Quick Update

Blogger is causing image-posting problems (I'm researching options, and may be moving this blog to another host soon... will keep you posted), and on top of that our Internet's been finicky for the past three weeks, so I apologize for the absence of posts and am here to provide a quick update on the goings-on at the HSS. Certainly, with the drama that unfolded last month on our beautiful new floors, you can imagine there's been plenty happening that would, under normal Internet/blogging circumstances, have provided lots of posting fodder. It's true, there's been lots of frustration, rearranging, planning, interacting, shopping, and other activity. We'll give a good ol' summary once everything's finished and back to "normal," we promise.

In the meantime, though, we're here to report that our place has been "packed in" by professionals, and floors should go back down starting tomorrow! Hooray! Unfortunately, the turmoil of all of this means it will be challenging to live at home, so we're packing ourselves out and will be enjoying a brief staycation at the Other Home Sweet Schwab (Dave's parents' place) for at least the next few days. Supposedly we'll be back home by the weekend.

What this also means is that I won't be home tomorrow to record and post our eleventh Twentieth in our home. Can't believe we're so-quickly approaching our first full year! You'll have to forgive the fake-20th post again, which I'll take and post our first day back home. Every day's the same right now, anyway (read: hot/humid/sunny/beach-vacation-y), so it's six of one, half a dozen of the other, right?!

We'll be back soon!

Floors: Near Completion

All of the flooring is installed! So why "near completion" you might be asking? Well, I'm not sure. But all of our contractor's equipment and stuff are still out, so it looks to me like he's not quite finished yet. Also there's an interesting taping situation going on in the front hall, which equally leads me to believe that there more work to do. I think he needs to do some finishing work on the thresholds and the baseboards, but beyond that, I can't figure it out. Guess we'll find out tomorrow. In the meantime, it really looks transformed. Here are some new shots, including a few "perspective" shots for my dad...

(from the front door looking in)

(aforementioned taping situation... we'll call it a tape crop circle)

(mysterious tape crop circle markings - arrows pointing at... well, nothing except the middle of the circle.)

(from our bedroom door, looking down the hall toward the dining room)

(and looking into the kitchen...)

(look at that beautiful, seamless hallway situation! ignore the edge of the tape crop circle...)

(living room)

(perspective shot: looking into the living room from the balcony, by way of the new door! (forgive the mess))

And on a side note... how great is it to still have day light at nearly 7:00pm?! Hooray Spring!

Floors and a Door

Good news! After some set-backs (a few additional set-backs while we were away... but they're in the past now, so they need not be regurgitated), we have some serious floor progress! Hooray! And they are really looking great. So far, the floors are installed in the living room, dining room, most of the hall space, and some of the kitchen. All that's left is the rest of the front hallway, including the closet, and the rest of the kitchen. One or two days more and we're fully floored--literally and figuratively. We also got a surprise phone call on our way home from our travels letting us know that the replacement slider for the living room had come in, so the new sliding door is also in place, and it looks fantastic. Bonus: it opens and closes easily! Great day at the HSS! Enjoy...

(living and dining room: complete!)

(hallway through to the master suite door: complete!)

(front hall -- complete up to the closet area)

(kitchen: just barely started... say goodbye to those amazing laminate faux bricks!)

And here's the new slider (I promise I'll provide better photos in daylight):

(ooh la la = easy access to grill)

Lanie thinks it smells funny in here, but I think she appreciates how sleek it's looking!

Hopefully there will be more exciting news to report on tomorrow. In the meantime, I'm off to consider running for the condo Board (oh, man...)!

Grout is In!

Dave finished the grouting and he did an absolutely incredible job! Here's a close-up of his handy work:

Our kitchen is looking so new and fresh and pretty! Who could ever have known when we started with this:

(and this photo actually includes the first upgrade of a functioning faucet!)

 that we could end up with something this great in the same space?! I mean, it's purrrrty:

(pretty good before-and-after, eh? especially for two of the least handy people we know!)

It's nearly finished... so close!

Tile is Up!

