26_Farther Beautification

Even though there were no big projects anymore, the works on the house never stop. We continued to put more details and to beautify, either inside or outside, the house. Here are the updates on what we had done to the house.

October 2017: New Plants and Accent Walls

As the weather getting more pleasant to be outside, we worked on our yards. Not only we groomed the yards with regular maintenance such as mowing, raking the falling leaves, and trimming the bushes and branches. We also plant new plants to make the yards more thick and colorful.

We took out a big stump and replace it with Osmanthus tea olive, plant more Boxwood shrubs to fill the gaps between the old boxwood, and add new plants such as Crape Myrtle, Camellia, Sky pencils, Yews, etc. I will upload the pictures in summer time as now, in wintertime, they don’t look colorful.

Stump that we took out and replaced with Osmanthus Tea Olive

The only ‘big’ project that we did this month was painting an accent wall in the study room. We chose bright color to light up the room.

Painting an accent wall in the study room.

December 2017: Additional Lightings, Painting Kitchen Cabinets and Island, and Installing Backsplash

Once we started living in the house, we realized that we need more lights in the open living-kitchen-family area. However, it was too risky for us to install them by ourselves, especially concerning making holes on the well-done ceiling. For this task, we decided to call a professional to do the job. We got his number from a local lighting store. He didn’t work at the store, he was just a freelancer that normally being called by the customers there. His name is Mike Autry.

In early December, we went out of town to give him a chance to install all the lightings. We put 12 recess lights, 2 over the island lights, 2 dinning table lights, and 1 porch light. When we returned home, suddenly our home is so much brighter.

Some of the recess lights.

Left: Dining table lights. Center: Over the island lights. Right: Porch light.

We used our Christmas holiday for painting the kitchen cabinets and island. Although we liked the natural wood color, we had to paint them to give more protection from stains. It is easier to clean stains on painted wood than on bare wood.

This task was pretty arduous because we had to clear the kitchen and unhinged the doors. We had to lay all of the doors to paint them, which meant they took a lot of space. Again, we transformed our open space as a construction area. Of course we made it dirty, as we had to sand everything before we painted them.

Preparation before painting.

So first, we sanded all the parts. For the kitchen cabinets, we paint a primer because we used regular paint. As for the island, we were interested with the chalky finish look; this type of paint doesn’t need any primer, so we applied the paint directly. We let them dry overnight and we sanded them again. We painted the kitchen cabinets after sanding, and painted second coat to the island. We let them dry overnight again. For the last time, we put second coat for the kitchen cabinets and put wax for the island to seal the paint. This task took us around 10 days to do it.

Sanding and putting protection tape before painting.

As for the color, my husband wanted the cabinets to have the same color as the trim, so we stayed on creamy white color. For the island, we wanted something that is contrast to the blue wall, so I suggested bright yellow. It was a bold decision for my husband, but he was willing to embrace brighter colors in his life J.

Painting the 'sunrise' island.

Installing the doors back including their new hardware.

As we had to take out everything out the cabinets, we decided to reorganize our kitchen stuff and put on cabinet hardware. Before, we just stack everything in the available spaces. Now we tried to organize them in baskets and racks. There are a lot of cabinet or drawer organizers in the markets; however, the measurements might be not suitable. We had custom cabinets so it was not easy for us in finding the right organizers. After went back and forth to 4 different places, we only bought 2 organizers: 1 for a trash bin and 1 for organizing pans and lids. But the limited options just made our creativity expanded. We decided to make our own organizers. We made our own rack for our backing dishes, lazy Susans, and basket drawers.

Our custom rack for baking dishes.

We finished painting and reorganizing kitchen cabinets and the island on the 26^th December. However, we didn’t have a lot of time to rest. On December 27^th we cleaned up because my brother in law with his family would come to visit us. He would help us in installing backsplash, as well as spending quality time with us.

For the backsplash, we opted for natural stone to give natural look around the kitchen cabinets. The backsplash area is only around 25 sqft.; so it didn’t take long to install it. However we took a lot of time in cutting the stone to fit with the available space. The stone/tile cutter needs water to lubricate the cutting wheel, and the cold weather kept making the water frozen. So we had to change the water every now and then. After we finished installing the backsplash, we had to let it dry for around 3 days before we could seal it.

My husband and his brother installed the backsplash.

The kitchen with natural stone backsplash.

