The looong remodel is almost finished!

14 years ago

I have been yapping and yapping for six months now about our remodel, but haven't really had any pictures except for the new room. Still don't, lol, but it's almost finished!

What a way to live. It hasn't been all that bad because the new room is pretty darn big so it made it easier.

All the paint for the cabinets, beadboard and trim were finished today. Tomorrow they start on the ceilings and walls. The painting in the new room is done though.

Next up...FLOORS! Then we get our lives back!

The reason it took so long is because the cabinet guy and the painters are very good craftsmen, and we had to wait and wait until their other projects were finished before they began on ours. The new room has been finished since February! So it's taken FOUR months just to get the cabinets built and the rest of the house painted.

Except for the bedrooms, nothing looks the same anymore. The house is now L shaped when it was rectangular, and the front of the house faces a new direction.

Have any of you done such a major overhaul to your home?

Oh, to give you an idea of a Before and After...Before in my kitchen and teeny tiny utility room, I only had four drawers...FOUR. And they were tiny. Now I have 23! And they're all huge! I have so much space now I don't know what to do! But I love it! lol

Sort by:Oldest

Comments (6)

golddust
14 years ago
This is such wonderful news, Oakley. Every project we take on takes forever and a day as we do most of the work ourselves.

Our upstairs is a sawmill. Well, maybe no longer a sawmill but I can not move boxes out of my guest room until the library shelves are built. Before that, the ceiling must be straightened, repaired and painted.

It's been like this upstairs for a year. (DIY alert.) We have a whole house fan waiting to be installed but the ceiling has to be reinforced, so it's really hot in our bedroom at night... The list goes on and on and on.
suero
14 years ago
Remodeling is a lot like having a baby -- months and moths of nausea and discomfort, and then you live with the result.
Related Discussions
Toto Guinevere - so disappointed! looong review
Q
Comments (55)
Hi everyone, I've installed several Toto toilets, use them exclusively in my home and would like to offer some advice that'll address the two core complaints mentioned in this thread: the dripping sound and the flush problems. 1) The dripping sound is due to the Toto's proprietary roughin adapter and how it mates to the floor's flange. One trick I've found is to use a hot-glue gun and glue a zip-tie to the toilet's exit port so any trickling water is gracefully conducted down the zip-tie and onto the adapter. You must be sure the zip-tie is secured onto the 'front' portion of the exit hole and extends 2 inches or so beyond the hole or it won't work. 2) Toto is famous for their flushing. They use a superior 'swiggle' in the exit tube to improve the vacuum. The ONLY cause for a poorly flushing Toto is a flawed installation of the 'waxie'. The 'waxie' is the wax seal used where the adapter mates to the floor flange. If it's moved, even slightly during installation (or even during the toilet's use if the floor bolts are not secure and the toilet slightly rocks), the waxie develops pin-holes that breaks the seal (and thus the vacuum). So, if you don't experience an impressive sucking effect each time you flush, it's the seal. Just replace it. I hope this helps everyone to solve the distracting dripping sound common to Toto toilets, and explains the mystery of why some people love the flushing action of their Toto toilet, while others are forced to use a plunger.
...See More
Almost complete bathroom remodel
Q
Comments (13)
Your space looks really nice and your layout is similar to what my daughter wants to do. (Only her room is more like 7 by 8 feet and I wonder if we can fit everything.) What is the size of your shower. How wide is your vanity. I suppose the shower and toilet sit on the 11 foot wall, but it looks more like 9 feet? Your new bathroom looks more spacious with the new layout.
...See More
Kitchen remodeled 2+ years ago almost done!
Q
Comments (25)
I don't think your kitchen is too busy---yet. But, it has a lot of elements that can take it that way if you aren't careful. The beadboard is a big part of that. It's an appropriate choice, but yes, I do think all of your examples are too fussy with the brackets and the beadboard. It takes away from the beadboard and the beadboard takes away from the brackets. I think that brackets or beadboard could work. Just not both. Doing floating shelves between the cabinets is very easy. Much easier than doing actual floating shelves! You can mock it up with cardboard boxes to get a feel for it. Basically, you are creating a large U framework out of 2x4's and facing it with plywood, mitered at the edges, or just filled with filler and painted if you want to paint them. The back, open U portion slips over a 2x2 cleat attached to the wall and screws to attach it to the shelf where you can't see it. Then you screw in from the sides of the cabinets into the 2x4 framing at the sides. A bit of caulking and touch up paint and you have a simple "floating" shelf between the two cabinets.
...See More
Haven't vented in a looong time
Q
Comments (14)
Hey Love! It's good to hear from you and I'm really happy that overall things have been going so well. You must have been working very hard to get to the 95% disengaged and that is just great news. UGH to the storms. SS is terrified of tornadoes too, and they are not that much of a threat here because of the terrain. (We do have them, but they generally only hit four or five houses at a time, hop back up into the clouds, back down again - not like the areas where they leave a path of destruction for a mile.) We had one here about a month ago; I set SS a task of calming and explaining to one of the pets what was going on (pets all being in the cellar with us). So SS (as I'd hoped) told the pet all of the stuff I've told him - even if funnel cloud comes down it doesn't mean it's going to hit our house, even if it does it's likely to just take off roof or something and we'll fix it, even if it destroys most of the house we'll be safe in the cellar and we have insurance for everything else. It really seemed to help calm him - the more he repeated it to the pet the more he seemed to believe it himself. (We were fine- we had hail larger than golf balls so I was a bit concerned myself that time!) I think some parents do that because they don't have any friends. If I heard a scary noise, if I were hiding in the cellar because of a tornado warning, I'd call or text a friend for encouragement - not a kid! Great, kid can worry about me, but I'd prefer an adult who can see on the news that tornado hit my area and if I don't answer, can drive over to check on me. Does DH get along well with the teacher? Maybe they can both tag-team BM - teacher can tell BM that she's really hoping to be able to talk reason to her since DH doesn't seem to "get it", how important summer school is for SS, how teacher is optimistic that the child's mother (unlike his father) can understand that.....if BM thinks she's putting something over on DH she'll do it in a heartbeat. :-)
...See More
folkvictorian
14 years ago
Glad to hear it's almost finished and can't wait to see the photos! It's tough to live for months and months with boxes and stuff piled everywhere -- what a pain! I can't imagine how you survived with only 4 kitchen drawers! Do you need to do some shopping now to fill up all 23? :)
awm03
14 years ago
Yay oakleyok! Wonder if it will feel strange to you to have everything done? You kind of get used to the disarray and disruption! I hope you truly love your new improvements for many years to come.

