Almost Christmas...

Well... it's 2 weeks until christmas, and I still have not updated anything.

Deb and I haven't done anything to the place since the summer... we've been very lazy about it. But that'll soon change.

In January, we are going to be purchasing our new flooring. We haven't made the firm decision yet, but it'll either be a dark brown oak engineered floor, or it'll be a very dark high quality laminate. The Laminate is cheaper, but I hate laminate... so we'll see. It also might be too dark.

We're also going to be getting the tiles for the kitchen backsplash around the same time. So that'll be the final step in getting the kitchen finished.

Lastly, we will be getting our new kitchen table and chairs... yay! finally we'll have somewhere to sit and eat dinner. Right now, we eat at our coffee table. I think I have an even worse hunch back now because of it.

2 months

it's been 2 months since my last post. Sorry to say, there's nothing new to report. Well, that's not totally true. We've finished paying for the Kitchen, so now they can't repossess it! :P Hopefully we'll be getting the carpet ripped out in January or February and we'll be putting in engineered hardwood floors. That'll make the place look so much better!

As requested

Before:


After:

Finally...

We haven't done much in the way of reno work since we had the kitchen finished. Yesterday, however, I decided it was time to get something done.

We've had our microwave sitting in a box in the dining area for weeks now. It was sitting there because I had to install a receptacle in the cabinet before I could get the microwave in there. The electrician was supposed to do this, but it seems the electrician we hired was a cursing curse word. I had to do some playing around to get it in there, and it is definitely not to code, but it works and it's safe.

After I got that done, it was time to get the microwave up. First i had to drill a couple holes in the upper cabinet, then some holes in the wall. This was interesting. The microwave requires is mounted with a bracket that screws to the wall, then the microwave slides onto this bracket. The instructions say that when you put the bracket on the wall, it needs at least 2 screws through a stud. Unfortunately, the stud in our wall didn't line up with the holes in the bracket, so I had to go out to Home Depot and pick up a drill bit that would go through metal. I come back, drill the holes, and then realize that the instructions called for 3/8" holes. I had bought a 3/16" drill bit. D'oh! So then I take a look at the screws they provided. These screws were too small for the holes I drilled, so why did the instructions call for even larger holes?? stupid. Anyway, I have metal studs, and no screws that would work in a hole the size I made, so I went BACK to Home Depot, picked up metal screws that were sized right for a 3/16" hole, came back, put them in and it was perfect. The rest of the mounting of the bracket was using 4 toggle bolts in drywall. I then slid the microwave up onto the bracket, screwed bolts into the top through the upper cabinet, and I now have a microwave. Hurray!

It looks nice in the kitchen now. Everything is complete except for the backsplash. It's going to be hard to sell this place when the time comes.

Pictures!

So, Here's what the kitchen looks like now that we have some granite installed. The sink, backsplash and under-cabinet lighting still needs to be installed, but that'll have to wait until we return from Mexico.

Countertops Pt. 2

AS I TYPE, our granite is being installed. It looks super nice.

Countertops

I just got a call from our cabinet maker (who also arranged the counters with a granite company) that the granite guys would like to install the counters on friday this week. That's pretty sweet.

I've got all the appliances where they belong now, so with the countertops coming friday we'll pretty much have everything complete, except the backsplash (which I'll probably do next month) and the drains for the sink.

OMG New cabinets!

Yay, it's all done! and damn does it look good. Here's a picture



And this is the tile we will most likely use for the backsplash:

More cabinets...

So I got home tonight hoping to see a finished kitchen. Instead I saw something else... SAWDUST! On EVERYTHING! Now, I'm not stupid. I figured there's be some sawdust from the cutting that needed to be done. But seriously, the guy could've at least TRIED to cover up some things with the tarp he had.

Colour me annoyed.

Also, it looks like all he did today was the trim pieces... the doors are not installed. WTF! Does it really take THAT long to do the trim? It doesn't even look right... you can see the seams and nail holes, so he had better be filling those in tomorrow when he comes to attach the doors.

It's still a nice kitchen, but I'm annoyed that it's still not finished. I want my home back! I have no room to move around, literally! Right now I'm sitting in bed because I can't use the living room. I have furniture piled on top of furniture just so we could make room for the cabinets to come in.

