New Year, New Challenges

Happy New Year!! 2015!!

First blog of the year.... here we go.

What a delightful way to start the new year! On January 2nd, our ceiling in the "brown" room aka our TV and temporary living room just fell down. Yes, out of nowhere. Well not exactly. There was a hairline crack around Christmas time which exponentially grew everyday but we tried to ignore it, hoping it would just hold. And it did not hold. In fact, the plaster ceiling came crumbling down on our sofa and rug. Good thing my little Punas were not hurt! So here's the damage:

(Exposed lath and missing plaster)

(The Man was right on it, the next day filling the hole with drywall)

(Drywall puzzle)

(Drywall puzzle with washers to hold down the existing plaster ceiling edges)

(The Man carefully cutting out drywall "puzzle" pieces)

(The next day, plastering begins....and the Lady is taping up the seams with fabric mesh tape, to keep the seams from
cracking as the Man claims. There is no way to put mesh tape up without getting dirty, it's a messy job!)

(just like that, here's my contribution: mesh tape on the seams between drywall and plaster. The Man swears by
this. Otherwise, you'll be sorry with cracks down the seams)

(Tape while the plaster mud is still wet, so it can adhere well)

(Me on the ladder looking out to our street)

Offffff course with any construction or renovation, you always hit a hiccup. Plastering on the old ceiling with a combo of the new drywall has backfired a tad on the man. We got some major bubbling and peeling from the old ceiling (not strong enough to hold the new plaster), so the Man had to remove the new plaster that he just plastered on and put big chunks of mesh up on the ceiling to hold the new plaster to the old ceiling. Yes, complicated, tedious hard work.

It set him back a few days and frustrated him as well. He said he's drywalling all of the ceilings from now on.Sounds good! Plus we got some rain this weekend, which dampened the environment, so we couldn't paint. He finished plastering and sanding/sponging the ceilings but we're just waiting for all of it to dry up to paint.

Patience. Live and learn. Two attributes we will probably come across again and again this year.

Working mode,
The Lady