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Showing posts with the label bedroom

Clean Bedroom

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While the new bedroom is clean, I thought I should probably shoot a few photos... This new double bed sure does cover a lot of that beautiful new wood floor! I converted the bedroom door to a Dutch door... first, I marked where I needed additional hinges... I removed it from its hinges... I cut the door in half... since this is a hollow core door, I had to fill the now open ends with solid wood... added a little shelf to the lower half... added some decorative trim to match the rest of the house... painted it Colonial Red (a primer plus three top coats)... routed out for the new hinges... installed the new hinges... hung the new door... added Dutch door hardware to lock the bottom half to the top half... and, it is beautiful... This bedroom is the future location of my hobby room which will be mostly model railroading stuff with a workbench/desk. The room has been designed in an old train station style with quite a few train station details.  One such detail is the door to

A Room for Adam's Visit

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Adam will be arriving for a relatively short visit from somewhere on the opposite side of our planet in the next few days so it has been a very busy couple of weeks around the house.  As the regular readers of this blog already know, we moved our master bedroom to Adam's old bedroom when he left for the Air Force. I tore that bedroom apart... aired it out for months... and rebuilt it completely to include a rebuilt closet, rebuilt shelving and desk, new flooring and a new wood plank ceiling. This bedroom has been exceptionally comfortable for Sheila and me! This heavy laminate wood flooring has a vapor barrier already adhered to the bottom of each plank so we were able to install this directly on top of the subflooring. The original, long term plan was to turn our old bedroom into a room for me to keep all my models... mostly trains... and to create a space which would be better suited for building and working on models rather than our kitchen table. This project, however

An Exceptionally Busy Weekend

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I haven't written anything in about a week and a half because I've had some exceptionally lousy health and, more recently, I've been busy working on the house and out in the yard during my good health. Working on the house only happened after taking a few weeks off because of spinal problems. I managed to have a productive and busy weekend but I didn't get to touch a single thing that has been on my long 'to-do list'.   On Saturday afternoon, we had a broken water supply pipe due to repeated stress. The pipe just broke completely in two! The water was shooting out of the broken pipe like a garden hose with a nozzle on it! Water was everywhere! Our vanity was filled with water, soaking everything in the vanity. The flooring was soaked. On the positive side, the adjoining bedroom is a construction zone so no finished materials were damaged. The problem was gaining quick and easy access at a time when we needed to move quickly to minimize damage. The wate

Foundation Finished

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I had another productive morning today which puts me on a pretty unusual streak. The weather is about to get lousy for a little bit so I can take a short break until it clears up since I have no room indoors to be cutting big pieces of lumber.  A piece of pine spread across the two foundation pilings... stone pathway is now extended to this new window alcove too. This morning I went outside with the intention of backfilling the dug out foundation and then quickly moving on to some carpentry indoors. Backfilling was done in a matter of minutes so I continued grading the area... then decided to continue with hard landscaping around the area. I expanded our stone pathway to where this new window alcove will be located. Then I placed some sod strips alongside the new stone... cleaned up the adjacent flower beds... did a little bit of raking... and now it is looking nice and clean out there. The two foundation pilings are slightly low (on purpose). I'll rest the outside end of

A Short Work Day Today

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After overdoing it yesterday on home renovations, I only worked on the house a short while today. We have the grandkids here today so I'll spend the rest of the day playing with them. Yesterday, when I was digging the foundation for the little three window alcove, I realized that the septic tank is in the way by a few inches. So, last night, I came up with some new plans with new dimensions. Now I can cantilever this small alcove out beyond the two pilings holding up this alcove.  After digging the foundation deep enough, I dropped in some pre-made footings... then glued the concrete pilings on top of these footings once the depth and dimensions were correct.  I'll wait a day or two before backfilling.  This bedroom renovation project is coming along nicely but slowly. As long as I accomplish something almost every day, I should be okay.  

