View allAll Photos Tagged homeimprovements
During the installation of vinyl tile one learns that the perfectly smooth subfloor is far from smooth, corners are never exactly perpendicular, and opposite walls are not perpendicular.
this was 6 years ago. I was starting to feel bad during this cure, so I wanted to see what I started out with. I guess I have come a long way. I feel better now.....
I knew it had to happen... I've joked here before about how someday I was going to find the Crackheads'™ stash that they left behind. Well, I found drugs under the stove when I moved it to clean the side of the cabinet. Okay, it's just sinus medication, not something illicit, and there was also a not-worn-at-all potholder (not 'pot') back there.
There was so much pet hair under there that Cheddar thought he'd suddenly become the single father to a litter of kittens.
after a months-long struggle with lack of motivation and paint stripper, the bike room is painted! and the nasty carpet has been removed! now all that's left is to sand and paint the window frames, the windows themselves, pull & paint the baseboards, nail in some quarter round trim, and either re-finish the floor or call it 'done'.
We got a new bathroom set (shower curtain, rug, towels, etc.) for our guest bathroom a few weeks ago and decided we wanted to repaint the bathroom. We took the plunge yesterday and bought paint and Summer painted the bathroom all by herself.
This is one of the after pictures I took today.
My mother's first response to the pictures of our new house (two years
ago) was "Loose the wallpaper." We just started removing it last week...
only to find multiple layers of wallpaper... and unprimed plaster
underneath.
Message to anyone putting up wallpaper. Putting up a skim coat of
plaster to smooth the walls before putting up wallpaper is cool, but
paint on a coat of primer first. When you go to remove the wallpaper
years later, the water and wallpaper paste remover will turn the plaster
to mush. It is impossible to easily remove the wallpaper without having
to go back retexturize the walls. This is the third time I've had to
deal with it... and it's getting frustrating.
Our first big project is done!
This room is directly outside our bedroom. Of the tasks performed, we:
-Replaced light fixture with ceiling fan
-Replaced blinds
-Patched all holes and painted the walls "Kalamata"
-Replaced outlets and faceplates with white ones
-Installed recessed directional halogens and put them on a dimmer switch
-4"x3/4" baseboards
Another view of the home theater showing the can lights on. This is the only lighting circuit on right now, the rest will be hooked up later.
Next will be the vanity and floor....the 44th U.S. President will be inaugurated before this room is officially stamped "DONE" :)
Or, how NOT to choose an AC contractor.
The before shot details the mess left in my attic by the individual who installed my 4 ton AC unit last year.
Three weeks ago I noticed the walls under the evaporator were damp!!!!
Where do I even start? No primer on the joints, and he must have used every angle fitting he had with him that day.
Scariest thing? He is LICENSED to do this work!
I printed out the 'before' shots, took them to the best damned hardware store in the world, Elliot's, and showed them to Tony in the plumbing department. Tony used to oversee the maintenance of the giant TI facility at 75 and 635, and as soon as his eyes popped back in his head we went to work figuring out what to do next.
Two days spent cramming my 6'5" frame into the 6' attic, cussing this man, his family, and anyone who resembles him, plus 20 minutes of quality time with a diamond saw against a cast iron drain pipe to, you know, make SURE the water has a downhill run, and the results are what you see in the after picture.
Still not pretty, but at least my version doesn't leak.
Typical of me, I didn't take any 'before' photos of the mudroom. (You can see part of it in the background of countertop stage 11 and small pieces in a couple other photos.)
So today's project was to paint the room "field of pines" so that tomorrow the appliances can be moved out and the flooring can start. Why aren't they out yet? Still had some laundry to do first. :) And no, that's not the final color of the windowsill... that's the old yellow, which will be replaced with "grey ashar" (same color as the cabinet there) as well.
The pantry door is finally stripped and repainted, with new hinges... and will go back up as soon as the flooring is extended into the pantry, so I don't have to work around it. Yesterday I painted the doorframe "grey ashar" after a serious sanding to get the clumpy old paint off; the previous Crackheads™ had closed the door and slapped on one coat of paint, thus the little bit of frame that wasn't covered by trim got some white latex on it, which kind of drooled into the door-space. The cabinet doors can go on any minute now (after a bit of shaving, I'm sure).
Posted for those who keep hearing about the bathroom remodel I did last year (with little additions over time). Metal theme is brushed nickel.
Door handles: McLendon's Hardware
Trim and paint: Lowe's, with stain by Olympic
Mosaic and cove tiles: Ceramic Tile Center
Vanity, vanity top, and faucet: Building Materials Outlet
the walls in the back hallway had been purple and coral for TOO LONG! Surprising it lasted that long... if I did not leave in an uncaffinated haze in the morning and come home from work in the Minnesota winter darkness, it would not have lasted the 5 months that it did.
My mother's first response to the pictures of our new house (two years
ago) was "Loose the wallpaper." We just started removing it last week...
only to find multiple layers of wallpaper... and unprimed plaster
underneath.
Message to anyone putting up wallpaper. Putting up a skim coat of
plaster to smooth the walls before putting up wallpaper is cool, but
paint on a coat of primer first. When you go to remove the wallpaper
years later, the water and wallpaper paste remover will turn the plaster
to mush. It is impossible to easily remove the wallpaper without having
to go back retexturize the walls. This is the third time I've had to
deal with it... and it's getting frustrating.