Tag Archive | bathroom demolition

Bathroom renovations, one month in.

Hello!

It’s been a couple of weeks since I’ve updated on the house and the pregnancy. Things are still going well. I don’t have any new belly pics still because I keep forgetting to have Aaron take a picture. I’m 17 weeks 3 days today. Nobody can tell that I’m pregnant still except Aaron and I and some of my coworkers that see me everyday. Otherwise, I just look thicker than normal. I’ll have Aaron take a picture tomorrow hopefully.

House stuff is coming along. Last weekend Aaron installed some drywall in the bathroom and rewired.

He also installed an exhaust fan in there. There wasn’t one before and it definitely needed one.

He also installed the new window! Yay! That might have actually been two weeks ago but I don’t think I blogged about it yet. One new window, 13 more to go!

We’ve shown our old house to three people now and we have two more scheduled tomorrow so hopefully we’ll have it rented soon. It’s kind of a pain to keep the house super clean all the time. Maybe by the time we actually rent it, keeping the house clean will become a habit and I’ll stop letting things collect on the kitchen island. It’s possible. It’s not likely but it would be nice.

Last week I was on the way to the grocery store and I was driving out of Troy Hill and it’s the night before garbage day and I dry past someone’s garbage and see a rocking horse. I kept driving down the block until my brain processed that I needed to stop and get that thing! So I hit the brakes, backed up half a block and put it in my back seat. And so now we have a lovely wooden rocking horse for the future baby. I plan on spray painting her and giving her a new mane and tail.

Still wearing my work clothes and looking a little frazzled. This is a slightly embarrassing photo. I promise my skirt is actually knee length.

Our new appliances were delivered last week too. Yay new refrigerator! And it fit in the semi tiny spot. We’re installing a new dishwasher too. That black one doesn’t work and starts to smoke if you turn it on.

We also have the new oven over at the old house. We’re taking the old oven to the new house but right now they’re both in the kitchen. Maybe this is scaring away potential renters. But they’re getting a shiny, brand new, stainless steel oven. Promise we’ll remove one before you move in.

Because clearly the potential renters read this blog..

This past weekend, I went to a children’s consignment store that was pretty much my favorite thing to do in the whole world. I love bargains. I bought 5 little baby clothing items. Two of them were girl specific and the rest were gender neutral. I figure if we don’t have a girl, I can give them to my sister-in-law who is having a girl in June. 5 items for $11!

I also stopped at a furniture consignment store but it was kind of a let down. I plan on checking out another children’s consignment store that I found soon.

After my consignment shopping venture, I met Aaron over at the new house and helped him with the plumbing! Aaron tackled soldering the new shower/tub plumbing and I helped by lighting the torch and running to the hardware store 3 times to get forgotten items. Unfortunately we had to lose another wall in the process. The small wall to the right of the doorway had to go in order to run the new pipes. The drywall went first and then we realized the framing had to go too because it was weak and rotting from a leak at some point.

The good news is the soldering seemed to go really well! After we were finished, we turned the water on and there were no leaks!

Here is Aaron focusing on soldering the last couple of pieces together:

We ran the shower head pipe up really high because the shower head I ordered kind of points straight down instead of a regular shower head. It’s this lovely one in chrome.

Another picture of Aaron soldering intently. Thanks to my dad and papap and the man at Rollier’s for helping Aaron learn how to solder.

This weekend the tub goes in! Then we’ll hopefully pick up the tile and that will be next I think. This bathroom project turned out to be HUGE. Way bigger project than I envisioned in my head. It’s a bit stressful to have two houses and be rushing to get them both ready in time for renters and so we don’t have to pay both mortgages for too long. I’m looking forward to having renters and moving into the new house. Once it gets a little warmer and I can open the windows, I’m going to do a little painting in the new house. I’ll wear my respirator and ventilate and I think it’ll be okay. Most sources online say painting with low VOC paint while pregnant is not a problem. If anyone has read something different or their doctor warned them against it, let me know!

Alright time to do a little reading and eat generic swedish fish.

New house work continues

Jan29

It’s Sunday morning, 7:04 AM. Aaron is still asleep. I went to bed around 10 last night so I’m awake.

Last Saturday, Aaron and I found a Lowe’s three miles from our new house which was pretty exciting. We bought the tub for the new bathroom:

We also got the new sink. We decided to get another pedestal sink (we have one in our current house too) because the new bathroom is pretty tiny. Plus this probably saved us about $300 because all the vanities I found that I liked were $500+. I did make Aaron promise that we would get Carrera marble countertops for the kitchen since we went with the pedestal sink. We’ll see if that pans out.

Toilet in the back seat. We got the “Devonshire” style toilet and sink.

