood.  It is a very powerful and unsteady tool, but she handled it with ease.  I told her how impressed I was and she said "don't ever be afraid of power tools - unlike our husbands, they do what you tell them to."  I have now decided to try to do some of the cutting with the chop saw (which is stationery and seems a lot more safe).  Bob and his crew were able to cut away the rotted wood and add new boards and put the joists back in place, all in one day and at the low cost of $200.  I sent several pictures to Mike so that he could see what he was missing.  We both decided the $200 was money well spent.

Floor jacks and beam holding up our kitchen

Bob's wife using a reciprocating saw with expertise

While Bob was there, he and his worker Andy, brought their dogs because they thought they would have fun with Zena.  However, Zena was not in the mood for playing that day and did not get along very well with the other dogs.

Bob's dog confined to the truck - not very happy!

Zena ignoring Andy's dog

Because of the lack of water facilities at the house, I decided to join the Tonto Apache Gym which had so kindly given us free showers over the weekend.  They have a great facility with an indoor pool and their rates were cheaper than the other gym in town.  It was nice to have a place to shower during the week as the temperatures were still fairly high during the day.

Stats:  1 Home Depot trip; 1 Walmart trip
Remodeling expense 8/23-8/26: $221
Remodeling expense to date: $16,289

No Water No Floor

After returning from vacation, we had a few days at home and then went up to Payson on Friday.  I drove separately with Zena (our dog) as I would be spending all week at the house keeping tabs on the plumbing work.  Mike came up a few hours later after putting in a couple hours of work. 

One of our main goals this weekend was to pull up the subfloor in the kitchen.  When we bought the house, we knew that something was different with the kitchen floor as it was about 1/2 inch higher than the flooring in the rest of the house.  After pulling up the tile before our vacation, we found a fairly new plywood floor but the view from the crawlspace did not show new flooring.  It appears that someone put new flooring over the old rotted flooring.  We also found a hole in the floor next to the back door and discovered that water was coming in under the threshold.  Our neighbors had told us that the previous two owners both had flood damage.  We decided we better replace the kitchen floor before it ended up caving in on us.

View of newer plywood on old flooring going into kitchen

Hole and separation near door corner

We knew that Craig and Dennis had just recently started the plumbing work, but I did not find out until I arrived on Friday that they had turned off our water while they were running the new pipes.  After a panicked call to Craig, he made a run to Home Depot to get some parts to setup a temporary faucet in the kitchen that we could use to fill buckets to use for flushing the toilet and washing up.  This definitely made our stay at the house even more primitive than it had been and a step closer to camping out.

Faucet and bucket in kitchen

After Mike arrived, we started the task of uncsrewing and removing the newer layer of plywood.  This task was not too tough, though some of the screws were stripped and we couldn't get them out so we had to use the prybar to pull up the wood.  After seeing the old flooring underneath, we were very thankful we made the decision to put in this extra work.  It was a mess.  The original floor was a layer of plywood over a layer of insulated sheathing material (like thick cardboard with a material coating).  Most of this came up very easily.  While we were pulling it up, we had to walk on the joists where the flooring no longer existed.  One time Mike stepped on the sheathing, mistaking it for a solid board, and fell through.  Luckily he fell on one of the crossbeams and not all the way through to the ground, but that fall, combined with his already bruised rib from our vacation, made him a very sore person.

All flooring gone and using plywood for walkways

Area where Mike fell through and caught one of those cross beams

After getting all the flooring up on Saturday, we were very hot, sweaty and dirty with no way to shower.  It was late in the afternoon and we decided to see if we could find someplace to take a shower.  Matt and I had paid for a two week membership at one of the local gyms in July, but that was a bit expensive for a one time shower.  We decided to check prices at the Tonto Apache Gym that is near the Mazatzal Casino and they said we could shower there for $5, but they were closing in 45 minutes.  It only took us 10 minutes to get there and they ended up letting us shower for free.  It was a very nice facility with a pool and since I would be staying up in Payson for a couple of weeks, I thought I might join, at least for the shower facilities.

Stats:  2 Home Depot trips; 3 Walmart trips
Remodeling expense 8/20-8/22: $3,053
Remodeling expense to date: $16,068

A Well Deserved Rest

Since Matt has been going to college in Texas, we have tried to combine our vacations with him returning to school.  One year we used one of our timeshare exchanges for a resort in Pottsboro, TX and this year we booked a condo in Hot Springs, Arkansas.  This was our third driving trip to Texas since he started college. 

This year Matt decided it would be nice to have a car at school.  He has made it two years without one, but since he is now an upperclassman, it seemed wrong to rely on his friends to run him to the store and for haircuts.  Also, he now has a girlfriend and wanted to have the ability to take her out on dates every now and then.  So we made the decision to drive him to school in the Jeep Cherokee and then fly home - leaving him with the SUV.

