Prime Cabinets and a (Mostly) Trim Bathroom

Hello again! It's been a while since my last post, but I've done several things since (and probably not quite as much as I should have), which I'll be talking about this evening. To begin, I've finally gotten around to priming the base cabinets in my kitchen. I've only done those from the sink to the water heater closet, since I will most likely be cutting out the cabinets under the stove top so I can put in a full size range. The cabinet that holds the ancient wall oven will either become a pantry, or will be removed so I can put my refrigerator over there. Those decisions are still up in the air at this time, but they will eventually be decided.

That countertop is so junky right now! Hopefully as things progress, that junkiness will quickly go away. In any case, the base cabinets, at least, are now ready for their first coat of paint. I just have to decide what color that coat will be! One thing I'm going to have to keep in mind is that since my bedroom and the bathroom both open off the kitchen, and both have rather bold colors now, the kitchen will most likely need to be a more neutral tone than I had originally intended. And that's fine with me, since the kitchen has just one tiny window and will need something lighter and more neutral to brighten it up somewhat.

As for the bathroom, I finally decided on colors for it. Yay! The main color is a shade of brown called Irish Tea, while the trim color (which was originally going to be white to match the vanity, fixtures, and ceiling) is a shade of pewterish-beige called Dust Bunny. Originally I had planned to paint the bathroom a shade of green or khaki-green, but I felt drawn to brown, especially since my both my sister and my friend suggested brown would perhaps be a more compelling (and complementary to the porcelain tiling) base color. So I then went through all the shades of browns that I have on color cards and narrowed it down to a few shades. But the Irish Tea is the shade that spoke the loudest to me, so it's the one I finally selected. My friend and I went through various color combinations last Sunday for the trim, and finally we decided the Dust Bunny would be a very good shade for the trim.

Sunday also saw us measuring and cutting the baseboards for the bathroom, although we just put them in place rather than nailing them down. We knew we were going to have to do some more measuring and trimming once we were ready to go, so there was no point in nailing them down at that time. We then went and purchased the paint, as well as trim for the corners, and the corner blocks for the crown moulding. However, we were unable to find the proper size of corner block for the single outside corner, so we figured we'd worry over that at a later time.

Monday found me applying the initial coat of paint to the bathroom walls. I was so eager to get started that I had to rein in my enthusiasm so I would take the time to prepare for what I was doing rather than rashly jumping right on in. Of course, my enthusiasm still got the better of me, so I ended up having to stop in the middle of painting to take care of a few things (such as remove the temporary light switch cover). By early afternoon, the first coat was laid down, and it was looking good!

The true color really only shines through in the last picture above, the one that features the vanity. It felt so awesome having that first coat of paint on the walls! And it was looking so good! Although I could see the necessity for the upcoming second coat. In several areas, the primer was shining through like a white rash. So, once the first coat was on the walls, I collected the baseboards I had removed for the wall painting, and then opened the pail of trim paint to paint those. I laid them across several plastic tubs in the laundry room and painted them there.

I had thought these were hard to paint, but I'd find out the next day that doing the crown moulding would be much more of a challenge!

On Tuesday, I went ahead and applied the second coat to the bathroom walls. It went a bit quicker than doing the first coat. Once that was done, I then painted two of the flat wall trim sections, which would be the same color as the walls. I then had to take a break to drive a neighbor somewhere to drop off some items she was donating, then later that day I took the five sections of crown moulding and put them on the plastic tubs in the laundry room where I had painted the baseboards. I then gave them a coat of the trim color, waited for them to dry, then gave them a second coat. (I forgot to take a picture of them as they dried.)

