July 1992
Planted two new trees in the small peninsula of dirt between our driveway and the neighbor's driveway. Bradford Pears. These have worked out beautifully. They are of moderate height -- maybe 20 feet tall, but very round in shape. In the spring and summer, they have large green leaves. They provide much needed shade for both our drive (in the morning) and the neighbor's (in the afternoon). In the fall, the leaves turn brilliant shades of yellow and red.
15 July to 30 July 1992
Thompson Painting, Drywall and Handyman stained and sealed the outside wood. Under the eaves, and around the windows and doors. The wood gables on the left, right, front and back. Kelly Moore Color #364 Natural Cedar. $2790.00
22 July to 29 July
Install ceiling fans in both kids bedrooms. Fans, pull-chains, lights. This was easier because I could get access in the attic to the electrical and framing work in the ceiling. Removed the old light fixture, and put in a new electrical box and fan brace. Ran extra wire and put in a new switch box, so that instead of the old single switch we now have two switches -- one for the light and one for the fan. $124.68.
21 Sept 1992
17 Oct 1992
Bought two wooden shelfs (at Target) and installed them in the Master Bathroom and the middle Bathroom. These are solid oak shelfs, with a little rail around them, to keep things from falling off. $37.98.
October 29, 1992
Upgrade the sprinkler system. There were some dry spots in the yard, so I asked Gorbet, who put in the sprinkler system originally, to come back and add some more heads and move heads around, as necessary to get better coverage. $123.03
November 7, 1992
Bought a cubic yard of Garden Mix from Gardenville for the yard. $30.24.
Saturday, November 7, 1992
Friday, August 14, 1992
Bathroom Repairs
July 1992
For some time -- 2 years -- we had noticed problems with water in the shower area. After a shower, we would find water outside the shower, in a corner on the tile. The problem was a leaking shower pan (under the tile). The water would leak into the space under the tile, on top of the concrete slab, and then migrate out from the shower. This caused water damage to the bathroom shower walls, and even into the bedroom.
All the tile had to be replaced around the shower and tub.
Frank Leitzel was the general repair person. He first removed all the damaged tile from the floor and walls. Instead of the pre-fab shower pan (the part under the tile that had leaked), he installed a fiberglass pan, custom made to the shower.
Then we had to re-install the tile. Myrle Brooks did that. He did a "mud-set" of the tile, which should be better, in the long term, than the standard "thin-set".
The hard part for us was finding the workmen, and picking out the replacement tile. Naturally, it being 6 years after the house was built, the old tile that we had picked out was no longer available.
The general repairs were 1325. The tile installation was 850. The tile cost 514.68. Our house insurance covered a lot of the repairs for the damage. They paid 4400.28 for the damage. Unless there is more that I don't have records for, it looks like they paid us 1810.60 more than the cost of the repairs.
For some time -- 2 years -- we had noticed problems with water in the shower area. After a shower, we would find water outside the shower, in a corner on the tile. The problem was a leaking shower pan (under the tile). The water would leak into the space under the tile, on top of the concrete slab, and then migrate out from the shower. This caused water damage to the bathroom shower walls, and even into the bedroom.
All the tile had to be replaced around the shower and tub.
Frank Leitzel was the general repair person. He first removed all the damaged tile from the floor and walls. Instead of the pre-fab shower pan (the part under the tile that had leaked), he installed a fiberglass pan, custom made to the shower.
Then we had to re-install the tile. Myrle Brooks did that. He did a "mud-set" of the tile, which should be better, in the long term, than the standard "thin-set".
The hard part for us was finding the workmen, and picking out the replacement tile. Naturally, it being 6 years after the house was built, the old tile that we had picked out was no longer available.
The general repairs were 1325. The tile installation was 850. The tile cost 514.68. Our house insurance covered a lot of the repairs for the damage. They paid 4400.28 for the damage. Unless there is more that I don't have records for, it looks like they paid us 1810.60 more than the cost of the repairs.
Saturday, April 20, 1991
More Making a House into a Home
In addition to major projects, there are continuing efforts to make the house into a home, by personalizing it to our own needs. Most of these are small jobs, but they add up.