We took a second trip to Lowe’s later in the day with Aaron’s dad’s truck and got all of the insulation, cement board, plywood, green board which I think was actually purple, and a bunch of wood for the floor in the bathroom. Aaron is scabbing in extra pieces of wood to make the floor level and to make it stronger.

Here is the hole in the floor where the tub was. The old tub was leaking and leaked into the ceiling below (where the kitchen is) so that part of the drywall needs to be replaced.

Here is the hole from below in the kitchen. And also a better view of the previous owner’s great paint color choices.

This weekend, the hole grew:

We also ordered the new window for the bathroom. We will have one nice window with the grill in between the panes that actually opens. Yes!

Here is a better picture of the kitchen. We’re not really going to do much to the kitchen at this point except for paint the walls and get new appliances. Down the road, we plan on painting the cabinets white and getting a new countertop and backsplash. Right now, the countertops and backsplash are tile that match the floor. Bad move old owners. There are white tile EVERYWHERE.

I’m standing in the dining room taking this picture. The dining room is open to the kitchen and then those sliding doors lead out onto the deck which is covered in the back and open on the side. The door in the kitchen leads out to the open part of the deck.

Aaron, working on the floor in the bathroom. He purchased a new level this weekend and he loves it. LOVES it. We also bought a mailbox and trash can this weekend. Exciting stuff! Apparently the old owner’s took the mailbox with them because there wasn’t one.

I didn’t spend a ton of time working over there this weekend but I did finish prying all of the trim out of the bedrooms. Here is the master bedroom without any trim. It’s sponge painted a nice orange color… The floors are nice though!

Here is the second bedroom. This color isn’t so bad.

Here I am trying to take a picture of the 13 week belly. I’ll have to have Aaron take one today when I’m not wearing multiple layers.

Here’s the living room where Aaron has two table saws set up. The carpeting will eventually come out. There is oak hardwood underneath but we’re keeping the carpet there to protect it while Aaron is working on the bathroom.

And lastly, I bought my first maternity item! It’s one of those stretchy bands that you put over your unbuttoned pants so you can wear them longer. I got a black one at Target. It’s pretty comfortable. I tried it out yesterday.

Today I have to bake cookies for potluck Sunday at church and Aaron has to meet a client for a bit this morning then church this afternoon then probably watching a movie this evening. Have a nice day!

Our New House!

Jan18

Hello! Lots of things have been happening over here but I haven’t really been taking too many pictures. I’m going to start carrying my camera around more and taking more pictures, especially since we started the work on our new house!

But first, Christmas happened in Troy Hill. We got a tree from Home Depot this year and it ended up being great! It doesn’t look very big in the picture but it was pretty huge. Ornaments only on one side because we don’t have very many.

We had Christmas dinner at Aaron’s parents new house which is awesome. Here is Aaron with his grandma, Dorothy. Her and Aaron are about to arm wrestle.

(that’s not true)

This past Friday we closed on our new house and Aaron immediately went over there and started demolishing the bathroom. On Saturday I went over too and started cleaning. It’s pretty gross right now. The previous owners were smokers and it was a foreclosure so it is in rough shape. I wore a respirator and rubber gloves. Possibly overkill but I didn’t want to inhale the fumes. Plus Aaron was upstairs knocking out the bathroom walls so all sorts of debris was floating around. Aaron was wearing a respirator too. I can’t believe I didn’t take a picture! His has pink filters.

The carpet in the left side of that picture is from one of the bedrooms upstairs. The house has carpet everywhere but oak hardwood underneath it all so we’re slowly tearing out the carpet and will refinish the floors before we move in.

I cleaned for a little bit then went upstairs with needle nose pliers and spent a few hours pulling staples out of the wood floors. Oh my. I finished one bedroom and now have three blisters.

We also decided to pry this hideous wooden shelving and mirror off the wall in the dining room. If you look closely, you might be able to see the red, white and blue Americana fabric hanging from it. Shaking my head at the previous owners.

Here is the vanity and the sink from the bathroom. I didn’t take a picture of the bathroom yet but Aaron has it down to the studs at this point so this weekend we’re going to start buying the drywall and a new window for the bathroom. The windows in the house are pretty gross and half of them don’t even open so we’re going to slowly replace them starting with the bathroom.

Here’s a picture of the kitchen. Yes they painted the ceiling blue and the walls red. Bright blue and red. And the doors are sort of beige and gross. Every single wall and ceiling in the house needs to be painted. They painted the ceilings of each room to match the walls. For example, the small bedroom upstairs has yellow walls and an orange ceiling with orange trim. One of the bedrooms is also sponge painted.

I’ll take some more pictures this weekend and get them up on here. I also have more exciting new to post coming up this weekend. Until then, have a great week!

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