We didn't work on the house the 29th, we actually moved. Rob enlisted the help of 2 people, rented a truck and got everything (mostly everything) over to the house on Tuesday.

Last night we finished up the move and Rob did the post-rent clean up. I remember when I did that 2 months ago, it took much longer then anticipated and his experinece was the same. Once everything was at the house we tried to determine what we had time to do that night.

It was late so we moved the cabinets back into the kitchen and put the couter top back on. That went smoothly and once I put the cabinet faces and drawers back in, it looked amazing. It's one of those before and after pictures that makes you say to yourself "Wow, the woman that remodeled this kitchen is a damn genius, I wish I was her so I could use that kitchen". Stop laughing, I'm serious!

We need a few pieces before we connect the sink so it's not connected yet. I get the impression that after we install the hot water heater, we can do the kitchen sink but...... as I have said before, when I predict these things I should pad it by a day. SO, we will have the kitchen set up by tomorrow night and tonight will be only the hot water heater.

We slept at the house last night and it was pretty comfortable, with the assistance of a big horking window banger, that kept the humidity out of the bedroom and ketp the temprature almost chilly! I was very excited to be in the new house and was intrigued by everything: the new shadows on the walls, my new view of the night sky and the hum of the AC. This morning was pretty funny. The morning light hits the room however it was overcast so there was a soft grey light coming through the window and it gavew the room a very comforting familiar feel. I needed that because we had no hot water so I washed my hair in the sink with cold water. A cold shower at 7 am would be detremental to anybody who interacted with me that day. I would be walking around with that cold water shock face all day.

We can use the bathroom in the new house. I don't want to goss anybody out but we both verified that the toilet works!
We can use the sink in the bathroom, I washed my hands in it!

The mirror/light goes up tonight and then it will be all done..... except for the doors. There are no doors in the bathroom so using the facilities can be a community event unless you open the hall closet door to block the view from the street.

Our bedroom walls are hot yellow so I PAINTED, AGAIN. I am so tired of painting! I firmly believe that the paint fumes are getting to me. On Sunday I had the spider on the door incident and last night I had run ins with a moqsuito and gnats.

There was 1 mosquito (that I saw) and I chased him about the room for quite some time. In the end, he won. I walked out of the battle zone with 4 mosquito bites. I don't know how, but that damn bug managed to get me on the rear end!

As I was on the ladder priming the hot yellow I noticed that there was an army of gnats up on the celing and that periodically they would get stuck in the primer..... after my mosquito incident I was a little angry at flying bugs so I would stick them in the paint when I saw them. I'm telling you, paint fumes make me crazy!

Anyway, tonight we start the move. There are some big things to tackle, installing the hot water heater, installing the kitchen cabinets back into the kitchen and hooking up the sink, getting a fridge but it's all down hill from here. I think......

As I was reading my post from Friday, I was thinking..... 'whenever I predict a finish date for something, I should add 2 days for hidden stuff that pops up or things that take longer then planned'

It seems like I spent all Friday and Saturday painting doors and frames for doors. I primed them, I painted them, I repainted them. I inhaled so much paint that when a tiny little spider got himself caught on the door, I left him there as a little hint to other spiders. It's a 'warning do not enter' type of thing. Or primer and paint fumes make you a little crazy. Please don't tell PETA on me.

While I was painting (and mumbling curses) Rob repaired the plumbing from the kitchen sink drain. There was a spot under the house where it was leaking and we found out why. There was a TON of rust in the pipes, mixed with 50 years of bacon grease, goop and scunge. The pipe was not installed with any kind of slope in it so it wound up with standing water which turned to rust, which ate through the pipe and caused a huge gaping hole int he pipe. Rob replaced it with PVC and we have a fully functional drain for the kitchen!!!

When I could paint no more, I put the finihsed cabinets up!!!! The hardware looked great on the cabinets and I only had to drill 2 holes on each cabinet to get the new hardware to fit. All the upper cabinets are up on the wall. The lower cabinets are waiting for me since the kitchen counter is in the living room.

Sunday was actually a fun day. We installed the bathroom and kitchen floors and DAMN, we do good work. The bathroom floor was a very odd shape but it was small so that went off without a hitch. The adhesive was some icky stuff. As soon as you get a little bit on your hands it turns into something out of a cartoon. It sticks to everything and makes long stringy strings form what it's sticking too. At first I paniced becuase (of course) I had it all over me, but after reading the label it came right off with hose water and soap. I was suprised becuaes it was like liquid cement. Ick.

The kitchen floor was a little tricky becuase it was a tight fit but once we got it in the right spot it went by relatively quickly. Both rooms look soo good now. It seems like I have been doing prep work for weeks so it's nice to see the finishing touches go up.