Started New Project Today

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Even though I had great difficulty breathing again today (it is my 'new normal', I suspect) , I managed to start working on a new project this morning. I didn't get a whole lot done but it was nice to have a fairly productive morning, for a nice change of pace. Our old bedroom has been relegated as a temporary storage facility rather than a nice bedroom since we moved into our new bedroom just before Christmas. This morning, I started moving things out of this room so we could begin renovating.  I needed to take a lot of breaks to catch my breath... used my inhaler about three times... got a little dizzy a few times... but, slowly, I managed to make a slightly noticeable dent in clearing this room of clutter.  After lunch, I went outside and started excavating for a small foundation for a small three window alcove we plan to add to this bedroom.  The good news is I did not encounter any buried utilities. I started this digging by hand with a plastic shovel just in

Moved Into New Bedroom

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Yesterday was a very hectic and painful day but we managed to get the bedroom finished enough to move into that bedroom and sleep there last night! Being able to lie down in that room last night was very nice. I say it was a "very hectic" day because we were on the move all day long... clearing out the room of building materials... laying underlayment... laying carpet... installing baseboard trim... moving in bedroom furniture (which involved moving it all out the back door and in the front door... in the snow... finally, some snow!) ... moving my office/computer stuff to the new desk... cleaning and installing the mini-blinds... installing curtains... and probably a few other things I can't remember right now. It truly was a hectic day because we wanted to get into that bedroom before the Thanksgiving weekend was behind us! I say this room is "finished enough" to move into it because we still need to hang photos and art on the walls and there are a few o

Ceiling Installed

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I managed to get the ceiling installed in our future temporary bedroom the other day. It is looking good! Yesterday, my spine was killing me from all the crouching (while cutting) and then standing (while installing each piece of planking)... over and over... one piece at a time. Actually, my spine is feeling almost as poorly as it gets since my original injuries. Any change in position sends a huge wave of pain to my lumbar spine and my feet.   Regardless of all the spinal pain, I managed to get the ceiling installed and then I managed to install the lighting yesterday.  The room is coming together slowly but surely. I made these ceiling planks from a few sheets of luaun underlayment so the cost was very affordable. It did require some work, however.  I needed to rip the sheets of plywood into 8" wide strips... stain each piece... then polyurethane each piece. This job was toughest on my spine because of all the up and down, crouching, stretching, reaching, etc. Logistica

A Busy Day

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Ceiling planks laid out on the floor for staining and polyurethaning... I needed to do this in two batches. Our day was a busy one today! I spent the morning staining the second batch of planks for a new ceiling in our new bedroom. Then, after my usual (and very necessary) 2-4 hour after-lunch nap, I managed to put a coat of polyurethane on all the planks just as the kids were arriving from day-care with Gee.  We had a nice dinner... watched "The Santa Claus" (the kids were glued to this movie from the very beginning)... the kids had some ice cream cones... then the kids helped Gee make some dark chocolate chip cookies... and I managed to get a second coat of polyurethane on all the ceiling planks as Lukey watched from the doorway.  All in all, it was a busy day and a very productive one at that! Tomorrow, I hope to stain and polyurethane trim and/or our nightstands.  Little by little... things are coming along... Shot using one of my manual f

Changing Priorities

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Those of you who follow this blog know that I've been excited about getting our outdoor kitchen grilling area completed. Unfortunately, this project has been put on a back burner. About two weeks ago, I found that the roofing material I need/want for this grilling area is out of stock. This is what happens when the building season is extremely short and places to buy supplies are even shorter. So, I need to wait until this product is back in stock. Who knows how long that will take?  In the meantime, I decided to do a "quick" project in Adam's old bedroom.... While he was home on leave... for a whole month... he was supposed to pack up all his stuff, toss out whatever he does not want anymore, and clean up his room a bit. Everything he owned fit into this tiny bedroom so this was by no means an overwhelming task for him nor was it an unreasonable task. Sheila reminded him a few times that he needed to get started on his packing... he chose to just sit in front