A Header Table

Better Picture of Fireplace Update

Ok yes, there are home improvement trappings all through this picture, but it is better than the last one. Oh - and I'm including the before too, just so we don't forget where it started.

Now... What do we do with the mantle? It has to be painted, but what color? Ultra Pure White? Something a little less stark? The same oil rubbed bronze spray paint as the mantle? And for the record, the second pic where the brick looks so much more yellow is much more true to life than the first where it looks all creamy and neutral. That brick is anything but creamy and neutral.

Alright nonexistent readers - what say you?

Quick Fireplace Update

Well y'all - it's been a while since I've posted, and that's mostly because life has literally spiraled out of control, and so has the reno project. The bathroom still isn't done (though it's awfully close), and nothing else has really been tackled, except this one thing: the fireplace surround. Y'all remember what it looked like before:

As you can see - the... burnished brass look is a little dated, and I really wanted to get a whole new surround. But it turns out that fireplace surrounds are upwards of $200, and they look pretty much exactly like this except other colors. Since we decided to splurge on granite for the kitchen (oh - it's totally not a splurge - we got it for such a good deal, and it's gonna be gorgeous!), and we really want to get things done ASAP, it seemed a little silly to pay several hundred dollars for what we already have. So I took a note from Designed to Sell, and I spray painted it. Sounds sketchy, I know, but really - Krylon makes a great product, which works fantastically when you do it right (like most things).

Here's how it went:

1. Figured out how to remove the surround from the fireplace (there are bolts on the inside that are really easy to get to - these are not the ones you want, especially if you try to turn them and they won't turn - then there are bolts that are ish easy to get to and require half your body to be in the fireplace - those are the winners. Unscrew them and the whole thing lifts right out - I'll post a pic of that later)
2. Laid out plenty of paper and cardboard to make sure no overspray would get on anything I cared about (like the brick). I chose to do the spray painting inside, because every time I do something like that outside, bugs get sprayed in, which isn't exactly the aesthetic we're going for. But - the moral of the story is: protect everything that you like, because whatever you don't cover will encounter overspray.
3. Cleaned everything very thoroughly, then went over the metal I wanted to paint with high grit sand paper just enough to get the shine off of it (I think it had some kind of outer coating that looked a little like polyurethane when it came off). Then wiped all the sanding dust off of all the surfaces.
4. Used painters tape and a razor to tape off the glass perfectly. For each side of the glass, I laid painters tape all the way across the side, covering the seam between the metal and glass. Then I used the razor to trim directly in the seam, ensuring perfect coverage. I used paper (grocery ads in fact) to fill in the center of the glass.
5. The first thing I did was go over the entire surface with a coat of grey, metal, primer. Once that was dry (5 minutes) - I went over it again.
6. *** A side note - at this point I had already tested all the possible colors of metal spray paint on pieces of foil and had chosen the one I wanted -Krylon Oil Rubbed Bronze (it really looks kind of iron black, but whatever) ***
7. Once the second coat of primer dried (I let this one sit for 10 minutes) - I put on the first coat of the Oil Rubbed Bronze - then I waited 10 minutes and put a second coat on.

And that was it... except for one small detail. I missed the tops of the doors because of the orientation in which I sprayed. Then when I went to do them, I sprayed the paint too close to the surface, which caused some of the non-cured paint (it had been more than an hour and less than 24 since its last coat - which qualifies as Krylons 'absolutely no more coats of paint right now' time) to bubble and peel - a real downer. So in that spot, I used a razor scraper to remove all the coats of paint from that entire edge piece, I resanded, re-primered, and re-painted that entire piece. And in the future, I will recoat within an hour, or after 24 - but never anywhere in between.

And here's the progression Primer:

First Coat of Oil Rubbed Bronze Krylon

And the final product, please excuse the sad cell phone pic (my cell camera is actually great, but the lighting in this living room is horrendous):

I'll post a better pic at a later date, but I have to say - for $12 worth of spray paint, I'm super happy. Also, just for the record - it's probably safer to use high heat spray paint (specifically formulated for repainting barbecues and things like that), but none of the high heat stuff came in a sheen that we could live with, and truly - from experience, this particular fireplace surround really doesn't absorb that much heat on the surfaces we painted, because it's well insulated on the interior.

