Laundry Room Floor

We finally got around to yanking out the floor in the laundry room. Kind of a necessity to keep the flow of the kitchen from looking too chopped up. At this point we have drawn the line (literally) at the area under the washer and dryer and in the little half bath. They will stay vinyl roll flooring for the time being.

We started out Saturday morning, pulled all the baseboards and started cutting the edges with the Crane toe-kick saw. I'm getting pretty good with this thing and it's not nearly as intimidating as it once was. What a lifesaver...


We had already cut a chunk at the doorway to fit the last board from the kitchen into the treshold. There's a pocket door between the two rooms.

Got everything stripped and pried up down to the sub floor and swept in preparation for the construction felt and new floor.

Layed the new floor...

...and re-installed the baseboards and trim.

I need to put in a new threshold under the back door and a couple of binder strips of oak at the transitions and then it will be complete.

Immortality 2005

About a year ago, I posted about the immortality of garbage cans. And, how the only two ways I could figure to get rid of one was to leave it when you move (a good idea) or to take a reciprocating saw and cut it up into pieces for the garbage man sanitation department. (a little more difficult, but if you ain't movin'...)

Today, I finally got around to it.

Learning to Cope...

When we moved into the house, there was small, and I mean really small, crown molding through most of the house. Since we've always liked having picture rail moldings to hang our pictures from, the bride came up with the idea of adding the picture rail below the small crown leaving about a 2 1/2 inch space and then painting the whole thing to look like one piece of molding. It came out surprisingly well...


It's been kind of a challenge to cope the inside corners and miter the outside ones with the picture molding and also filling in the missing crown molding in the new added house parts. But I think I'm kind of getting the hang of it.



Once on the wall, it fits!


Which is a surprise, because I have a bad habit of cutting things a little too long the first time and then cutting them too short when I take them back to adjust them...

Where we been????

Well, we arrived at the point where we need to finish up detail work before we start on any more major projects. At least that's my point and I'm going to press it.

We've been filling nail holes, caulking seams, painting, putting gliders on the bottom of chair legs and finishing up trim work.

I'll post some pics when we've made enough progress to be interesting...

Floor Show

Since we're re-using a run of cabinets, that were between the kitchen and dining room, against the wall we found that some of the features of a double sided cabinet don't work so well in this application. Like the row of drawers and doors that ends in a blank cabinet back...


So, my little bride told me I needed to do something about that. And, that I needed to do something about it before we laid floor. So, I bent a couple of jigsaw blades and cut out a the blank side to make a drawer and a cabinet door opening...

Now, I told the bride that my cabinet skills are like really terrible and that she had a 50% chance or less of getting something decent out of it. As it is, the drawer turned out a teeny bit crooked, but I'm going to live with it. Yes, I am.

We started in laying floor, jockying loose cabinetry and kitchen tables,


...and, I must say, the results are very pleasing...

Treading the Boards

At son2's birthday party today, his grandparents invited him to come spend the night with them. Son1 was long gone to do things teenagers do. We were left completely alone. You know what that means, right?

Right. We took up the rest of the floor in the kitchen and got it cleaned up in preparation for laying floor tomorrow...


Which, of course, will make us really popular with the trash people come Tuesday...

Sub-Urban Archaeology

started back in on the demolition today since we'd gone as far with the new floor as we could. We uncovered what may very well be the original kitchen floor...


...and are proceeding to tear it out. The toe kick saw has been great even if it's a little scary. If I had to saw all of the edges with the reciprocating saw I would lose the will to live. One draw back is that it doesn't get into corners very well. And, neither does the Sawsall.


Which meant that I had to chisel out the plywood from the inside corner of the kitchen cabinets. A time consuming process, but necessary and worthwhile...


Tomorry is son2's birthday, but we'll try to get the rest of the floor out between parties and church.

Details, details...

Here's a pic of the pantry corner with the trim installed except crown molding. We are using the nook next to it as a tool staging area and have moved a temporary shelf in place for that.


The nook was left purposely to put a rolling island in when we're not using it. The bride had a pretty good idea that I think I can implement using an "extra" Victorian sideboard and adapting it into an island. I'll keep you posted...

Here's a couple of close-up peeks at the trim we're using around the doors and baseboard...

Getting there.

We've been doing some trim, painting and decorating for the last couple of days. Still have to fill my nail holes and touch up the paint plus install a few more pieces of trim (like base shoe)... but here's where we are so far...

The foyer looking west...


...and looking south...


the new closet...


Son2's room looking south...


...and looking north...

Getting the hang of it...

We started in early this morning filling in the floor in son2's room. A thunderstorm came up suddenly, mid morning, and we literally cut the last two boards amidst large raindrops, shoved all the equipment and tools into the shop and ran inside.

Since the rain precluded painting or cutting trim work, we installed the pantry door. I think I'm finally getting the hang of the door thing. This one went very smoothly and the "crack" is pretty even all the way around - best one yet!



When the sun finally came out, the bride started painting woodwork, and as it dried, I cut it, took it in and installed it. Some of my cuts aren't so great, but isn't that why God invented wood filler? And latex caulk? Good stuff if you ask me.

This is peeking in son2's room from the foyer...


And, inside...


My little bride went shopping with her mother, so I guess I get tonight off...

Goin' South

I left work about 10:30 this morning and the little bride had been off all week, so she was back from the yard sales when I got there and ready to make me work.

