December 24, 2022 – January 1, 2023
If you see my post from last week, you’ll see that we were unsure that Craig and Sue would make it up Saturday to help move our spare bedroom over to the house.
After some bitter cold, gusty winds and about 6 inches of snow on Thursday into Friday, they were still able to come up Saturday morning.
Saturday, December 24
What better way to spend Christmas Eve than by loading a truck, trailer and two cars full of stuff to take to the new house, in sub-zero temperatures, and ankle-deep snow.
I had spent the week leading up to partial-moving day loading up my car with boxes of stuff that never got unpacked in Coralville. I spent Thursday evening straightening up the garage to make room for the stuff I was going to bring down from the guest bedroom, which I did Friday evening.
Saturday morning, I loaded up the last of the stuff we’d be taking, including luggage and work computers, into Brandy’s car then we waited for Craig and Sue.
They showed up a little before 10:00, backing their open trailer into our driveway. We quickly loaded the trailer, as well as the bed of Craig’s pickup and in less than an hour, we were in our cars ready to go. Just as we were pulling away, FedEx showed up to the house with the Christmas gift from my parents that I’d been expecting since Thursday (but the weather delayed.) Sue took the box then the caravan was on the road.
We made our requisite stop in Olds for gas (pumping gas in that weather is for the birds) then continued on our way.
We got to the house right around noon and unloaded the trailer and Craig’s truck. I finally got a chance to look at the box containing my parents’ gift to me, and it was an outdoor pizza oven. That will be nice to use once the snow melts off.
Craig and Sue left, and Brandy and I set up the guest bedroom to act as our bedroom for the time being. Once that was done, I got to work, replacing some light switches and outlets in the hall and the master bedroom.
The next task was to swap out the ceiling fan in the master bedroom. I climbed up on the stepladder and took down the cover over the motor and was greeted with four nuts holding the motor to the mounting bracket. This was the first time I’d encountered anything that would require a wrench or socket, so I was wholly unprepared. That pretty much dampened the rest of my to-do list, so I called it quits for the day.
Sunday, December 25
Christmas
I got up pretty early and kind of tooled around, picking up the best I could waiting for Brandy to wake up. Once she did, it was a short time before we headed up to Craig and Sue’s for a 9:00 breakfast of scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage bacon (?) and waffles.
We ate and I was given a 9-bottle set of hot sauces for Christmas. We stuck around for a bit chatting, I borrowed a socket set from Craig to unbolt the ceiling fan from the master bedroom, then we headed back to the house to get to work.
The first thing I did was take Craig’s socket set up to the ceiling. The set he gave me was pretty small, maybe eight sockets in total, with standard and metric combined. I took the half inch socket up to the fan and it was too big. I took the 3/8″ and wouldn’t you know, it was too small. I tried a 10mm and it was too small, then I tried a 12 and it was too big. He didn’t send a 7/16″ or 11mm with me, so I was stuck.
I went to work continuing on the outlets in the master bedroom while Brandy checked with her friend Hilary to see if she had a wrench we could borrow. She scrounged up a 7/16″ wrench so when I was done with the last outlet in the room, I made the mile drive to her house and picked it up.
I got back just a few moments later, had a quick lunch, then took the wrench up and it fit perfectly. I got the rest of the fan down and new one put up in no time.
Once I was done with the electrical work, I got back to work sanding the floor. I didn’t quite get a chance to finish it last week, so I picked up where I’d left off, about halfway through. At about 3:45, Brandy pulled me from the project so I could shower to go to Hilary’s.
Hilary got us, among other things, a 17″ Blackstone griddle, along with an adapter to hook up a full-size propane tank to it (as opposed to a small, 1 lb. cannister.)
We sat for a bit, had some drinks and came home. We had a few more drinks at the house before calling it a night.
Monday, December 26
I was off Monday so I took advantage and got a good chunk of work done.
I finished sanding the floor in the bedroom, then continued on with replacing the switches and outlets throughout the dining room, Brandy’s office and into the kitchen. I had two sets of three-way switches that I replaced and later found out that I’d wired them incorrectly. I saved the rewiring for another day.
Additionally, I primed a small piece of wall that I’d missed the first time around near the fireplace, then made a few trips out, to the grocery store and to Menard’s, and shoveled snow from the sidewalk in front of our house.
It was generally just a lot of busy work up until dinner time. I made some pork chops with roasted sweet potatoes and sauteed green beans, then cleaned up the kitchen and called it a night.
Tuesday, December 27 – Thursday, December 29
I had to work the rest of the week so was a little more limited on what I could fit in after signing off.
Tuesday, I patched up some holes in the drywall in the kitchen, after which I took down the ceiling fan to get ready to install a new one. Wouldn’t you know it, this fan was bolted to the ceiling too. Craig had told me that he’d left a handful of wrenches at the house so I got the roll out and took the 7/16″ wrench up only to find it was too small. I took the 3/8″ up and that was too big.
