Something bad happened that actually was a very, very good thing... After following breiaj's instructions to the letter, two of the floor tiles in the bathroom popped up a couple of days later and wouldn't stay stuck. When I pulled them up the rest of the way, I found a leak! If it hadn't been for those tiles unsticking, we wouldn't have found that leak until it did a LOT more damage - like made a big ole mess of the kitchen ceiling. So here's one way in which vinyl tile might actually be BETTER than sheet! A few notes WRT breiaj's instructions... I admit to dropping back to $3.99 paintbrushes because they became unworkable so quickly - the glue would start to dry up in the bristles while we were working and it would become more like a paddle than a brush! We didn't have any problems with bristle loss. 2" flat-ended paintbrushes were just the right size, a wider brush seemed like it would save time but was really more awkward to work with, especially with cut pieces. Don't bother wearing rubber gloves in hopes of keeping your hands clean, they stick to the tile's adhesive and to the adhesive you're spreading on and just generally irritate the crap out of you. :-) The adhesive - Armstrong's anyway - is kind of hard on your hands though, and contrary to the label does not wash off with soap and water! We ended up using a "painter's wipes" product we had on hand to clean up our hands about every hour because we would get too sticky to work effectively, and our fingertips were pretty raw and sore afterward. Even though it costs a bit more it's a lot easier to work with the smaller containers of adhesive using this brush-on method, because the bucket gunks up something awful. If you're laying more than about 100 square feet, seriously consider coughing up for the vinyl tile cutter (homedepot.com has one for about $50, or you can rent a superduper heavy-duty one for about the same for a weekend)... scoring and snapping with a utility knife sucks after a while, it's slow and hard on your hands. Make sure you have a comfortable utility knife no matter what though, and a LOT of blades. Stanley makes a really nice knife in their FatMax line, with a rubber-cushioned handle. A jamb or undercut saw ($15) makes dealing with those door jambs SO much easier than trying to cut the tile around them! We removed the baseboards; we were going to replace them with vinyl cove but the damn stuff just would not cooperate so we patched the baseboards with wood filler galore and put them back, and it looked SO much neater than butting the tiles up to the baseboards. deeje, I've checked around with several manufacturers of vinyl tile and the biggest deal WRT moisture is not to slop around too much water when you mop - contrary to popular belief, you don't need a gallon bucket full of near-boiling water and some vile chemical to get a floor clean! Try a well-squeezed-out sponge or terrycloth/microfiber mop instead of a sopping string or rag mop instead. Those microfiber cleaning cloths fit on Swiffer handles really well, if like me you are too cheap to buy the Swiffer cloths. :-) ctaylors6, the instructions in the Cryntel box agree with the Lowes guy - wash well-secured vinyl very well, rinse well, allow to dry thoroughly. I'd use something like TSP that would destroy any gloss on the existing floor. Our vinyl was trashed so we couldn't leave it, so I can't speak to the adhesive method on top of vinyl. We still haven't gotten the kitchen floor laid down yet. We had to tear out some of the subfloor and replace it, and then do a lot of leveling and sanding on the rest, got diverted with a day of electrical work, and to top it all off DH has been sick as a dog. :-( Cross your fingers for this weekend!

