In the basement where the phone line comes in from the outside, there's usually a jack. Could you plug your vtech in there?

Regarding that phone jack in your kitchen:

Open up the faceplate and see if this line is dead-ending there or if it's spliced off to some other location. (Don't worry, phone lines can't electrocute you)

If it's dead-ending, you can just tape off the wires so that they don't touch each other, push the wire back into the wall and patch over the wall.

If it's continuing on to another location, then you probably want to keep this location available. But you could replace the faceplate with just a blank one if you don't want a phone there.

Hindsight is always 20/20. The easiest thing you could have done is to tear the kitchen sheetrock out, extended the phone line into the backsplash area and incorporated the jack into a specialty receptacle. Repair sheetrock, then put in backsplash and paint walls.

Now not so easy. I would go back and see what you can do in the bedroom to make room for the phone.

Ok. move the calendar someplace else. Install a decorative wall shelf unit. See if you can buy a cord that matches the wall. Put the phone on the shelf. Run the cord down from the electrical outlet, over to the edge of the counter and then up under the cabinet and velcro the excess cord under the cabinet.

If no other choice but main phone base in the used bedroom you mentioned. I think some v-tech phones you can buy additional non-base phones (what ever they are called) Or buy a new set base and enough "extra phones. You can buy more though the company if you need more than what comes in the set in stores, usually info to order in box. That would be cheaper than rewiring and tearing apart kitchen wall. Also better than those wires you have now in kitchen.

Can you just add an additional phone jack somewhere? My husband did it and he is not that handy, but passes sometimes.

Hi, Why not put the main base in the guest room, you then would be able to put the auxiliary bases where ever you want. You can access the answering machine from the hand held phone. You would never have to go in the guest room.

Good Luck Woodbutcher

Okay, to reply to everyone: Greg, you were a little complicated for me, but I can tell you we are on a slab with no basement. We do have a handyman friend who can only come out rarely because he's so busy, but he may be able to look into your suggestion.

Brickwood Builders: Yes, as soon as I found that photo from a year or two ago, I wanted to slap my head--but the phone jack never entered into my head nor the head of the electrician who actually did move some other outlets for me. Shoot!

Jenwen, interesting idea. I will ponder it and see if I can make it work. There is actually a baker's rack on the other side of the calendar, but I think it would look odd pushed up right next to the counter. Then we'd need to move the garbage can.

Ron Natalie, yes, it's supposed to be able to be wall mounted, but I wouldn't know where to put it that it wouldn't odd. I'd still have the cord problem.

Izzy Mn and Woodbutcher, you may have best solution: we already did order an extra handset a long time ago and could get another. Put the base in the guest bedroom and just turn off the ringer. Then get our handyman friend to just cover up that kitchen phone jack so I can finally center the calendar.

Thanks all!

You could also get a phone line splitter for the living room, if that is where you would prefer to keep the base unit.

You may want to keep one corded phone somewhere in your home. If you lose electrical power, like we did often for a number of years until they fixed issues in our neighborhood, the cordless phones do not work.

It would attach to the two studs on the jack plate, just like the slimline did. Most have a provision to hide the phone cord inside the base, and you could route the power cord along the junction of the cabinets and wall, and tuck the excess cord neatly under the cabinet.

Yes, I agree with mad-gallica, get a $2 splitter and put it in the livingroom. You might want to keep that princess wall phone though. It is the only one that will work in an emergency whhen the power is out! Yes, the cordless phones have batteries BUT they do not work if the base unit has no power. I keep one in my bathroom (the jack was there when we moved in) for just that reason.

I used to have about 10 phone splitters up in the attic. Of course I tossed them all.

I will have to call the phone/cable company: in the living room, a cord comes out from under the phone jack plate. No idea why. I thought that would allow me to still use the connector, but in trying this morning it didn't work. Will try to get a photo to show you what I mean.

Anyone know why they would do that? Pretty sure that cord goes to our modem.

i'm a TeamGuestBedroom member, and buy some additional handsets. we had a system like that and had 5 additional non-base handsets scattered around our 4 story house. (then we got rid of our landline and had to buy a raft of new handsets to go with our system which makes all the phones ring when one of our cellphones ring... i hate carrying a cellphone around with me all day.)

oh and yeah, keep one landline phone, even if its not plugged in.

Thanks for that reminder, ninigret. I was thinking I would have to keep the kitchen phone jack which I would rather not. I didn't think about the fact that I could just keep the phone for emergencies and plug it in wherever.

Off topic, but does anyone else have great difficulty typing on Houzz with a tablet? It keeps erasing words I try to add or correct. And it often puts a word in twice.

i only use houzz on my laptop, everything else ive found to be an exercise in frustration. especially the small photo size makes assessing a dilemma very difficult.

If you have a cellar below, it won't be too difficult to install an extra baseboard-mounted phone jack just to the right of the kitchen counter.

Buy several feet of phone cable at the hardware store. If they don't have phone cable, Cat 5 or Cat 6 Ethernet cable will work fine.