Today, we set to work to put the baseboards in place. They were a bit tricky, as some sections needed to be cut off to fit, since not only were we installing the baseboards but also installing trim around the lips of the tub/shower unit. Since that trim reached to the floor, the baseboards abutting them had to be trimmed back to accommodate the extra sections. We weren't able to fit all the trim around the shower unit, but we did get the important pieces in place (those along the outside that reached to the floor). We then nailed the baseboards in place, then began the task of installing the crown moulding. First, we put up the four corner blocks, then did the moulding in between them. This became a little interesting, since the two longest sections of wall were longer than the sections of moulding. It became a bit of a challenge, but we also weren't able to complete all the crown moulding, since we're missing the one outside corner block as well as having to decide what to do around the window we installed over the shower. But, most of it is up, and it looks great! Next, we then installed the two sections of flat moulding over the seams where two sheets of luaun meet up; these sections weren't long enough, so of course we had to merge them with smaller sections from a third piece. It looks rather funny at the moment with most of the flat trim being painted while the small lower sections are still unpainted lol.

Some of these pictures are a bit blurry because my camera doesn't like taking pictures in the bathroom. I guess it's too small and dark for it to focus lol. But you can get the general idea from the pics. The bathroom is well on its way to looking sensational! Still going to have to decide what to do with the light fixture as well. Since I've chosen a darker shade for the bathroom, the light fixture is going to have to be a bit stronger than I had really planned on. Or we may end up going with more than one light fixture in the room. In any case, I also am going to have to paint the ceiling. I had hoped that would be unnecessary, since the beadboard we put up was already white, but it's showing some wear and tear from the installation, but shouldn't be too bad to paint.

In any case, this is one more step towards having a completed home!

Getting There!

This past Sunday saw several developments occur. First and foremost, the faucet situation in the bathtub had to be addressed. The problem was that the cold water would not turn off. In order to turn it off, you had to twist the middle knob to the center so that the water was neither coming out of the spout or the showerhead. While alright for a temporary workaround, this was completely unacceptable as a solution. So on Sunday, we took apart the faucet and discovered that the problem seemed to be (possibly, probably) a missing gasket on the cold water stem. So, our first mission was to Marvin's Building Supply to see if we could locate a gasket to replace the missing one. No such luck. The guy we asked for help there referred us (as so many people at Marvin's tend to do) to Home Depot. Of course, this made sense, since Home Depot is where we bought the faucet, and Marvin's doesn't even carry Glacier Bay, the brand we'd bought.

So, off to Home Depot we went. While there, we spoke with Dennis, our favorite plumbing guy there, who tried to help us locate the gasket we needed, although the three of us put our heads together and decided probably the best thing to do would be just to replace the whole faucet. They actually had more in stock at this time. (I can't remember if I mentioned how I got the one the previous Sunday: It was the last one, it was WAY in the back on the bottom shelf, so I crawled in as far as I could while my friend went to the other side and poked something through to push it to me. I got my head momentarily stuck in that shelf getting this thing lol.) So, we bought a new one, brought it home, installed it, and...it worked! The cold water turned on and off as it should. The hot water turned on and off as it should. So I planned to take the defective faucet back the next day (and did), and to let them know it was defective. Dennis thinks the problem with the one we got the first time was that it was cannibalized by another store employee, which is why it was shoved to the back, instead of having been sent back to the manufacturer as defective.

So, once the new faucet was in place, we went ahead and put the insulation in place so that we could get the paneling back up.

The picture above was taken out of sequence, so you can see the paneling already cut and standing in front of the closet door waiting to be put into place. But, before getting to that, we had to finish installing the vinyl planks on the bedroom floor. That proved a little difficult, at least for the smaller pieces at the bottom of each plank line. We ended up having to waste a few pieces to get small ones with proper lips to fit under the edges of the next plank in line. But, we finally got them down, so my floor was finally finished!

Before putting the desk along the wall, I of course had planned to put the baseboard back in place, but we discovered a very severely rotted section on it, so the whole thing got tossed. I'll take one of the discards from the bathroom this week and paint it up to go in place. Anyway, after the floor was finished, and the rotted baseboard problem noted, we then had to cut out a section for the last remaining paneling in my bedroom for the window. Once it was cut, we then set it up temporarily in place so I could check the next day to ensure the new faucet wasn't leaking. Then, we brought in my "new" desk to put in the room and brainstormed on how to get the cable, which we left in place on the other side of the room, to the desk itself. What we decided on is to get a cable connector and extend the cable under the house so we can bring it through the floor closer to the desk. That would just look so much better than the tacky concept of stretching it across the floor lol.