This weekend will be one hell of a clean-up weekend

Cabinets

Yesterday was a busy day. At about 8:30am I took a drive out to the Abbotsford/Sumas border (and, in fact, crossed it) to pick up our sink and faucet. This took a few hours because when I got there the faucet was the only item that had arrived. I called UPS and found out that the sink was on a truck out for delivery. I decided to take a chance that it would arrive soon, so I went and grabbed some breakfast. when I was done I drove over to the place where the stuff was shipped. It turns out that the UPS truck had JUST ARRIVED, so I was able to pick the sink up right off the truck. I'm glad I decided to stick around.

During this time, Deb was at home with the cabinet installer, making sure things went well. By the end of the day, the cabinet boxes had been installed and there was a huge mess of sawdust everywhere. Today the installer is coming back to do the doors and trim pieces and hopefully clean up a lot of that sawdust.

I'll try to post pics tonight

Finally

YAY!!! We finally painted the bathroom! It's... white. We chose white because There's already so much colour in the green tile, and since it's such a small room, we didn't want to overwhelm the space. So the walls are white, and we'll put up some nice artwork to make them a little less bare. It looks so nice now that it's all done.

Snag!

Stupid UPS and there stupid stupidness!

So, I ordered our kitchen sink and faucet online from a company in the states. We ended up saving about $600, close to half what it would cost if we bought here in Canada. Even with the duty we'll have to pay, it's still over $400 savings. well worth it.

Well, it seems UPS has a bunch of retarded monkeys working for them. They received the items from the shipper, sat on them, and then sent them BACK to the warehouse they came from. Why?? Who the fuck knows. I got various different answers from UPS when I called them, but apparently they were waiting for payment of the duty. When I asked them how I pay for this they told me they'd call me and tell me when they had the value of the items, as they did not know it yet. So then the next day they sent the items back! Idiots.

I spoke with the vendor I purchased the items from and they confirmed that they got the items back and they're re-shipping them out to me. This time, however, I am not having them sent to Canada. I am using a company called "Ship Happens" that is located in Sumas, WA. They will receive the package for me so I can drive across the border, pick it up, and take it back across the border. Then I'll just have to pay the duty at the border. Hopefully this works out.

close

Our kitchen is nearing completion. Over the weekend we scraped the plaster off the walls where the fake brick was, patched a bunch of holes, sanded the walls and put up a coat of primer. The electrician has come in to rough in the electrical for the under cabinet lights and the new microwave hood-fan. Now all we have to do is wait for our cabinets to arrive. They've been delayed by a couple days, so we'll be getting them on June 11, instead of June 9.

This weekend we're going to take it easy a bit. We've got to go looking at tiles for the kitchen backsplash, but that's about it.

Keep on Truckin'

The kitchen floors are now done. They look great. Today, our electrician is roughing in the wiring for the new under cabinet lights. Tomorrow, we're going to be patching up the walls in the kitchen and getting them clean and smooth. Sunday we'll be priming the walls so that we'll be ready to paint as soon as we pick a colour.

It looks like we won't be able to do the wood floors until October :( I may not have the funds available to do them in August. We'll just have to wait and see I guess.

New Tile!

Here is the new tile, pre-grout

Kitchen's Gone!

We demolished our kitchen. It now looks like this:


This is the faucet we're putting in the kitchen. We got a pretty good deal on it.

Bye Bye Kitchen

Tomorrow is the last day in the life of our 70s kitchen. Our condo is going to feel so much different once this new kitchen is put in place. It'll be brighter, cleaner, bigger and sexier.

The new tile floor will be installed on Tuesday and will extend into the dining area, whereas previously the kitchen floor ended right at the kitchen cabinets, and there was carpeting in the dining area.

The new cabinets are to be installed the week of June 9th, and then the countertops will probably be the first week of July. We'll be in Mexico the week of June 22, so that's why there's such a delay in that.

Interior decorating...(re:) wallpaper

"Wallpaper is material which is used to cover and decorate the interior walls of homes, offices, and other buildings; it is one aspect of interior decoration."

It is also one aspect of interior decorating that should never be used. EVER.

"Interior decorating styles change over time, and eventually a person may wish to remove that once lovely wallpaper."

People should think about the people who might live in their place after they move out before applying wallpaper. You should never put up wallpaper, ever.