Sept 1987
Added a shelf in the utility room over the washing machine. This is mounted on the wall to the garage, and provides a convenient place for bleach and distilled water, and other laundry items. $44.57
August 1988
A coat rack for mounting on the wall in the front entranceway. Four brass coat hooks on a wooden board.
$35.00
7 Feb 1989
Wire shelves for hanging on the inside of the pantry closet door. The shelves are only about a tin can in depth -- maybe 5 inches deep and 18 inches wide, but its 72 inches tall, so it pretty much fills up the back of the door. and provides 8 or 9 shelves, for cans and boxes.
Dec 1989
Put up a shelf in the Utility room to hang things. This is a white wire shelf with 4 hooks underneath. Originally, it was for hanging up the kids' book bags after school, but eventually it became used to hold the plastic bags from grocery stores, and dog leashes, and extension cords. $31.16
16 Dec 1989
Added a switch to the outlet in the front of the garage. We plugged the exterior Christmas lights into this outlet, so it was convenient to have it switched, so that we could easily turn the lights on and off. $10.68
Dec to Jan 1990
James Conner, my ex-wife's nephew, designed a landscaping for the big bed in the back yard, and then implemented it. He cleared all the rock from the bed, added mulch to the soil, and dirt. He modified the sprinkler system and then put in plants. The idea was two layers -- Nandina on one level and another plant on another level. With the native trees that were already there -- a couple of cedar, a Mexican Laurel, and some Shin Oaks -- above it all. Over time, the Nandina has taken over the lower levels, so now it is just Nandina below and the trees above. Linda calls it "The Jungle". It's quite dense and overgrown. The cat likes to go in it and hide away, emerging from the jungle when she wants to come in. $112.81 for dirt (6 yards of garden mix from Whittlesey Brothers), $15.52 for mulch. $207.42 for plants. $148.00 for labor.
Nov 1990 to April 1991
Built a workbench in the garage. Mounted a 2x2 on the wall with lag bolts on the sides and back walls. Then used a metal bracket to attach another 2x2 to the front, forming a horizontal frame mounted to the walls. On top of this put a 3/4 inch piece of plywood cut to fit. Made two surfaces this way, one about 20 inches from the floor and the other 36 inches. Did the same along the other wall, so that the workbench is an L-shape. In the front corner, I used a steel angle-iron piece to bolt to both sides of the L-shape, as a support, but not massive or intrusive. Most of the plywood was covered with polyurethane (2 coats), but
I also used a left-over piece of Formica counter top to cover one surface. $49.13. $18.05. $6.45. $108.26. $16.31. $20.74.
Behind the workbench, on the walls, I mounted 3/8 inch plywood sheets, so that there was a solid surface for nails, and hooks, and hangers, for holding tools and such.
This combination gives me two storage shelves -- one on the floor and one on the lower shelf, plus a nice workspace on the top shelf, with my tools and supplies hanging on the walls. Of course, over time, more and more stuff got left on top of the workbench. I've been collecting the silverware baskets out of discarded dishwashers to hold tools and such, and a headboard from a water bed sits on the top of the workbench as a shelf unit. As a result there is very little work space, but there could be, if I just cleaned it up.
Sept 1987
Added a shelf in the utility room over the washing machine. This is mounted on the wall to the garage, and provides a convenient place for bleach and distilled water, and other laundry items. $44.57
August 1988
A coat rack for mounting on the wall in the front entranceway. Four brass coat hooks on a wooden board.
$35.00
7 Feb 1989
Wire shelves for hanging on the inside of the pantry closet door. The shelves are only about a tin can in depth -- maybe 5 inches deep and 18 inches wide, but its 72 inches tall, so it pretty much fills up the back of the door. and provides 8 or 9 shelves, for cans and boxes.
