All that work in August and I haven’t even bothered to show it off. This is it. It is not all the pictures that I took but the best ones and it shows the progression of how things went.
I will be honest, my proudest detail is the drain pipe. Everything worked out so perfectly and looks pretty neat too. I have to admit when I was purchasing the pieces, I kept going around in circles about how everything was going to fit together and if I got the right fittings and pieces. I am happy to report that I only missed two 90s and one piece I purchased extra. Not too shabby.
I am happy to have that done and it made me remember how much I enjoy doing productive projects like this. In many ways, that year I spent at home was some of my most enjoyable time ever. Yes, it was sun up to sun down but that was because I couldn’t stop myself.
End Your Programming Routine: My next project is not a project at all but clean-up from this one and all the other stuff I did since the beginning of the year. I am getting ready to button things down for the winter and that means dump runs, donation center runs and breaking down recyclables versus trash. I am going to be a happy man when the eyesore of all the things too big to fit in the garbage can finally go away.
I know, I just kind of dropped off of the face of the earth. Most outages are planned and I try to make some kind of announcement. But, I just got overwhelmed and hyper-focused with what I had to do. My wife has set my deadline at August 31 which I should comfortably make. But, you would be surprised at how many steps go into this seemingly simple process.
I should also mention that in the middle of last weekend, I also had to redo the front brakes of my Lincoln Navigator. I needed the Navigator to go get sheetrock so that I could continue making progress on this project. I was forbidden to drive it unless I fixed the brakes. Add that to the list of reasons why I was not able to write.
I know that I have already written about this once and will possibly show the finished product in a week or so. When I casually said, I can do that, I had no idea what that really meant. It has also been really helpful that the finished vanity is right behind me so I can take measurements. For instance, because I did a mock-up, I realized that the backsplash was going to hit the switch plate cover. Rather than trying to modify the cover, I decided to move the electrical box up so that it would clear the backsplash.
I was already doing electrical work to add the new light fixture. While I would have preferred to eliminate the round junction boxes for the old lights, the wiring was just too complicated to fix without ripping out the ceiling and re-wiring the bathroom fan as well.
Speaking of old electrical work, those junction boxes turned out to be antiquated. They are 3 1/2″ round which is a size that is not made anymore, at least I didn’t run across it. By proxy, I was not able to find paintable covers, except for one. I tried all of the local hardware stores and both box stores. Ordering was the only way to get something that would work.
I had a dream of insetting the medicine cabinets into the wall. That is just a better look to me, but it meant that I needed to take a critical look at the framing given that was a structural wall. I took a good chunk of drywall out to do the wiring and see what I could see with the framing. No dice there, the vent stack ran right where I wanted to inset the medicine cabinet and I was not about to re-plumb all of the drain pipes to make it work. I would have been possible but not without a lot more time, money and effort.
When I committed to the project, I didn’t give any thought to the plumbing. Well, only a little. I figured plumbing was there so it should work. I thought that I would tee off of the existing shut-off valves to each fixture. That was before I learned that each fixture should have a shut-off. Since I had to modify the rough plumbing, I might as well make it so that I had to modify the cabinet as little as possible.
I also learned the copper flux can go bad. After hours wondering why I couldn’t get the solder to work, I finally decided to change the only variable that I hadn’t changed which was the flux. Pretty soon I had one joint completed in five minutes instead of 15 minutes on the torch and $20 of solder on the bench top. That stuff has gotten crazy expensive at $41 for a half pound roll.
All that was child’s play when it came up against the drain plumbing. I thought that I was going to add a p-trap to each sink and then out the drain until I was wondering if the pipes needed some pitch. It turns out that I needed a whole new setup. I was scratching my head with a whole bucket full of pieces wondering if I got the right stuff. I am still not sure until I get to the point of doing the work.