"Most of the methods of wallpaper removal can be aided by mechanically perforating or scoring old wallpaper with a tool called a Paper Tiger, which looks like a puck with a wheel of sharp teeth. Rolling this tool on the wall in a clockwise or counterclockwise motion effectively creates tiny holes in the surface of wallpaper, but leaves the drywall undamaged."

The paper tiger is used for removal of non-peelable vinyl papers. Peelable vinyls are 2 layer papers, the top layer peeling off to leave a paper backing, which, being porous, is removed by just wetting it."

We did have peelable 2-layer vinyl paper, however it peels off in tiny shreds. So we got the Paper Tiger. It works well. It does damage drywall. We have a lot of sanding and patching to do.

------

Yesterday I took down the last remaining wallpaper that was in the dining area. It took about 4 hours to remove the paper that probably took about 10 minutes to put up.

I don't care if your designer thinks it will look "hip and amazing" or even add "charm". Listen to me as I tell you that it is all lies. Just say no to wallpaper.

More work being done

After a few weeks off, we are finally doing more work. Today I ripped out the nasty old carpet in the dining area, and also took out the tile in the kitchen. There's still tile under the cabinets, but we'll get to that when we tear down the cabinets next weekend. This tile was the same as the bathroom - tile on top of parquet. It's coming up fairly easily, except for the tile that was under the stove... that was directly on the concrete.

Just an update

We still have not painted the bathroom. I'm lazy and I don't feel like doing it right now. But we have ordered 2 of the 3 appliances for the new kitchen. They were on sale and I saved a total of $320, so I'm pleased about that. The cabinets will be installed around the 9th of June. We should have the kitchen floors tiled about a week or so prior to that. I'll be taking some time off in august, and I hope to take up the carpet and install the engineered hardwood floors at that time. Once those floors are in place all we have to do is paint and get sexier furniture and our place will be finished! YAY!


EDIT: The only reason I hadn't gotten the dishwasher when I ordered the other appliances is because it was not on sale. Well, I went on Future Shop's site last night and saw that the dishwasher I wanted was on sale for $100 off! So I ordered it. Yay, $420 off on my appliances! w00t!

Nothing but paint left

Well, aside from paint, our bathroom is finally done. Here's a photo. It's a little yellow... the lights are a little low-powered.

Next up

This weekend we will probably hang the mirror for the bathroom and install the wall sconces. That should pretty much do it, except for paint. We'll probably end up painting next weekend.

Also this weekend, hopefully, we'll move out desk out of the "Dining area" so we can take care of the last remaining wallpaper. I've got to pull up a couple tiles in the kitchen to see if they'll come up as easily as the bathroom tiles (I have my doubts.) We may do a bit more shopping too, I'm not sure yet.

We've ordered the kitchen cabinets, so those should be installed at the end of May. The cabinet maker is bringing us a sample door with the colour we've chosen next week so we can make sure the colour and style is what we want. We've gone with a shade of white called Chantilly Lace, a Benjamin Moore colour. The counters have not been decided on yet, but we're leaning towards a black granite. The new cabinets will go all the way to the ceiling, unlike the current ones. This should give us about 18 inches of storage at the top and make the kitchen feel taller. As well, we've added on about 18 inches of counter space, and we'll have under cabinet lighting. We haven't figured out what the backsplash will be, but it'll probably be some form of glass tile. So it should be quite nice when it's finished.

We've decided on a medium-dark floor, somewhat of a coffee colour, maybe a bit lighter. we haven't quite found the exact floor, but we will soon. We'll probably have that installed in May, once the kitchen tile has been laid.

Sink

Today we are having the plumber come in to install our sink. It's been about a month since we have had a sink in there. I didn't realize how long we have been without one, but I guess it's been awhile. It will be nice to brush my teeth in the bathroom and not over a pile of dirty dishes. I can't wait....

Gettin' Stuff Done!!!

The bathroom is almost done! On Saturday we will have a plumber in to hook up the sink (a pipe needs to be cut), and then the mirror installed and then the lights. Then we get to paint and finally (and this is the best part)...put up the towel bar. We have been without a towel bar for about a year now...

In addition to that, we will order our new kitchen in a couple of days and should take 6-8 weeks to be installed. Before the kitchen gets put in we need to tile the kitchen and dining room floor and possibly put in the new floors for the rest of the place.

Exhausting, never-ending, but worth it:)

Colour palette for bedroom

I was looking at a website today on colour and design and came across this colour palette that I thought would be rather nice for the bedroom.



what do you think?

