Running on empty, but we are almost there!

As the title would suggest, we are pretty tired. Lots of sore muscles, bruises, scrapes, and general fatigue. This picture of Timmy sleeping it off in his Cheetah sheets pretty much speaks for us all at this point. But on the bright side, we are finally getting there, there is light at the end of the tunnel.

Yesterday was an incredibly busy day at the Broken House as the following pictures will attest. At one point we had no less than 10 contractors working in the house, and we needed mirrors around corners basically to prevent traffic jams. Appliance delivery men, 5 guys finishing the tile and installing the carpet, 2 granite guys, and 2 electricians. For what it's worth, the granite guys showed up about 9:30AM and were there till after 10:00PM. I guess that's a lotta granite. They didn't get paid by the hour, and it was a flat rate for the job, so I give them credit for sticking with it and doing an outstanding job even though I know they were getting tired.

First picture, beginning of the day, granite arrives and we are so happy! 



In this picture, Rita is resolving the details of under-cabinet lighting and outlet placement with our electrician. What a nice guy... He was soaked in sweat and still has to come back on Monday. But he told me he had fun working on our job.

That's us, the party house!



So as I mentioned above, things got a little busy at times in the Broken House today.

Here's a snapshot of the kitchen area with just 4 people in there trying to work. This shows 1 granite guy (there were 2), the appliance delivery man (there were 2), Tim, and one of two electricians.

It was a fun atmosphere though. We had the radio on, lots of people talking and laughing, and a good group of workers. Everyone got their job done and I'm so happy with the sub-contractors we hired.

Here comes our new refrigerator. The blue stuff is a film to protect the stainless steel from scratches until after all the construction and moving is finished. We also got a new stainless dishwasher, stove/convection oven, and microwave.

The stove/oven comes next week, so as of now, we are still only about 3/4 complete on appliances.

An action photo of the two granite guys demo-ing the old laminate countertops. You can also see the new stainless microwave has been installed by this time, and we still have the old stove in as a place holder untl the new one gets delivered next week.

The electrician's ladder is visible in this picture. He is installing "above the bumpout" lighting (above the cabinet bumpout). That'll give the kitchen a nice glow in the evenings with the above cabinet lights and below cabinet lights as well.

From Rita's perspective, most of the day was spent painting over the creamsicle orange paint in the kids' bathroom. I had exactly two votes of confidence on the creamsicle orange from my blog readers, but the rest were silent. I guess if you don't have anything nice to say, people decided to say nothing at all. Tim was a little more vocal in his thoughts on the creamsicle orange. The decicing factor for me came when one of the flooring guys (who is also a painter) came by and said that with the proximity of the kids bedrooms to the kids bathroom, that "this end of the house looks like a box of crayons!" I think he meant it in a nice way, but I took the hint. So, the creamsicle paint was a little harder to paint over than one might have guessed!!!! I bought another paint in a pale yellowish/beige off of the $5.00 Lowe's bargain bin, so for those who are wondering, this bathroom has now cost me $10.00 in paint! It took a couple of coats of paint, especially on the cut-ins but I think the yellow is a little more subdued and normal. I also CLEANED the bathroom (much needed) and added a new light fixture over the sink. This is the 2nd light fixture I installed there. The first one was broken out of the box from Lowe's, and I didn't figure that out until it was mounted on the wall.

 

Next, here are Norah's and Tim's rooms with their carpeting installed. It's just a beigy-tan carpet in a berber style.

 Here is the clearer, better shot of the guest bedroom as promised. The carpet in here is the same as our Master Bedroom, and it's called "Stone" sort of a grayish/brownish/beige, a little darker than the kids' bedrooms.

 

Another shot of the granite guys in progress. Now you can see my faucet is installed, but still no dishwasher. We had to wait until after the sink, drains, garbage disposal, etc were all hooked up to install the dishwasher.

 Here's the refrigerator installed. Clearance of fractions of an inch on either side. Tim asked me as it was being delivered "Did you measure it? Is this thing going to fit?" My answer was "Yes, it'll fit" but mentally I was thinking "Oh crap, I should have measured."

Luckily it fit.

You can also see the granite on the little bar area next to the fridge, and the backsplash granite. I think it looks really pretty, and it'll look even better once the lighting stuff is all resolved.

