End of Week 8: Paint time!!

Ending Week 8 here......this week was better than the last two weeks. Everything is wrapping up, rough work I mean. Now for the finishing work, which is more like seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.

The crew is finishing up today the last tid bits of rough work (plumbing, lighting, closing up drywall, cancelling things, touching up moldings, etc). Hot mopping (tarring the area to prevent water leakage) in the shower/bath area happened on Wednesday so we're on a roll! I went there yesterday to paint the colors we have selected for the bathroom and kitchen. Wow, I can't believe it's already here!! Paint!! Yikes.....

I realized as I was painting these colors on the wall....I have never in my life painted a wall before. Sure, artwork, canvas, things for school yes. But actually painting a wall, I have no experience in that. The Man has plenty of experience painting. Seems easy, but it's not. In fact, using a little brush for a sample wall was not a good way to go. It left a lot of streaks.....okay, much harder than it looks. Apparently, I'm supposed to do multiple coats too.

This weekend, me and the Man's big task is the completely paint the kitchen, bathroom, laundry, pantry and powder room!!! Huge task. I hope we can get it done by Monday. The Man thinks it's no problem, but I'm the newbie here so....hope the paint goes on well and doesn't clump or streak!

(Hot mop, check!)

(Hot Mop shower and bath area, check! Smells terrible, because it's tar)

(Sample paints....lots of shades of grey. Yes, I like neutral, I like greys)

(This is a bad picture, couldn't get a good shot of this in the right light. Two spectrums of grey and the last one is
black...though at this angle it looks charcoal)

(Bathroom wall of all 4 colors we are considering, light grey to black)

Paint time!!
The Lady

Week 7: Not starting out so well either....

Week 6 was basically a nightmare. I don't really want to remember it.

Week 7 is now starting off as a nightmare and I am beyond irritated, I might just boil over and blow up!!! This whole process is now extremely infuriating, I am losing my patience. Seriously. I am beginning to think, when the hell is this going to be over?!! I am so sick of construction......and the saddest part is maybe, they are at 20% completion. Ughhhh!!! Shoot me!

What's stressing the Lady out so much this week and just pushing me over the edge is the general contractor. As I said from the beginning, designers and GCs never meet eye to eye. In fact, I think GCs are from a different planet. They just don't think on the same wavelength as interior designers do. Maddening.

I think we hired a fairly honest and decent GC. Out of the 5 we interviewed, he seemed to be the most honest and upfront. However, lesson learned. NEVER trust a GC. Never. Write things down, if he says something verbal. Bloody hell, record it on a tape recorder. I wish I did. He has been so far, pleasant and very responsive to work with. There have been a few miscommunications and now I feel like we are not on the same page. Good thing the Man and I are in this together, because the Man can talk to the GC. I don't want to speak to him right now, he's aggravating and testing my patience.

For example, the GC is now [emphasis now] telling us the height of the floor in the kitchen will be slightly (like 3"- which is NOT slightly) raised than the living room's hardwood floors. Hold up?!?! WHAT? I was flabbergasted when I heard that. Excuse me?! That is not only the first time I've heard this, it is unacceptable. Flat out, unacceptable. How can there be a grade different on the floor from the kitchen to the living?! What the hell. The kitchen flows into the living room, I can't even imagine if there was a step between those rooms!! What atrocity!!! I mean, not only is it hideous, it's flat out stupid stupid stupid......Well, here I am venting away. He's going to "minimize" the height difference but there will still be a "height difference". Yo, thanks for the heads up, bitch! [referencing Jesse Pinkman, Breaking Bad]

Let's see, what else has ticked me off this week.....more issues about the clawfoot tub and the piping. The bathroom is more of the Man's project so I have tried to detached myself from it since I have so many other things to worry about. But now the bloody GC is saying he never knew we wanted chrome piping, he thinks "engineering" the drain piping is too difficult for this job, that this wasn't really part of the scope, blah blah blah. Go cry me a river then get this done already. Jeez Lois. Oh and the lighting in the kitchen. I don't even want to write it out, but it's been a bloody nightmare.

Bad week you say? Why yes sir, give me a second helping of misery and frustration and hold the patience too while you're at it.

( I love Jesse Pinkman from BB, love his character, his quotes, his silliness on this show. This cheered me up a
little...I miss Breaking Bad)

Losing patience,
The Lady

Week 3's Nightmare: The process of getting bids from multiple vendors

This Week 3 has been particularly hard for the Man and the Lady. It's frankly been a huge nightmare. We found out some daunting news about our newly bought house, which has made us think twice about this house. Too late now, we're in it 100%....

We have been working everyday after work (our day jobs) at the house, scraping the ceiling and taping off the rooms with plastic sheets. Mentally, it's an exhausting job. I know the Man and I are both pretty burnt out. We get home to our current apartment, which is nice and clean and construction-free, and it's so comforting to be there. We hardly sleep because we have to work afterhours on our house till late at night, it's just like being in college finishing projects, except it's our house.

