Around the House and Playground – Page 2

How to deal with challenges when remodeling

Drink. Ha! Post over.

No, no, I partially kid.

It seems when removing walls you should expect the unexpected. Random wires. Random water lines. Etc. Etc. I prefer to hope for the best myself. The plan for the kitchen was to remove the wall that separated the kitchen from the rest of the house. We have these pillars there. The one on the opposite side of the house is load bearing. We assumed the matching pillar would be the same. Turns out the pillar is hollow. Aesthetic only.

The wall, however, load bearing. What a depressing discovery. I lost a lot of steam when I pried the dry wall off that obviously load bearing section of wall. We thought we may be able to move it into the pillar as planned but then I found another small section of load bearing wall on the other side of the pillar.

That wall is not coming down. Plans must be modified. There are cabinets on that wall already. Now we might as well leave them and expand them into an L. I really want a counter height sitting area so the kids can be with me while I’m doing kitchen stuff. I was also hugely looking forward to expanding the aisle between the cabinets and island. With the kids on stools and ladders helping, and dogs hanging out in the hopes of dropped food, there is no space to move around in our current kitchen. So, on top of the new L’d section of cabinets I’m going to remove our hideous current island and build a thinner wood island in it’s place. I now also have to patch up all the holes in the side of the wall I’d removed. That drywall would have been removed anyway, as electrical had to be changed, but I would have done smaller sections if I’d known I’d have to patch them back up.

I’ve lost so much steam over this discovery it’s been less exciting to continue. Still, the part of the wall that can be removed, is gone, and it’s glorious!

Before

After

Current plans are to strip and paint the remaining cabinets. Build a new island and remove old one. Tile the floor (laminate sucks!). Nap, possibly forever.

Here are a few pics of the wall removal, just for fun.

This part of the wall was never to be removed but I did have to remove the drywall so we could change the dinning room light switch from the wall that I removed to this. Thankfully the wire went over to this wall anyway so it was a simple fix, for my father. I claim to have done 0 of the electrical work here. My father is amazing!

Vintage Chick Feeder as herb garden

I’m so excited to have found this piece in an antique store recently. It is going to look amazing on the new island, or the table. I have options. I’ve started the herb seeds in it today. I’m interested to see how good I am at growing them indoors. I’m usually a pretty big failure at it. Anyway, take a look and keep an eye out for this amazing piece. Would make a great organizational tray, drink caddy, etc, etc.

A simple organizational upgrade

The item that kicked off our kitchen renovation was a simple coat rack. Simple but life changing. Our garage enters into our laundry room. We have a front door but it is literally never used, ever. Everyone comes in through the garage. We had no closet there. We had nothing in the area that would work as one either. Coats were taken off and thrown onto the dining table. I HATED it. So I ripped down a wall, planked a lot, started going crazy and made coat and shoe storage. Life changing! It’s not very nice looking though. We have a rather large variety of stuff to keep there. Farm coats, pants, gloves, boots and going out in public coats and shoes. It was getting stuffed. I was getting annoyed again. Luckily we have a wall in the laundry room that is used for nothing. The bathroom door opens onto it so you can’t store anything there without blocking the door. Anything, that is, but coats.

Since I’m TERRIBLE at discovering where studs are I simply mimicked the style of our current coat rack and cut two 2×4’s to length, stained them and screwed them up, a lot. Then the same style hooks were added with the exception of a coat rack we already had that had been falling off the wall for years and holding our ironing board. That got screwed onto the 2×4’s and is still holding our ironing board.

Took no time at all if you don’t count stain drying time. Stud 2×4’s are cheap and the hooks I’d bought were around $3. So I’d say this was one of those under $10 projects.

Ah I shouldn’t say that as I bought a bucket to hold our hats and mittens, which were out of control with everything else. That was $12.99,

Anyway, few pics. Nothing big. Well it’s pretty big for me. I like having the extra storage space. For 4 people we seem to have the clutter of 20.

Oh and in case you are wondering, kitchen is a bit different now. The living room too. That’s what happens when you whack a hole in the wall. I like whacking holes in the walls! Kids do too!!

3 people can knock a pretty darn big hole in the wall pretty quickly.

Life, as it has become

Staying home has been different. I have so much more time for projects and yet…not. Kids have a funny way of doing that.

I’m doing things I haven’t before as a mother. I’m not used to making their breakfasts or their lunches during the week. Of course I had enough requests for bacon and eggs today that sometimes they’re rather indistinguishable. Home made chicken and french fries is always a hit. Today it was picnic on the floor lunch. This always ends up torturing our giant dogs who sit a respectable distance and wait for the kids to abandon their plates. Oh how many tears have been shed over abandoned plates being consumed by ravenous canines.

I am often lost on how to occupy them as well. I’m anti-electronics, which limits my winter time options. Luckily we have an unfinished basement. Unluckily the spiders loved our unfinished basement. So we fumigated. It did a pretty decent job. Now I’ve simply had to clean up all of the stuff we’ve left down there. It appears that whenever we had something I didn’t know what to do with, I simply put it in the basement. Procrastination is my thing. Things are cleaning up nicely and the kids have all of the things they’d not normally be able to play with in the winter. We have bikes, scooters, roller skates and some large plastic tractors down there. We also moved 1/3 of their toys down there. It’s been a great place for us to go and work off some of this winter time energy.

I’m also trying out this whole kids crafts thing. They’ve finger painted (whole body painted is more accurate) on a tarp in the living room whilst I mudded the new drywall. We’ve done pipe cleaner building. Ok, ok, I’ve built things with pipe cleaners and the demands were pretty ridiculous. They each have their own boxes of personal supplies: pencils, glue, scissors, etc. Things are going pretty well.