Dec 1989
Put up a shelf in the Utility room to hang things. This is a white wire shelf with 4 hooks underneath. Originally, it was for hanging up the kids' book bags after school, but eventually it became used to hold the plastic bags from grocery stores, and dog leashes, and extension cords. $31.16
16 Dec 1989
Added a switch to the outlet in the front of the garage. We plugged the exterior Christmas lights into this outlet, so it was convenient to have it switched, so that we could easily turn the lights on and off. $10.68
Dec to Jan 1990
James Conner, my ex-wife's nephew, designed a landscaping for the big bed in the back yard, and then implemented it. He cleared all the rock from the bed, added mulch to the soil, and dirt. He modified the sprinkler system and then put in plants. The idea was two layers -- Nandina on one level and another plant on another level. With the native trees that were already there -- a couple of cedar, a Mexican Laurel, and some Shin Oaks -- above it all. Over time, the Nandina has taken over the lower levels, so now it is just Nandina below and the trees above. Linda calls it "The Jungle". It's quite dense and overgrown. The cat likes to go in it and hide away, emerging from the jungle when she wants to come in. $112.81 for dirt (6 yards of garden mix from Whittlesey Brothers), $15.52 for mulch. $207.42 for plants. $148.00 for labor.
Nov 1990 to April 1991
Built a workbench in the garage. Mounted a 2x2 on the wall with lag bolts on the sides and back walls. Then used a metal bracket to attach another 2x2 to the front, forming a horizontal frame mounted to the walls. On top of this put a 3/4 inch piece of plywood cut to fit. Made two surfaces this way, one about 20 inches from the floor and the other 36 inches. Did the same along the other wall, so that the workbench is an L-shape. In the front corner, I used a steel angle-iron piece to bolt to both sides of the L-shape, as a support, but not massive or intrusive. Most of the plywood was covered with polyurethane (2 coats), but
I also used a left-over piece of Formica counter top to cover one surface. $49.13. $18.05. $6.45. $108.26. $16.31. $20.74.
Behind the workbench, on the walls, I mounted 3/8 inch plywood sheets, so that there was a solid surface for nails, and hooks, and hangers, for holding tools and such.
This combination gives me two storage shelves -- one on the floor and one on the lower shelf, plus a nice workspace on the top shelf, with my tools and supplies hanging on the walls. Of course, over time, more and more stuff got left on top of the workbench. I've been collecting the silverware baskets out of discarded dishwashers to hold tools and such, and a headboard from a water bed sits on the top of the workbench as a shelf unit. As a result there is very little work space, but there could be, if I just cleaned it up.
Wednesday, November 16, 1988
Bookcases
April 1988
When the house was built, the first room off the front entry way was the "living room". I planned to use this as an office. And because I have a fair number of books, I wanted to make it a combination office and library. Since I didn't know what I wanted for books shelves, we left the room empty, but I did ask them to raise the ceiling as high up as they could go. Because of the way the roof was laid out, this meant we could take it up to 10 feet, an extra 2 feet over the normal 8 foot ceiling height.
Now, two years after the house was built, I ordered some built-in bookcases. Preliminary inquiries showed that I couldn't just go to a cabinet maker and say "I want built-in bookcases, floor to ceiling, in my office." I needed an actual plan of exactly what I wanted. So I had spent some time looking at books and movies and designed my own bookcases. Then I took those to several places and asked if they could do it, would do it, and how much it would cost.
I picked Daniel Musselman, working under the name of "Interior Woodworks" on Todd Lane, in Austin, Texas. He did an excellent job! I signed an order on 21 April 1988 and finished the job on 23 June 1988 by installing the bookshelves in the house. These were pre-finished (two coats of polyurethane), solid wood (oak) custom bookcases, costing $4184.00.
The shelves stretch across one whole wall, and then extend out on both of the adjoining walls, basically 5 sections 3 feet wide, 15 inches deep, and 10 feet high. (So there must be a 15 inch by 15 inch square of unused space in each of the two corners. The shelves are all adjustable, except for two fixed shelves at 34 inches and 90 inches from the floor (for strength and rigidity). On the left and right sections, the bottom area (below the 34 inch fixed shelf) have cabinet doors. They were made as just frames, and I purchased two pieces of "glue chip" obscured glass from Renaissance Glass, $42.88, to fill the frame, on 1 August 1988.
There are three electrical outlets behind the book shelves, and I cut holes to allow them to still be used. I bought Myrtlewood outlet covers for these three outlets in Oregon (3 for 2.75 each = $8.75). These blend in nicely. (It's sometimes difficult to find the outlets, they blend in so well.)