And that's what's been done in the last - way too long period of time. Anyone else spray painted their fireplace surround or found high heat spray paint that has a decent sheen to it? Let me know in the comments if so!

Master Bathroom Demo

Well, adoring public, the master bathroom demo is done, and BOY was it fun. We've had... an unsurprising number of surprises, a good amount of blood, stitches, and one unintended shower. We are also the proud new owners of not one but three water meter keys. Apparently in this town, water meters covers aren't particularly standard, and your neighbor's meter key might not fit your meter cover - nor will 2 of the three keys available at your local home depot! Thankfully, the most expensive meter key did actually work, but I'm fairly certain that we spent more time getting the cover off the meter than we did in ripping out and capping the plumbing.

What we've done:

1. Used a demolition hammer to rip out floor tile (after attempting the same with just a regular hammer - not the recommended method)
2. Cut the copper pipes leading to the shower, and installed valves (for our convenience as much as any future homeowner's)
3. Used any means necessary to rip out the door assembly, tiled surround and cement board backer, and fiberglass shower base.

And here's the breakdown of that:


Ceramic Tile Removal


I've already covered the basics of this step, but there are a couple of things I didn't mention, because they hadn't been completed at the time of that post. After the initial removal day where we used the demolition hammer to tear out the tiles, we noticed a bunch of spots where the thinset just hadn't come up. At first we thought we could get away with using just a manual scraper to clean those up, but sadly that was not the case. In the end we rented the demolition hammer again, and my brother actually came into town and finished removing all the leftover thinset. If you are removing ceramic tile, here are some things you should do that we learned the hard way:

1. Do not attempt this in a bathroom that still needs to function - the amount of dust you create will make whoever uses the bathroom crazy!
2. Always wear eye and ear protection, and ignore the fact that all the DIY shows never show this: use a respirator. All that dust will certainly go into your lungs, and if you're sensitive at all, it'll cause serious breathing problems.
3. Seal off your demo area from the rest of the house. If you don't, like us, you'll end up with a fine layer of dust on everything, which is really not awesome.

And here are the basic steps to getting this done:

1. Go to HD or your local tool rental place and rent a demolition hammer with tile removal attachment.
2. Put on your gloves, eye protection, ear protection, and respirator.
3. Remove your tile.
4. Clean everything up so you can see if there are spots you've missed.
5. Go back over your concrete floor and make sure you've removed all the thinset.
6. Return the demolition hammer, and call it a day!

 Cutting the Copper Pipes

Boy was this an ordeal that shouldn't have been. Our friendly homebuilder saw no reason to install valves on the pipes leading to the shower that we demo'ed, so we had to follow a little bit longer path to renovation success here.

1. The first thing we did was cut an access panel to the plumbing from the opposite side of the plumbing wall, which in our case was in the 'toilet closet.' We used a jigsaw to cut this access panel, and we didn't make it very clean, because we're going to put a proper access panel in its place later and will clean it up at that point. I can't get the pictures to work right, so just check out the one at the end that's labeled "access panel."
2. As you can see, there are clearly no valves in that panel. To install valves, we obviously need to cut those pipes, and to cut those pipes we need to turn off the main water supply to the house. This simple task took about 4 hours and four people. Unlike other houses I've lived in, the meter and shutoff valve for this house are located in a locked compartment in the front yard. I can only speculate that the city believes people will spend hours of their lives just watching the meter tick away and therefore must lock them away to keep citizens from wasting away their lives (like Harry Potter and the mirror that shows your heart's desire). Anyway - we bought a meter key at HD - it did not fit. We borrowed a meter key from our neighbor - it did not fit out meter, though it fit his. Finally we bought the most expensive meter key that anyone has to offer, and it fit. Now - don't tell anyone this, but we took the lock off of our meter after that. Clearly the thing was defective! We tested the water in the kitchen to make sure the valve was actually off before proceeding to cut pipes.
3. With the water off, we went ahead and cut the pipes using a pipe cutter designed for small spaces. When they use these things on TV - it seems super easy and like it happens super fast. That's just not true. Expect to spend at least 10 minutes cutting each pipe, and don't freak out about that. It's cutting the pipe - it just takes longer than anyone would like!  The picture labeled "pipes and cutter" shows the pipes and the cutter we used.
4. Once we got the pipes cut, we needed to install valves so we could turn on the water. A guy at HD told us about Shark Bite plumbing - it takes all the soldering out of copper plumbing! We bought the valves, marked the depth on the pipes, and then we pushed them on. Voila! Valves installed. We then turned on the water to make sure we weren't leaking - and surprise! No leaks. It was amazing. The pictures at the bottom show the SharkBites as purchased and then as installed.