I haven’t done a serious project like this since I remodeled the little house in 2020. I was telling my wife, image if someone didn’t know what they were doing and had to call a plumber, electrician, drywaller and painter. This would would be a serious financial investment. The vanity wasn’t cheap to begin with but I wouldn’t be surprised if it was $20,000 job.
End Your Programming Routine: On the surface, it seems simple, replace one vanity with another. But, boy oh boy going from one sink to two is an exponential dynamic. It’s good though, it flexes some muscles that have atrophied. I know that it is going to be something that I can be proud of because I was careful and did everything right.
Well not really, it was kind of a deal with the devil so to speak. I had it all planned out, I was going to buy my wife a really nice gift for her 50th but then she asked me if we could redo the bathroom. This isn’t a surprise, she also asked for it for Christmas. I of course said yes because that is what she wanted.
I call is a deal with the devil because this is supposed to be when my summer started. I was supposed to be enjoying the last days by hiking and planting and all the other stuff. Now, I have this large project that I am embroiled in. The truth is that I am being a little over dramatic. I haven’t done a significant project in quite a while and I don’t think it will take too long.
Here is the plan. I am going to change two light fixtures. The vanity is getting changed from 36 inches to 60 inches and from a single sink to a double sink. The medicine cabinet is getting switched from a single unit to two units. Because of that, I have to reroute the electrical to a new electrical box in the center of the everything.
You can see the mock-up from the picture. The tape represents the two mirrors and the vanity footprint. I already have it in my head that I am going to have to tear into the wall, but the trick with the mirrors is that they need to be centered on the sink location. That needs to fit into the existing space appropriately.
I would dearly like to put the medicine cabinet into the wall cavity, but that wall is a structural wall. It is one side of the house as the bathroom is a shed addition as well as holding up the stair case. I don’t really know how much chaos that would cause to do until I open the wall. That will be a to be determined.
Just like pulling a sweater thread, I cannot cut into the wall until I remove the existing vanity. The new vanity was delivered with a broken top so we are waiting for a replacement. It is my preference to leave the existing vanity in place until I can essentially swap the old and the new and minimize the out of service time. But, I may go ahead regardless in the name of progress.
The only part of the process that concerns me is the plumbing. Technically speaking, each sink needs a supply shut-off. I watched some videos online that this can be done outside of the wall by removing the valve, but if I am going open things up anyway, I might as well put them where they should be.
Then there is the waste plumbing. It is not that I cannot stick things together but that I am hoping I can. Plumbing can be a fickle mistress when it comes to head pressure. There must be enough free flowing air so that a vacuum is not created and effecting the drain action. I am going to try once but I may ultimately call a plumber if it doesn’t work right the first time.
I will be honest, It is not the remodel that I really want to do. I would like to get rid of the tub and move to a dedicated shower. I would love to add a claw foot tub and redo all the tile. The problem is that we got a quote for a shower in a day outfit and it was $40,000. It was a name brand outfit and I am sure it was quality materials but not in the budget.
End Your Programming Routine: Clearly, this is not the worlds biggest project and I have concerns like I think the vanity is too close to the shower. But you know the saying happy wife, happy life. The medicine cabinet is gross and the shelves are sagging and the vanity saw it’s best days in the 1970s. Only having one sink has been a constant limitation for us when I need to shave and she needs to put in contacts. So, I do think it will be a worthwhile refresh.
For the last couple of weeks, stuff has been piling up in our foyer. The reality is that a lot of these projects are not really necessary but as my wife is fond of saying, ‘happy wife, happy life’. It doesn’t say that much for me, but the optional things are relatively easy. It is the necessary ones that are going to be a lot more work.
We have lived in this house over 20 years. That entire time, we have had a heat pump downstairs but no air conditioning upstairs. We had our bedroom upstairs for at least 13 of those years and the truth be told, I only found a handful of days a year to be too hot. Nevertheless, we are having house guests in a couple of weeks. My wife wanted to ensure they were comfortable.
