Today is the day we got some color on the walls.

The dining and living rooms are DONE.

We just have to tear down the tape and paper and do some minor touch ups.

I'm still obsessed with the white chandelier.


My mom came up and helped us with tape and a few other random things. She also treated us with new vent covers!

I love them. They're one of those little details that really polish off the look of the place. It's kind of putting the cart before the horse when we've still got some baseboard finishing work to do but I couldn't resist putting these in.

And speaking of vents...

We still have the original vents throughout the house. I love them. I remember when we first peeked through the windows of this house thinking they were clunky and scary - but with a fresh coat of paint I think they're charming.


We also tried to strip the bathroom window. I think the wood is being held together by the paint so I just sanded down the edges we chipped off and Jeremy soaked it in primer.

A special shout out goes to our Oklahoma brewed beverage of choice during this remodel:

Prohibition never tasted so good.

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This whole week has been so stressful. We've both been absolutely exhausted and completely drained. But this made it all worth it:

Today is the day we put tile down in the bathroom!


I could just stare at it. For hours.

Yesterday Jeremy and I laid the "HardieBoard" down over the subfloor. We even did it the correct way by putting a layer of thinset mortar underneath.

Our good friend, Mario, came over tonight and helped us lay some tile.

Meet Mario. He was actually one of my interns a couple years ago at work. Also a graphic designer I put my trust in him with the visual accuracy it takes to lay tile.

Also! Today our wood floors were finished being refinished.

They look fantastic. It makes me wish I had done the entire house. Or maybe the entire hallway seeing as how we've trashed the floors in front of the bathroom with all the work that's been done. Oh well.


Jeremy finished painting the trim in the living room and dining room. We also finished painting the chandelier. I think I got the paint on there a little thick but that's okay. I'm going more for an overall impression rather than focusing on the details. *Note: I might need to get white wire for hanging the crystals back on.

Now we're just finishing prepping the rooms for the wall color.

I absolutely cannot wait for these rooms to be finished.

Expect a lot more progress in the next few days. I will try and keep you updated!

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This weekend was about taping. And taping and taping and taping some more.


Our family taped (thank you)!

Jeremy taped.


Liz taped (in style).


We got the living room and dining room completely taped off. Today we managed to primer the living room and dining room trim.

Here's the chandelier in the dining room after all the crystals were removed.


Here it is after today - all primed white.

Look how creepy our house looks. It's so dark and dank with everything painted and all lights removed. Also, now that we're painting over the taped up windows it's getting even darker. We're painting our trim (Bright White) tomorrow.

We also had our plumbing fixed this weekend. When the plumber manager walked into our house she said it looked like a scene out of "Ghost" - I knew I liked that lady!

Check out our new pipes! PVC! No more lead poisoning our poo.

A&B Plumbing did this for us and we were really happy with the service. They came in on Sunday, were honest and got it done.

And today we had our subfloor put in by our friend, Jon.

And I was just getting used to seeing the guts of our house all exposed.

We need to buy some "hardy board", which is basically a 1/4" of concrete sheet that we'll put on top of the plywood subfloor. We're aiming to get this installed tomorrow along with painting the trim and chandelier in the living and dining room.

And our floors were sanded down today.

They'll be finished by Thursday or Friday.

Then we move in.

Wow.

• Labels:
• Bathroom
• Painting
• Remodel


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The bathroom tile has been ordered!

Black & White unglazed porcelain tile in a spiral pattern.

We had our bathroom pipes replaced with PVC on Sunday. Today our friend is coming in to put in our subfloor. The tiles should hopefully be coming in on Wednesday, which we will be installing ourselves. Then we'll just have to texture, paint and replace the baseboards. Our plumber will come back in over the weekend to install the sink and toilet. Then we're DONE!

A frequently asked question (for the bathroom and kitchen backsplash which is 1" x 1" tile):
Do the tiles come individually? How do you install that!?

The answer is NO. They do not come individually. The tiles, fortunately, come in sq. ft. section backed with mesh. This means we can tile 1 sq. ft. at a time.

I'll have another update this evening about our weekend progress!

• Labels:
• Bathroom


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So yesterday we went over to the house only to discover that the wood paneling was going to put up a fight. The grooves were showing through the joint compound I used to texture over it.