Access Panel (really rough, I know)

Pipes and Pipe Cutter

SharkBite Valves!!!

SharkBite Valves Installed and Not Leaking!

 Ok - I know I said I was going to break it down in one post, but I feel like this is becoming the Iliad of home reno blog posts, so I'm gonna talk about the rest of the shower demo in another post. Has anyone else ever used the SharkBites and loved them? Or had a meter that couldn't be opened?

Ceramic Tile Removal

Well, for all you nonexistant readers and DIYers out there - I have a super little known secret to share with you: ceramic tile removal from concrete is ridiculous. I mean - ridiculous.

First, I thought - we've removed ceramic tile before, this shouldn't be so bad. So I tried to get the tile up with just a hammer, chisel, and crow bar. I started in an inconspicuous area, underneath the vanity - behold:

The inconspicuous area under the vanity: note the chipped tile that hasn't budged at all.

I've been informed that this hammer was purchased at the dollar store... 

After switching to an actual hammer made with real metal, this is where we got.

Surprise of the day: there are actually 2 layers of heinous wallpaper in this bathroom - sweet!

It was not long after this point that I discovered something truly horrifying: the ease with which these initial tiles came up was equal to the difficulty of the subsequent tiles. Whoever installed this stuff saw fit to randomly include sticky black construction adhesive under SOME tiles but not others. After struggling for 20-30 minutes with that, we decided our lives would be easier if we just had the right tools. Enter HD tool rental center and a demolition hammer. Though this still wasn't the easiest thing in the world, it was much easier than it would have been by hand... and by that I mean, we would have given up and just buried the house if by hand was the only way to accomplish this!

The demolition hammer in action:

And just so people don't read this, attempt to do it on their own, and then blame us for the happy surprises that come with ceramic tile removal:

1. The demolition hammer is a piece of heavy machinery and should be treated as such - ALWAYS use appropriate PPE (personal protective equipment) like ear plugs, safety glasses, and gloves.
2. If you don't use gloves, you will get blisters (we sure did).
3. The grout/thinset under the tile will come out with the non-powered scrapers available at your local HD or Lowe's, but your time will be much better spent by just paying the extra hours of rental on the demolition hammer and using it to get all the grout/thinset off of your concrete.
4. Tile is very heavy, especially if you have >100 square feet of it. Don't fill up a contractor's trash bag with tiles and expect it not to burst open - because it will. We used a heavy duty gardener's wagon with a heavy cardboard box on the bottom to get our tile out of the house.

And - after all that, here's what the floor looks like now:

Painting the Living Room

Since we didn't really have enough experience to tear down the paneling, we decided that priming and painting was the way to go. We purchased ten gallons of tinted primer, and 2 gallons of paint - the name of which I'll figure out when I go check the can in the garage later. The primer is Kilz2 Latex Based Primer, and the paint is BEHR flat interior latex. Here's how we did what we did:

1. Moved all the furniture to the center of the room and covered it with heavy drop cloths. 
2. Covered ALL the carpet with drop cloths, and tucked then into the baseboards.
3. Covered the windows with newspaper and painters tape.
4. Covered the ceilings with craft paper and painters tape.
5. Cleaned the walls with a TSP alternative: BIX TSP substitute. We mixed it according to the directions and wiped down all the surfaces to be painted with a rag.
6. After the walls dried, we started to prime them with a roller. This is not recommended for paneling - it will take FOREVER.
7. Went to HD, purchased a good paint sprayer (wagner).
8. Using the paint sprayer AND rollers - 1 person sprayed, the other person smoothed with a roller after - got the whole room primed in 1 hour (the previous 1/2 wall had taken 3 hours by itself).
9. If you're using a paint sprayer, it's very important to clean it out while the paint is still wet - so in between coats, rinse out your paint sprayer!
10. Using the same sprayer roller method, we applied two coats of our paint.
11. A couple of days later, with all the tape still in place, we used small brushes to paint all the trim and baseboards.  Below are before/during/after pics.

before:

During:

After - both taken during the holidays.

