Home Improvement Roundup

Today is another edition of home improvement roundup, but first it's day 8 of the photopalooza. I promised pictures taken during the day, but I cheated a little and also added some effects. It's just when I saw them that they looked a little old timey so I made them look really old timey. The first is of a house just across the field from mine. No one knows who owns that particular piece of land, and the second is of some houses and trees behind me past another field. We'll have to see what we come up with today.

Home Improvement Roundup. This week's edition will be followed by a tutorial next week. This week's edition is about taking down a wall between two rooms. Not just any wall. No, a load bearing wall. I want a more open floor plan in this ugly double wide of mine so I decided we needed to take down the wall between the kitchen and living room. When I'm done the living room will no longer be the living room but a library/dining room. But, that's in the future.

Creating a more open floor plan aids in heating the home. It will be a more efficient way for the heat to pass from room to room. Plus, an open floor plan gives the illusion that the rooms are bigger and the house is bigger than it actually is. There are a few problems with taking down a load bearing wall like how to support the weight of the roof. The good part is that a roof on a double wide does not weigh as much as a roof on a normal house so we created a few header beams(next week's tutorial) and attached them to either side of the existing wall.

Actually, we have only attached one beam. I can't seem to get someone(ahem, Steve) to do the other one. Maybe on his day off. Once that is done, we can then begin to tear the wood frame of the wall out. The wood we tear out will be saved and used in other projects in the house. Also, while doing a project like this, it's a good time to insulate any cold spots you may find in the walls. I suggest the blue hard foam that you can find in sheets at any home improvement store. We will also be rerouting electricity so that we can install a ceiling fan and some much needed lights in the ceiling as there never were any in this house.

Well, I'll be back tomorrow with more pics for the photopalooza and hopefully a new item for my shop. Home Improvement Roundup will be back next Thursday with a tutorial on header beams that are more common than you think. It'll save you money on your home improvement project if you know how to make one.

Home Improvement Roundup

It's Thursday so that means another Home Improvement Roundup.

Last week, Debbie from Craftymoose asked about refacing cabinets. I have never done this before. I'm from the old school with cabinets because my dad is a cabinetmaker by trade. I did a little research though and found some interesting articles.

doityourself.comhas a whole series on refacing. It tells you which sides of the cabinets to do first, gives you a supply list, and everything. It seemed very informative. Plus, for those of you who would just like to spruce up your cabinets, you will find how to stain your cabinets and how to paint your cabinets.

kitchenrefacing.org is an illustrated tour of how to reface your kitchen. The guy who runs this site is supposed to have 35 yrs experience in cabinet refacing. He's known as Mr. Refacer. He even tells you how to accurately measure your kitchen.

Those are my favorite links. Of course, there are lots of places on the internet to shop around for these supplies so keep looking to make sure you get the cabinets you want. If refacing isn't for you but you need new cabinets and no money, you can very easily build some really beautiful modern but plain cabinets from plywook. I've seen it done, and it can look quite attractive.

Now, I thought I would give a review on a product I wanted to try. We recently installed a motion sensor light switch in my temporary workroom. They switch on when you walk into a room and switch off on a timer when you walk out. The one I bought also makes it so you can work the switch like a regular light. This is what I've been doing during the day then turning it to auto at night. The hard part is remembering to switch it before I get ready to work. It takes a lot of getting used to. Plus, the range on it is ginormous. I was planning on using it in all the rooms but now I'm not so sure. I think it would be perfect for those rooms that aren't often used but lights get left on like hallways or for bathrooms at night. I'm just not sure about this product yet, but it probably takes a bit of getting used to like anything else.

Home Improvement Roundup

It's time for another edition of home improvement roundup! It's been awhile since I've done one of these posts, and to be truthful, it's been awhile since we've done any remodeling too.

My family finally listened this year at Christmas when I said give me money and Lowe's gift cards. Hooray! So, we went to our favorite auction ever. There we found some carpet remnants. Ewww, you may say. No, these are great carpets. They are the leftovers on the roll. You know when the roll gets too small to keep cutting. I decided K had to have one for her room and only paid $8 for it. You can see it in the picture. I think it's pretty.


Then, browsing around Lowe's, we found that they had recessed lights on sale. A four pack with the housings and lightbulbs for $20. Great deal! The picture below shows what they look like in the ceiling. So, it was time to remodel K's room. We hadn't planned on doing it now, but she needed to clean it anyway. Plus, when removing the carpet, I accidently broke her bed which was originally mine when I was a kid. Oops. Oh, did I mention the drywall for her ceiling was free through freecycle?

The moral of this Home Improvement Roundup is that you can redo a room for next to no money if you are willing to do a little searching. All in all it will cost us approximately $70 to give K her Egyptian room like she wants. I think that's pretty good. Now, if my ankle would just get stronger so I can finish it.