I spent last night painting, AGAIN. I am getting very tired of painting, paint brushes, rollers, primers and the smell of all that stupid stuff. Additionally, I am tired of finding paint all over me, even after exfoliating every inch of my body. I had to wear pants to work becuase my legs are COVERED in primer from last night.

It's a mystery how I manage to get paint all over me. Last week, I even found paint on my ribs.

While Rob painted the bathroom, I primed the bathroom, door and door jamb last night. Do you know what that means? It means that tonight we paint the bathroom, 2 doors and 2 door jambs. This gets us even closer to installing the floor and the vanity, sink, mirror and toilet. In the fantasy world I live in, (where everything goes right) the bathroom will be DONE tomorrow.

wow.
done.

Let that sink in.

The bathroom will be done. Which is good becuase we are starting to move Rob's worldly belongings this weekend. I don't have much at his house so I am not as freaked out as I was when we moved my stuff. Also, I may have reached my max freak out point.

Maybe not. Last night, as I was priming all 6 of the pannels in the bathroom door (and cursing myself for picking out a door that needed that much attention to paint) I was wishing I could set the door on fire. It would serve it right for being so hard to paint. Then I decided I wanted to give the house a time out untill it decided to cooperate and fix itself.

You may be wondernig where I was! Rob and I spent last week in the Outer Banks, surfing, swimming and fishing. It was a much needed break from the house. Right before we left for the trip, I had decided that I was mad at the house. I have blister/scabs on both knees from laying down the subfloor in the kitchen that still hurts when I kneel, that's one of the many reasons I was mad at the house.

We got back from the Outer Banks on Friday night and went straight to work on Saturday and Sunday. Rob felt revitalized and very focused on the house after the vacation; but I am having a hard time getting my act together. I didn't even work on the house last night, I went out and bought a little weber grill and cooked steaks for dinner. How is that for avoidance!

We're in crunch time though, we move out of Rob's on July 31st. Oh wow, did you feel that? My blood pressure just jumped. Can you hear that? It's my heart beat racing.

The only thing left to do in the bathroom is sand off the mud, lay the flooring, prime and paint the walls, put the toilet, vanity and medicine cabinet in and then install the doors. That's actually a managable task.

The kitchen still needs work, the drain need to be replaced with PVC, the floor needs to be installed and I need to do the back splash.

The living room floor needs work and we have not even started on that, we need to repair the hole in the floor, sand it and put the urthane down.

We can definately finish the bathroom and kitchen before we move in but we are unsure about the floors. Even though I don't feel like working on the house I force myself to do it because I have my heart set on doing the floors BEFORE we move in. We'll see if it happens.

We had a nice long 3 day weekend for the 4th of July.

Thursday night, we moved the plumbing over to accommodate the new vanity. Did you hear me, WE MOVED THE PLUMBING! I was amazed at how easy that was. It took a little bit of time but we moved PVC pipes and actually copper pipes. I didn't get to use the blowtorch but that was probably a good move on Rob's part.

When we got to the house on Friday the 4th it was a bazillion degrees and equal humidity. Since I am a genius I decided to tackle the outside of the house on the hottest day of the year. The yard had not been taken care of for 1 ½ years, it was a jungle. I got the lawn mower, weed whacker, edger, SPF 30, DEET and went to work. My favorite part was the edger thing, I got to add some shape to the azalea's instead of looking at moppy headed shrubberies. I made a dog and a ballerina - just kidding. The bushes just look like bushes however they are not rubbing against the house and they are not being choked by vines anymore. Those vines are nasty. I see an on going battle brewing but I will win, I'm smarter (most of the time).

While I was outside sweating out all the toxins in my body from the night before, Rob was in the bathroom putting the finishing touches on the modifications we needed to make to get the linen closet door on. When we did the wiring, we forgot to put a switch in, yup, we would have put the mirror up with no way to turn the damn thing off. So he worked on wiring and then dry walled. I am sure he did much more then that on Friday but I was delusional from the heat and have a hard time remembering exactly what he did.

I'll tell you what I do remember. I staggered into the house when I was done with the yard and told Rob that I was putting a bathing suit on and he had to hose me down becuase it was just too damn hot. I have never seen a man drop a hammer as fast as him. I stood in my backyard and got a cold hose down. I can't tell you how good that felt, the only thing that would be better would be a dip in a pool or the ocean. Standing outside and feeling the hose water go from warm to cool to cold is such a distinct feeling. It brings you back to 6 years old in a jiffy. I began to think about how a slip and slide would fit in the backyard ...

