Demolition

So, this is our front porch now.

We decided that since we have so much work planned for the house we might as well pay the extra money to have a dumpster that is emptied each week. Thank goodness we made that choice! What you see on our front porch is what is left after the dumpster was filled with a whole bunch of carpet. So, once the dumpster is emptied, we can fill it again with the stuff on the front porch. Unfortunately, we still have plenty more to tear up in the house. Oh well, we'll get rid of it week by week.

As you can imagine, all of this demolition is creating quite a mess. The carpet had plenty of dust in it, but the big culprit is the tile and it's concrete backer board. Andy chiseled up the tiles and then pulverized and tore up the concrete backer board that was under the tile. He had hoped that the backer board could remain down with the laminate laid on top of it. Several flooring people at the big box stores said that was probably the best way to do it even. But of course, that wasn't what I wanted because then the entry and our breakfast nook (the two places with the tile being removed) would sit about an inch above the rest of the flooring. YUCK!

Here's another picture of the layer of dust that is coating much of our house currently.

We have one "clean room" downstairs. Even with the plastic on one side and curtains on the inside, some of the dust still made it through.

Andy learned that the recommendation to use a sledge hammer to demolish concrete backer board should be followed. If you use a wood splitter rather than a sledge hammer, you might have a little too much force. You might go through the concrete backer board (including the metal mesh in the middle of it) on down to the plywood subfloor. Since it is not advisable to have big holes in your subfloor, you would have to cut out and replace the subfloor in those areas.

OOPS!

OOPS again (sigh - actually you might hear sounds more like a grizzly bear)

Our house

Trying to buy a house

So after waiting a month for all of the utilities to be hooked up, we've had all our inspections and appraisal done. There are a few repairs that we have to make (because the bank selling the foreclosed property won't do ANYTHING) before our loan can be funded. So that is happening in the next week. We'll do the other repairs once we close on the house. Our bank has told us that the closing date is September 26, but we are working with them to try to make it happen a little sooner. I think that we wrote our offer on the house on July 15...how crazy!

We would love to be able to move in a beautifully refinished house but have decided that will not be the case. Paying for just under two months of our time and the hotel and the unknown cost of the repairs to our house after the cost of purchasing the home means that our bank account won't be thrilled. So, we've decided to be patient for most of the renovations we would like to do to the house. We'll replace the carpet in the bedrooms before we have our good delivered, but the other flooring will have to wait a little while.

We will be very excited to be able to move in to our house whenever that comes to pass! The house will stay a diamond in the rough for a while but will eventually start to shine.

Remodeling our great room

Before moving back to our house, we had about two months to fix or change anything and move slowly. We made the decision that we wanted to change the flooring in our great room from carpet to laminate wood flooring. While we were at it, we switched out the baseboards for a larger and nicer design.

Since we wanted to spend less money on the project, we decided to do the work ourselves. We thought that we had tools we could borrow from others if we didn't already have them. Unfortunately, we found that many times what we had or borrowed didn't work as anticipated. So, Andy got a bunch of new tools including a table saw, reciprocating saw, (larger) nail gun, air compressor, and shop vac. Here are some pictures of his new toys that we are oh so glad that we purchased after getting over the sticker shock.

Those two were part of a package deal. He was really excited that the air compressor has a removable chest and is on wheels!

Do you see that big grin??

This buddy is my friend. I don't remember having used one but quickly found out that it was worth its weight in gold (well, maybe not at $1000+/ounce). I can't imagine our mini construction project with out it.

So, over many weekends, interrupted by other small projects, we put the floor in. I laid out the flooring pattern, Andy made the cuts, and we worked together to put in the pieces. Andy finished the quarter round and transition pieces once we moved in to the house.

Before:

During:

We removed the carpet, and Andy worked hard to rip up the carpet tacks and baseboards.

We readied the concrete foundation and laid down this black plastic with the help of friends.

Then, the foam underlayment went down and I started laying out the laminate pieces.

Finally, we are making progress!!!

However, each time we would make good progress, we would find that there was something wrong with a current or previous row. So, we'd have to remove that part to figure out what was wrong. It was two steps forward, one step back. But then finally we were finished with the flooring and moved in to the house.

Finished project:

Great room and kitchen

Living room

Dining room

And now that we've finished that project and have all of these wonderful tools, clearly, we need another project...can't you hear Andy groaning... At least the other projects on our list are smaller and are not immediately necessary.