Our New Old House

I am just a six inch piece of plastic tubing away from completing the bathroom sink installation.  I made my third trip to Menard’s last night and STILL came home with the wrong size tube.  I just wasn’t paying attention!  Gah!  I wanted so badly to get up this morning and brush my teeth in my new sink.  Oh well, as my Great Grandpa Rivera would sigh in resignation at the end of the day: ”mañana.” (“Tomorrow.”)

Meanwhile, here are photos of my progress so far:

I used a hack saw to cut the drain pipe to the right length.

Then I used the hack saw to cut the PVC drain pipe too.

The PVC pipe was a little messy after I got done cutting it.

I used a steel wool pad to scrape off all the burrs and clean up the shavings and grime that might keep the PVC cement from bonding.

Here’s the sink after we mounted it to the wall.

The faucet now in place. We got the one from the same line as the one in the kitchen. “Savannah” from Price Pfister.

Ooh shiny! (This photo should come with a sound effect: “Ting!” Like the little chime it makes when someone on TV winks or smiles brightly.)

Last night when I realized I was missing one final part to hook up the sink, but it was too late to go back to Menard’s, I decided to take a break and go hang out with my friends at a bar. After a gin and tonic and sampling my friends’ drinks, I decided to come home around 11:30pm and at least hook up the drain stop before going to bed. Let’s hear it for plumbing while under the influence!

Zoot says, “Ur doin it wrong. No waterz comin’ out.”

Hooking up the drain stop.

Almost got it.

There was a big hole in the wall behind the back of the vanity from where they’d taken out some water damaged plaster from the old leaky sink. The top of our drain pipe branches up and over to the left somewhere. I can’t figure out where this extra drain pipe goes. It’s pointing toward the outside wall, but there’s no evidence of it exiting the house. Quite mysterious.

Tonight, I will be making what will hopefully be my final trip to Menard’s for this project. Hopefully.

[tags]bathroom sink, bathroom, plumbing, pedestal sink, faucet[/tags]

 Hopefully this will be the last of it. But don’t worry! I got to do the fun part today: demolition!

Today’s mission: demolish the old bathroom sink to make room for the new bathroom sink!

Scratch can’t understand why he can’t sleep in the sink anymore.

Tore out some of the carpet to reveal some really… um… interesting flooring.

And what’s left of the water damage from a leaking toilet.

Zoot got to sniff in the wall.

Some of the… um… interesting paint colors the bathroom had been.

Coming up later this week: the installation of our new pedestal sink! (It’s shiny!)

And a bonus photo for you: Scratch got nosy when Brandon was making garbanzo salsa.

[tags]bathroom, flooring, plumbing, photos, cats, vanity, sink[/tags]

Last night while I was stripping paint in the basement I really wanted some music, but I was out of electrical outlets. (Which got me writing down a few more things I’d like to have done when we do any more electrical upgrading.) Brandon came up with the brilliant idea to run an extension cord and a patch cord from the computer through the laundry chute to the basement so I could plug in my stereo. Isn’t he the greatest?

BTW, I listen to Pandora.com all the time when I’m working on the house. You can find my stations by visiting Pandora.com and typing my username: SuNovia5 in the search box.

Oh, also, I put a coat of polyurethane on a door last night and it looks great!

And I said goodbye to the gloves that gave me chemical burns:

[tags]electricity, basement, doors, photos, Pandora, music, stripping paint, wood[/tags]

I may have just learned a lesson the hard way. Probably a few lessons.

I’ve had these cruddy old canvas gloves since we first bought this house back in August. Since then I’ve used them for everything from stripping paint to cleaning metal with ammonia, to wiping things with mineral spirits, and pulling dusty clothes out of the foundation to spray in insulation foam. These gloves have seen it all. But that long lived loyalty may have been my undoing. Seems that during my last session of paint stripping, I received some minor chemical burns on my hands. I should have known better than to use canvas gloves for any of the aforementioned jobs.

