House Progress: 22 September 2010

We have been working, but that does not change the fact that we are behind schedule to get moved in to our new home.  However, our current landlord is being patient and understanding.  I just wanted to give you an idea of what we've been up to this month with the house remodel...

We are running into small issues like stores closing at 5:00 so we can't pick up supplies timely, so I finally took a half day last Friday and got a few of these important errands done! 

• I got our tile ordered for the kitchen, mud room and both bathrooms.  Should come in today!
• I picked out colors and finally got the paint for the whole house.
• I picked out stain for the wood floors for the remainder of the house.
• I picked out exterior lights and interior lights

Nathan wasn't even with me.  I made all of these decisions on my own... hope he likes my choices =)

Nathan also took Friday off work so he could rent a sander to get all of the wood floors sanded down.  Our plan was to do that on Friday and stain on Saturday.  Oh what a great 'plan' that was!  However, we are still not done sanding =)  Yeah, things seem to happen that way, huh?!  Mind you, we live out in the middle of 'nowhere' so running to get supplies is a process all of its own! 

Nathan ran into town Friday morning to pick up a sander from Menards.  He quickly came home and got to work with it.  However, the floors were not cooperating!  He finally ran back into town and rented a different sander... that one was a waste of money too!  By the time I got back to the house Friday evening, he only had our bedroom done.  He was so tired and frustrated.  He ended up getting some hand/belt sanders from his boss and we tried to work with those.  By 9:00 that evening we were both covered in dust and done for the evening!

He woke us both up at 8:00 AM Saturday morning to get back to work.  (I was feeling less than happy @ 8:00 AM) I returned the first sander and picked up some higher grit sand paper for the others and we were able to get the rest of the floors sanded, with help from Phil and Nathan's parents.  Now, we just need to go over everything with a smoother grit... whew, that was quite a process!  I'll just go ahead and say it - I'm a wimp and after a round with that sander, I feel like I've been beat up!

When we bought this house, this main bathroom had an odd set up.  We flipped the tub around to stand on the back wall and that has freed up a lot more space within the rest of the room.  Nathan also made my linen closet a little smaller (just not as deep) and that helps also.  Not a good picture of the bathroom, but the tub use to be on the right wall with the toilet facing it on the left wall.

Our other big project has been drywall repairs.  We had someone come in and hang drywall in the rooms/areas that we had to gut, but Nathan is doing the repairs in all of the other spaces.  His brother, Ben, came over and helped with this also.

Upcoming:

1) Nathan ordered our doors, so we need to paint doors and trim

2) Paint interior of house

3) Finish sanding wood floors and stain (living room, dining room, hallway and 3 bedrooms)

4) Lay tile (mud room, 2 bathrooms, kitchen and my walk-in closet)

5) Install kitchen cabinets

6) Install trim throughout house

... and the list goes on =)

Thank you for all of the help & encouraging comments!  This is our first time to ever take on such a project and there have definitely been times of discouragement along with the excitement of getting it done and living in a home of our own again soon! =)  Nathan's knowledge and determination have made this project happen!

Hopefully we'll have some more pictures/updates to share soon!  Stay tuned...