Brittie, Swedish Girl is a good one here!! You'll like her! Ellie Ngraham, I don't do anything to WD. I just thought I would be patient for a while longer and it paid off this year. She is a nice one...NOW!!!! Linda, she does have a good edge that makes the whole flower.. Nancy, I have had better pictures of Poiseden and she is my fav of the two. Mulberry Connection is to short to suit me.. Christine, Tropical Cooler is new to me and I have her in a pot BUT, I think she is gonna be a honey! Avedon, WD is still looking terrific. I really like her this year! Hehehe!! Kay, do you have room for S G?? Send me your address because I may have a couple of fans to spare later this season.. Rita, I'm not to surprised that you like TC...I knew it was your kind of daylily. Thank you all..Ellie

You can pick out that filler depending on what they used - I tried it just to make sure in case we wanted to use something else/tile in the future as I used a lot of screws. I didn't want the kitchen higher than the living room. It would be a nightmare to do, but you can do it. The luan is what is causing the problem - that needs to be pulled up and replaced with plywood not luan. Standard practice is luan and no one we talked to was willing to use nicer plywood even at our insistance. Luan is the smooth surface - the didn't need to use something different. We made the choice to use better plywood as we choose DIY/better materials with the money we saved on labor (so, we probably aren't saving any money and its a lot of work, but we are getting some better stuff). Even if you put the vinyl under the cabinets, vinyl is easy to cut, but it also depends if they used the glue down method vs. tape. We taped ours down just in case I wanted to change my mind in the future or we ruined it redoing the hardwood floors or something else given we are redoing the rest of the house. We glued our one seam under the fridge and we probably didn't need vinyl under there but we have the ice maker and I know what's under there (I also put it under the oven but not dishwasher except where I could reach). The real questions are how did the put it down and they probably are trying to do what is easiest for them. I would want the 1/4 inch luan removed and replaced with 1/4 plywood, screw down (not nail) with deck screws so they will not rust and are solid and they need to be counter-sinked, it filled (let it set for a few days), sanded smooth, then use the tape method for the vinyl, cover with molding. (I did everything but lifting the plywood and the molding myself (husband did that), so it is an easy thing to do, so don't let them tell you how hard it is and I am not a big woman). Putting down vinyl is one of the easiest things we've done (and windows surprisingly). Debi, were you the one who they put the wrong color in? If you were, I'm not so sure given this is the second mistake, I'd want them fixing it.

The key thing is to prime the ripped areas with a shellac-based primer before patching, or else the exposed paper will bubble (ask me how I know!). After the primer is dry, skim the ripped areas. Let that dry (may want a couple of coats of mud if paper is all feathery as 2-3 thin coats are better than 1 thick coat, don't sand between coats), then skim the whole wall if it's not too big (like one wall, not the whole room), if you're careful you can just take a damp sponge and wipe down the high spots on the final coat, or a sanding block with 220 grit sandpaper, just to smooth it out, don't want to sand through the top coat. And don't sand out the patches before you skim the entire wall or you'll see them - let the final skim coat blend in the edges. Then prime and paint the whole wall. Of course, if the rips are on every wall in the room, you may not want to skim all the walls so you'll have to feather the patches. Hopefully they're concentrated in just a few areas so you can spot-prime and patch the rips, then skim the entire area(s) and just sponge of sand the edges. Guaranteed if you try to patch and feather, sand each 1x4 (or so) rip, you'll end up sanding through your patch and/or scuffing the undamaged wall around the edges so much that each spot will be visible. Again, if you've just patched (large) spots, best to prime the whole wall (may want to prime the new mud first, then after it's dry recoat the entire wall, depends on what paint you're using) before you paint. HTH