Pliers it is!
I finally got the mounting plate off and was able to continue on. I ran into an issue though when the new mounting bracket cover was too small to cover the electrical box in the ceiling. We decided to return that fan and try one with a wider mounting bracket.
I then moved into the bathroom where I attempted to swap out the faucet (a task that was spurred by a clogged drain.) When I went to turn the cold water off, the stub started spraying water everywhere. The leak stopped when the valve was opened all the way back up. That is a little too much for me to be able to fix so we’re going to have to hire a plumber for that task. I would have tried rewiring the three-way switches or replacing the last two outlets in the kitchen, but it was dark by the time I got to that point. I decided instead to call it a night.
Wednesday, while we were working, the carpet installation guy came to… uh, well, install the carpet we’d picked up last week. Meanwhile, Sue showed up to paint the master bedroom. After I got off work, I cut in the ceiling in that room, laid down the first coat of polyurethane on the floor, then left the house to run a couple of errands before heading over to Craig and Sue’s for a dinner of peppered steak. We returned home with a borrowed vacuum cleaner that I used to vacuum the newly installed carpet. Once done, I moved our makeshift offices out of the dining room/Brandy’s office (along with everything else that was in there, including Ash’s kennel, the dolly, and a bunch of other miscellanea) in an effort to make room to begin laying the vinyl flooring. We were planning on starting that project Friday after work.
Thursday, I went to Menard’s for a new ceiling fan for the kitchen. I wound up getting the same one we got for our master bedroom. In the master bedroom, we settled on the lighter pine side for the blades as it’d match our furniture pretty well. In the kitchen though, the lighter side is much lighter than the cabinets and the darker side was much darker. We decided to go with the darker side because that would match the darker flooring that we were planning on putting down on Friday.
Craig and Sue had the gold trim pieces for the fireplace for which we had bought some high-temp flat black spray paint. Craig was waiting for warmer weather to paint them for us. Once the temperatures got above freezing, he got it done and after a couple days of curing, Sue brought them over Thursday, so I popped them in. It made a HUGE difference in the look of the fireplace. It looks great now.
I tried re-wiring the three-way switches in the kitchen but still got it wrong. I thought I had the potential solution in mind, so I waited until there was daylight on Saturday to give it another whirl.
After that, I moved 25 boxes of flooring, each about 50 pounds, from the garage, up some stairs, over the deck, and into the living room to allow them to warm up before starting to lay them down.
The plan was to paint the kitchen after that, so I took off the longest baseboard in the kitchen and started taping off the rest of the trim before completely running out of gas. I took some melatonin, ibuprofen and a hot shower and was asleep before my head hit the pillow.
Friday was the big day. The flooring was the big goal for the week. Craig showed up at about 11:00 to take me to Menard’s to get a sheet of insulation upon which any cutting of the flooring would be done. I wound up getting a small 14″x48″ piece that I could have just as easily fit in my car, but we also got a few 12′ pieces of baseboard molding for the family room, so Craig’s truck came in handy. While we were there, I picked myself up a jigsaw and some blades to have on hand for myself so I wouldn’t have to borrow Craig’s.
When we got back, the plumber called saying he was on his way to fix the leak under the bathroom sink. He came and went uneventfully, replacing both shut-off valves under the sink. He did leave the supply lines to the sink disconnected though as he said they would have leaked if he reconnected them, and he knew I was going to be replacing the faucet soon anyway. I didn’t get around to replacing that faucet, so we spent the rest of our time at the house with no working sink in the bathroom.
Sue showed up as I was signing off from work at 2:00 and we got to working on the flooring. We got 8 full rows and the first halves of rows 9 and 10 put down in about 3 and a half hours. The first two rows needed cutouts for the floor vents that were handily cut by my new jigsaw. The third and fourth rows needed cutouts around the fireplace but otherwise, went quickly down the line. Once we got into a groove, with no cutting needed, the vinyl clicked and locked into place with ease, and the process went quickly and smoothly.
At about 5:30, I found myself getting anxious and frustrated so I decided to call it a night. I ordered a pizza, took some ibuprofen, sat down and watched some TV and went to sleep in a hurry.
Saturday, December 31, 2022
New Year’s Eve
Brandy was sick most of the night. She’d been complaining of stomach cramps off and on throughout the day and it came to a head Friday night. She was in the bathroom, vomiting, and in the bed, crying of stomach cramps all night.
There wasn’t much I could do except hold her and try to comfort her, but I was able to sleep. I did wake up at about 3:30 and went through my normal routine, showering and getting dressed, making some coffee and tooling around on the internet. I was reluctant to start working on the floor because I didn’t want the hammering waking Brandy.
