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Stairway to Heck
Here's where stuff gets ripped out and thrown out. Our wondering junk
staircase is finally being fixed. Pictures to come on where we are today, on the
official launch.
- March 20th, 2009
- Imram from the stair place came by today with a preliminary newel for us
to approve. It's so pretty. I just can't wait to see it in place.
- March 19th, 2009
- It's official launch day. Kris signed the paperwork and we're off and
running.
Heck Takes a Powder
Well we're at it again. This time it's the powder room so that guests have
as warm a place to do their thing while we do ours in the kitchen.
Click here for the most recent blog.
- March 20th, 2009
- Finally, more updates. I stained and varnished the crown mouldings and
broke my foot trying to fix a door. I'm officially a klutz. Anyway, the new
bathroom vent has to go in before I can do the install, but with everything
that's going on, I'm putting it off for a few days.
- December 18th, 2008
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And finally we have a very awesome powder
room. There's a little bit to touch up: a missing tile; grouting
touch-ups; and the special handle on the toilet. We're thinking about
crown moulding, but that can wait. Victory is declared! |
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- December 17th, 2008
- Apparently, I could have written for a TV series. After a good deal of
MacGyvering the vanity and faucet, we have a successful installation and
flowing water in the powder room. This is a major milestone and we're very
happy. Fortunately, my supply of power tools rivals some of those celebrity
home renovators, so it was no trouble making the various holes in marble and
steel bigger, and trim down the mounting rings to fit around the sink
without compromising strength. All that's left is to mount the lighting
unit, install the toilet, put the casings on the door, and finish the tile
trim. We're back on schedule. No parties were harmed in the making of this
powder room. Pictures to come when the lighting unit is up.
Mid-day update: I just got a message from the faucet supplier. You
wouldn't believe the helpful suggestion. Like I didn't already try changing
the order in which the supplies were attached? Do I look like an idiot? I
sure hope this doesn't turn out like the fridge-repeat, because it's sure
starting out that way. Another late night update: The lighting unit
and small chandelier are now up and working. Just the columns left to do on
the vanity now. I've got the first clear-coat on the casings, and after a
little creative stain matching, are looking pretty good. As usual, I'm
overdoing it - is using exterior diamond hard varnish for bathrooms
overdoing it?
- December 16th, 2008
- What a disaster day for Heck's Powder room. Some of the key measurements
supplied by various manufacturers were way off. The electrical box for the
light unit was off by two inch. How can you be off by two inches? It's
actually inside the mirror. Good grief. The doors and drawers on the vanity
are way out of whack, and based on the technique used to put stuff in,
adjustments are virtually impossible - the doors don't line up and the
drawer scratches the marble vanity top. To make matters worse, the bone
heads who drilled the holes for the faucets made it absolutely impossible to
install our facet. Some idiot decided that it would be cool to put a
backsplash on the vanity and now there's no room to position a hole so that
a standard spout can be attached. I feel like I just out-sourced a software
project and got back an awesomely pretty piece of crap that isn't compatible
with anything. Parties may be cancelled as a result.
- December 15th, 2008
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After a very frustrating day, I've made a
bunch of progress:
- The vanity is in place and level;
- The plumbing supply lines are in;
- The chair rail, which you can see, barely; and
- Thing are shaping up.
The vanity supplier assures me that the mounting hardware, which is
missing, will be here soon. I'm still trying to figure out how to shove
a 46" vanity top into a 45-1/2" space. Somebody is going to get a
hurting - real bad. |
- December 14th, 2008
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The tiles are up and grouted. Kris bling'ed
the walls by ragging on pearlescent gold paint. It's pretty cool! The
base of the vanity is in place and level - pretty nice to have levelling
feet in the unit itself. Unfortunately the mounting hardware was missing
from the shipment, so we're a bit goofed up. We also found that we are
short one cap rail tile and another is cracked beyond hope. What can we
do? It's good progress though, and pretty great in comparison to the
starting point. I'm going to wait until the vanity is in, though, before
I finish the plumbing. |
- December 13th, 2008
- The tiles are up! Lesson learned: 16" tiles don't need to be buttered.
It makes putting them up harder. I'm waiting until tomorrow around 7pm to
grout. It's going to look pretty awesome. In the mean time, I can finish
plumbing and Kris can sparkle the walls. Pictures to come tomorrow.
- December 11th, 2008
- It's wall day. Ron helped me yesterday to get the floor tiles down and
they look great. Now comes the much less hard part of doing the walls, which
involves priming, painting, and mounting tiles. That should take a few days.
Pictures will follow. For those who wanted pictures of the original
bathroom, we tried denying what it looked like and thought we didn't have pictures.
Imagine black walls with wallpaper trim, a cheap white cabinet over the
toilet. Yuck. Unfortunately, although we tried deleting the pictures and
deny the whole thing, a picture surfaced. check out the bottom of this page.
- December 9th, 2008
- While I like tiling, I think this marble is a bit too fragile. I've been
struggling with broken tiles and inefficient blades. What can you do?
Pictures to come, hopefully tomorrow, if I manage to get the floor set.
Let's just say that carbide blades don't work as well on marble as diamond
blades. I'm so wiped.
- December 5th, 2008
- The drywall is up and I've actually got the first coat of mud (drywall
compound) on the walls and ceiling. Yay! And this time I really do get to
take a break because the mud needs 24 hours to set before the next coat. It
looks like I'll be starting tiling on Monday. Now if I could only figure out
what colour to paint the walls. The vanity connection may even be next
weekend. How about that?
- December 3rd, 2008
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Lots of progress now. The drywall is gone
and garbage has been taken away. You wouldn't believe the black walls.
There was no way I could paint or repair them. Wall appliqués were
pasted on using silicone sealant, which completely corrupted the ways.
Anyway, the new subfloor is down and setting. I've got a 48 hour break
now until the thin-set is ready for heavy traffic (a.k.a. putting up new
drywall). |
- December 1st, 2008
- Yuck! I pulled up the floor today and found a wonderful surprised. The
toilet wasn't sealed properly and the subfloor is a complete write-off. It's
off to the lumber store tomorrow to fix that mess. We're still on track for
a possible finish before Christmas, which will make Kris very happy.
- November 30th, 2008
- Destruction finally has begun on the bathroom. We moved stuff out of the
room today, including the old cabinets, toilet, and sink. Bye bye bathroom.
The supply pipes have been repaired too, so that helps.
- November 29th, 2008
- It's the official launch day for the project. We have most of our
supplies ready to go, except drywall and floor boards. I'll get those when
we're ready, because I don't want to store big stuff in the house. The
target is a one month project. Good luck to us all.
| After a long search, we finally found a before
image. Here's what it looks like. Maybe it'll shed some light on why we
embarked on this journey. |
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