One issue, of course, is getting to the books on the top shelves. For that we need a ladder. Not just a ladder, but a rolling library ladder! In October, I ordered a custom made "#1 Straight Side Oak Rolling Wood, Track Mounted Ladder with Natural Finish" from the Cotterman Company in Croswell, Michigan. The order was placed on 3 October 1988 and it was shipped on 31 October, with delivery on 16 November 1988. The ladder was $303.50 plus $57.67 in shipping costs.
Once the ladder was delivered, I installed it.
These bookcases fit perfectly with the hardwood (oak) flooring. The only problem, long term, that I have had with them is that I keep filling them up with books! I have thought about extending around the room, but doubt that I could get as good a job as these.
When the house was built, the first room off the front entry way was the "living room". I planned to use this as an office. And because I have a fair number of books, I wanted to make it a combination office and library. Since I didn't know what I wanted for books shelves, we left the room empty, but I did ask them to raise the ceiling as high up as they could go. Because of the way the roof was laid out, this meant we could take it up to 10 feet, an extra 2 feet over the normal 8 foot ceiling height.
Now, two years after the house was built, I ordered some built-in bookcases. Preliminary inquiries showed that I couldn't just go to a cabinet maker and say "I want built-in bookcases, floor to ceiling, in my office." I needed an actual plan of exactly what I wanted. So I had spent some time looking at books and movies and designed my own bookcases. Then I took those to several places and asked if they could do it, would do it, and how much it would cost.
I picked Daniel Musselman, working under the name of "Interior Woodworks" on Todd Lane, in Austin, Texas. He did an excellent job! I signed an order on 21 April 1988 and finished the job on 23 June 1988 by installing the bookshelves in the house. These were pre-finished (two coats of polyurethane), solid wood (oak) custom bookcases, costing $4184.00.
The shelves stretch across one whole wall, and then extend out on both of the adjoining walls, basically 5 sections 3 feet wide, 15 inches deep, and 10 feet high. (So there must be a 15 inch by 15 inch square of unused space in each of the two corners. The shelves are all adjustable, except for two fixed shelves at 34 inches and 90 inches from the floor (for strength and rigidity). On the left and right sections, the bottom area (below the 34 inch fixed shelf) have cabinet doors. They were made as just frames, and I purchased two pieces of "glue chip" obscured glass from Renaissance Glass, $42.88, to fill the frame, on 1 August 1988.
There are three electrical outlets behind the book shelves, and I cut holes to allow them to still be used. I bought Myrtlewood outlet covers for these three outlets in Oregon (3 for 2.75 each = $8.75). These blend in nicely. (It's sometimes difficult to find the outlets, they blend in so well.)
One issue, of course, is getting to the books on the top shelves. For that we need a ladder. Not just a ladder, but a rolling library ladder! In October, I ordered a custom made "#1 Straight Side Oak Rolling Wood, Track Mounted Ladder with Natural Finish" from the Cotterman Company in Croswell, Michigan. The order was placed on 3 October 1988 and it was shipped on 31 October, with delivery on 16 November 1988. The ladder was $303.50 plus $57.67 in shipping costs.
Once the ladder was delivered, I installed it.
These bookcases fit perfectly with the hardwood (oak) flooring. The only problem, long term, that I have had with them is that I keep filling them up with books! I have thought about extending around the room, but doubt that I could get as good a job as these.
Thursday, August 11, 1988
Initial Landscaping
October 1987
With a new house, the builder tends to clear the lot and build the house. When he is done, they bring in top-soil to spread around the house, and in our case, grass (sod) on top of that. They work on building the house but not much more. So we had pretty much a boring, neutral front and back yard. They did leave some of the native trees, but not a lot of them.
The first task was to put a fence around the yard. We contracted with Viking Fence for 414 feet of 6 foot 1x6 cedar pickets on wolmanized pine 4x4 posts with 2x4 runners. The contract was signed October 9 and they were done by October 13. $3300.00
Next, we worked with a landscape company, Powers' Landscape, to layout beds, trees and plants. Malcolm Short built short stone walls around the flower beds. This used a white limestone rock that matched the house. $780.00
Then Powers' came in and installed Flowers, trees, dirt, mulch, and stone as needed. $2799.76 on June 12 1988.