We got home on the 4th and I had delusions of walking downtown to see the fireworks. Ha ha ha, what a joke. We had stopped on the way home for food and went a little wild. We got the makings for pizza and some premade ribs. When all was said and done there was very little food left over. There was no way I was moving. By 9:00 I was ready for bed however I was going to try and stick it out till 10:00. Once again, out cold by 10 on a Friday night. Rock STAR!

I woke up on Saturday feeling energized, I actually rolled out of bed, into my running clothes and took a short jog, just call me the glutton for punishment. After my run we spent some time picking up a friend's truck and getting al the big unruly pieces from the hardware store. We got the door, 2x4's and 4x8 ¼ inch plywood.

Rob had the grand luck of teaching me how to use a circular saw. I'm not sure that is the correct phrase but it was one of those saws you can lug outside and stretch a piece of 4x8 plywood over a make shift horse and cut it in half without taking off any digits.

The kitchen floor needed a sub floor and I decided it was my job. That kitchen is going to be all me. I measured my kitchen then lugged the 4x8's outside and did the cuts. It took a long time to do the cutting because before I turned on the saw I would look at my fingers, toes, line of cutting and then cut 2 feet only to stop to reposition then start all over again. I'm a freak but I have all my fingers and toes. So there. Did I mention that it was still a bazillion degrees, this is gross but I'll tell you anyway. I would look down to line everything up and sweat would put into my eyes and onto the wood. I was pretty disgusted by myself.

Anyway, I spent all day hunched over wood and didn't get one splinter.

I have no idea what Rob did all day, he dry walled, he says the bathroom is mere hours away from being done.

When we got home on Saturday night my back started to ache a little bit. With every second that passed it hurt more and more. I took one of those crazy anti-inflammatory and ½ a muscle relater and was in bed, asleep by 8:00 pm. I woke up at Midnight, just in time to catch some of SNL. I promptly went back to sleep and got up at 8 am. Strangely I didn't feel too refreshed but my back was better and I was HUNGRY!!!!!!!

Sunday - I had the wood all cut for the kitchen floor, it was 5 pieces of wood total and they fit together like a cleverly constructed jigsaw puzzle. The first think I did was pull up the wood to vacuum the floor but when I put the wood down ... It didn't fit. While I had the R2 unit in the kitchen, vandals came into the house, re cut all the wood and put it back where I had my wood. I placed everything down exactly how I had it but had to chisel off ¼ inch here and there to make it fit. Now I had to secure the floor down.

Do you remember my 'I can't do anything right fit' with the drill and the bathroom floor? I overcame that and screwed my wood floor down. I took no prisoners, I was kicking ass and taking names!!!! The floor got a few good kicks in but I won. I walked away with some nasty blisters and bruises on my knees and hands but the floor is stuck where it is by 50+ piercings with drywall screws. You tell me who won that battle.

I am tired just writing this. Tired and hungry.

We got home from work on Friday and decided to lay down on the couch for a minute. Just for a second........ 45 minutes later I bolt awake and realize I have 15 minutes before I meet my sister at the new house. I race around the house getting ready, kiss sleeping beauty goodbye and give the tour for the millionth time. I got a lot accomplished - I changed the light bulb in the upstairs.

Saturday was a different story, we got up early and went straight to the tile store. I ordered http://www.ceramictileintl.com/prodbrow/asp/detallelinea.asp?linea=Hearthstone&producto=WALL in Kindling and Ash. It was relatively cheap and I'm excited to get the tile work done. Then we went straight to the house.

I went to work sanding down what had been spackled and repairing drywall in the kitchen. What a God-Awful job. It took a long time to do with very little return. While I was doing that Rob was measuring the floor of the bathroom to finish putting down the plywood floor. When I was done with the drywall I was having a hard time finding something to do. I'm at a crazy impasse where I'm useless.

Rob suggested I move all the big trash/scraps out to the BBQ area to get it out of the house. I did that in 5 minutes and was right back in the useless place. He found a job for me to do and showed me how to drill the floor down in the bathroom and when I tried to do it, I didn't have the power to get the screws countersunk in the plywood. Then we couldn't get the screw (that I screwed up) out of the floor. He suggested I measure the kitchen and the thickness of the current floor. I felt so awful that I couldn't contribute to the work that was being done I stomped myself into the kitchen, sat on the floor and pouted for about an hour.

While I was acting like a 6 year old, Rob got more done in the bathroom and that room is so close to being done it's excruciating! He came to an impasse without the closet door so we did a run to the hardware store at the end of the day. Normally I HATE going to the hardware store but this was kind of fun. Rob took the Z, I followed in my car and we just got the door. None of that dazed wandering around the store looking for 1/2 inch copper pipe. We stuck the 18 inch door in the hatchback of the Z. Rob took it to the house while I got movies and dinner.

Asleep on the couch by 11 on a Saturday night, oh, the life I lead.


