See the change, be the change

So, I found a drywall dude. Not sure how good he'll be but the price was perfect and I don't have to do it. Huge blessing, and now I am just trying to get things ready for him. I can't believe how much the space will transform in the next month. Cabinets will be delivered on the 17th and if all goes well I'll have the flooring down before they arrive. That means in ~3weeks we'll have walls and floor. Although I know that it is going to seemingly shrink the space that has been massively open for the last several months, I'm glad I can finally see the progress.

So now I'm just finishing up the prep for the drywall which basically consists of putting in insulation, running the gas line for the range, and trimming out the sills for windows and hopefully installing the new window if it gets here in time.

One thing I need some help with.... I need to move the piano which has bunged up wheels. For those who have helped before, you know that I just have it sitting on moving dollies right now and unfortunately they aren't really effective. I would like to tip the piano over and lay it down so I can install new wheels on it and then of course get it back up and hopefully be able to roll it around. So, 2 questions:

1) Does anyone know if tipping the piano over will damage it?
2) Who can help us this weekend for about an hour while I do this? I'm thinking it will take 4 dudes, preferrably 5, including myself to get this thing tipped over and back up. It's very heavy. Feel free to post here if you are available. I'm open all weekend except for Sunday evening.

PS - if you have better suggestions, just let me know. Worst case scenario, I don't do the wheel installation and just move it over on a different wall.

Sweating the small stuff

I’ve hit the point in the remodel where I need to tie up a lot of loose ends. Basically need to prep for drywall which means everything inside the walls needs to be located, nailed in, smoothed out, tightly secured, etc. I’ve got a list of about 20 small things to complete which would typically annoy me. However, the other night I pounded through a bunch of them:

1) Fixed the leaking shower drain pipe.
2) Blocked in the shower plumbing
3) Installed the shower fixture and trim kit
4) Blocked in for drywall in two corners
5) Blocked in for the shower rod
6) Blocked in for the medicine cabinet
7) Installed the 1x2s to thicken the wet wall

The nice thing about the small stuff is that is goes pretty quick.

The electrician is supposed to be by tonight to polish off his work… hopefully that happens and while he is working I can pound out another 7 items.

One item I need to complete is patching the holes in the subfloor. An incident the other night not only demonstrated this need but emphasized my agility.

I was trimming a warped board in my ceiling structure. Jared knows what I’m talking about and it’s a little hard to explain but basically before we can hang drywall everything has to be pretty straight, unfortunately, 10 foot 2x4s are almost impossible to get unwarped and I had some significant warpage that I didn’t realize was an issue until it was installed. No big whoop, but required a little effort to trim it down to get it even with the rest of the ceiling. Jenn was out somewhere and I was working on trimming this wood. Good thing she was gone because I was making a massive amount of sawdust. Anyway, I was on the ladder using the circular saw one handed making this somewhat delicate cut…. I’m literally trimming about ½- ¼ of an inch off a 2 x 4. Keep in mind also, I have my typical after work attire for home improvement on… a white t-shirt, mesh shorts, black socks and sandals. I did have my safety glasses on, until I took them off because I couldn’t see. So anyway, just as I neared the end of my cut as I hit full extension with my arm and body I felt a strange movement below as the ladder began to tip over. What the buff!!!! Sure nuff, the ladder had wiggled its way to a hole in the floor (for those who know, it’s the one that is near the dining room that I formed when I was ripping out the very first cabinet) Not a big hole but it has been annoying because every time I dropped something, a screw, a pipe fitting, a pencil, it fell through that hole to the garage… never bounced and then fell, always feel straight through like I was Reggie Miller behind the arc,. Anyway, the ladder leg started to go through and as it tipped I reacted quickly with spinning saw blade in the right hand I grabbed the joist with my left arm to hold myself up. The ladder teeter tottered a bit and then settled back in place as I dangled from the ceiling with saw in hand. Not even a scratch.

I’m not out of the woods yet but I’d like to point out that I have finished the majority of the dangerous portions of this remodel with not even one trip to the hospital. I thought for sure when I started this I would be posting weekly things that destroyed the project and a related injury that required medical attention.

Yay for me.

Light On!

I haven't blogged much lately due to busyness and Jenn usually picks up most of the happenings of my life so you're covered. Plus, I figured you get pretty bored with... "This is what I did on the kitchen this week...." posts. That answer has pretty much been "plumbing". I'm glad I did the plumbing because we save a bundle but man, it really hurt the schedule. And as I wrapped it up this past weekend I was a little bummed when an old pipe that I didn't even work on started leaking so I have to go back and cut some stuff out and fix it. The beauty is, I'm pretty good now so it shouldn't be difficult, just a pain and/or disappointing that it is not completely done. Thing I learned.... always, always, put in a drain valve at any low point in a plumbing system. For those that understand, you cannot have water in a pipe that you need to sweat. Most systems you can drain (utility sink in the basement, etc.) but I have 2 5' sections that are low. The day I was buying valves they were out of the ones I wanted so I took a risk. Has caused me all sorts of extra work.

The really great thing is though, I got a great situation with an electrician, Dan. Side job for him and he needed some work this week so he started pretty quick. He's basically letting me help him and he is just charging me hourly. Any hour I save him is just money in my pocket. On Tuesday, I took the day off and Jenn and I hung can lights while he wired them up, at the end of the day the kitchen lights were on!!! Yahoo!!!! Very huge as I could barely work in there when the sun wasn't up. Now, it is almost blinding. Will probably go with lower wattage bulbs once these burn out. Dan should finish up tomorrow and then I will just be doing some misc. stuff to prep for drywall.

Anyone have any recos for drywallers? I think I might sucker Jared and his buddy into it but this is something I would love to hire out... if the price is right. :-) (Man, I love Bob Barker)