Backsplash Tiled!

We had the backsplash tiled today. It's not grouted yet, but it looks good.

Counter installed!!

Our Counter has been installed!! here's a shot with the sink on top, though it's not actually installed.

One More

This is our new vanity. the photo kinda sucks, but it looks awesome

Photos of the work

Here are some photos of the work in the bathroom we did.


This is what it looked like right after the floor was grouted. I was a little worried because the grout looked brown, but it was still very wet. Once it dried and cured it looked exactly like what we wanted.

You can probably see, but there's a tile that is right next to the tub that is darker than all the other tiles. I didn't catch it before the tiles were laid so it ended up getting used where you can see it. Luckily once the toilet and door was reinstalled you don't really notice it.



This is what the room looks like now. Baseboards are in, walls are flat and primed, floor is clean and sealed, new toilet is installed.


I painted the pipe for 2 reasons. 1, the previous owner had painted a portion of the pipe and it was a gross yellowish colour now. And 2, since only half of this pipe was painted and half wasn't, and since the pipe would be visible inside the cabinet I figured that if I painted the whole thing white it'd look just a little cleaner.

You'll also notice that there are 4 valves in the wall. This is because they re-piped our building a few years ago and they left the old plumbing in place. It would've been nice if they removed the old valves. I wanted to cut them away but I didn't have a tool that would cut through them, so I had to leave them. Oh well.


Here is another view, showing the new toilet. The original plan was to reuse our old toilet, but the old toilet was next to impossible to pull off, so I was going to just smash it to pieces and buy a new one (they're not very expensive at all.) Well, that's easier said than done. For some reason, the old toilet was very resistant to 3lb hammers. I did manage to finally loosen the toilet and remove it, but not without chipping the porcelain first. I didn't want to reuse a chipped toilet, so I bought a new one. It's a better toilet anyways. The tank is lined (so it doesn't 'sweat') and it just looks a little more modern.

Busy Weekend-Progress!

We are finally seeing progress! The bathroom floors are grouted, the baseboards are on and the walls are primed! Another wall in the living room has been primed as well. For the next few months I think every weekend will be filled with reno work, shopping and planning. On the 19th we are having the kitchen measured and a plan is going to be started for that. We also are going to be shopping around for floors for our place. Exciting!

Toil, toil, toil...

This weekend we are going to be doing a lot of work to our place. We are filling holes in the walls, sanding them down, priming walls, putting on the baseboards and painting them. We are also doing this to the walls in the bedroom adn the living room. Lots and lots of work. Also, we are going to buy the hardware for our vanity so that the cabinet installers can put them on.

A Glimpse of the Future

So Deb made a mock-up of what the bathroom will look like when it's all done. Here it is

The start of the middle of the end....

Tomorrow we are starting the middle of our bathroom project. We are ripping out the old vanity and counter top so that the floors can be tiled on Monday and Tuesday. Then on the following Monday our new vanity will arrive and be installed. Then the backsplash needs to go up and after that, the last pieces installed (mirror and light fixtures). So the tentative completion date is March 3rd.

Window Shopping

We've been to a few furniture stores recently as we are desperate to get rid of our old couch. It's green, huge and the padding is gone from the arm rests. We saw a few things that we liked a lot but they were either too expensive or too big. As much as we liked the couch from Lazy Boy, the eleven foot sectional will not fit in our tiny place. And the couch that was the perfect size, was double our couch budget. The same problem comes up with light fixtures too. We cannot justify buying the perfect light fixture for the dining area if it costs $700 as we would not be taking it with us when we sell.

I think that when we have finally found the pieces that we want we will have gone to every furnishing store there is....

More money spent!

This past weekend we went and picked up our new bathroom sink and faucet. Here's a photo of the sink:



And here's the faucet that will be installed on it:



We can't wait to use it. I have a clog in the P-trap in the current sink which is slowing the draining of water. I'm too lazy to take the trap apart and clean it out, especially since we're re-doing that plumbing in a month or so... weird timing.

In 2 weeks we're going to the cabinet maker to order our new vanity. It will be very sleek and sexy.

In sadder news, our dishwasher (which seems to have lived for 33 years) has died on us. On New Years day, in fact. It cleans the dishes, but the pump that pumps the water out of the dishwasher is busted. so we now have to wash things by hand. That makes me a saaaad panda!