Weekend Four - Epoxy and Subfloors

We started out this weekend's work with more dirty work. Every weekend I think to myself, "we're finally done with the dirty stuff!" And each week I return to the house to find more dirty work to be done. During the week the make-shift closets were removed from the two bedrooms where we found closets in the corners, so we had that mess to clean up.

There use to be a closet on that far wall next to the window. Now we have access to the closet in the corner... 

There used to be a closet in this little nook in the master bedroom...now there is access to the closet in the other corner of this room and this nook can be just that...a nook! (And don't mind Heather, she's just doing some important texting in between shoveling garbage bags full of plaster and lath.)

This week we also found out that mudding our paneling wasn't a good idea. Apparently a sheetrocker my mom talked to had actually done it before (see, not a bad idea!?), but it didn't turn out so well. Within 6 months he said it was falling off and you could see every mudded crack. Not a good idea after all!? He said it'd be less trouble and a much better idea in the long run to just sheetrock the entire place. So that is the new plan. So my mom set to work this week de-paneling the place (thanks mom!), and she left a few sheets for us to carry out.

On Thursday night we loaded up the truck with all the demolition debris, and on Friday morning we woke up to this. Wyoming is a cruel, cold place, where it snows 6 inches during the second week of October!?

On Friday morning Heather and I set to work on prucing up the downstairs bathroom. The tub and tile surround needed re-finished (via a couple of epoxy kits from the Home Depot). And we were going to paint the tiles on the wall. Don't worry, we got the "gripper primer" which apparently is the best for tile painting, googled "tile painting" to death, and were reassured by the associates at Lowe's and Home Depot that we could, indeed, paint the wall tile in a bathroom with successful results. So we went to work

Before...nice and pink...

In order to refinish the tub and tile surround with our fancy epoxy kit, we had to complete a five-step cleaning process of the entire surface not once, not twice, but THREE times. AND we had no running water, which means we had to haul every bit of water we used over from my mom's house. AND, the plumbers had already removed all the pipes from the house, so we had to catch the water that we used with buckets in the basement. AND we couldn't figure out how to get the furnace to create heat (see snowy picture above), and so we were trying to keep warm and heat the space up with space heaters so that it would be warm enough for us to actually paint. Thank goodness I had Heather to keep me company and make me laugh about the ridiculousness of the whole situation, otherwise this would have gone down as one of the dreariest home improvement tasks in history, with good reason!?

By lunchtime we had finally finished the cleaning process, and after lunch we sprayed on the epoxy finish and primed the rest of the bathroom. We actually ran out of epoxy finish, and could have used just one more can to even things out, but since we couldn't just run down the street to Lowe's or Home Depot, we were out of luck. We will put on another coat of epoxy next week, which according to the directions, shouldn't be a problem.

After...

I told you Heather made me laugh...we used face masks and everything, but she still managed to get epoxy paint all over her face!? Tell me that isn't funny!?

The remainder of Friday was a bit of a bust. After removing the paneling upstairs, we realized that the top quarter to top half of the walls in each bedroom had no insulation. The insulation had previously been blown in, and had settled substantially. So, at 3:30pm we decided call it a day to drive 70 miles down to Evanston to pick up a hopper and insulation so we could fill in those gaps first thing on Saturday morning. Well, it turns out that hoppers aren't exactly something you just throw in the back of your SUV. They are gigantic and are so heavy that they have to be forklifted into the back of a truck and it stays there the duration of your project. Our SUV and girl muscles were not going to suffice. We'd have to come back with a truck another day. So after a quick trip to Walmart and a drive-by of Evanston's sad excuse for a movie theater, we decided to just head back home for the night.

On Saturday our project was to finish painting the bathroom's wall tiles (see finished product above), and lay new subfloor in the areas that needed it...namely the three new closets upstairs, the living area downstairs, and the downstairs bedroom and closet. Laying subfloor isn't rocket scientry, but we did get to use a saw and a measuring tape, which was fun and made me feel like my brain wasn't rotting out of my head after all. We sure felt proud and releived when it was all finished! Things are looking better.  

Notice who is sporting the bandana this week!? My mom was very proud of her "getting down to business" look, but she was fairly easily convinced to cross over by tempting her with a cute, new hat.

At this point we are kind of at a stand still and can't do much of anything else until the electrical is done. Our electrician finally showed up this weekend, and he informed us that it is going to take longer than he thought to re-do the electrical. He told us he'd be done by the end of October, but he said it might be double that!? He was suppose to be here the past two weekends, but just started working on it for the first time yesterday. And he can only work three days a week...Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. So, I'm not sure how this is going to work out...so far, I am not impressed.

The plumbing should be done by the end of October, as should the new windows and the new roof. Once the electrical is done, we can have the sheetrockers come and do their magic. Then we can paint and do all the finish work. But until then we're just sitting ducks. We were planning on doing the finish work in November (paint, floors, cabinets, fixtures, etc), so if this electrical guy thinks he can take until Thanksgiving to get this electrical done I might blow a gasket.  Anyone know of a good electrician in our area in need of a good project??