the upholstery project

first, a little background on my family.  my sister and i love to clothes shop, and i'm a big fan of thrift stores for over-enthusiastic furniture remakes.  our parents, the mums specifically, abhor shopping of any kind that has to be done in person; i think internet shopping was invented for them.  my sister also stand at a towering 4'11.75"... or 5' according to her doctor.  but i digress.  needless to say, regular chairs dwarf her, and her little feet dont touch the ground. 

mums, of all people, found the tiniest chair ever at some kind of estate sale where they live, and brought me the chair to reupholster.  and then it sat in my living room from thanksgiving 2014.  over christmas, my sister and i perused fabric.com for the appropriate fabric, i ordered it, aaand it sat in my sewing room for the next 4 months. 

how not to trim out a window

so the bathroom remodel is still an ongoing thing.  BUT ITS SO CLOSE TO BEING FINISHED.  i just need an uninterrupted day with no homework or restaurant shifts or netflix or friend dates or anything else to feel guilty about.  but last year, the window was sort of nicely trimmed out with poorly painted white and lovely pink and black tile beneath. 

fast forward august through.... january, and the window was naked.  now it sits half finished.  half you say?  weeeell i need to remove the pieces i attached and try, try, again.  feck.

diy interior storm windows

the temperature this winter has been... confusing, to say the least.  saturday was -2 in the morning, and a whopping 8 by noon.  i was working outside, and can confirm, yes it did not get any friggin warmer.  yesterday was 47 and raining.  but between freezing my ass off trying to climb onto a metal roof and dodging floods in my basement, i built 3 interior storm windows.  only 11 more to go..

left window is as always, right window has interior storm window installed

bathroom status: 95% done!!!!

MERRY FRIGGIN CHRISTMAS TO ME!  the bathroom floor [sans molding/trim] is done!!  nothing says christmas-eve-fun-time like my mom and me crawling around the bathroom floor cursing, flailing, and chasing my cat around with the vacuum.  my dad was wisely in another room for the duration.

new kitchen shelves!

for awhile ive been debating the merits of open kitchen shelving.  i have a mostly white [and yellow] kitchen, and a black cat that manages to get his nasty on every single thing i own.  just over 6 months ago i removed the glass door on my liquor cabinet, essentially leaving the glassware on open shelves, and it has been a resounding success.  minimal cat hairs in my glasses, and the bathroom demo didn't even leave a layer of dust.

i lack the funding to redo the entire kitchen and the cabinets are terrible, so lo and behold, it's time for open shelves!

bathroom status: 89% done!

progress report on the longest bathroom remodel ever - top pic aug 13, bottom pic sept 18.  all i need now are for the sink faucets to be turned 90 degrees [should point outward so you turn the water toward yourself...rather than into the spout], the sink drain to stop leaking into a tupperware in the vanity, the flooring laid, window trimmed out, and the new radiator connected.

some semblance of privacy, progress, and patience

unrelated frog for your viewing pleasure

up against the wall motherfuckers

citation [sorry not sorry it's wikipedia..]

so day 4 of my lovely home reno project... my buddy questioned where i wanted the shower head and plumbing located.  seeing as i had confirmed time frame [multiple times], work scope, plans i'd drawn up both on paper and drafting software [in person and via email], walked through the potential layout [over lunch], and showed him all the components i'd bought... i was pretty pissed when he said, oh i didn't know you wanted that there.  i guess were ripping out this wall too, since we need 6" for a wet wall and the existing studs are only 4". 

sometimes in school, you learn stuff and junk

liiiiike how to draw up and wire your own bathroom circuit!  even though you [i] sometimes drop out of a program halfway through since it isnt heading in the direction you hoped but it was an associates degree and you already completed two others...  but that doesn't stop me from writing run-on and incomplete sentences, no sir.

a brief respite

for a year now, ive assumed the hot water dripping in the bathtub was from the faucet not turning off fully, and spent countless minutes trying to crank it closed more.  however, after the tub was removed and the water turned off... it continued to drip out the hot side.  all over the floor.  solution? 

red solo cup.  sigh.

a wall full of secrets

and by secrets, i do mean razors. 

and no i didn't cut my finger on the razors.  more like i black-swan-ed a giant hangnail and it bled everywhere.

bathrom demo

ok so it's been a month since i managed to post "the bathroom demo is starting!" pics.  here are some more demolition pics.  cos the bathroom STILL ISNT DONE YET and it may be driving me more than a bit crazy insane batshit nutso.

turns out the tiniest crappiest vanity ever ... fell apart as we were removing it.  the sink was barely caulked to the wall and the sides fell away once we removed the sink.  the trap underneath was made of some kind of chrome coated plastic which merrily cracked into pieces.  but the fitting i added to the cold intake line held just dandy.

the bathroom from hell... is no more!

 

sooo here's a preview of what a good friend and i have spent our past week doing.  the long sought after renovation is at hand!  and ... may prove to be my undoing.  stay tuned.  i might get enough energy to post more pictures sometime in the near future.  or check my fb and instaspam.

homeowner problems

aka the saga of the shit flood and getting stood up by a plumber.

im not serious about the shit flood.  it my have been that tragic in my mind.. but really it was the contents of the disposal, a load of laundry, and maybe one toilet flush that seeped out onto my basement floor.  if you were brave enough to read to here..  kudos.  i exaggerate in times of panic.  also, i used a gallon of vinegar and 3 bottles of lysol sanitizing the floor.

real furniture. like an adult

look!  i have an actual bed!  instead of mattresses on the floor!  like.. im 21.  it only took me more than an entire calendar year and it doesnt exactly match anything else, but who's counting!

card table time travel

the 1980s were a decent decade.  computers as we know them, microsoft, atari, and star wars came to be.  cabbage patch kids and tmnt were born.  hell, i was born.  and so was this card table set.

living room part deux

and by deux i really mean.. version 7.3.  or somewhere thereabouts.  its a work in progress.  but the new additions: pineapple shaped lamp that i repainted and added a black shade to.  pretty sure its made of solid metal and could easily kill a man.  also, a slightly garish mirror, to add to my mirror collection.

living room refinements

learning google sketchup

as a former engineer i know how to use autoCAD, powerCAD [the apple version], and microstation [the cheapo student version].  since i am... not an engineer currently i don't have access to any of these programs and am not paying for a license.  i know i can use a free version of autoCAD, but mnehh.  i didn't really like it when i had to use it.

being highly adaptive.. ..i googled "free cad programs" and happened upon this mini review of the top 5 free CAD packages on the interwebs.  being a sucker for pretty much anything google and free, i downloaded google sketchup and proceeded to watch the intro tutorials.  hours and hours later on a saturday night i drew up a preliminary 3d sketch of my bathroom remodel.  unfortunately in 3D it turns out ... thaaaats a shitton of furniture [?] in a very small room. 

a year of houselove

my housaversary was actually the ides of march.  and i had a kegger.  hence the leftover beers in the library...  but here's to another year of successful projects and progress!