So I am trying a couple things. First, I retextured over a couple of the lines again. Today I will see if that shows through. Then I filled in all the grooves on the remaining walls with the joint compound but didn't texture the entire wall. I'm going to let that dry and then texture over the entire surface.

We also met with a plumber and his manager. He looked at the pipes and said that they do in fact need to be replaced. He's going to also run them under the subfloor in the crawlspace. He also needs to replace or add or fix some sort of vent situation - Jeremy thinks a vent to these drain lines makes it so there isn't a vacuum that sucks the water out of the "U-traps" - U-traps are there to keep toxic poo gasses out of the house. We were a little disappointed that we couldn't just patch it up and move on - but at least we're doing everything right. Our house is becoming a money-pit in the process.

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I had to have them. So I backordered them about a week ago and got them in the mail this morning. I ordered two sets - one for me and one for Liz, who sends me fun treats every holiday via snail mail.

I'm most likely just going to frame them and keep them as a piece of art.

• Labels:
• Eames


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Today I started texturing over the wood paneling in the living room.

I got the entire East wall finished.
Jeremy started taping off the windows to prep the room for painting.

Here's an up-close shot of the textured wall vs. the wood paneling.

The photo doesn't really do it justice. It really does look so much better. I'm the kind of gal that can appreciate wood paneling in all it's glory but in this room it just looked bad. It was more of wood veneer most likely put in to cover up something horrifying. Like huge cracks in the wall. Or dead bodies.

We'll paint the walls and ceiling all the same color to keep everything cohesive and open-feeling. There is some 1" half-round molding at the top of the wood paneling and some trim in the corners. I'm not sure if we should paint those the same color as the rest of the room so it blends in or paint it white to match the window trim. Any thoughts?

And finally. Here is the bathroom concrete-less.


Here are the pipes. Also our most recent quagmire.

When Jeremy uncovered the pipes he discovered a crack.


That crack is in the pipe that carries waste to the bog of eternal stench. If we don't fix this sewage will fill the crawl space under the house that we happen to have no access to.

We may be able to patch this pipe. Or we may have to replace it. The pipes being lead isn't a huge deal considering they're not potable pipes - they only act as drain pipes. We're having a plumber come out tomorrow evening to take a look. We're hoping he can just patch it and be done with it. Then we'll have our contractor friend come in and install our subfloor. We'll tile, install baseboards, texture, paint, install the toilet and sink and be done with it.

In case you were wondering about said toilet and sink:

How sad. We literally have no pot to piss in.

Oh! And I met with the floor guy today. He was so nice. He told me that we won't have to completely replace the "dog stained" areas of the floor. That they will lighten with sanding and unless we have a huge problem with a slight stain then it's not a big deal. He will replace the planks that are damaged are due to termites. He said that when he sands the floors down he could uncover more damage. Apparently when there is carpet on top of wood floors the termites will eat all the way up to the surface. When there isn't carpet they'll only eat the very bottom layer of wood and move on. Just another reason why carpet on top of wood floors is evil. We're going to go ahead and have him patch up the closet as well. All of that will cost as much as it would have cost to have the "wee-wee stains" guy refinish the floors alone. He'll get started on Monday.

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I finished the wall texturing in bedroom one (aka the master bedroom)!

Jeremy worked on taping off the living room to prep it for painting. My next goal will be to texture over the wood paneling in the living room by this weekend. Hopefully we can primer and paint and be done with the living room.

Jon, our contractor friend, came out to check out the bathroom progress. He said we definitely need to fix the crack in the pipe (which happens to be l-e-a-d) and that it will either need to be patched or completely replaced.

Our floor guy wasn't able to make it out due to some car problems. He said he would make it out in the morning and that he wasn't trying to give us the runaround. I appreciated that but I'm still really anxious to get these floors finished.

I don't have any photos of our progress so I'll leave you with this:

The Hepper Bed.
I think Scooty deserves this for all his time spent sleeping in the sink.

• Labels:
• Kittens


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It's easy to put the interior design of the house on the backburner when we're so focused on just making the place functional.

So I thought I'd look for some bedroom inspiration.

DwellStudio Draper Stripe Collection
Saffron Quilted Coverlet - Full / Queen
I have always loved DwellStudio bedding. It has always been just a little too expensive. I've always been one to buy the least expensive sheets I could find that usually had a low thread count to match. That is up until this year. After I moved out of my old house I was needing to buy new sheets. I was at target late one night, on the phone with my brother, with a couple of glasses of wine in my system and he convinced me to splurge on bedding. He explained to me that a lot of time is spent in bed - so you might as well make it nice. By the way, he sleeps on a mattress he found in the street, sheets that were in my parents linen closet for decades and a thread-bare quilt. I think he was probably trying to live vicariously through me when he told me to buy the goose down comforter.