We're still waiting on our remodel to wrap up. Started in September: new siding, roof, attic floor, replacement windows, front porch, pediment over entry, front door, exterior lights, interior trim, interior doors, air conditioning, better insulation, new electrical box & some rewiring, and new water boiler. We are waiting on the weather to dry up so exterior cleaning & touch up painting can be completed before the new gutters go up. We do our own interior painting, and I have one hallway, a foyer, and a few windows to finish. Still need to replace garage doors, deck, and family room flooring after we finish this round of improvements. Also, our landscaping was trashed, so that needs to be redone.

Now that we've redone our house, I hate to say this, but the rest of the houses in our forty-year-old development look a bit dated in comparison. I wonder whether we did the right thing by sinking so much money into our house, though the original materials were failing and needed replacing. Time will tell if it was all a good investment or not.
Oakley
Original Author
14 years ago
Chaos reins supreme! The wood floors are about 90% laid as I write this. The tile in the kitchen is being laid right now too.

I took "Big Dog", Gracie, the English Pointer out to potty a couple of hours ago and instead of coming back to the bedroom she goes running to the LR and SLIDES through the glue! Everyone gave me a dirty look. LOL.

So I plopped her in the tub, got her toes separated, and tomorrow she goes to the vet to be de-glued and have the nails cut very short.

Only bad part is the tile has to sit for a couple of days so we won't have kitchen access. At least the microwave is still in the LR, and the fridge may get moved to the DR so we'll at least have some food.

I'm tired. I'm tired of workers here all the time. At least most of them are hot young bucks. hee hee.
newdawn1895
14 years ago
I can't wait to see your rooms Oakleaf. Twenty three drawers oh my. Sounds like someone may be going shopping to fell those babies up. (lol)

Get your A-- in the shower Jane, NOW. Well, got to go you all have a great 4th.

.....Jane

The looong remodel is almost finished!

Comments (6)

golddust

suero

Related Discussions

folkvictorian

awm03

Oakley
Original Author

newdawn1895

COMPANY

BUSINESS SERVICES

GET HELP

CONNECT WITH US

The looong remodel is almost finished!

Comments (6)

golddust

suero

Related Discussions

folkvictorian

awm03

OakleyOriginal Author

newdawn1895

COMPANY

BUSINESS SERVICES

GET HELP

CONNECT WITH US

Oakley
Original Author