I suppose where it finally cracked, my son’s room is south facing. I won’t lie that it does get hot. But, over the years he has declined the offer for air conditioning. Our exchange student was staying in my son’s room and he spent several nights sleeping downstairs in May when we were in the 90s. Now that he is gone, we are cleaning up the remnants and my son is moving back into his room. It is the perfect time to get the new AC unit installed. I have a second one to install in the upstairs family room.
Speaking of my son’s room, he is also getting a new ceiling fan. My wife says that it needs to be replaced because it is old. What? Remember ‘happy wife, happy life’. The truth is the pull string has been broken pretty short. The reason is the kids would jump off the bed and pull on it breaking it. I know because I have caught them doing it.
This could be repaired for a couple of dollars; I have also done that before. But, it is best not to fight it. I have to say it does look new and more contemporary. The new fan is significantly inferior to the old one. This one has two lightbulbs where the other one had four. Also, the access to remove the globe requires you to reach your fingers up and over the metal fixture, inside of a channel.
The worst part is that I had to completely take the whole fan apart twice. Once because the blade was rubbing on the switch. After that was fixed, I found out that one of the supply wires was rubbing on the fan motor. That is done now.
Now that we have had the dry rot repaired and the new windows are installed, that has spawned two projects. The first is all of the replacement work has to be painted on the exterior. The second project is that I need to do drywall finishing on the inside.
I guess that because those are separate trades, then that is why they do them. It does seem like for two days of work and $5000 in labor that I would have a week’s worth of effort to finish. They did do the initial mud and tape job and it was pretty sloppy, so they did me a favor by stopping and not charging me more.
But wait, there is more. For my wife’s birthday (and anniversary) she want’s a new vanity and light fixtures in the bathroom, bedroom and dining room. This definitely makes my shopping easier but I already had a plan for what I wanted to buy. Now, I am going to have quite a bit of work to get all of this work done. Keep using the phrase ‘happy wife, happy life’.
I think that is enough to do this summer. As I have already stated in my podcast there is still plenty going on in life the summer as well. I am assuming that I can complete all that in the summer time frame. You can expect that there will be periodic updates on all of the work. The fan and AC are done now, at least my foyer is clear of boxes at this point for now.
End Your Programming Routine: We are currently in a holding pattern for cancer treatment. There have been some mixed results on the testing and so the doctors want to wait and retest in a few months. My wife really wanted to wait until the fall to get started anyway, looks like there will be no choice now. Hopefully, I can get the projects finished before my life is turned upside down again.
I feel like the role of demolition in a project, particularly on TV is portrayed as some kind of romantic process. There is a wild, passionate throw of ideas like “we can knock this down and open that up and replace these fixtures and those sets of cabinets”. Everyone will get out their pent up aggression and an hour later will be moving on to making everything nice and new.
In the real world, that just isnt true. Demo is long, tough, tedious and dirty business. The conditions are less than ideal sometimes downright gross. Rot, mold, mildew, excrement and even dead animals are part of the discovery.
In my case, I am always mindful of ‘over’ demo. If I want to use one sheet of drywall or plywood, I am calculating precisely how far to go so as not to need one and 1/8 of a sheet. I am thoughtful that molding profile may not be easy to match again, so unless I want to redo the entire room, I need to be careful removing it. Gentle demo can take days longer.
I try to be consciences about reuse and value as well. Cabinet and fixture removals are examples of that. Habitat for humanity will take items in serviceable and good condition, but not damaged. I try to reuse wood and minimize landfill fodder as well. We burn appropriate and clean wood in our fire pit for family entertainment. That minimizes waste and maximize use, but nails and things need to be removed first.
I don’t mind swinging a sledgehammer ten times. But eight hours of prying, cutting at odd angles, hammering and wrestling sharp heavy objects quickly removes the romance. It is probably my lack of experience, but rarely does any of this go as planned or easy.
Yesterday’s progress on the bathroom. Boy is our work cut out for us.
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