So back to the DwellStudio bedding. I found a few grey and yellow color schemes that I love. I also like the dark grey wall color in the photo above. I'm thinking about doing something about like that in our master bedroom as well. I love the coziness yellow quilt paired with the grey and white striped sheets.


DwellStudio - Ash Draper Stripe Duvet Collection


DwellStudio - Thicket Saffron Duvet Collection
I like the overall print on this set but I'm not a fan of butterflies. Even if I was I would probably feel a little funny about making Jeremy sleep under them.

Maybe we'll treat ourselves to some of this fantastic bedding for Christmas. Or maybe we can piece together the look for a lot less with the help of Target, Wal-Mart and the mall.

Oh! I also came across some DwellStudio bean bag chairs:

Jeremy needs one of these to go with the new Xbox 360.

As far as the remodel goes... We took Saturday off to enjoy time with the family. We saw The Happening - it was terrible. Then we enjoyed some karaoke with some friends.

Sunday I managed to texture one more wall in bedroom one and Jeremy got the rest of the concrete out of the bathroom. That is a huge accomplishment! We did notice that the toilet drain (the one that carries the poop and pee to the bog of eternal stench) has a crack in it. We'll have our friend take a look at this tomorrow and see what he thinks. Hopefully we can just patch it up with some plumber putty and some sort of heavy duty tape - if not we'll need to get a plumber out to replace it. We also need to see if there is still a leak occuring that originally caused all that wood to rot out.

• Labels:
• Inspiration
• Master bedroom


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We've had the house for a week now!

Today we enjoyed happy hour at Iron Starr, again, while Bob the washer and dryer guy delivered the goods to our driveway.

We hauled the dryer through the back door and shimmied it into the little pantry/basement entry nook. Then we realized the doorway to the basement was about 2 or 3 inches too small to fit the dryer through. So we took the door off and after quite a struggle removed the frame from the wall. Once again we are staring at the guts of our house.

It took a little maneuvering and a little squealing (on my part) but eventually we got the dryer down the steep stairs and into the basement. The washer was a little smaller but also a bit heavier than the dryer. It took about the same amount of work to get it down the stairs as well.

So that's what we did with Day 7. I didn't take any photos of the house guts or the washer and dryer so I'll leave you with this.




St. Patty's Day - 2008

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Last night we met with the floor guy. It was incredibly frustrating.

He came into our house and quickly measured the floor. He abruptly asked us what we want to do about the urine spots. We thought maybe he could just refinish those as well and maybe with stain and the polyurethane they won't be so noticeable. He strongly advised against that saying that when he sands up the floor the entire house will "smell like wee-wee". I threw up a little bit in my mouth.

So he's quick to leave but I stopped him and asked what our options are. The poor man was hard of hearing but at the same time he didn't seem very helpful or nice. Which is what you really want when someone is providing you with a very expensive service. He basically told us that we just need to replace half the flooring in each room. I was on the verge of tears as he left so instead of working on the house we indulged in happy hour at Iron Starr.

Today I was so stressed out thinking about getting the floors done on time and being forced to use this weirdo because he's the only one that will take credit cards. After talking to both of our moms we decided it would be best to call other contractors and at least get a second opinion. I'm okay with replacing half the floor (if necessary) but I'd rather do it with someone I'm more comfortable forking over thousands of dollars to. We're also racing against the clock with our move-in date approaching at what seems like the speed of light.

So I called another contractor and he was so nice. He's going to come out on Monday to look at the floor and will be able to work on them a week before we move in!

Oh! We did buy a used washer and dryer set off of a nice guy for a good price. Those are being delivered this evening.

• Labels:
• Floors


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Day 5:
We met with our new cabinet maker. He's a nice guy and we're confident he's going to do a great job. We think he'll be done with his part towards the middle of July. Then we'll need to paint the cabinets, have glass installed, install hardware, get countertops put in, and tile the backsplash and behind the range.

After that we decided to take a break from hard labor for the evening. We went to Home Depot and found a light for the kitchen (not the breakfast nook - but the kitchen area).



