MONDAY was a holiday! A bonus day off- woo hoo! The morning kicked off super early with me leaving the house at 6:40am. I needed to pick up some moulding from Woodcrafters in NE Portland, but they didn’t open until 8am and I needed to be back home by 9am. So why did I leave my house at 6:40am? Well…..
A) 30 minute commute to get there (so that means leaving at 7:30)
B) wanted 15 minutes to stop at Voodoo Donuts (it’s only 7 blocks away from Woodcrafters!! So that makes leaving time 7:15).
C) I had returns for Home Depot- the big mirrors I bought a few weeks ago- I didn’t want them in the back of my car traveling to and from Portland, and loading the 10′ moulding sticks on top of it.
D) I also had returns for Lowe’s, and both stores open at 6am, so with any luck I’ll knock all of that off my list before 7am!
Anyway- I was making the outing a “date” for Riley and me….and she was well aware that we would be leaving around 6:30- and she still wanted to join me!
We made our rounds- Home Depot, Voodoo Donuts, got to Woodcrafters at 7:59am. I showed them what I wanted, we purchased three 16-foot long sticks, they cut them for me so they’d fit in my car, we paid the amount due and we were back in the car by 8:05am! Talk about service! And they bundled the wood for me, too!
Side note: I can haul 10′ long boards in my Expedition- they just have to sit on my dashboard!
We hit Home Depot again on the way home (I needed to get different mirrors but didn’t want to buy them BEFORE going to Woodcrafters) … anyway- I had shopped online the night before and saw that they had one option perfectly sized for the master bathroom, and a smaller one for the main bathroom- which should be fine. And they come with their own hardware!
Back at 4100, a little late because we also did a bit of long-overdue grocery shopping- the gutter guys were there tearing down the old gutters. It was POURING down rain, too!
Riley helped me unload the car, we got the new trim situated upstairs to paint, and got the kitchen counter cleaned up, and set up another table in the dining/living room to use instead of the kitchen counter for all our “stuff”. And then it was time for me to leave and pick up Brooke from her overnighter and take Riley back home.
In the meantime, I had texted Jim’s cousin, Todd, to see if he wanted to come help (he’d offered the day before). There are several tasks that we knew we weren’t going to get around to doing, and I already had Jory lined up to come over and help with some of it, but knew there was enough for Todd to do, too.
Todd showed up, my mom showed up shortly after (to clean windows/tracks), and Jory showed up shortly after my mom. We had a full house (the gutter guys were still there!). I love bonus days off!
By the end of the day, we had accomplished A TON!
Todd painted the doors: 3 bedroom doors, 1 bathroom door, hall closet door, bathroom pocket door, 2 doors upstairs. That was a full day’s work, and not something we were planning on doing this time around due to the shortened timeline.
Jory painted the textured walls:
Also something we weren’t planning on doing- we were just going to wash them. When she finished that, she went upstairs and painted the trim and ceiling edge in the purple room- also something we weren’t going to do. (Actually, originally we weren’t going to do ANYTHING with the upstairs!).
I should have taken a detailed before picture – it’s like a 10 year old painted the room! If you look at this zoomed in picture from last year, you can see all the paint on the ceiling…
When she finished that, I had her also paint the new Master Bathroom window sill that Jim built the day before.
Jory has been a lifesaver with this house! She worked for about 3.5 hours.
While everyone else was painting or cleaning, I went around the house and caulked window sills, filled the joints in the trim, caulked some of the door edges, the kitchen backsplash above the new counter, etc.
Then my focus was finishing the kitchen. That meant more scrubbing and bleaching of tile grout, hanging the cabinet doors, drilling holes for handles and knobs, it took longer than I expected. I only have one cabinet door left to hang (the hinge holes were stripped out, so I filled them with glue and will let them set overnight).
OH, and I like MY countertop edges much better than the originals….
Mine:
Original:
Or maybe it’s just because mine are newer and prettier! Ha! Who knows….