So, Monday I checked to ensure there was no leakage, and then put up the wall. Of course, doing it myself and without having someone to check, I put it up crooked lol. Oh well, we'll correct it Sunday.

The section of paneling to the left really isn't that much darker. It was just in shadow from the light coming through the window. Anyway, I then took note of how my room was laid out, how my bed in its current position was causing some problems, so I turned the bed around against the other wall, which freed up quite a bit of room!

I like it much better over here. I went ahead and hung up the antique picture I'd gotten at one of the auctions, and later that day (no picture of it yet) I moved my chifferobe against the wall to the right of the bed, along with one of my small antique lamp tables. The room is certainly coming together!

On Tuesday, I finished priming the bathroom walls. Now I just need to select the color that will go in there! I've already decided the trim is just going to be white, to match the vanity and the ceiling. The possible shades have been narrowed down from a couple of hundred to just a few dozen lol.

It was very difficult getting around the toilet, mainly because the toilet fits so snugly against the wall. In any case, once the walls were primed, I then took measurements for the trim, most of which we managed to get today from Hudson's Dirt Cheap Building Supply. Sadly, they didn't have any corner molding at all, but I was able to get the baseboards, the crown molding, and the flat molding (to hide the seams along the walls where two sheets of luaun come together).

The baseboards came in 16 foot sections, while the others came in considerably smaller ones. It was fun driving with those 16 foot baseboards wobbling about out of the back of my truck! Good thing they're flexible and didn't break!

So now I'm all set to put up most of the trim (still have to find the corner moldings) on Sunday (unless something else comes up), and in the meantime I should be able to finish the bedroom (baseboards and a corner molding for in there as well) this week. Fingers crossed!

Installing a Bedroom Floor

On Sunday morning, I had every intention of purchasing a laminate floor to go in the bedroom. I was so ready to get off the couch and sleep in my own bed! But first, of course, I had to get the flooring to go in there, and get it completely laid down so the room would be ready for me to move into it. So, Sunday morning we went off to Home Depot, with every intention of purchasing the laminate and the padding to go beneath it. We arrived, and looked closely at the cheap display at the front of the store, then took a sample with us to the back where the rest of the laminate was to compare. It was actually kind of depressing to look at the cheap laminate, made mostly from compressed cardboard, and compare it to the better quality which was made from real wood. Finally, though, I pretty much decided on one of the cheaper laminates (but not quite as cheap as the front display), when we decided to chat with someone in flooring and get some information.

Justin was the guy we ended up talking to, and he explained a lot about the differences in the laminate. For one thing, the cheaper type (made from cardboard) was most definitely not waterproof. So, even a small spill might cause the flooring to swell up. Of course, I always take a glass of water with me at night to sit on the nightstand, and I've been known to knock that glass over when I sleepily reach for it in the middle of the night. So, I wasn't too keen on the idea of cheap laminate anymore. I was actually starting to think perhaps carpeting was going to be my best bet, even though that would mean it wouldn't get laid down that day. And then of course I dismissed that and started looking at the other types of laminate. However, the type made from wood lacked one feature that the cardboard type had: the pieces didn't interlock. The cardboard laminate is based on a modified tongue-and-groove type arrangement. Each "tongue" and "groove" features a lip that interlocks with each other and, once locked in place, will not separate. The wooden laminate planks didn't have this feature. They would require actually being glued together to keep from seperating (with their actual tongue-and-groove feature). In addition, while the floor could float that way, it would actually be a better arrangement to either glue or nail down each plank to the subfloor. Again, this would probably mean I wouldn't have a floor laid down that day.

