Finish line in sight

The master bath is trimmed and primed. We decided to put some more wainscoting around the tub area to make it pop a little more. This weekend we will paint and get everything clean because the shower glass is coming Monday morning. We are almost there!

How to trim out a pocket door

This weekend we would like to be done with the master bathroom completely so tonight I had to trim out the pocket door to the toilet room. Our door was a little bit tricky since it closes against a perpendicular wall, but the steps are generally the same. First I had to rip 1.5" strips to go on either side of the door closing so the door disappears flush when it's open. Before I did this I adjusted the backstop on the door with a couple pieces of wood to make sure when the trim was installed everything was perfectly flush. Not the easiest task, but it definitely pays off to be exact. Then I installed a 4.5" strip for the door to close against and the wall trim to rest against.

Since this wall was going to be a little odd looking with the regular 4" trim we've been using around the doors I decided to give it some more detail by using 1/4" MDF in a wainscoting effect. The rest of the bathroom is going to get a bluish/grey paint, but this wall will remain white to make it pop and give the bathroom some character.

A good day for indoor work

It was a dark and stormy day...and, well, nothing exciting really happened.  But it was a productive day nonetheless as we move forward on the detail work on the second floor.  We spent the day finishing installing the base trim, puttied and caulked all the trim, and - after a few false starts while Brian figured out how to cut the crown molding (and I stood around and said vaguely encouraging things) - started installing the crown in the master bedroom.  The pictures above show one half of the entry hall with crown and one without so it's a nice snapshot of the difference.  We got about halfway through the master bedroom installation and then put the project on hold because we're going to take back the rest of the molding that we previously purchased and exchange it.  A word to the wise - do not buy the double-sided crown molding.  It seems like it would be easier to work with, but it doesn't line up quite right from front to back so it actually just creates more problems.  So, if you're planning to do this yourself, save a trip and just buy the one-sided crown molding the first time!

We also had a helper in today - a friend of our drywall guys who came over to give us a hand with painting.  He finished both built-in closets in the two guest bedrooms and put two coats of paint on the trim and doors in one of the bedrooms so that is a great help.  We'll probably have him back over next weekend as well.  It feels like we've spent the last two weeks doing nothing but installing and puttying and caulking trim so we know exactly how much there is still to paint...and we could certainly use a hand with that!  All in all, it turned out to be a good day to spend inside and get a lot of work done!

Consequences of not planning...

...Or better yet - consequences of changing the plan after the fact. Originally we were going to put sconces in the master bath. So I wired everything up in the bathroom for future sconces. We didn't have the vanity picked out yet either so I left the wires dangling in the general area we wanted to eventually put the electrical boxes. I would highly suggest you not do this if you're planning something similar. Next time we will definitely have these decisions (lights/vanity/spacing) made before we close up the walls.

Fast forward to present day... We couldn't find any sconces we liked enough so we decided to go with normal above the mirror lighting... oops. The drywallers poked the wires through where they could and now the wires are way off from where I want them to be. I toyed with the idea of poking a series of holes to reroute each one, but that seemed like it was going to be a huge pain and make a huge mess. I decided on ripping off about a 6x2 section of drywall to give me better access. It was messy, but I was able to get everything routed to where I needed them to be. After some cleanup I got the lights wired up and the outlets roughed in. The last picture is my first of probably about 6 coats of drywall mud to get that wall back to being smooth. At least it will mostly be covered by mirrors in case I don't get it perfect.

You can also check out the granite we picked out for the master bath. Soon we'll post some pics of the whole space. Still some work to do in there this week/weekend before we can call it finished.

Productive Day

We spent the day checking more tasks off the to-do list - grouting the master bath shower walls, trimming out the remainder of the doors and windows on the second floor, finishing floor trim in the second floor bedrooms, and for me, puttying all the nail holes, and for Brian, plumbing the guest bath on the second floor and doing some electrical work in the master bathroom.  The guest bath now has two working sinks so it is very nearly complete.  We ran into a small problem with the master bath vanity when Brian discovered that the installers drilled the faucet holes too close to the sink, leaving no room for the valves.  I would be upset but it was the end of a long day for the installers and it's a problem easily fixed...just as soon as I get the granite company on the phone tomorrow and get them to send someone out.  In the meantime, I am still spending far too much time admiring the marble kitchen countertops (gratuitous picture above) to be particularly bothered about the bathroom.

All in all, it feels good to be making visible progress on the second floor, especially after so much time spent laying the (sometimes literal) groundwork for these projects.  We'll spend some evenings this week ticking more tasks off the list and hopefully be ready to start painting next weekend!

This is not DIY

I had a little trouble posting these pictures yesterday (I'm clearly not the IT side of the family) so they're a day late but I think the (near) finished product, the kitchen, makes up for the delay.  We had our countertops installed yesterday and it's definitely not a DIY project - it took two big guys to even get the island countertop into the house, much less set it in place, but the countertops are in now and we're really happy with how they look!  We went with a honed white carrera marble and a simple Grohe faucet for the sink and a small soap dispenser so everything is very streamlined and unobtrusive.  We still need to pick out and install a backsplash but the kitchen is coming together and we're looking forward to hosting some great dinner parties here in the coming months!

More pictures to follow tomorrow as we also had countertops installed in both second floor bathrooms and Brian is, as I type, installing faucets.  We finished the last of the master bath tile today as well and will grout tomorrow, and I spent some quality time going around the second floor with painter's putty getting the trim ready for finishing.  The clock is rapidly ticking down to April but I still think we have a shot at getting moved in upstairs by - or at least around - the first of the month.  Regardless of exact timing, we're not far off now!

Delivery!

Can't wait to start using these.

Wall tile... Check

We finished up the master bath wall tile today. All that's left to tile is the curb and we are waiting on more of the grey floor tile to finish that. Hopefully next weekend we can grout everything and get some paint in here. There was also a fair bit of trimming, puttying, an painting going on all weekend. Getting close to the finish line!

The little things

The good thing about not living upstairs is the entire floor is our workplace. The bad thing is we need to be 100% done before we can move upstairs. So it seems like we spent an entire day doing small jobs. There's still a lot of detail work to do before we are ready to paint which hopefully is the last step. The big pain of the day was tiling the shower pan. The little tiles were tough to get them nice and straight. After that we knocked out some trim an hung the last door. Plus we finished up all the odd pieces of hardwood flooring and the master bath marble threshold.

Floor... Check

We finished up the master bathroom floor today. The large format tiles are a pain to cut, but they do make installation much quicker. Once the floor tiles were down we could set all five cabinets for the vanity. The countertop template guy is coming Tuesday and hopefully both bathrooms and the kitchen countertops should be installed in a couple weeks. For the past year and a half we have been sharing a tiny 1950's bathroom with the words smallest sink so having a 7 foot vanity is going to be a nice reward for all the hard work.

Chugging along

An hour here and there this week and the master bathroom floor is almost done. I also got the first of five vanity cabinets built. By tomorrow night we need to have the floor done and all the cabinets built so we can get the countertops measured next week. We should have all the countertops installed the following week so big changes are coming!