Let me know if there is anything in particular you'd like to learn about in next week's Home Improvement Roundup. I do take requests. lol.

No Sense of Color

Time for another edition of Home Improvement Roundup. Yep, it's Thursday again. I know I promised you birdproofing your house, but....

As many of you know, I have been painting my mother's downstairs hall. I'm supposed to be painting more, but for right now, I am just tackling her hallway. This may not sound like much, but it has 12 foot ceilings, a mini wall because of the staircase, a chandelier that will burn you, and 4 doors. It has not been the easy painting job I've ever done. Well, I have just about accomplished the hallway. I just have the ceiling and 1 wall left. Then I can tackle the staircase. Why didn't I just do it all at one time you may ask. That brings me to tip #1. If you are drastically changing the color of a room, you will want to only do part of your painting so you can see if you like it and live with it. In this case, it was more than drastic. It was night and day. Here's some pics to prove my point.

Oops! Just realized I missed a couple of spots I didn't see. Here's something I have learned because of this project which will lead us to our second tip of the day. My mother has no sense of color. Seriously. I suspected this before, but now the hypothesis has been proven. Don't get me wrong. I love the colors she chose- just not together. It's like looking at the dissection of James' Giant Peach. You make think I'm crazy, but it's true. The scond pic is most like the actual room. Pic 2 turned out way lighter than the room really is. I'm wondering if my mother will like it since she hadn't seen the colors on the wall when I started. Knowing her, she will, though I have no problem bringing paint home. lol. This brings me to tip #2. When choosing paint colors, don't pick colors that are too closely related. It will make you feel closed in. Most importantly, if you aren't sure, buy a little jug of the paint and paint a single wall or even just a portion of the wall to try it out. Those are my tips for the day. Hope you enjoyed them.

I have no idea what we will be discussing next week. I will have to see what project I am working on next. lol.

Home Improvement Roundup

Today on Home Improvement Roundup: Drywall and Spackling. It's a continuation of my closet/hot water heater remodel. I have a lot to remodel on the whole house so I figured I would create Home Improvement Roundup to talk about it. No matter how boring it is.

Anyway, last weekend and some this week, I went back to work on the closet. Steve installed my new light and lightswitch which I love. Finally, no more pulling the little chain which hasn't worked anyway in about two years. Plus, we finished laying the floor. This was no easy task since whoever built the house obviously didn't own a level or a tape measure. It looks beautiful with the light shining on it. Kind of reminds me of an Italian villa or at least what I imagine one to look like.

Now we are ready to spackle to get ready for the paint. I have become quite adept at spackling. Goodness knows I get enough practice since they didn't install the drywall properly and left gaps that an elephant could walk through. By the way, drywall should be layed horizontally across the studs not vertically unless you are using one piece to finish the whole wall. I saw a new drywall tape being used that I really wanted to use so I figured this was as good as time as any. The name of the company has escaped me, but if you see a yellow plastic mesh tape in the drywall aisle, that's the one. It self-adheres to the wall, though it can be pulled off if you mess up. Because of this, you don't have to apply a bed of spackle which saves you money and time. Love it so far. These seams are so much better and went so much faster than my previous ones. You can see the seam with the tape and the seam after the spackle was applied in the pics below. Remember when you are laying the spackle that you should apply a thin coat, but thick enough so that you no longer see the mesh. You should also go about 1" past the sides of the tape. Once it dries, it will turn completely white then you will be ready to sand. A good spackler/drywaller will have to sand very little. When sanding is complete, run a damp paper towel across the seams to get the dust off then you are ready for paint.

Next week on Home Improvement Roundup- Birdproofing your house. As we all know, I keep getting birds in my chimney. We'll see what I can do to remedy this situation. Until next time...

Leaving Hell

Well, it was 4 am, but I got my bath. The hot water heater got installed. The subfloor is at least in, and I got some of my new tiles down. I still need to grout them. Here's some pics of the process. Did I mention we did this ourselves?!



The picture above is the hot water heater closet with the hot water heater removed. The picture below is the bathroom closet demolished. The pic is from the backside of the closet. This will give me more room in my bedroom closet, and I still have one closet in the bathroom.

The picture above is the new subfloor in what used to be the hot water heater closet, and the ruined floor in my bedroom closet. The picture below is the wet floor after being removed. See the insulation. If you look close, you can probably see under my house.

The picture above is some of my new tile floor. Do you like the pattern? I got the beige tiles from an auction for $1, and the brown tiles from the Habitat for Humanity Outlet Center. I have enough to do the whole closet. The picture below is my blessed new hot water heater on its new platform. I also got that from the Habitat for Humanity Outlet Center. Yay that part's done!