Day 6:
After getting our cable installed Jeremy continued to rip out the bathroom floor.

Now I'm not sure if we really need to rip ALL of that wood out in between the subfloors.


I never want to see the guts of my house ever again.

Meanwhile, I continued to texture the walls in bedroom one. I've got two out of four walls done. We decided to go ahead and texture over the wood panelling in the living room as well.


All I want to do is dive into some design magazines and figure out what color to paint everything. And we're not even a week into it!

• Labels:
• Bathroom
• Kitchen


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So it's day 4 of the remodel. We spent two hours working on the place.


Jeremy fixed all the exterior lighting.


I textured the largest wall in bedroom 1.

You can't really see the detail here but the wall now looks more like plaster rather than just dry wall.

Meanwhile, Jeremy worked on the bathroom.

He managed to get all the baseboards up - only breaking one in the process. That's the least of our worries with this room.


There are a few different levels of subflooring going on in here...

So about the bathroom.

Today I was freaking out in my head about the bathroom. It was the end of the world as far as I was concerned. So I called my buddy Mario's friend Jon who happens to be a contractor. He also happens to be a life saver and a DIY confidence booster. He met me over at the house on my lunch break and took a look at the bathroom. He said that for a girl that played roller derby and has already taken a sledge hammer to some of the tile that I should just run with it. He told me exactly what to do:
1. Carefully remove the baseboards.
2. Take out ALL of the floor. You know that scene in Beetle Juice where the dead guy opens the door to the house and it's all sand and that monster is swimming through it. He said to tear it out to that point. Where you open the door and fall into nothing and get eaten by monsters.
3. Screw new joists to the old joists.
4. Lay plywood on top of all that
5. (optional) Lay concrete board on top of the plywood.
6. Tile.
7. Replace baseboards.

I also called a few floor refinishing places to get some bids on refinishing the wood floors in bedrooms one and two. It looks like either $2.60 or $3.00 a square foot to refinish the floors. We'll probably go with whoever can get it done the quickest.

In addition to Jon giving me some solid bathroom floor advice he also told me that the Lowes cabinets we're looking at are crap. He said that if we plan on being in the house for more than a few years that we should really look into getting a cabinet maker in there to build us custom hardwood cabinets. He gave me a few numbers to call for some guys that do a good job and aren't completely booked. Jeremy called one of the guys and booked us an appointment for tomorrow evening. He can start building the cabinets as soon as next week!

Overall, we're feeling overwhelmed but just taking everything one step at a time. But we do know this - our home is going to be fantastic. I can't wait to have our housewarming BBQ.

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We closed on the house Friday morning at 9 am. Right after signing a few papers and handing over thousands and thousands of dollars we went back to the house and immediately got to work.




The first thing we did is tear out the carpet in bedrooms one and two. The floors are in decent shape. Bedroom one has some water damage but we'll just say it gives it character.


We spent hours pulling out staples and getting the carpet tack strip out of both rooms.



We'll be calling flooring people first thing in the morning to see about getting them refinished.

We also tore down all the left over curtains, sconces, metal blinds, etc. and made a nice pile on our driveway. Fortunately OKC has a big trash day once a month (booyah, Norman) and it happens to be this week.

Then we decided to tackle the bathroom.

We took one hit to the tile and found treasure underneath.

Hexagon penny tile that is most likely original to the house. We were beyond excited and felt like we had hit the jack pot.


The progress was coming along nicely.


We were thinking we could just take a sander and buffer to the tile and it would be as good as new.

And then I saw this.


Hmm... Still probably salvagable, I thought...

And then it got worse.

Okay, so maybe we can't save the tile. Maybe we'll have to patch up this corner and replace all the tile with something else.

And then it got even worse.


And worse.

I got scared and had to stop.

It looks like we'll have to rip out all the tile and completely replace the subfloor. We also need to figure out if there is still a leak (which there most likely is) and stop it at the source so this sort of thing doesn't happen again.

I'm calling a few contractors first thing in the morning regarding this situation as well.

We also managed to get all the exterior landscape lighting and the porch light working. We're anxiously waiting for it to get dark enough outside to check out how good it's going to look.

Oh, and we went to Lowes and started the kitchen remodel process. We'll meet with the planner again on Wednesday to finalize and order new cabinets and countertops.

In the meantime I will continue to agonize over the perfect shade of white.

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