I've been skimming quickly, and have a few comments based on my quick read. First, everyone's work on their ranches - fabulous! However, and apologies if I've misread or misinterpreted, but cathleen has or will have a relatively limited budget and is not a DIYer. pirula's gorgeous reno looks like one that had a nice-sized budget, and joanneemb, you've said you and your DH did all the work yourselves. mtnr is 100% correct IMO that if cathleen has the budget to do all that kind of thing herself, she also the budget to get a nicer house from the start. "Built ins, higher baseboards, solid wood doors, new windows, custom moulding, new kitchen and bathrooms...... All of that is very expensive, especially if you are not DIY, and if you were you probably wouldn't be asking us. It kind of begs the question, if you can afford to do all of the above, you can afford a nicer house to begin with (especially since, often, all of the above are cash expenses and a nicer house you pay for over 30 years)." That list above - baseboards, wood doors, and so on - those are just the things you can see. Sometimes (not always, of course, but it could happen), there is basic work you have to do first, or you may have to do it in order to make the changes you envision. We had to have lots of electrical work done before we even got to the good stuff. Our electrician is great, a true artist if you will, and reasonable, compulsively careful and concientious. He told us that for what he had to charge to do the work on our house, he could have rewired an entire new house. We did everything we had to for safety plus some things we wanted to do - and there is still work we decided not to do because of the cost. We were so lucky to have found an excellent, very reasonable contractor. By our calculations, had we gone with anyone else, our total reno costs would easily be two-thirds higher than they've been. We would not have been able to do this work; it simply would have broken the budget, so badly damaged as it is anyway. That leads to: if you are not a DIYer but will want to make many changes to a house to transform its look and style, you will need to be confident of your ability to hire the right people. Our contractor has great taste and an aesthetic sense, as well as technical skills, and he has worked on many old houses. The guy before him, let's just say the work was perfectly competent, but he would have done only and exactly what we told him to do. That means we would have had to have been thoroughly informed and completely educated before starting anything. Through word of mouth, including our contractor's own recommendations, we now have competent, trustworthy people to work on every conceivable part of our house if necessary. The last find - finally - a great plumber. We just paid him ~$400 to fix a kludged-together mess with the kitchen plumbing.... That leads to another thing: cathleen, even after you've bought what you hope will be your perfect house and have budgeted for molding, wood doors and all the rest, you will still need to have plenty of funds available for fixes and problems that could pop up over time, things you might have failed to account for in the beginning. "If anyone knows where to find detailed cost breakdowns, please let me know. I have not been able to find this information." Can anyone steer cathleen to some websites or other places where this info is available?

I would pass on the luncheon because most of the people at the service will probably be there. Why would anyone think one was not safe and the other was fine especially with people projecting their voices if they are seated apart. Second thing but something I have noticed having been a panty hose wearer most of my life. The pictures do not appear to be of the hose part but of the panty part. There are very few even big women's hose that are as wide as is shown. If they were cut lengthwise there is the small problem that the cut edges roll simply because that was the way they were formed.

I'd like to second the recommendation for a home energy assessment. Here, it's a $50 co-pay and the service is funded through fees charged on everyone's electric bill. While the visit was a bit underwhelming, the blower door test was worth the whole visit. It came as a complete surprise that the draft created sucked in the most air along the top trim of all the windows. The contractors applied a bead of clear caulk over many (60+ windows, so it will be addressed when painting is done). I learned that the attic air sealing can make a big difference but it's often a sizable project to do it completely. You should really remove the insulation to get at all the areas. A big benefit in my location is that the assessment qualifies you to have a significant discount for insulation work. If NC has a similar program you may get that crawl spaced addressed for very little cost. In addition to insulation, vapor barriers may help on the basement/crawl ceiling. If your attic is a pull down hatch, it should have an insulation 'box' that fits over the hatch opening. Attic vents and exhaust fans should be checked for proper operation to let that heat out. Any lights cut into the ceiling can have a cap put over the opening in the attic. Vents in the ceiling (bath) should be sealed in the attic around the cut out. In addition to a blower door test, thermal imaging might be helpful. I think you can rent the infrared scanning equipment to identify hot and cool spots. If you're lucky, the energy audit will include that service. Regarding the windows: many new windows will have an R value of 3. Consider that in light of R-30 or higher wall insulation. If the old ones are solid and properly installed and insulated, new ones will not help much. One of the most energy efficient window treatments is the honeycomb cellular shade and the double cells are more insulative. I'm not enamored of them but they sort of disappear when not in use. Other cheap stuff: weather stripping, more caulking inside and out, thin foam insulation pieces that go behind wall switches and plugs on outside walls - plus baby safe outlet covers (shocking how much cold air comes through those unused plugs in winter), well controlled use of expandable foam not just at pipes but also (very carefully done) around electrical boxes on outside walls. link Home Energy Checklist