Still, I’m struggling. They want TV. It’s blizzarding. I’m out of occupying ideas. I guess one show won’t kill them, or me.

Speaking of me, well I might just drive my poor husband batty. He came home one day to find our bedroom furniture in the burn pit. I did some re-arranging to say the least. Every day he comes home and something is different. Walls are missing, walls have appeared, stuff is in different places, I’ve got a new project. Building trains with the kids had me close to the windows and….

I think I have an idea about what to do with one really tall one. Now to get the right plants and some planters and and…..sigh. Help us!

The fridge has been moved! Also, how to make your own rustic faucet and sink.

The day has finally arrived. The stars aligned and the fridge has been relocated. My biggest obstacle to removing the main wall has been eliminated. Gosh I’m nervous. I’m removing a main wall. Eeeks!

Enough of that. Let’s talk what happened this week. I soldered for the first time. Soldered a faucet. Then I made a sink and a counter and TA DA! Bathroom is now fully functional again!

A bit about soldering, it’s not that hard. It seems hard. I procrastinated on it. Then I did it and it was so easy I had no issues at all. This is a first try faucet.

Entirely hand made by moi! Allow me to show you how:

Whilst the kids were supposed to be sleeping I gathered my supplies. I cut the pipe to the necessary sizes, cleaned all of the fittings, donned gloves and began.

I put a small amount of flux on the inside of my fitting and the outside of the pipe and put them together.

Then, over a small flame, heat the fitting from the bottom. You’ll know the metal has reached the correct temperature when the solder melts within 2 seconds of touching the pipe.

You’ll see the solder get sucked into the crevice. I put on a bit much my first few solders but with time I began to figure out the perfect amount.

Thicker fittings take about a minute and a half to reach temperature. The regular copper fittings about a minute.

The pipe that you aren’t soldering, but are holding on to, gets HOT. So do be sure you are wearing thick gloves for this.

They really aren’t that sneaky. They think they are though.

You can polish up your finished faucet by simply smearing flux on, heating it and then wiping it off with a cloth.

Now, on to the sink I made. I bought a bucket at the farm store. A beautiful bucket. I arranged it just so, then marked the bottom as to where I needed to drill the hole.

Then I gathered what I needed to install the drain onto my new sink.

I bought a basic sink drain fitting, some plumbers putty and some plumbers caulk. Couldn’t be more basic. Put a ring of putty around the drain fitting, screw it on, caulk it and you’re done.

It’s GORGEOUS!!!!!!!! I have a burlap skirt that just needs a few staples to cover the front of the sink. It’s country perfect! Oh I should add we just shark bite’d it on to the old pex pipe. Super easy installation.

I was simply waiting for the bathroom sink so I could move the fridge. I attached the ice maker water tubing through the wall on to the bathroom sink. No leaks, fridge fits, it’s a dream come true!

Had time to stain the pantry shelves,

Fly a kite,

And admire the pantry shelves.

What’s next? Well other than the details, like doors on the pantry and finishing the plank wall that is going to be the last pantry wall, well this:

This hideous wall.

The entire thing. It’s all going to go. A giant island will take it’s place. A glorious, giant island. Oh the vision I have for it is so strong. I’ll be able to move around the kitchen better what with kids and dogs constantly observing and attempting to assist me. I’ll be more connected with the kids while I do daily tasks such as cooking and dishes. We’ll have a lovely counter top eat in section. I just know that this island is going to bring the family closer. So long as Husband can survive the destruction first.

Another Kitchen Remodel Update

If you haven’t been keeping up you can go to these posts to see what I’ve been up to:

I spent a large amount of my Saturday and Sunday completing some of the parts of the remodel I was most excited about. The new pantry was painted (though the shelves still aren’t stained as it’s been too cold to do so far). The best part is the over the fridge storage I built for all of my important kitchen bits.

I had most of my pans stuffed in a single cabinet next to the stove, my baking stone and cast iron skillet in the buffet in another room and the cutting boards stashed on top of my pot rack. It was a mess. I could hardly find anything and getting the stone and skillet were a hassle. No more! They are within reach of us tall people, in the kitchen and beautifully displayed. Of course, some of them aren’t exactly beautiful….that blue cutting board. Still, I am in LOVE!

Since I built, I was obviously able to customize the different heights and widths. It is spectacular! I even had room left over for my huge serving trays.

Allow me to back up though. The first thing I did, after taping, puttying and floating the new walls was add the 2×4 frame the new storage would sit on.

Then I painted, with help.

A very happy helper indeed!

Then I measured and cut the top shelf out.

And painted some more.

The pantry is 70% complete. I still have to make doors. We are also putting a wooden fronting on the side of the wall and the front of the 2×4’s. Also, I have to stain those shelves!

I love it already! Of course doors are needed as not all our food is that…photogenic.

Have to build a door for the top shelf storage as well. It’s quite hideous at the moment. Terribly functional though!

I also primed and texture the part of the new wall that faces in toward our formal living room. The walls are different sizes. The original interior walls of our house were made with 1 x 3’s. I used 2 x 4’s. Still, it works. I have the wall primed and ready for a decision on color. I’m hesitant as there is another wall in the formal living room that is going to be removed so I suppose I should just wait and paint the whole thing at once.

The fridge is almost ready to be moved. The water is the only hang up. I’m building a new sink and faucet for the 1/2 bath as shrinking the wall made the old sink too large. Once those are done and installed I’ll be able to turn the water on and thus have the fridge connected to water for the ice maker. May not be a big deal to some but I’m fairly certain my husband and children could not live without ice.