Terribletom, I appreciate your caution in responding, and I thank you for your diplomatic concern for my feelings. I certainly can understand your fear that I might rip haphazardly into wiring I don't fully comprehend, then go about my business till the house burns down. But I've come here to learn, and my skin is thick, so forgive me if I press ahead. "I (or others) could shoot from the hip about some of your specific questions." And I thank you for your interpretation of the cut red wire. You apparently are right about the PO using a piece of 14-3 when he actually needed 14-2; had I noticed that the red wire was clipped on the switch box side as well, I would have realized the red was just a short span of dead wire--and that would have answered my question about why it was cut short instead of being capped off like the white wire. And I suspect at some point somebody would have suggested that my confusion about why the PO used a single-pole switch (note my question mark in my initial description) might be because it isn't a single-pole, that perhaps 3-way switches in the 1980s looked like single-pole switches with a wire coming out of their backsides. So that clears up THAT question. "Without fully mapping out the circuitry and assessing the whole situation, any answer or set of answers would be pure conjecture--potentially dangerous guesswork." I understand that. And I realize that by describing the circuitry rather than posting my diagram of it I managed to scare and confuse people, possibly making my wiring project sound more complicated than it is. I HAVE mapped out the circuitry and have presented it all here as concisely as I could so that more knowledgeable heads than mine could assess it. The only piece I've left out is the origin of the 12-2 from Junction box 2. I know the wire to the basement has to connect back to the circuit box, but I assume that it also connects to the switch by the front doorway (the one inside the wall that I'm leaving alone)--because it HAS to. For one thing, in order for all 3 switches to work together, that front switch cannot be an island; for another, that switch has to connect to the second light source (whether it be the overhead or the side lights), because I only have 1 set of K&T wiring exposed, and clearly the overhead functions independently from the side lights. I can (and should) go down to the basement and trace that connection. But it has to be there. Otherwise, why involve junction box 2 in this at all? "Moreover, your description of the problem(s) betrays a lack of understanding of the basics of house wiring." Could you please elaborate? If it is because I used the terms "positive" and "negative" instead of hot and neutral, I apologize. I'm also aware that I used "beam" instead of "stud" at one point. And, having had my "eureka" moment, I am relieved to realize there are no single-pole switches involved here. I've tried very hard to be clear but know that precise vocabulary is important in technical explanations. I need to know what I'm missing, because I'm obviously not explaining myself adequately. "you're planning to move some switch boxes and rework what they control. That raises the issue of 'abandonment'." I am planning to move 2 switches, but I'm not sure I have the wherewithal to rework what they control, nor is that my goal. There will be no abandonment here. I'm not moving either junction box 1 or 2 (nor do I really want to fiddle with their contents)--just including them in my explanation in order to present "the whole situation." I need to place a switch by the door to the outside, connect it to another switch 3 feet away on the same wall (by the door to the back hall), move the 14-3 coming thru the floor from its current location to the new wall, extend the new wiring around the corner back to the 2 junction boxes, insulate the wall with the new switches before the carpenter (he didn't get to that wall last Sunday) drywalls that short section. No drywalling is being done at this time on the wall with the junction boxes. "And make no mistake about it: that's exactly what is at issue--a rewiring of the room and, perhaps, adjacent dependencies." But if I don't alter the contents of the junction boxes, I can't affect dependencies, right? The only function coming thru junction box 1 is some of the overhead lighting. I don't believe any of the outlets or the back hall light would be affected by moving the 12-2 out of junction box 2 (which might well be the most sensible thing to do, given how crammed that box is), but right now we intend to leave that box alone--just lengthen the run of 12-2 so it can reach the new switch. "But re-routing and re-working K&T is a perilous business at best." I've noticed that mentioning K&T does seem to make folks nervous. I would LOVE to get rid of the K&T in this room, but that's a much bigger project than we can manage at this time. All I want to do is to confine the K&T in junction box 1. And in order to do that, I have to understand what's going on with the "white wire" leg of this circuit. What I want more than anything is to replace the existing mess coming out of the bottom of junction box 1 with a single 14-2 (or 12-2, if that is the better option) and feed it, along with the 12-2 from junction box 2 thru the holes in my studs over to the new switch box locations. But I can't do that until I make sense of the current configuration. I don't own a camera. My DS took the pictures of the existing wiring. Would it help if I asked him to take a picture of the diagram I made in order to explain all this? Would you feel more comfortable if I went down into the basement and traced the path of the 12-2 back to the switch by the front doorway (yes, I know I need to do this anyway--and yes, I KNOW it would make you most comfortable if I said "I'm hiring a licensed electrician")?