I told her I was looking for the most bang for the buck we could get and that I wanted to start on son2's room, the ex-living room.

We pried out the plywood overlayment in there which went a lot better than I thought it would. By taking the skillsaw and setting the depth to 3/4", I was able to cut the sheets in half to make it easier to pry them out. The lever that adjusts the depth on my skillsaw stripped out and fell off, so I had to adjust it with pliers. I guess that's what I get for buying a lower priced model. I think I'll go with Delta or Milwaukee next time.



We cut and layed a few courses of floor and then went to lunch at Red Lobster. Special treat, the little bride and I on a date. Having kids for the last 23 years, there just doesn't seem so much time for just us.

We had a summer thundershower about 5:00 which made it where I couldn't cut the boards outside, so we put everything in the garage and hung the new door for son2's bedroom.

By 8:30 tonight, I was pooped. But I think we made pretty good progress...

Faux Sho'!

My little bride decided a faux finish was in order for Son2's room...

Floored.

My little bride set a goal for me to get completed tonight. Get the pantry floored and the shelving system installed. Since that involved a trip to Lowes, I wasn't sure it could be done on that time schedule. We had to buy the shelving system.

On advice from a friend, we got wire shelving to allow light to pass through whenever possible and help visibility in the back areas of the shelves.

In order to floor into the pantry, we had to floor up to the pantry and then cut some odd boards to fit around the door entrances, etc. Happy to say, it's ten o'clock and we got it done...

We'll Just Have To Move.

The main reason it's taking so long to actually put some floor down, I mean once we started, is because it's so difficult to get the long pieces to line up. They make it look so easy on TV. Just put a block of wood against it and bang it in. I guess they edit out all the times that they bang one end and the other pops back out.

When we opened the first few boxes of wood, they were all full lenghth. We assumed that the whole load was that way. Then about three or four boxes in, we found random length smaller pieces. That turned out to be a godsend.

The subfloor is so uneven down the hallway that we positively could not have forced long pieces of flooring to fit together. So, over the hump, the smaller pieces kept us going. I can only hope that the dining room will go smoother. (and son2's bedroom...)

The Porter Cable floor nailer has worked well. I experienced my first jam after only laying about six planks. It was confusing because I didn't know what was wrong. The nailer "cocked" and acted like it wanted to go on, but refused to do anything other than let out a slight sigh every time I hit it.

I checked to make sure my air pressure was still up to snuff. It was. I checked to see if the nails were in it. They were. I took the nails out and everything seemed fine. I hit it harder. The little bride gasped and said, "don't break it!" Last resort? I checked the owners manual.

It said that several possibilities existed. I didn't lubricate it properly. I had. Use the wrong nails? They always want you to believe that their brand is the only acceptable one, but no the nails were okay. A nail was jammed. I took it apart by the directions and sure enough, there was an errant nail stuck right where it shouldn't be. I popped it out, put it all back together again and it worked fine after that.

It was fairly easy to deal with after I understood the directions, so next time it will be a snap. Though I hope it doesn't happen often because it does take about five minutes or so. But then, maybe I need a break?

The doors were a different story. I don't see how anybody can get one to hang straight. I could get the door straight and swinging properly, but the gap around the jamb wouldn't even out to save my life. I gave up after about an hour on each one and pronounced them "Good Enough" in a pontifical sort of way that made a believer out of my little bride. Hey, they open and close and if that's not good enough then we'll just have to move.

Progress at last...

Today we finished up the floor in the foyer and hall and put in the hall closet door and our bedroom door. I think it's all coming together nicely...

Woke Up This Morning...

and didn't have no Statesboro Blues. So we started in on finishing the demolition necessary to start laying floor. You know, things like removing our bedroom door (we waited until the last minute for obvious reasons...) and the closet doors so we could remove the plywood from under the jambs properly and replace with the pine planks.


And then we layed black paper down for the vapor barrier...



And then we got a lunch invitation from my stepmother who was passing through from Houston Texas. Hmmmm, free lunch/hammer boards? Good company/hammer boards? A couple of hours off/hammer boards?

We went to lunch at the Flying Fish (best catfish in the world, bar none) and then got home to start on the installation (at long last...)

Special Request

Can anyone tell me if it's possible/likely to use an abrasive saw blade in a skill saw to cut cast iron soil pipe? In this application, it's a standing run of plumbing that needs to be cut into, not new materials.

Any ideas or suggestions would be appreciated.

Halls of Marble

Reno 911 interferes greatly with blogging, so if I become incoherent, that's why.

The little bride decided that the foyer and front hall should have marble wainscoting with gold gew-gaws, so she started the faux painting process...


layin' down the base coat...


and sponging the "design"...

Work Slow Down - But Not On Strike...

The book show this weekend slowed me down more than I had hoped. At least that's what I'm going to blame it on. Picked up a few neat things including an early broadside advertising a production of Uncle Tom's Cabin that would look great framed.

Electric is complete in the new pantry and all but two pieces of the drywall are in place.



I want to get at least one coat of mud on it, but the little bride is pressing me to start laying floor.

The Pantryfication of America

Well, as posted earlier, we cleared the floor for the pantry area

and got the new pantry laid out

and framed in as of tonight.

I borrowed Bill's framing nailer which made quick work of the framing after I got it cut out. He even threw in a beer!