Just for comparison, here's the before and after right next to each other (if I can get the formatting to work correctly)

So - about $150 total for primer + paint + sprayer + rollers + brushes + tape + dropcloths = totally worth it for a room that doesn't feel like a cave!

What about you - have you painted or torn down paneling in an older home? Should we think about getting rid of the paneling altogether, or do you think the paint was a good enough update?

In the Beginning

was a 1970s house with 95% of its original fixtures, floors, and wall coverings. When we were looking at houses, I saw this one online, looked at its horrible brown kitchen and quirky brick-walled master bedroom, and said "no way. we don't even need to look at this one. it's a lost cause." BUT we got it for a steal, it has good bones, and we're gonna make it gorgeous.

Since this is the beginning, I should say that "we" is me and my mom. Since I was paying half a house payment to rent a teeny glorified closet during the initial stages of my PhD, my mom and I decided it was a logical investment for her to put the down payment on a house that I could then live in for the rest of my degree and make the payments on (with the help of my roommate). More space for me, decent return on investment for her - win, win. 

So - here's what the house looked like when we bought it:

The super brown kitchen, viewed from the dining room. Note the wallpaper on the ceiling. Our working assumption at this point is that it's structural, and if we pull it down, the whole ceiling will come with it. Also, for those of you wondering if that's a matching formica backsplash - it's not. It's WAY better than that. The formica facade is actually continuous from the countertops all the way up to the backsplash - so that super great brown color is matched from counter to cabinet... high quality stuff for the 70's.

This is the breakfast room (and my lovely mother), as viewed from the ultra brown kitchen. Note the coordinating wallpaper. I imagine, no matter what structural changes we make to this house, wallpaper removal will be the most time consuming task we undertake.

This is the living room as viewed from the same location as the previous picture, but the photographer turned counterclockwise about 60 degrees. That wood paneling is so beautiful, but oddly enough - my roommate and I painted over it within a few months of moving in. I'll talk about that in another post.

Now - onto the really good stuff: the master bedroom.

Things of note about this room:

1. The entrance is directly off of the kitchen/breakfast area.
2. The carpet AND bathroom tile are powder blue.
3. The master bath was not an addition, as the brick wall might lead you to believe. Nope, when the house was built, someone with a lot of creative license thought to themself, "a load bearing brick wall, yes, with two separate openings into the master bathroom. no privacy, no remodel flexibility - extreme awesomeness. that's the ticket!"

And then there's this:

 The master bathroom. I know what you're thinking - where did we get those light fixtures, and are there any left for your remodel? How did someone make a light fixture interpretation of a bucky ball? The questions could go on forever, just like the timelessness of these larger than life glass prickly pears. My roommate and I keep talking about bedazzling them (or pizazzling them for any Malcolm in the Middle fans), but we're just not sure the world could take so much awesomeness in one tiny space. What you can't see here is that the shower area is just a shower - there is no bathtub in this master bath, and the toilet has its own closet. I suppose that was the solution for the no doors issue presented by the fabulous brick wall - put the toilet in a closet. 

Below is the 'dining room' which I firmly believe should be converted to a fourth bedroom, or at least a nice enclosed office.

Check out those gorgeous 'rustic white' support columns. They're all over the entryway/kitchen/living room transition area. AND, as recent attic investigations have revealed - THEY ARE STRUCTURAL :( 

The second bathroom:

We were so sad that it didn't have the same light fixtures, but it does have the classy brass and plastic faucet fixtures and integral gold-flecked plastic shell sink!

The things we love about this house:

1. The neighborhood is fabulous. Trees, trees, trees, old people (not drunk college students), and there's only one entrance into the neighborhood.
2. After looking at prices in our neighborhood this year, for even less updated homes, we got it at A STEAL two years ago.
3. There are lots of built-in cabinets that will look great with a fresh, well done coat of paint.
4. It'll be a showstopper when we finish remodeling.