Anyway- here’s a quick before and after shot:
The other accomplishment for the day was hanging a window treatment in the kitchen.
Before:
Now:
My original thought was to hang a dark wood roman shade like what 5745 has…
But 5745 has a dark-ish wood floor and dark countertops to balance such a dark window shade.
4100- not so much. I needed to keep everything in balance so I stuck with basic white.
The primary reason for going with blinds instead of a roman shade was because the other day the sun was so bright- glaring right into the kitchen- so bright I could barely stand at the sink. If I had a roman shade, that would have meant pulling it all the way down, and then I’d have no view and it would be dark. And that would feel sad. :(
Anyway- my shift was over before 7pm. I had a bunch to do at home, with my REAL job and REAL life and I figured a 10.5 hour workday at 4100 was enough! Jim went over and wrapped up a few small things (electrical, outlets, flooring issues, etc.)
Total hours spent between all of us (not counting the gutter guys): 28.25
TUESDAY I called the carpet installers- he said Lowe’s hasn’t received the ordered carpet yet, and they will see if they can track it down and get a delivery date. He (Dale) said that his schedule is open for the rest of the week to accommodate us- so be ready!
My mom went over in the late morning to clean a couple more windows. I wasn’t able to go over there until after work and after karate, which wasn’t until 6:30-ish. Jim got there just before me.
The evening’s focus: getting the bare floors prepped for carpet laying (it’s not like the installers will sweep them clean or anything) and I worked on scrubbing the master shower door tracks, scraping the caulk off the door edges- yuck.
I seriously almost quit. Decided I’d rather fork over several hundred dollars for a completely new door track and doors….but I worked through the pain and conquered it. It still needs a good cleaning, but I need to caulk the edges first so water doesn’t run all over the floor!
OH, and I put the handles on the new drawers! The screws that came with the knobs were a 1/2″ too short because of the thickness of the new drawers- so I had to go to the hardware store first. But here they are!
Here’s a head-on shot to see if there’s any noticeable differences in height or style….
Looks AWESOME to me!
And a good before & after, cuz you know how much I like those!
Ta da!!
My last task of the evening was caulking around the sink.
And before….
We only worked until 9pm. Total hours worked, including Mom scrubbing windows some more…. 7.0
WEDNESDAY Jory went over and put the second coat of paint on the two upstairs doors, the pocket doors and the entry closet door. That wraps up all the door painting- whew! My mom went over and cleaned windows and vacuumed all the bare floors- it’s a big house!
I got a call from the carpet installer that he has us booked for Monday morning. BUT, if there’s any chance he can get to it on Saturday, he’ll do it then. Really I think we are done with things other than cleaning. I need to shampoo the purple room carpet, and put a transition piece at the threshold of the 1st bedroom, maybe do something with the laundry room flooring….
Another example of half-assedness. If you’re going to put fancy looking “marble” vinyl tiles to hide the old original linoleum, why not do the WHOLE floor? I dunno.
Neither Jim nor I went over to the house after work. I was simply exhausted and needed a night off. We spent the entire night on the couch watching our DVR’d shows. Took a much needed break. Sadly, we still need to hit up Costco and haven’t had a chance to do that, either!
THURSDAY had to be a work day since we took Wednesday off. Jim and I both met there after work… he tackled the last bits of cleaning the floor in preparation for carpet, he also worked on the main bathroom toilet and fixed the heat duct upstairs.
I hung the bathroom mirrors, hung the blinds in the master bathroom and dining room, hung the last kitchen cabinet door and did a bit more touch-up painting of the white trim.
We brought home a bunch of recycling and tools that we won’t be using any longer. This weekend is going to be a big clearing out weekend- trying to bring everything home again!
FRIDAY we met over there after work to do a few things, but changed our mind and decided to go shopping for a few items instead!
We did get the stump grinding done today! Tualatin Stumpgrinders Inc came out and did the job- he did a fantastic job, too! Now we have tons of shavings/dirt. Not literal tons, but it will feel like it!
Elisa's Ramblings 