We had a safe two-day trip to Hot Springs, with an overnight stay in Albuquerque, NM.  We were very pleased that Matt's girlfriend, Danielle, was able to take the Amtrak from Ohio and join us for part of our vacation.  We did some sightseeing, kayaked a river, took a dinner cruise and rented a ski boat.  Both Mike and I skied many, many, many years ago and we were surprised that we were able to get up (and down) without incurring any injuries.  Matt and Danielle have not skied before and, though they came close to getting up, they weren't able to keep their balance.  We changed out the skis for a water tube and the kids had fun riding that.  Mike decided to try the tube and I, wanting to give him a little more adventurous ride, did a whip which caused him to wipe out and severely bruise a rib.  Guess we should have left the new stuff to the younger guys.  We left the resort on Saturday and made our way to Matt and Danielle's school where we spent a few days helping them get stuff out of storage and setting up their rooms.  We then returned to Phoenix, very thankful that we did not have to drive back.

Laurie kayaking the Caddo River

Captain Mike at the controls

Matt and Danielle hang on in a turn

While we were on vacation, we had a couple of phones calls from the electricians.  Nothing major, just some clarification about where things needed to be placed and how they were doing on time and money.  They were able to finish the initial electrical work (more cleanup and finishing to be done after the inspection) just before we returned home.  After taking a couple of days off, they started the plumbing.  The initial home inspection did not reveal any major problems with the plumbing, but, during the electrical work, Craig and Dennis discovered that some of the pipes were poorly routed and not secured well.  We thought it would be best to have it reworked now instead of later.  We also purchased a blown glass shade to hang over the piano in our new house.

Stats:  0 Home Depot trips; 0 Walmart trips
Remodeling expense 8/7-8/19: $45
Remodeling expense to date: $13,015

Time for a Break

We finally got our permit from the Town of Payson.  We had to document where all the lighting fixtures and switches were going and we couldn't do this until Matt finalized our floor plan and we had a chance to talk with the electricians about what was actually doable.

Our handyman, Bob, brought his crew to put a new roof over the kitchen.  This was something that came up in our inspection.  Because the original roofing job was not done correctly, the rolled roofing that was installed over the kitchen was buckling and the inspector felt it wouldn't last another year. Once the shingles were off, we discovered that the plywood under the roofing material was rotted in some places and also it wasn't thick enough (old building code versus new code).  Bob replaced the bad wood and added a 2nd layer of plywood to bring the roof to code.  The facia board, which was also rotted, was replaced and soffit holes were installed to provide venting for this portion of the roof.  New rolled roofing was installed with a layer of shingles over it to give us additional life on the roof.

The kitchen currently has a 5" slope that will make it hard to design a cabinet layout since the ceiling height ranges from 80"-85". The cabinets on the north (back) wall would be flush with the ceiling while the cabinets on the south wall would have a 5" gap.  The biggest design issue is the cabinets on the west wall would start flush and finish with a 5" gap.  I can't figure out how to make that look right so I asked the handyman how hard it would be to drop the ceiling in the kitchen and he said he'd only charge us $625.  This price seemed extremely reasonable and he will do the work while we're on vacation.

Good photo of ceiling slope against old cabinets

Matt and I headed home on Wednesday for the first time since starting this project. He needed to get ready to go to college and I had to prepare for our vacation to Arkansas.  We were home only a couple of days before we were on the road again on Friday.  Since our route took us through Payson, we decided to stop by the house and check on the work progress.  The electricians were pulling wire like crazy.  We were a little nervous about them working while we were on vacation as we're paying them by the hour and would have preferred to be there to be sure they're working, but we can't go forward until the electrical work is finished.  We decided to cross our fingers and hope for the best!

Stats:  2 Home Depot trips; 2 Walmart trips
Remodeling expense 8/2-8/6: $5,783
Remodeling expense to date: $12,970

Matt to the rescue!

The original heating in the house was baseboard heaters in the main room and two bedrooms and then a wall heater in both the hall bath and master bedroom, many of which did not work.  Based on the little information we learned of the building code in Payson, we knew we needed to have permanent heating in each of the living areas prior to getting our final inspection.  Since the summer can get into the high 90s, we decided we also wanted air conditioning.  We looked at many options, but found the least expensive was to use a wall a/c unit that provides heating too.  We had everything laid out for this idea until we found out that the code also stated you had to have so many BTUs per square foot.  Due to the size of the common room area, we would have needed at least three units which would have been expensive and taken up a lot of wall space.  Our electrician told us about an a/c company in town that he had worked with.  We met with them on Friday and, for not much more than all the wall units we would have had to buy, we were able to get a heat pump with a backup furnace and all the ductwork.  We signed the paperwork and they will install the unit in the early part of September.