Anyway, the burns are minor, but I only now realized that I don’t know a thing about treating chemical burns! I washed my hands in cool water with a mild soap, patted them dry with a cotton towel, and haven’t applied any balms or lotions or anything, just kept them cool and dry. The sensation is like a bad sunburn.

I took some pictures. I know, I know, totally self indulgent. They’re not even that bad. You can barely see them in the pictures. But it’s my blog and I’m posting them anyway.

And of course when I pushed my sleeve up, I got a nice chemical burn in the crook of my elbow. There’s one like this on my other arm but I couldn’t hold the camera with my left hand and get a picture of that one. Just take my word for it, it looks the same.

My course of action for now is just to keep them cool and dry and watch them carefully. I’ll welcome any suggestions you have (except to suck it up and stop posting pathetic pictures of myself on the intarwebs; I already know I’m a total dork.)

[tags]photos, chemicals, burns, hands, mineral spirits, first aid, safety[/tags]

I’m very close to finishing my first paint stripping project. There were two wood doors in the basement of my house when I moved in. Both had several layers of paint. I never planned on putting these doors back up in my house so I decided to use them as practice pieces so I could learn how to strip paint. Maybe it’s the fumes from the mineral spirits, but as I’m nearing the final phase of restoring the wood to its natural beauty, I’m getting really sentimental about this door.

I had never used a heat gun before but through a little experimentation on the door, I learned how. I learned how long is too long to leave CitriStrip on a project (3 days = way too long.) I learned the miraculous power of mineral spirits to dissolve even the gooey-est mess (3-day old CitriStrip.) I learned that wrapping a terry cloth towel around a flat head screw driver is a great way to get the gunk out of carved molding and cracks.

Most importantly, I learned why these houses are called Craftsman houses. In uncovering the layers of paint I uncovered a timeless beauty that was built to last for generations. Even though the design is simple and functional, every surface and joint is constructed with skill and care. The men who built this door paid attention to the grain of the wood, made sure the saw’s cut was perfect, sanded the door by hand, lined up the joints in the molding by hand. Their hands, not some lifeless machine, touched every part of the door. Nearly a hundred years later, the quality and beauty of the door still glows warmly, bearing the scars and wrinkles of age, but no less beautiful for them.

Those of us who fix up old houses can sometimes see the benefit in “flipping” a house quickly, using all modern materials, making a house clean and functional, but not really taking the time to seek out its inherent character. That’s fine for some houses. In fact, it’s really the best thing to do for a lot of properties. But when we come across a house that still has all that beautiful Craftsman quality buried underneath the layers of paint, paneling, and wallpaper, we discover that a quick fix and a coat of paint just won’t do it justice. We feel a responsibility to the craftsmen who built the house, and through the process of restoring it to its original beauty (or updating in a way that maintains the house’s unique character) we feel a kinship to them.

In a way, I feel like an apprentice to each of the master craftsmen who built all the parts of my house. On some days I’m a lowly plaster mixer, fumbling around to find the correct ratio of powder to water. On other days I’m a carpenter’s apprentice, learning to double check my measurements and square up my work. But since I’ve never done any of these things before, I’m relying on the house to be my guide to how to fix what’s wrong with it. I guess in a way I’m getting instructions from the craftsmen themselves through the work they did on the house.

This may be getting a little metaphysical, but it’s hard to describe the feeling I get just placing my hand on the bare plaster that’s been covered up for 60 years under layers of wallpaper, or running my hand along the bare wood I’ve just stripped and prepared for varnishing. Something inside me wants to send a message into the great beyond to all those craftsmen, saying, “I appreciate the care you took in building my house. I’m doing my best to learn how to continue caring for it. In the meantime, please excuse my fumbling.”

I don’t think I expected to feel this way when I started out on this project. Brandon and I really looked at the house as an investment, a great experience in the meantime, but ultimately with our eyes on the prize of getting a good return for our money. There was nothing wrong with that earlier mindset, but I’m grateful for the new understanding and appreciation I have for my house and the people who built it.

[tags]doors, paint, photos, woodwork, craftsman, bungalow, house building, rehabbing, old houses[/tags]