Our Home Renovation

Today I decided to work on the built-in medicine cabinet. I’ve known for a long time how I wanted it to look, but it hadn’t gone anywhere beyond that. We were planning on putting beadboard in the back of it, however I didn’t have enough of it today (and Home Depot/Lowes were actually closed for once!). So, I decided to try another idea that I had a while back as an alternative: tile the back wall of the cabinet. We had some leftover 2″x2″ tiles from the floor and shower, so we proceeded to tile a 20″x24″ piece of MDF that would fit into the back of the cabinet and serve as the back wall.

Here’s what the medicine cabinet looked like when we moved in (just for kicks):

and here’s what it looked like this morning:

This is when we were getting started. Danielle was cutting apart all the little tiles and I was putting them onto the MDF:

Here it is almost finished:

And finished:

One problem that I hadn’t anticipated (though I should have) was that the moisture would cause the MDF to bow out in the middle. I wasn’t planning on doing anything to attach it, I was just going to put it into the back of the cabinet rough-in and the build the frame of the cabinet in front of it. Since it bowed, however, I had to come up with an alternative. I ended up pulling a few random tiles off before the mastic had dried and nailing the MDF to the wall. This solved the bowing problem and fixed it in place, too. Unfortunately the small nails from the nail gun went through the wall into the closet behind, but I can trim those off later.

This is what it looks like with the frame in place:

I still have to build the door (with mirror) for it, as well as drill the holes in the two side pieces for adjustable shelves, then do the outside trim. So far, though, we love how it looks! Much nicer (and more exciting) than beadboard!

We took possession of the house yesterday and pretty quickly got started on the long list of work that we need to do. We first tore up the carpet that was in the dining room, family room and foyer. We knew there were hardwood floors underneath, but we weren’t sure what to expect of them – there was quite a bit of apparent “water” (yellow water would be more accurate, if you catche my drift) damage on the carpet, so we didn’t hold too high of hopes for the hardwood. We were extremely surprised, however, to find that the hardwood underneath was in fantastic shape. Better than the other rooms in the house, in fact. There are some scratches on it and it needs to be cleaned well, but otherwise, it is (almost) gorgeous.

While Danielle was pulling staples and removing the tack strips, I started working on the bathroom demolition. “Demo” or “Demo Day” has become quite a common term, thanks to Extreme Makeover Home Edition. I had always wondered why they never saved anything from the houses that they tear down – now I know. In the bathroom, we decided to try and save a few of the items so we could sell them and get a few extra dollars. Well, demo becomes a totally different thing when you’re try to save stuff. Forget the sledge hammer, you need screw drivers and putty knives to remove things if you plan on saving them. In the end (so far), we managed to save a couple towel bars and the vanity countertop. We’ll also save the toilet and second vanity countertop, but I think that’s going to be all.

With the vanity removed (which ended up being very time consuming just so we could save the countertop), it was time to tear into the wall. The wall ended up being a little different than we expected. The walls are floor-to-ceiling tile that was put in sometime in the seventies, most likely. The wall consists of the following, from back to front: 3/8″ drywall (that’s what it appears to be, though it seems an odd size), wire mesh, approx. 1/2″ concrete, another layer of concrete approx. 1/4″ thick, adhesive, ceramic tile. Breaking through plaster is no problem. Two layers of concrete is another story.

We did get a fairly large hole made in the wall and hopefully will get the rest of the wall removed today. The good news in all of this, is that there is no lead paint on this wall, so there’s dust, but it’s safe dust. We didn’t get as lucky on the opposite wall, though it is just plaster (painted with lead paint) under the tile, so it’s easy to remove.

Enough of my rambling, here are some photos from day 1.

Our first major project (of the many listed previously) will be a complete remodel of the bathroom. As soon as closing is complete next week, we plan on starting the demolition.

The house currently has one full bathroom on the main floor. The house was built in 1927, so most of the wiring is knob-and-tube style and the plumbing is currently all galvanized. We’ll be tearing the bathroom down to the studs in order to get a good idea of the “insides” of the house – it will enable us to see what kind of insulation is in the house, what condition the wiring is in (and upgrade it) and also allow us to upgrade the plumbing. The bathroom is 4’8″x 9’8″ and contains a bath/shower, 2 vanities (though one is only a countertop, no sink) and a toilet. There is a fairly large window (28″w x 45″ h) over the bathtub.

The bathroom contains at least one layer of lead-based paint, which was pointed out by our home inspector. Apparently separation and cracking of individual layers of paint is a good indicator of the presence of lead, so we will be wearing special masks to help filter the lead particles while we are tearing out the walls and ceiling.

Since there’s no way to know exactly what we’ll find when we get into the walls, it’s hard to know exactly what our next step will be after demolition. We’ll need to upgrade the wiring and electrical, as well as insulation perhaps.

We worked to try and change the layout (illustration coming soon), but there really isn’t much room to expand any of the walls. There is a closet against one wall, however inside that wall are numerous pipes, including the main sewer vent line. The pipes could be moved, but it seems like we wouldn’t be gaining enough to make it worth the extra hassle, time and expense. So, the layout will remain basically the same.

The floor will be ceramic tile from DalTile (we’ll put up tile samples soon) in a pinwheel pattern that has actually been a lot of fun to layout. It is a combination of white 8″x8″ and gray, dark blue and light blue 2×2″ tiles. The walls will have wainscoting, painted white, that goes up 48″ and the walls will be painted light blue above that. I’ll be building the vanities and the sinks will be ceramic basins created by a pottery studio nearby. We’ll be putting recessed lighting in the ceiling along with a exhaust fan, as there currently isn’t one. The countertops on the vanities will (hopefully) be made of the same material we plan on using in the kitchen – Caesarstone – in a dark gray that resembles concrete.

We’ll be posting illustrations of what we’re planning on the bathroom looking like, as well as more photos of the existing bathroom as soon as we can.