Nightmare might not be a strong enough word for this week......it's surely been like hell. As I anticipated, once you start opening up the house, it's like opening pandora's box. It's bound to release bad things. We found out that the foundation of our house is basically useless. Our home inspector at the time of the sale told us that the brick was bolted down to the foundation. This past weekend, we had two foundation specialist and structural engineer come out to inspect and evaluate our house. Turns out, the work the previous owner had done to the foundation was basically crap. If anything, they said, it "weakened" the structural support of the house. Basically, we need a new foundation by means of a "sister" foundation.....which short story short, is going to cost anywhere from $30-$40K.....ouch. That's a big slap in the face.

On top of that horrific news (which the Man was very upset about), there's the asbestos we have to get rid of in the house and COMPLETE renovation of the upstair master bathroom and downstairs kitchen/laundry/powder room. Don't get me started on that!!! Okay, Lady has to vent a little about that......sooooooo, I am an interior designer/architect and being in the trade, I know of certain construction details and home renovations. I'm in the business, of course I would know a thing or two. Right? Right. My very first mentor, who taught me pretty much everything about this business, whom I respect and to this day keep in touch with told me long long ago, that General Contractors are like aliens. You'll never quite get their rational and neither will they. They are just from a different planet and don't think like you.....or so interior designers say.

To close off Week 3, we found a leak in the drain pipe for the upstairs bathroom. Another wonderful surprise that comes with an old house. Yay us! NOT!

(The Man on a ladder looking at the leak from upstairs)

(A hole in the drywall ceiling the Man created to get to the source of the leak.
Fantastico! We have a hole in our ceiling!)

When will this end....,
The Lady

Week 2: Cottage cheese ceiling!!

Week 2: Removal of Cottage Cheese Ceiling AKA Popcorn Ceiling AKA perhaps Asbestos-Ridden

Okay, so far not a good start at the house. Disgustingness continues with taping off rooms for scraping of the cottage cheese ceiling. And let me tell you, HOW THE HECK did Dexter do this?! Taping of a "killroom" takes hours! HOURS I tell you. Not a few minutes, hours and hoursssss......... :(

Our home is about 2400 sq. ft. The only rooms not lined with the popcorn ceiling is the kitchen, laundry and powder room and master bathroom. Which means, a big majority of the home IS! Just to tape up the living room, which granted is huge, by myself, took me about 6 hours. Yes, 6 hours of my life wasted, putting plastic sheets up like Dexter did before his "kills." Oh joy. Getting up on the ladder, sticking blue painter's tape onto the wall, getting off the ladder, stretching the plastic sheet little farther, hoping not to rip the plastic.....repeat, repeat, repeat.  How do you do it Dexter, how do you do it. Tell me your secrets, Mr. Dexter Morgan. I never want to see plastic sheets and blue tape again.

I guess I shouldn't complain because I apparently have the easier job out of the two choices. The Man has the worse job, coming in after I tape up a room and getting on a ladder to scrape the disgusting white cottage cheese ceiling with some water so it doesn't just create a dust bomb. Sucks to be us right now! (reference: Nacho Libre).

(Panoramic of the living room)

(Living room, half taped off with plastic sheets)

(Living room, just about the start the floors)

(Entry looking at stairs going upstairs)

(Living room, looking towards the entry)

(One out of the 5 bedrooms....so sad)

(Hallway upstairs)

(My knight in shining armor....or the Man in a HEPA filtered biohazard suit
getting ready to scrape the ceiling)

Exhausted and it's only just begun,
The Lady

Week 1: Yuck, Clean up time!

WEEK 1: YUCK!

Oh the joys of owning a home. First week of owning our house and we're ripping things out left and right. It's disgusting and dirty and dusty, not to mention dirty, dirty, oh and did I say, dirty? It's filthy. This house has been vacant for about 8-9 months, and things are just downright repulsive and grimy. Bathroom looked like a nightmare. Kitchen is beyond use. Not to mention the guacamole colored old carpet and spider webs everywhere....of the many, many things the Lady is OCD about, dirty and bugs are like #1 on the list. I hate hate hate dirty places. I just refuse to go to places like this. And for me to now OWN a place that is beyond disgust, it's frankly making me queasy. And what makes me even queasier is that the Man and I have to clean it all up. Not just clean, demo, throw away, rip apart, scrape away, wipe down......oh joy oh joy!!

(Kitchen with bags and bags of trash we found in the cabinets)

(Kitchen, gross floors and old dingy cabinets)

(Kitchen with more trash, nice lighting though!)

(The Man ripping out the guacamole colored carpet to reveal the nice oak flooring)

(One silver lining! Nice hardwood oak floors, just needs cleaning and refinishing)

(The nasty green guacamole carpet lined with disgusting hair and animal fur....yuck!!)

(The Man going at it!)

(Our beautiful hardwood flooring and bay window)

Sarcastically,
The Lady