PHEW! That was a long day! But it ends with a fist bump because the tile is up! We hit some bumpy spots for sure, including tight corners, and odd uneven lines thanks to the not-so-perfect cabinets and floors in this unit, but Dave was Master of the Tile Cutter, and I was Master Tile Cleaner, and it's looking pretty good, if we do say so ourselves. All in all, it might not be perfect, but it's fairly close, and we're excited to soon see and share the finished product... tomorrow is grouting!

So here's a quick photo summary of our kitchen at the end of tiling day:

So... while today turned out to be a bad day for Da Bears, it was a good day for tiling and Steelers (that's mostly for my dear friend ELH, but also: Tribe Pride, Coach Tomlin!).

Stay tuned for what promises to be an exciting grouting round-up! Ha!

Tiling...

We are deep in tile-application mode! Yesterday was prep day, with Dave priming the walls for adhesive and tile:

Then we let that dry and moved onto prepping ourselves for today's task: actually tiling the wall. Dave set the alarm for 7:15 (we had to make significant progress before the Bears game!), and I got up at 7:45 and found this going on in the kitchen:

(woo-hoo!)

Dave had a rhythm going, including cutting tiles himself:

But at a certain point, enough had been accomplished for me to step back in and start doing my job, which is to clean up the excess adhesive between tiles, and make sure none of it is drying onto the tile surface. This is extraordinarily tedious and tiresome, but yields exciting results!

(in the past five months, we have found a simple blade to be a super multi-purpose tool)

We are now complete with the entire wall between the furthest right edge and the edge of the cabinet above and to the left of the stove area. Next chunk to be tackled (ha!) at halftime...

GO BEARS!

Wall Revival... Day 3

Not only did Dave come home and make a delicious dinner tonight of homemade pizza, but he also accomplished the first sanding and second spackling of the wall. It's hard to tell from photos (since it pretty much looks exactly the same as yesterday), but it's really coming along. The wall already seems close to even, so we're hoping it's just one more sanding (after this layer of spackle dries), and on to priming and applying of tiles... very exciting.

Here's proof that while we can tell progress has been made, it looks identical to how it looked at the end of the day yesterday:

(sorry 'bout that shadow)

And since that's not so exciting, here's a shot from yesterday afternoon in which it is demonstrated that Lanie is proud of Dave's hard work:

(high five!)

Onward to Day 4! Go Dave!

The Wall: Continued...

With regards to our ongoing kitchen update project, we have spent the last week a) completing the removal of the ancient chunky tile adhesive from the wall (Dave), and b) researching how to proceed. The removal of the chunky adhesive presented us with a stumbling block... basically, that process left some of the drywall "brown" (meaning it removed a layer of paper) and in some areas the drywall was chipped a little more by the adhesive removal (done with a scraper, quite crudely).

We wondered, could we put glass or ceramic tile, using a tile adhesive, directly over the drywall that had lost some of its paper layer? Dave read that you might want to use a product called "Guardz" and then a latex paint primer before re-applying adhesive and tiles. We were also hoping we could use spackle to smooth out the drywall spots. But we weren't sure. We were desperately hopeful we would not have to completely redo the drywall... So we spent a lot of time online, and seeking out the advice of friends who know better. Ultimately, the question was what order to proceed, if our gut instinct was to:
 
1.   finish removing adhesive;
2.   patch dented areas with spackling and let dry;
3.   sand lightly;
4.   (apply primer or Guardz, or both?);
4a. sand again lightly;
5.   get ceramic or glass tiles and some type of adhesive and apply.

As usual, the web had a billion opinions... but the ultimate conclusion we came to, with the help of a few friends and then the "experts" at the Tile Outlet, was to follow our gut, mostly. We're not buying "Guardz" but otherwise, we're proceeding as outlined above.

So, today we picked out our tile!

(ooh!)

It, and our grout:

(color = "linen")

were selected to match our granite and eventual wall color:

("Ticonderoga Taupe")

We also picked up all of our other supplies:

 
And set to addressing the first go at smoothing out the wall:

The plan is to apply another layer (or two?) of spackle this week until we are confident the wall is fairly even, then to sand it to smooth, then prime, then apply the new tiles!