Epilogue

Finally in the New Year, we had made the kitchen prettier than before. It is a nice way to enter a New Year. However, the works on the house would never stop. We would keep beautifying the house and of course doing some maintenance. Speaking of which, it seems we always found a new thing to fix as the season changing. I am talking about the shrinking wood on the floor and the trim. Entering the winter, we saw there were gaps on the trim and on the floor. While we couldn’t do anything with the floor, we kept caulking and touching up the trim to hide the gaps. I am sure we had to do different things to maintain them during the summertime. And I am also sure, that wouldn’t be the only project that we would do. So I will keep updating.

25_The End Of A Chapter

After working for around 4 months, finally our home was completely livable. There were works that still need to be done such as tidying up the garage, setting up a home gym, building a new shed, etc. However, these works wouldn’t affect our basic needs i.e. eating, sleeping, and bathing. So these works would happen later slowly. At this moment, it was time to end a chapter.

Last Big Cleaning Up

Now that we were done with renovation, we could throw away stuff that was not used. On September 9^th we piled up things that we didn’t want to use further, included a semi permanent gazebo in the back porch. I never liked this gazebo, I thought it was tacky and it blocked the sunlight to the house. I took off all the tarps, and while doing it I found various nests and crawling creatures such as ants, white spider, little cockroach, small lizards, etc. I was glad that we decided to get rid of the gazebo; otherwise it would become bug nests. Later on, my husband disassembled the metal parts. These parts would be given to the scrap metal guys who scavenged our old washer and dryer.

Left: The gazebo and leftovers of construction materials. Right: Only the gazebo's frames remained.

The gazebo blocked the sunlight to the house.

We also separated some things to be donated to ReStore, a social organization that provides affordable housings for people. We would give an old ceiling fan, old sink, and some leftovers of construction materials. But first, we filled our van with things that we wanted to throw away. We worked until the sun set, thinking that we would go to the landfill tomorrow.

Left: The last load to the landfill from the back door. Right: From the front seat.

On the next morning we went to the landfill, only to find out that it was closed on Sundays. So we had to bring back all the junk to the house and waited until Monday morning. It was a challenge in doing it, as the weather was cold, windy and drizzles due to the Irma hurricane effect. The landfill was an open area, it was not easy to walk from one dumpster to another in the rain and windy day; but this was our last trip to the landfill, so it was worth to do. After this, our house became more enjoyable to live in.

Before And After

A lot had changed to the house, especially the living room, kitchen, and the previous dining room. No more walls to separate these three rooms. Here I showed you the before and after pictures of these rooms. It was not easy to recreate the same pictures, as I was limited by walls for the ‘before’ pictures and by furniture in the ‘after’ pictures. But that was the point, presenting the changes. So, just enjoy…

The view from the entrance.

Another view from the entrance.

The living room previously had a folding door.

The living room walls.

The living room.

No more walls and pocket door in the living room.

The view from the hallway towards the kitchen.

Too many walls.

The kitchen.

Kitchen light.

The end of kitchen cabinets.

Another part of the kitchen.

The oven.

The sink and its window.

Kitchen wall, before and after.

The back window and wall.

Ceiling fan. 

Financial Situation

In about 4 months of work, until we went to the landfill last time, we had spent $35,878.44. This included buying the van and its reparation cost, appliances, and plumbing services. The biggest expense was putting new roof, followed by kitchen cabinets and appliances. The roof installment took 22.30% share.

We had not settled all the expenses, and thanks to various credit systems, we had time for two years to settle. Hopefully we would be able to do it on-time.

Future Projects

As I mentioned before, there were some works to do; but they all just small projects, it shouldn’t hurt our financial condition. However, there would be middle-size projects waiting such as bathrooms remodeling. We would put this project on pending until our financial condition recovered. So for now on, we would only work on small projects.  

As for this blog, I would keep updating it with all the works that we do for the house. So please keep checking on it. Meanwhile, just enjoy our gallery from the past projects. See you later!

Living room.

The kitchen.

Family room.

Dining places.

24_Last Piece Of The Puzzle: Having Working Kitchen

We started to live in the new house from August 25^th. However, we kept coming back to the apartment for doing laundry and, sometimes, cooking. When we moved in, we were still waiting for the countertops to finish. We had a guy came to measure the total area for the countertops on the 21^st; after that we had to wait for around 2 weeks to get the countertops done.

Fortunately, we didn’t have to wait for a long time. On the last day of our leasing period, or on August 31^st, the countertops were ready to be installed. This felt like a welcoming present for us.