---> I forgot the mini saga of the bathroom closet door. The frame is 18 inches across. I thought we can just put a door on the thing. When you think about the logistics of a linen closet door that opens against the bathroom door, it just creates images of finger crushing and Rob thought the sliding door would be better. , I can't remember the name of the doors he wanted, it's the kind that has the slats in them and one hinge. I warmed up to the idea and we do the search for the 18 inch door. Of course they don't make them in 18 inches. When all is said and done, we go back to the start and get a regular door.

Sunday, we woke up and watched Empire strikes back while we were getting ready and waking up. Naturally, all day we were calling the shop vac our little R2 unit. It kind of looks like R2D2. Sunday is the day of rest in the bible, why didn't we listen to the bible. This was a rough rough day. I'm not sure where to start.

As you know, I have had some issues being useful this weekend so Rob gave me a big task (actually, I think it was busy work to get me out of his hair and to keep me from sulking). The intake for the HVAC is disgusting. Years and years of dog and cat hair, dust, dirt and ick. My job was to go into the basement and remove the nails from the sheet metal so we can get into the return and vacuums out the ick. The metal is above my head and it's important I don’t damage the ductwork because we want to nail it back up.

Rob gives me a light and fixes up a spot for me to plug it in and goes upstairs. The plug won't fit in the outlet so I take a good long look around the basement. There are extension cords snake-ing out from the crawlspace/silence of the lambs and connecting to the few outlets that work in the basement. I follow extension cords and spend some time with the cord in my hand looking perplexed. I find a light that works, there is an extension cord plugged into one side that is working!!!! AND there is an open outlet that my adaptor will fit into on the other side of the light. Yippee!!! I found a place, I plug it in and the light bulb goes out and my light doesn't go on.....



shit


I call for Rob and when he gets into the basement I explain what happened and he is not happy. I had blown something that turned off the condenser for the 3 dehumidifiers in the silence of the lambs. NONE of the other outlets in the basement work. I am feeling absolutely awful, tears are welling up in my eyes and I have to leave the room. It was the worst feeling, I was trying so hard to help and I felt like everything I touched broke. I did find the solution to the problem in the basement so I felt a little better. It was one of those solutions that was just too easy so I felt like I had a little victory.

Now I had the lighting, a stool to stand on, my hammer, wonder bar and screwdriver. The nail heads were very thin and flush with the metal so I had to pry the screwdriver under the nail and loosen it to make room for the bar to fit between the nail and metal. Keep in mind I'm essentially pulling nails out of the ceiling with the light shining on me, making my back sweeeeat. It is a horrible job, horrible horrible horrible horrible. I keep hitting my left knuckle with the hammer and it's purple/red. I can't get the nails out and then...... somebody had the bring idea to put even longer nails with smaller heads in there. AND the heads are rusted so they pop! snap! off and I wind up hanging from pliers trying to get the nails out of the ceiling.

As you know, my day started off pretty poorly and Saturday was not a great day either, this was a great mix for coming up with creative profanity while doing this project. Unbeknown to me, Rob is almost directly above me working on the bathroom. He hears my crazed sputtering of profanity and he is very very amused by this.

After a while I decide that I need some food and a better tool for the job. I run out to get 2 sandwiches, gator aide, water and a mini wonder bar and somehow that turns into a 1 1/2 hour ordeal. I wait 30 minutes for lunchmeat on bread only to find out (when I get home) that they screwed it all up. Rob said I walked in the door, muttering and when I saw they didn't give me my order I walked right tout the door. He's a smart man, he stood there and didn't say a word to me. Even "I love you honey" would have set me off. The pin was pulled and it was just a matter of time before the grenade went off. I got to the restaurant and pulled a Dennis Pepe, they gave me my $ back and I returned to the house feeling a little better.

After lunch I go back to my horrible horrible horrible horrible job. In a matter of seconds I am even more frustrated then I was before lunch. My new tool didn't work so I was required to throw it across the basement, go pick it up and then throw it again. When that didn't satisfy me I took my hammer and hit the wood shelves as hard as I could 4 or 5 times while yelling "rats, oh darn it, shucks" (that's sarcasm, folks). I tried to calm myself down and sprayed the hose on my face. Man, I bet I was a SIGHT.

Rob must have felt the anger and he did the best thing he could have done.... he walked down the stairs to the basement and said "I'm ready to call it a day, how 'bout you?" . I was ready to quit the minute I started. I firmly believe, pulling those nails out was penance and I have been forgiven for any sin I have ever committed because I have been in HELL, I tell you!!!

Apparently, he was having a rough day as well. Even though my tantrum amused him, he was having some issues framing in the new door that we bought and was battling drywall.