Remove the current jack from the wall and snap a photo of its back, so you know what colors go where on it. The active terminals on it (tip and ring) are the two center ones; normally they go to the white wire with a blue stripe, and the blue wire with a white stripe. If other colors of wires go to these terminals, take note, and substitute those colors for the blue pair below.

Disconnect the old cable from the jack plate, and physically solidly attach the length of new phone cable to its end (twist well and tape; I usually solder at least some wires too). Pull the old cable down into the cellar until you pull the bottom end of the new cable through, leaving the top end of the new cable at the hole in the wall. Leave enough slack at each end to make connections. Remember that you'll be fishing the cellar end up to your new phone jack.

Drill a hole or two in the quarter-round molding just in front of the baseboard to bring the old and new cables up. In both the old cable and the new one, connect the white with blue stripe wires together, and then connect both of them to green in the new jack. Connect blue with white stripe wires together, then both to red in the new jack.

The old and new phone cables will probably have 4 pairs (8 wires). Unless you have more than one phone line, you can ignore all the pairs except the blue and white. Just snip them off, or coil them around the base of the jack.

Fasten the new jack to the baseboard with wood screws. Face the RJ11 jack down or to the side, to keep dust out of it. Make sure it has enough clearance to plug in your phone!

Reconnect the old wall jack to the new cable end at the wall hole, using the original color codes, then reinstall the wall jack. Test both jacks with a working phone.

Cj Mac, I was having trouble stuff not typing correct/erasing for a few weeks. It just stopped a few days ago, I don't know why. Maybe a update they did with bug at Houzz.

"Anyone know why they would do that? Pretty sure that cord goes to our modem."

My guess: it connects to a spare pair in the phone cable. Somewhere, probably in the cellar, the phone/internet installer placed a DSL filter, so your phone jacks get a filtered signal, but the line goes unfiltered to the modem.

That's kind of a hack, though. I would have installed a 2-jack plate, labeling one PHONE and the other DSL. Which in fact is what I did in my current house.

DavidR, we're on a slab, so no cellar. Maybe I'll see if the phone company could come fix that for me as it's obviously not how it should be.

i have the same old school jack. why don't you get the base set that you can hang on the wall? you could run the electrical in the wall and combine it w/the phone jack so all the wires are in one spot.

or just move the jack to the backsplash, but if you're going to move it, then move it somewhere logical.

ours was kept when we redid the kitchen w/a little desk/hutch area.

I did find this one if you do move the electrical to the jack

or, see if the phone company can do your phone jack w/the ethernet

" I was thinking I would have to keep the kitchen phone jack which I would rather not. I didn't think about the fact that I could just keep the phone for emergencies and plug it in wherever."

And then frame or buy art to hang right over the phone jack. Problem solved.

If the phone lines are long enough, you can remove that plate and use a jack near the floor like David suggested. (Remove the jack and gently tug to see how much slack you have in the line.)

If the wires are too short, you can buy phone line splice kits and extend the wires. Either patch the hole in the wall or install a remodel receptacle box and make the splice inside the box and cover with a blank cover plate.

Call a company that installs low voltage wiring.

Reference Beth H. and combing phone/electric in one wall box.

This may be a good solution, but make sure you use the correct dual voltage receptacle box. You cannot have low voltage (phone) and high voltage (AC power) in the same box unless it has an approved separator to keep the low and high voltage wiring separate. The dual voltage boxes are easy to find, but they are unique.

Since this configuration has both a USB charger and a phone jack in the same module, I'm not quite sure how it is wired. USB power adapters usually require A/C power that is converted to 5 volts at up to 2.1 amps, while a phone jack would usually be powered from the phone company (48-90 volts, but very low amperage).

Separating voltages is both code requirement and a very important safety requirement.

Bruce

Not sure what the MBR looks like but the Vtech should mount on a wall. You could mount the base on the wall next to the bed (don't need a night stand) and run the wires the same as you had it before. You just won't need a horizontal surface for the V-tech to sit on.

Hey everyone: it's a miracle! ;-)

Yesterday I had tried several times to get the base and phone cord to plug in behind our television in this outlet and jack:

I just now took the old slimline phone and plugged it into that jack--and got a dial tone! So I got the V-tech and tried again. Again got a "No power at base" message as I had yesterday. I unplugged the phone, thinking to try plugging it in elsewhere--but first I plugged it in again because I KNOW that outlet works. This time the phone lit up as it should and I got a dial tone.

So the old slimline phone is back on the kitchen wall where it had been and I'm just going to leave it there. I don't particularly like the V-tech next to the TV, but I don't much like phones anywhere. (You notice in those HGTV shows, they almost never have a TV or phone in a redesigned room.)

All I can think is that the cable guy gave us a bonus by keeping that jack free while he connected the modem.

Thanks for all the help!

You said "phone/cable modem". Does that mean your phone service is provided by your cable company via the internet?

Where's Radio Shack when you need them?

So I got the V-tech and tried again. Again got a "No power at base" message as I had yesterday. I unplugged the phone, thinking to try plugging it in elsewhere--but first I plugged it in again because I KNOW that outlet works. This time the phone lit up as it should and I got a dial tone.

Probably would not hurt to replace the cord from the phone to the phone jack. Sounds like the cord or the plug ends might be a bit iffy.