Bathroom Countertops Held Hostage

Isn't it just my luck that my renovations would be as ADD as I am? For about the last month we've been redoing various rooms in our house. As I've mentioned before, the floors in this place were awful. And the bathrooms were carpeted - which to me is just too bizarre.

So, we pulled up the carpet and have installed tile in each bathroom. Of course, it couldn't be that simple. New floors call for new paint, right? And, the half bath downstairs had a hideous vanity in it which also called for replacing. (Pictures will follow soon, I promise).

During the course of doing all this, we decided we'd go ahead with the second phase of the new floors: hardwoods in the downstairs. Eventually we'll need either new carpet or hardwood upstairs too, but having to live within our budget we are just doing downstairs for now. The downstairs floor is on order and hopefully within the next month will be completed.

Now, the plan in the masterbath was to put new floors and also redo the countertop. My new floors are black marble, and the new wall color is a light grey. Needless to say, the green laminate countertop that is in there doesn't quite match. So, the plan was to purchase a kit from Lowe's to refurbish the countertops ourselves. I read the reviews this sounded fairly simplistic and for now the most effective way to update both my bathroom and the kids bathroom countertops (theirs are a hideous blue) without spending a ton of money.

Well, that was the plan. Until Sunday. Sunday morning I was changing the trash bag in the kitchen when I noticed a leak. Yep, there was a leak under the sink. Got to looking around and decided it was from the dishwasher. Out comes the repairman on Monday. Guess what? New dishwasher needed. So, it looks like my bathroom countertops have been hijacked. Since nobody ever sees the upstairs bathrooms except for those of us who live here, we figure if given the choice a dishwasher is the more necessary part of life vs. new countertops.

So, long story short - my bathroom renovations are being held hostage until further notice. But my 10 year old dishwasher should soon be replaced by a new one. The hubs and I can stop yelling at eachother, or turning the TV up to high volume when dishes are being done. And possibly a sense of normalicy will follow. Or, as normal as can be for this family.

Phase 2: Bathrooms

Phase 2 of our home renovation has begun. Do you have any idea how difficult it is for a family of 4 (not counting the baby because he isn't mobile yet) to use one bathroom? It's no walk in the park, that's for sure!

This weekend started off with a quick trip to Lowe's & Home Depot. The floor we are putting in the master bath had to be ordered, so that's taken care of and will arrive sometime in the next two weeks. But the floors we're using for the other two baths were in stock. Purchased that, and all the things that we thought we'd need (of course not everything, as I've made probably 3-4 trips back since) and headed home to get started.

I wish I would have taken before shots so you'd know just how tacky the bathrooms were. Awful white carpet is throughout my house. Err, let me rephrase that... Awful carpet that should be white is throughout my house, including the bathrooms. We bought this house as a short sale. The 300 people who lived together as renters prior to their landlord going broke reaked havoc on the floors. The flooring everywhere is getting refurbished, but in baby steps. This phase is just the bathrooms.

We are currently in the "the tile has been laid, but not grouted" stage. Hopefully the grout will go in this afternoon and the bathroom accessories can go back in very soon. Right now it's somewhat like going to the DMV - take a number, you'll get service when your number is up.

I know, the settlers two hundred years ago didn't have bathrooms, and had to share an outhouse. But, I'm not a settler two hundred years ago. I do not share bathrooms well. Especially not with angsty teenagers who wake up before I do and are loud and obnoxious when getting ready for school.

Tune in for pictures, at some point everything will be back together and I'll share "after" pics, even though you can't have "before" pics.

My Weekend in Review

This weekend flew by. I'm thinking I need a vacation just to recover! It started simple enough, just a couple movies and the couch.

We started out watching Taking Chance. This movie was more than I expected it to be. Kevin Bacon is a colonel in the Marine Corps. He's an analyst who is starting to double guess what exactly he's doing with his life. As he reviews the list of casulaties he runs across the name of a young man who's enlisted from his hometown in Colorado. Bacon volunteers to transport him home for the funeral. What ensues is a heart wrentching true story following the next week of his life. I'm glad I watched it in the dark, because the tears were freely flowing pretty much throughout the movie. I would definitely recommend it as a must see. It wasn't a movie in theatres, rather an HBO movie so it didn't get a lot of recognition. For once I'm happy I listened to what Netflix recommended.

We followed that up with Have You Heard About the Morgans? Funny movie. Not great, but just what I have come to expect from Hugh Grant.

The rest of the weekend was pretty much work. Saturday, phase one of our home make-over started. We repainted the kitchen. It went from the awful red color that was there to a nice, warm "rusty nail." No, seriously, that is the name of the color. It's like a deep terracotta. The room now feels warmer and more welcoming than it did in the hideous shade previously there.

After painting and running errands all day Saturday we had the neighbors (and good friends) over for pizza and a movie. I was the only one who'd seen The Blind Side. And, I'm hoping it lived up to everyone's expectation after I raved about it!

(my caption option apparently isn't working - old kitchen on top, new on bottom)

The kitchen was the easy part. Sunday we tackled the living room and stairwell. I am sore in places I didn't know existed on my body! The hideous red is now replaced by a warm beige (a.k.a. "bush whacking" - where do they come up with these names?!) and the mantle is highlighted in a cream. Suddenly my house feels light and airy, instead of like a dungeon in one of the inner sanctions of hell (yes, the red was that bad).

(again with the caption keys! Dungeon living room top, new paint bottom- excuse the mess the baby has taken over the living room with his toys)

So that completes phase one. Next phase, new floors. That should be interesting!

Home Improvement: Take I

My fascination with reality tv is about to literally hit home in our daily lives. Andre (aka the hubs) and I love watching "Moving Up" and various shows about flipping/improving homes, etc. When we purchased our house last summer it needed some work. We've repainted most of it, and plan to finish that task very soon. Now to move on to the floors.

Our house is fully carpeted. This is an odd concept to me. Who carpets the bathrooms? So the plan is to rip out the carpet and put in new hardwood and tile. We may put new carpeting upstairs, this is still debatable. Andre seems to think he can do all this himself (except carpet install) which is even more intriguing to me. Needless to say, I may be temporarily living in a hotel during the time of the upgrades - just to keep the possibility for disaster to a minimum.

I can already picture the disaster that will probably occur. Sure, Andre's plenty handy... but my household luck is a lot like Tim Allen's. And, unfortunately I don't know if we have an "Al" nearby. (Although the real life Al does some ads for a handyman in town, but I digress.)

Anyone who knows me knows that even the simplest of projects become a daunting overhaul when I'm involved. The OCD in me requires intense/extensive research on the project at hand. Which means in a matter of days I will probably become a self proclaimed expert at the variations between Oak, Bamboo, Pine, Hickory, etc. Lord help us all!

As I begin this quest, I'm curious to know who else has survived a major home improvement project, and would you do it again? I've heard it said that building a home can make or break a relashionship. And, I've heard that "improvement projects" are sometimes worse than planning from ground zero. So, if you have any interesting tidbits you'd like to share - feel free. And be prepared, you'll probably see lots of rants/comments in the months to come (once we decide on a "go date") on this topic. But in the end, hopefully we won't have accomplished a complete demolish of our beloved home, rather I'll be able to post some really amazing before/after shots.