Tuesday, September 22, 2015
The heart of the home.
I forgot to share any photos of our makeshift kitchen! We are in the process of putting it back together again but for now we have a makeshift counter top, no stove, and a large row of top cabinets with no doors that need to be ripped out. We have been here several weeks now and things are going okay and I'm adjusting to living this way. Although I can't wait to get the kitchen looking better! We used up a lot of our funds having to do so much work that we did not anticipate so unfortunately we have to live with makeshift stuff a little longer than we planned. So far it has been okay. We have several small appliances that allow me to make regular meals and Damien has been doing a lot of grilling lately. We found a sink/faucet that was only $20 at the ReBuildIt store. The one that was here was disgusting and didn't work properly. We had to call in my dad again when we were trying to hook up this sink because the pipes were (of course) totally screwed up and leaked and needed replaced. He came to the rescue (again) and since we've been here everything has functioned properly... knock on wood. It just isn't very pretty!
This is basically how our makeshift kitchen is looking right now. Not exactly how I envisioned my kitchen to look when I owned a home but hey - it's functioning for now and it's only temporary.
Sunday, September 13, 2015
The Other House...
Damien has not been to our other house in about 6 weeks because he's been spending all his extra time getting the mobile home livable for us. Now that things are (somewhat) in order here, he had to go work over there this past Monday. We received a certified letter from the borough about a side porch/overhang needing to be removed or we faced a $1,000 fine. We were almost at the deadline so it needed to be taken care of. We don't have a building permit yet but you are able to knock things down without one so that is all that was done. Enough for now to keep the borough happy (hopefully?) and keep us from getting fined (hopefully?).Here's some photos of the house before & after. Obviously not a huge change. Our plan was to work on the inside and then tackle the outside but it seems as though we may have to do the opposite now that the borough is after us to get it done. We knew as soon as someone new owned it we would start getting into trouble so we are just trying to figure out what is best to do when. Next we are thinking we will find someone reliable to cut down a gigantic tree in the front yard that makes us very nervous. It's huge and if God forbid it ever goes down it's either going to crush our house, the neighbors house, or block the road - so we really just want to have it removed.
My dad saw the house for the first time when the porch came down and he liked it! He felt it had a good foundation, too, which was good news for me since we were unable to look into that stuff when we bought it. I'm anxious to finally be able to see this house slowly transform!
Sunday, September 6, 2015
Obstacles do not block the path, they are the path.
So far today has been a pretty big bummer! I woke up this morning with high hopes of doing laundry and organizing things around here. Yesterday Damien spent the afternoon getting the washer and dryer hooked up. Under normal circumstances that wouldn't take a whole afternoon and two trips to Lowe's but the pipes coming into the trailer leaked so they needed replaced. He also ended up having to replace the receptacle for the dryer because at some point they changed the outlets on dryers and the one here did not match up with our plug.So this morning Damien finished up hooking everything up and everything seemed to be working. There were no more leaks and the receptacle was good to go. I was so happy as laundry has been seriously piling up here lately. That's when things took a turn. The funny thing is that you can work so hard on something and think for sure it's fixed and then some random thing goes wrong that you never thought would. That is what happened to us this morning. Damien turned on the washer empty to run it through a cycle to ensure everything was in working order. Things seemed great..until the drain cycle... when everything went terribly wrong. Out of nowhere the drain hose ripped off the back of the washer and water started spewing hot water EVERYWHERE. We tried our best to stop the water but there wasn't much we could do. Damien tried to block the water from coming out the back while I used a bucket to get it out of the washer. Eventually we were able to get the washer to the back door to drain the remainder of the water out but not before probably about 20-30 gallons of water went all over our new subfloors. Now Damien has ripped those out and they are outside. We are hoping they can be salvaged but we'll see.
We went out and got a new drain hose and have successfully ran a load of laundry through the washer without any more water issues. It was scary as could be turning it back on but things are okay now and the trailer is smelling like Gain and bleach and we have some clean towels!
Now on to the next obstacle!
Tuesday, September 1, 2015
Happiness is peace of mind.
Yesterday was the final day we were able to be in our house, so we had to move into the "little house" as Abigail calls it. The place is basically a disaster zone right now but she couldn't be more happy. My dad thinks it's because it's such a small place and we are all now really close together. Either way, it's amazing to see things through her eyes. This is such an exciting time for her!Yesterday was a very stressful day but we successfully got everything out of the rental house and into the mobile home without an inch of space (or time!) to spare. Each corner of this place is crowded right now and stayed crowded through the day today because we were all way too tired to do anything about it since we were moving and cleaning extremely late into the night.
We had to call my dad in for help with the sink we got because (of course) it leaked when we hooked it up - just like everything else in here. It ended up taking him last night and today after work but we are leak free at this point and our sink and drains work. It was a huge relief to have his help because we were unable to turn on the main water without having that sink hooked up since there wasn't shut off valves for the faucet. Guess what? There is now!
Here is how things were set up for sleeping last night at about 1:30am when the three of us finally were able to go to sleep: a mattress thrown down on the floor and two couches. Perfect.
The "kitchen" is a complete mess. I moved things around a little bit today for my dad to come fix our sink but otherwise I did absolutely nothing.