At this point, Justin mentioned that there was another possibility. He lead us to the aisle that contains the vinyl planking. This type of floor is called Allure, and it's made by TrafficMaster. He showed us samples of it, showed how easy it is to lay it down and how the self-adhesive tabs intermesh with each other to provide a water-tight seam. He also showed us how to cut the pieces, by scoring them with a razor and then snapping the piece along the scoring. They had three types of hardwood vinyl planking in stock, as well as four types of vinyl sections that emulate ceramic or stone tiles. One big selling point on the Allure is that it follows the contour of the subfloor; if it's not exactly level, the Allure will simply flow with the dips, whereas the laminate would probably crack under the strain of not being level over time. So, I made the decision to go with the Cherry hardwood design of the Allure.

My bedroom is roughly 175 square feet (counting the section carved out for the bathroom hallway) and not counting the closet. However, that afforementioned hallway section and the closet are roughly the same size, so I would need the full 175 square feet of flooring, plus some extra for waste and what-have-you. Each box of the Allure contained 24 square feet, so I needed 8 boxes. At $1.79 a square foot, it was almost three times the $0.68 a square foot of the original cheap laminate. Of course, adding the very cheaply-made padding, at $0.25 a square foot, would have increased the price of the laminate to almost $1 a square foot, so the Allure, which does not require padding, was actually less than twice the price I would have paid for the laminate. And much more practical! Not to mention very pretty. Although I debated the choice of the three available, there really was no choice; I'd fallen in love with the Cherry color and design from the outset.

So, we brought the 8 boxes back, and started right in. And it was very easy going. We'd score off what we needed to fit a plank along one wall or another, although neither of us can cut a straight line to save our lives. The most difficult part was the closet. Having to cut out for the door frame (since we wanted the planks in the closet to line up perfectly and "flow" with the planks in the room), and cutting down the planks to fit inside the closet, slowed us down some.

And of course we staggered each plank, since we didn't want the seams lining up. However, the staggering was "controlled". Rather than a random staggering, we staggered it so every other line of plank matched up. It just looked tidier to us that way. Anyway, we continued on until we had to stop (we had to go do some other things besides just put down the floor), but we managed to get most of it done. The only part lacking is a single line along the wall the door is in, a line inside the closet, and a very few small sections that need to be cut out.

The color of the floor shows up well here, although our clutter is all over the place! Those sheets of paper were between each plank in the boxes to help protect the glue on the tabs. In the foreground, you can see the square and the razor knife we used for scoring each piece as necessary, and to the left you can see a couple of the small pieces after they were scored out of the longer planks.

On Monday, I went ahead and put down the baseboards along two of the walls (the longest pieces of baseboard), which makes part of the room look so complete!

In the second and third pics above, you can see the line of planks we still need to finish along the wall that has the door. But isn't it gorgeous? I'm thrilled beyond words for the bedroom to be even this completed! In fact, it was complete enough that on Monday I also went ahead and moved my bed into the room.

For some reason, the bedskirt looks really odd in this photograph. Anyway, of course I couldn't just sleep in a room that didn't have curtains up to the windows! So, I had to go curtain-shopping that evening. I had seen some at Ross Dress For Less that I'd liked, so I went there first. And they had only one left! Of course, one wasn't going to cut it, and I sure couldn't get that one and just hope to find three more to match it elsewhere! So I then went to TJ Maxx, thinking that maybe they'd have some nice deals on curtains. Well, I finally found four panels there that I truly liked (very similar to the ones I'd liked at Ross), but faced a small dilemma. Two of the panels had clearance prices on them, the other two were regular price. Well, I figured surely they'll let me have all four for the clearance price, since they were the same curtain. Boy, did I figure wrong! The sales clerk gave me some crazy reason, that the two on clearance were from August while the two that were regular price were from September. That made no sense at all, since they were the exact (and I do mean exact) curtains, so I asked to speak with a manager. The manager was no help at all; she wouldn't budge and claimed it was store policy (I'm still considering visiting the TJ Maxx website and lodging a complaint) and that it didn't matter if it was the same curtain, that what counted was the month each one arrived. Grr. So I went ahead and got the curtains for $10 more than they should have cost, and didn't get the $10 rug I wanted for next to my bed as a result. In any case, I now have curtains up!

I'm very proud of my bedroom, and overjoyed that for the last 2 nights I've been sleeping in my bed and not on the sofa!