Bedroom baseboard heater

Bedroom wall heater

After our electrician/carpenter (Craig) re-framed our window for the light switch, Mike installed the new window we bought.  This was the first time he had ever done this, but Craig gave him some good instructions and he and Matt were able to put it in on Friday without too much trouble.  Because the new window was smaller than the old window, they also had to replace the siding.  After carefully measuring for the door and window openings, they put it up and I painted it. This siding is a really rough texture and it is difficult to get the paint into all the crevices.  To make things more difficult, the paint store tinted the primer and it turned out to be the same color as the regular paint when it is wet. Now that the paint has dried, there are all these little pin pricks of primer showing through.  I think once we're finished remodeling, I'll rent a sprayer and just redo the entire house.

Setting in the window

Waiting on dad

Cutting the siding

Perfect fit

Saturday morning brought our first major scare with the remodeling project.  After the drywall and panelling were removed in the kitchen area earlier in the week, Craig noticed that the beam in the kitchen entrance was not properly supported. This beam is where the original outside wall of the house was prior to the kitchen addition and supports the roof trusses.  There were two studs on each end of the beam for support, but only one of the studs actually met the beam.  Also, the same studs, and a few others on the kitchen end of the beam, had major holes drilled through them for what may have been plumbing pipes that no longer existed.  This, combined with even more studs that had been completely cut off for other plumbing pipes, made this section of the wall very unstable.  For safety, we propped the beam up with a few 2x4s until we could replace the bad boards.  In the morning, Mike and I started pulling up tile in the kitchen until Matt woke up and could help with the framing work.  Some of the tile was under the temporary supports, so we had to move them to get the tile out.  Mike thought he could hold up the beam while I moved the temporary studs and pulled up the tile, but as soon as the 2x4s were removed, the beam started to drop as the studs that had been drilled through buckled.  As I was frantically trying to put the 2x4s back in place without any success, Matt woke up and ran to the kitchen to help.  He told us later that he when he woke and heard Mike screaming, he knew exactly what was happening and ran to the kitchen, praying the whole way.  Praise God! The prayers worked and he helped me replace the temporary supports.  We realized later that when we removed the drywall in the pantry on the back side of these cut studs, we took away the only thing that was keeping them from buckling.  Drywall has some strength to it, but Craig felt that the wall would have eventually caved and this, among many other structural issues found, made us very thankful that we decided to remove the drywall.

Only one stud touches

Not one real stud in this wall

Hardly any support

Buckled under weight of beam without drywall

We realized we could not proceed until we felt more comfortable with the framing around the beam, so Matt and Mike tackled the job of replacing the studs.  Adding more temporary studs along the beam, they were able to remove the original beam supports and put in two new studs on each end that actually supported the beam.  They also replaced the other drilled out studs, but could not replace the studs that did not reach the floor because there were plumbing pipes in the way.  That will have to wait until Craig re-routes the plumbing.  The new framing looks great and we feel much better about the beam support.

All new studs

New partial wall adds support

While the guys were working on the beam, I started scraping up the tile near the pantry.  These were the same type of peel and stick tiles we found under the carpet in one of the bedrooms.  It is very tedious work as the tile cracks and breaks into little pieces, but I was able to get up all the tiles in this area for the work that needed to be done later.

Tile coming up in little pieces

One of the things I've always wanted is a large pantry.  Since we're completely redoing the kitchen, we decided to take out the existing small pantry and replace it with a much larger (4'x 8') one.  Mike and Matt always groan whenever I say "I have an idea" because they know it means they will have to figure out how to take my idea and make it a reality.  This is the first time either of them have done any major framing work and, I have to admit, I was a little nervous.  However, it came out beautifully - even Craig was impressed!  Mike gives all the credit to Google and the many experts online who have documented all the technical advice he has found.  Part of the pantry expansion added even more support to the kitchen beam with an additional 2 foot wall.

One more wall to do

Pantry framing completed

The framing on the back kitchen wall was a mess and we wanted a better structure for when we put up our drywall and cabinets.  We also needed better framing for moving the kitchen window to this back wall.  Mike cut out all the bad framing with a reciprocating saw and then added new studs on this wall.

Changing back wall studs

We decided to replace the existing pantry's flat door with the 6 panel door we were going to be removing from the gun cabinet in our bedroom.  So just before Mike left for home Sunday afternoon, he and Matt decided to move it to the shed which previously had a very weathered door. This is an inside door so it probably won't last long, but it definitely was better than the one that was there and we eventually want to replace this shed so it should be a good temporary upgrade.

Old disgusting door

New door for now

Stats:  2 Home Depot trips; 1 Walmart trip
Remodeling expense 7/30-8/1: $4,679
Remodeling expense to date: $7,187