Slowly but surely... 

The Wall

This weekend we continued work on the backsplash wall (and again, "we" = "Dave")... The next step in this process is to smooth or remove the ancient chunky adhesive that held the previous tiles to the wall. This is a chore. Our original plan was to simply sand it to smooth. So we bought an orbital sander (under the assumption that this will come in handy for other projects as well, so not a loss if this doesn't work)...

...it didn't really work. We thought about patching it smooth...

 ...this sort of worked, but no, not really...

So Dave went to the hardware store (photo of chunky adhesive-covered wall in tow) to get some professional opinions. The five people working at the Ace he went to each had a different idea - and each debunked the idea of the guy before him. At the end of it, Dave bought only a scraper, and is attacking the wall himself... 

(It must be noted that at a certain point in this process, I came into the kitchen to find Dave wearing the best science lab-protective glasses ever, but he wouldn't let me take a photo...)

If this effort didn't work, we planned to contact our kitchen contractor and simply have him re-dry wall the chunky-glued area... however, after a few hours, we're half way there:

The plan is to finish the scraping, patch where needed, sand smooth, and then move onto tile selection and application.


It continues...

The Kitchen Project Continues

We are back to work on finishing the kitchen. The final checklist goes as follows:

1. remove old backsplash
2. sand wall to flat
3. select and install new backsplash
4. paint kitchen
5. shelf over refrigerator
6. (microwave)
7. (floors)

Today we did some investigating at Home Depot and are now prepared and in-process at tackling numbers 1 and 2 on this list. And by "we", I mean Dave.

We purchased a small orbital sander so we can smooth out the wall as soon as Dave's done. No rest for the kitchen renovators...

A Family Visit and a Working Sink

This is just the first of a few posts for this weekend, which was a special one for a few reasons. 1) my parents and brother arrived Friday; 2) Saturday Dave (with help from his father in-law) successfully (eventually) hooked the plumbing back up and got the sink working (!), and he finished the second coat of sealant on the counters so we could start using them; and 3) this morning Dave's parents joined us for brunch - an even more exciting event with the new kitchen! Whee! Plus, yesterday was the 20th, so I'll have my 20th Project photos to post, as well.

So, this one will be about the sink, I guess. Although I should first point out just how SUPER excited Lanie was to see her adoring Heller family:

(everyone's enjoying this good back-of-the-neck scratch!)

Having installed this faucet once before, as well as the one in our bathroom two months ago, Dave was ready to go getting us all set to use the new sink yesterday. Unfortunately, there were some leakage hiccups, but ultimately, his plumbing skills got everything in order and we're golden:

It's quite an undertaking:

(it's a dirty job...)

(but easier when completed as a two-man job)

(Dave has definitely grown accustomed to climbing into this little cubbie-hole)

(but didn't anticipate the size of the sink making things even tighter under there)

(testing...)

(and we're in business!)

Our beautiful new sink is now successfully working, and also successfully NOT leaking! Dave's the best.

COUNTER TOPS!

Early this afternoon I was sitting in my office and my phone buzzed indicating a text message. I looked down and it was a "multimedia" message... I opened my phone, and it was a "multimedia" message from Dave... I downloaded the message, and found myself weeping. Tears of joy, people! WE HAVE COUNTER TOPS! AND A SINK! (so, the sink's not hooked up to any plumbing yet, but who cares?! It looks like a kitchen again!) Check it out:

(I'm pretty sure tears were warranted)

(beau-tee-ful!)

(look at that gorgeous, shiny, stunner of a new sink! who knew a sink could bring such joy?)

(more pretty!)

(I was fully expecting the counters to clash intolerably with the back splash, but it's not SO bad, right?)

(looking into the Beauty through the new beautiful window. THAT'S a view!)

Clearly, months without a normal kitchen have left me slightly off-balance, but still, come on! That's pretty great, right?! And the timing could not be better... my parents and brother arrive tomorrow for a fun-filled pre-Thanksgiving visit. Can't wait!

What's the sound you hear? Relief? It just might be. Hooray!