It doesn't look much different right now but I'm hoping tomorrow to get things a little bit organized around here. At least to the point where we can all find outfits in the morning.
Tonight Damien made some delicious chicken on the grill and we ate it off paper plates and it was a great feeling. While we were eating he said "I know we are living in tornado alley right now (because of the mess) but I can't help but feel such a sense of relief." I couldn't have agreed more.
I love my family so much and though things are completely unorganized and a mess and only half work sometimes - I feel so blessed.
Sunday, August 30, 2015
Slow and steady.
It's been a really long couple weeks. I'm sorry that I haven't posted, however in my defense, not a whole lot to report! We ran in to some issues with the water and that took us a long time to get working. Eventually, we called in the reserves, AKA, my dad, to lend us a helping hand.Thankfully, things are now back in order. The water is currently shut off but that is a good thing because it's because we are installing a "new" sink and counter in the kitchen!
The water situation in the bathroom was really frustrating and broke my heart because it messed up Abigail's paper bag floor THREE different times. That made me sad because I put a lot of effort into the floor. I guess I should have waited to ever fix it instead of fixing it each time - but each time I thought the water thing was situated and then it never was.
We finally ended up replacing basically everything and anything we could having to do with the shower. And when I say me - I mean Damien. Eventually we (Damien) settled on these awesome things called Shark Bites. If you are EVER doing any kind of work to pipes I highly recommend them. It didn't take long at all to install and immediately fixed our problem.
The last couple weeks haven't been all bad. Our dog Otis got to see the house for the first time and he seems to be okay with it.
We also purchased a "new to us" fridge.
Abigail has started kindergarten so the race is on to get this place livable so we can move in. We are hoping to have that accomplished (believe it or not) in the next few days. What more do you need other than a place to sleep, shower, and eat, right?
Saturday, August 15, 2015
Note to self: Stop expecting.
My biggest problem with this whole mobile home remodel is that I expect to accomplish too much in one day. I really need to stop doing that. Since I have realized I do this, I am also now expecting to live in the mobile home longer than I think we will so I'm not let down when all the projects at our house take way longer than we plan on them taking.I guess when you buy an older home as you start to remodel you uncover things underneath that need work, too. That is how things went for us today. We spent a solid eight hours working and I thought for sure when we got there this morning that by the end of the day the bathtub would be redone with new faucet, shower head and walls and that the window would be completed and last but not least that Abigail's room would be painted. The window is done. Ok, not done but it is installed and sturdy. Everything else I mentioned is a hot mess.
I promised in this blog to show my readers even the worst part of remodels. I am not going to gloss over the worst days. Here is how we ended our day in the bathroom..
Disgusting, right? And to think I thought we were going to leave there today with a sparkling clean like- new bathtub! You see the previous owner - I'm just gonna say it - was an idiot! There was a leak in the cold water pipe and he just took a ton of silicone over the pipe which did not fix anything. The water was also constantly running on the cold side as well. I'm guessing it had something to do with all the silicone. Anyways - it left Damien feeling like he had no choice but to cut out the entire faucet and pipe that runs up to the shower. It's all water damaged anyways so it probably ended up being a good thing he did that. Now we are heading to Home Depot or Lowe's tomorrow with this bad boy in tow to figure out what the hell we are supposed to do.
The biggest hold up of our day was that we could not find a shut-off valve anywhere. It was several hours before we finally located the main shut-off valve for the house. Also, in case you are wondering, there is tons of spiders under the skirting of a mobile home. Gross.
I don't want to end this post on a negative note - so I'll show some photos of the window that has been put in the back of the house. What is really fun about this window is that we bought it on sale for only $10! It wasn't quite the right size but Damien did a great job making it work. In the next few days he will make it look pretty but for now it's sealed up and sturdy and no more bugs will get in.
Here's to a better day tomorrow!
Wednesday, August 12, 2015
Painting & Flooring
The plywood flooring project is FINALLY done. Damien finished up the section in the bedroom tonight that he felt needed to be reinforced. Now all the plywood has been laid down and we are ready for some other type of flooring to go on top. This is a huge relief as that project was beginning to feel like it would never end. Here is the bedroom - back in one piece and sturdy!
If you look at the first picture - you can see what one of the upcoming projects is. You guessed it! Fixing that ridiculous window. Here are some closer shots to give you an idea of what is going on here. They had a window air conditioner in there. Every day we go there I'm amazed at the way these people lived.
We don't really have our plan worked out yet but we think the parts of the window were in the closet so there is a very slim chance we can just put the window back together. We have to wait and see what happens when Damien tears off that plywood.
I also started painting in the kitchen. We picked a really bright color for the cabinets. So far I think I like it. The walls definitely need more paint on them and so do the cabinets - but it is definitely looking cleaner than it was ten days ago.
We will also be replacing the counter because it's in really bad shape underneath and has a lot of water damage.
This past weekend we were at a carnival/flea market in Palmyra and I found 10 yards of the fabric pictured below for only $5. It really caught my eye and I'm going to be using some of it in the kitchen. I think it will match our paint choice very nicely. I'm anxious for the kitchen to be pulled together. That will help the overall look of the house drastically.
There are so many projects to be done to make this little place a home but very slowly I see things coming together. Here's a cute shot of Abigail helping me work on her brown paper floor that we are putting down in her room! More on that another day!