Shortly after she woke up, I got back to work, picking up where we’d left off Friday evening. Sue showed up before long and we continued on, finishing the dining room, Brandy’s office and most of the hallway. We then turned our attention to the kitchen. I pulled the fridge out and made a few cuts to get the first few rows in before we were able to just throw down whole boards at a time. When we had enough put down to hold the fridge, I pushed it back into place. By that time, it was 4:30; I’d been going since about 8:00 and my back was done for. We called it a night, Sue went home, and Brandy continued to cope with her illness from bed.
I went to the store and picked up a few quick and easy things for dinner, headed home, fixed them up and quickly called it a night.
Sunday, January 1
I woke up super early again. As we were leaving Sunday, I started packing our stuff up, getting it ready to go back to Coralville.
Once Brandy woke up, I got to work on the flooring. The hallway was a challenge, to be sure. There were four doorways that had to be cut around, which also necessitated the trimming of the door trim and casings. The multi tool I’d picked up at the beginning of this project certainly came in handy for that.
Once the hallway was done, I returned my efforts to the kitchen. I started by pulling the stove out of its nook. It looked like it hadn’t been cleaned under the stove since the previous vinyl flooring was put down, and the side of stove was disgustingly filthy. I cleaned up the mess and got back to laying the LVP. The stove nook got the new vinyl pretty quick so I was able to slot the stove back in before long
The rest of it went pretty quickly, up until I got to a small alcove that leads to the basement- another doorway I had to cut and trim around. I got that done without incident and before I knew it, the kitchen flooring was done.
I cleaned up my messes, piling hand tools up on the kitchen counters, throwing the vinyl scraps into a trash bag and tossing that into the garbage bin, sweeping up the vinyl and insulation dust from the deck, then I loaded up the car with our stuff and we were on the road to Coralville at 2:00. I was so exhausted, about halfway through the drive, in Mount Pleasant, I pulled over and let Brandy finish the drive. I slept for most of that last leg of the trip.
Weekly Wrap-Up
In the 9 days we spent at the Green House, I:
- Swapped out two ceiling fans (master bedroom and kitchen)
- Finished sanding and putting on three coats of polyurethane on the master bedroom floor
- Replaced most of the switches and outlets throughout the house
- Laid down LVP flooring in the dining room, Brandy’s office, hallway, and kitchen
That doesn’t look like a lot, but it was a great deal of work. I once again spent a LOT of time on my hands and knees, between the flooring and the outlets I replaced. As always, pictures can be found on my Photo Diary.
What’s Next
This weekend, I will be traveling to Ottumwa solo. Brandy will stay behind and start packing the Coralville house. Sue will be joining her so I will be largely alone all weekend to work on the house.
The plans for this weekend include, but are not limited to:
- Adding transition strips between the vinyl I just got done laying down and the other floors
- Adding quarter round to the baseboards throughout the house
- Swapping the bathroom faucet
- Putting in vent covers throughout the house
- Adding baseboard to the living room
- Swapping three outlets in the kitchen
- Rewiring the three way switches in the hall and kitchen
- Touching up the polyurethane in the bedrooms
- Swap out the ceiling fan in the dining room/Brandy’s office
- Put up primer in the bathroom
- Take down the shower door in the bathroom
It might look like a long list, but it’s a lot of small projects, so I should be able to get a good portion of it done. If I can complete it all, I will be starting putting up shiplap in the living room.
To-Do List
Here is the remaining to-do list, updated from last week:
Prep for paintingFilling holesPriming three walls
- Painting
Master bedroomSpare bedroom- Bathroom
HallwayDining RoomBrandy’s Office- Kitchen
Install new showerhead- Take down shower doors
Finish hardwood floors- Install flooring
Hallway- Bathroom
Dining RoomBrandy’s OfficeKitchen
- Replace
fivesix ceiling fansMaster bedroomSpare bedroom- Bathroom
Kitchen- Living Room
- Dining room (just added!)
Replace hallway light fixtureReplace front and back porch lightsReplace house numbers- Replace front doorknob
Replace front door?(for later)
Replace mailbox- Adjust entry door to garage
Carpeting Living Room and stairs to basement (hiring out)- Replacing all light switches, outlets and plates
- Put up shiplap in living room (just added!)
- Hang new blinds
I would like to point out that this is not a finite list of all the work we are going to be doing on this house. This is just what we are going to get done before the official move-in. The Green House Project will be a project in perpetuity. Just beyond the list above, we need to renovate the basement, work on the front and back decks, power wash and re-stain the decks, power wash the siding, move the back fence… there is always something that’s going to need to be worked on in the house beyond the day-to-day maintenance.
But, just looking to the immediate future, we are hoping to be moved in by the end of January. At this rate, I don’t think that’s going to be a problem.
Thanks for stopping by,
-Phil
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