So at this point in the day, the only ones left are Tim, the kids, me, and the 2 granite guys. Everyone else has been paid and left to start the weekend with their families. I think the granite guys wanted to hang out with us this weekend.... Just kidding. They were very hard working and they stayed until the job was done and they did an excellent job. One minor problem, the electrician had to leave and will fit the electric receptacles back into the granite on Monday. That means we didn't have any kitchen lighting and the granite guys had no way of seeing once it got dark!

Luckily, we grabbed one of the contractors before they left. They need to leave their trailer at our place over the weekend. We borrowed their portable spot light and used that in the kitchen so that the granite guys could see what they were doing.  That helped tremendously.

That's it for the Broken House on this edition. It's not so broken anymore. Today we are having new faucets installed in the kids' and guest bathrooms. We are cleaning the cabinets inside and out, and it's just the four Flaherty's in the house. We will begin moving in this week, having a garage sale at the old house next Saturday, and big stuff being moved next Monday. From soup to nuts, we have had the keys to this house for 23 days as of this morning. I can't believe it. On the one hand, it's been a blur, and on the other hand I can't believe how much has happened in 23 days. Tim keeps saying "This is like Ranger School all over again." For the rest of us who didn't go to Ranger School, it's just a put-your-head-down-and-do-it month!



Demo Ends but The Money Flow is Just Beginning

We are done with the demo of the broken house. As you can see from the following pictures, it's a mess, dirty, dusty, walls peeled, bare concrete floors. It's now ready to get put back together! Close-up of the existing stove cooktop, complete with a tile chip for a nose. Those things are EVERYWHERE. Even Stove Man is happy that the demo is just about over!

Because we're getting new tile and new countertops, there's really no point in cleaning these surfaces off, they'll just get messed up again until the new stuff gets installed. We are also getting new kitchen appliances since these are about 15 years old, and well-used. The house (and its occupants) deserve something new and beautiful. Painting begins tomorrow, September 23rd, and so does the tile install. Granite goes in on October 1st or maybe even earlier if the tile guys are done. These are *hopefully* the last pictures of the house all pulled apart that we'll ever be able to show:

And now some good news! Our granite kitchen countertops are on order, and here's a quick picture of what our granite is going to look like. The picture was taken outdoors, on our cement driveway so as to get the correct color in daylight (without a flash), and it's got browns and golds mostly in it. The floor tile is on the right, more on that in just a minute:

Onto the master bathroom. Tim finished the great wallpaper peel in there. We also removed the jacuzzi jetted tub. I don't have anything against jacuzzi's or jetted bathtubs personally, but I am not a huge bath person. I am definitely not a huge "looks like fake marble with a big crack in it" bath person. Even more so, I am not a "steps of cracked tile leading up to the romance capital of Florida in the fake marble bathtub" kind of person. So, the fake marble bathtub is history.

Tomorrow the area where the tub used to be will be dry-walled (just the walls of course), the tile will be laid, and we'll cap off the pipes for a future claw-foot, free-standing, soaking bathtub. I think it'll look nice!

We are also going to have granite countertops in the master bathroom with undermount sinks. I went to the warehouse today and I picked out a somewhat funky slab with "a lot of movement" as they say in the granite biz.

My gal Susan at the granite yard had been saving this piece for me, and I'm happy she did. The picture may not show it, but there are a lot of golds, grays, browns, and even pink in this granite. It's called Juparana Classic, and I guess it's from India. All that way to wind up in my very own bathroom!

Our tile installer also took us over to another client's house today to see the exact floor we are going to have installed! He has installed the same product in several houses with great results.

It is gorgeous. It's a French Pattern travertine tile with a rolled edge, and feels beautiful to the touch and it's beautiful to look at, and very nice to walk on.

Tim and I are nervous about the price tag but it's so elegant and nice, and I think will really make our house stand out. I'm excited to see it in our place!

Again, the kids have been so good throughout all this. And, as fate would have it, Norah is the "Student of the Week" or something, which mostly means that she has extra projects to write about all her adventures as a first grader. My thoughts: "Great timing, First Grade Teacher."

Thankfully we are finished with the extra work. Her big project? "My work on the broken house." Way to kill two birds with one stone. Here are a couple more pictures of the kids pitching in around the house, cleaning up Tim's wallpaper peelings:

The next time I submit a blog post, we should have paint up and floors being tiled. I am going to paint the bedrooms, kids and guest bath, and the laundry room, beginning this weekend. I want a funky color for the laundry room. Syracuse University orange or something to that effect. Pictures to follow!