It took three guys to lift our granite countertops. However, it only took two guys to install them. Apparently, the granite was just cut according to the shape of the kitchen countertops including the sink. It had not been cut for the stove and the vent. So the two guys had to do a cutting job in the kitchen, and it sounded very loud. I had to wear my earplugs to reduce the loudness. They finished the installation in about 6 hours.

It took three guys to install the granite countertops. 

By afternoon, we had new countertops and double sink. This didn’t mean we had a functional kitchen; we still needed to hook up the stove and the vent. In addition, we had to hook up the plumbing for the sink. However, we couldn’t do it right away. We had promised to come to PA for the weekend.

Installation of granite countertops around the sink.

Left: Granite countertops before being cut for the stove and vent. Right: The stove and vent were encapsulated by granite countertops.

The island was covered by granite countertops.

The Stove And The Vent

Once we were back home, we hooked up the stove and the vent; so we could cook. Actually we still needed to work on the vent line: installing the vent pipe towards outside, but at least we could cook; as long as we didn’t cook something that produces too much steam, or fry too much.

The stone and vent were finally working. 

Drain Problem

However, again, we weren’t lucky in plumbing department. My husband tried to hook up the pipes for the sink and the dishwasher, with only browsing on the Internet as a reference. He never had done it before. After several try and errors in cutting the pipes, he managed to build a pipeline between the dishwasher and the sink.

Left: Before the pipes were installed. Right: The pipes were installed. 

But then, problem occurred when he worked on the drain; it blocked L. The water couldn’t get through to the drain. It stayed as puddle in the sink. He cleaned the drainpipe and encountered a lump of waste since, God knows when. He tried to connect the pipes again, but the drain still couldn’t work. In the end, he had to turn off the pipes for the sink and the dishwasher; and we had to call a plumbing company. OMG, we always had problems with plumbing. We had to think it through to redo the plumbing by ourselves. (See also 08_Second House Hunting).

The island was used for working station. 

We called Blanton’s, a plumbing company that we used previously, on September 4^th. However, we couldn’t get its service until the 7^th due to its busy schedule. And when the plumber came, of course he delivered a bad news: we had to replace the whole pipeline that supports the sink and the dishwasher because it was too old and corrosive already. The culmination of the shock, of course, was the price. It costs around $1,500 for the service. O… M… G… the whole house used the same galvanized pipes; if we had to replace them all, I couldn’t imagine the cost that we had to bare.

We didn’t have any other option but to accept the service. However, the plumber couldn’t work alone for a big task like that. So he would start the next day with his colleague.

About The Oven

We had to buy a new oven that could fit into our cabinet. (See also 21_InstallingKitchen Cabinets). At first, we compared different ovens from different websites. We ended up ordering an Empava oven from eBay because it offered cheaper price than other websites for the same oven. It said that the oven would be arrived on August 24^th.

However, on August 24^th, the oven didn’t arrived. We tried to track the package, but didn’t come out. We waited until August 27^th. At this day, we received an email from eBay, asking us to review the oven. I wrote that I couldn’t review the item because we had not received it even after 3 days of the scheduled delivery. At the same time, I contacted eBay to ask about the status of my order. Soon, I got a reply saying that the item was out of stock and eBay refunded our money. What?! That’s funny. They never bothered to check their stock and delivery status until we complained about it…???

Email from eBay, asking us to change the review.

Anyway, we considered the problem was solved. So we ordered another oven, of course not from eBay. However, eBay reached out to us, asked us to change the review for a compensation of an eBay gift card. A representative from eBay called me and waited until I changed the review. She said we would receive the gift card in a few days via email. However, 6 days later, when I wrote this, we had not received anything. Well, I guess you can conclude…

At Last, Everything Came Together

On September 8^th, the plumber came early. He said the job would take almost the whole day. Later on, his colleague came to help him. It really took almost the whole day. They completely replaced the pipeline including the one that was installed by my husband. When they finished, we tested the drain from the sink and the dishwasher, no dripping let alone leaking. Yaaay, no more washing dishes in the main bathroom!

Left: The installed pipes were cut. Right: The plumbers installed new PVC pipes.

The drain finally worked.

Around 30 minutes after the plumbers gone, the oven arrived. Alright, everything started to come together. With these, my husband felt motivated to finish installing the vent pipe. On September 9^th, finally we had functional kitchen, which meant our whole renovation project had completed. Everything worked as expected. We finally could enjoy our home.

Left: Our new oven. Right: The oven was placed above the microwave.

Our kitchen was finally done.

Our new favorite place to hang out was the kitchen.

The finished island.

The view from the island.