I was particularly interested in the trees. I like trees. They add a lot and are relatively low maintenance, at least compared with flowers, which always seem to need work. We got two Live Oaks, a Spanish Oak, two Drake elms, 2 Chinese Pistaches, as well as Redbuds and Crepe Myrtles. The Redbuds have not survived, and we lost one of the Chinese Pistaches, but the oaks have all done well. Of course it took decades for them to grow to full size. The other beds, flowers and bushes have come and gone.
The front lawn was problematic. We are basically on rock -- Texas limestone. And because the house is downhill from the street, there were issues with the front lawn. It seemed to me it came too much out from the street and then dropped to the house. So I hired my nephew, or rather my ex-wife's nephew, James Conner, and he spent the summer (1988) digging rock out of the front yard. With just a sledge hammer and a pry bar, he took out a lot of rock and re-contoured the front yard. This cost $230 for labor (32 hours) plus $149.40 for a load of dirt (6 yards of mixed soil) from Bert's Dirt to fill in after his excavation.
Now, since this is Texas, it's hot and often dry. To keep things alive, we needed a sprinkler system. Gorbet Sprinkler Company designed a system for our lot with 11 zones and 74 pop-up sprinkler heads. $3550.00 in June 1988.
And finally, in July (after the sprinkler system was installed), 3 pallets of St. Augustine grass to cover the front yard. $169.94 from Farmer's Lawn Grass and Nursery. Plus $284.46 (6 April 1989) for dirt (12 yards of mixed soil from Bert's Dirts) to even out the lawn. We have continued to put dirt and compost on the lawn to try to improve it. This has been a long term issue.
When it does rain, it can rain hard. With a large one-story house, we have a large roof area, so we get a lot of water off the roof. We had gutters installed by Sears. $509.30. They had a number of problems. It took them 2 tries before they got things fixed well enough. The main problem was the angle of the gutters. I figured that if they were supposed to work as gutters, then if I sprayed water on the roof with a house, the water would run into the gutters and then down the downspouts. This seemed to be a foreign concept to Sears, and the first two times, water sat in the gutters instead of running off.
With a new house, the builder tends to clear the lot and build the house. When he is done, they bring in top-soil to spread around the house, and in our case, grass (sod) on top of that. They work on building the house but not much more. So we had pretty much a boring, neutral front and back yard. They did leave some of the native trees, but not a lot of them.
The first task was to put a fence around the yard. We contracted with Viking Fence for 414 feet of 6 foot 1x6 cedar pickets on wolmanized pine 4x4 posts with 2x4 runners. The contract was signed October 9 and they were done by October 13. $3300.00
Next, we worked with a landscape company, Powers' Landscape, to layout beds, trees and plants. Malcolm Short built short stone walls around the flower beds. This used a white limestone rock that matched the house. $780.00
Then Powers' came in and installed Flowers, trees, dirt, mulch, and stone as needed. $2799.76 on June 12 1988.
I was particularly interested in the trees. I like trees. They add a lot and are relatively low maintenance, at least compared with flowers, which always seem to need work. We got two Live Oaks, a Spanish Oak, two Drake elms, 2 Chinese Pistaches, as well as Redbuds and Crepe Myrtles. The Redbuds have not survived, and we lost one of the Chinese Pistaches, but the oaks have all done well. Of course it took decades for them to grow to full size. The other beds, flowers and bushes have come and gone.
The front lawn was problematic. We are basically on rock -- Texas limestone. And because the house is downhill from the street, there were issues with the front lawn. It seemed to me it came too much out from the street and then dropped to the house. So I hired my nephew, or rather my ex-wife's nephew, James Conner, and he spent the summer (1988) digging rock out of the front yard. With just a sledge hammer and a pry bar, he took out a lot of rock and re-contoured the front yard. This cost $230 for labor (32 hours) plus $149.40 for a load of dirt (6 yards of mixed soil) from Bert's Dirt to fill in after his excavation.
Now, since this is Texas, it's hot and often dry. To keep things alive, we needed a sprinkler system. Gorbet Sprinkler Company designed a system for our lot with 11 zones and 74 pop-up sprinkler heads. $3550.00 in June 1988.
And finally, in July (after the sprinkler system was installed), 3 pallets of St. Augustine grass to cover the front yard. $169.94 from Farmer's Lawn Grass and Nursery. Plus $284.46 (6 April 1989) for dirt (12 yards of mixed soil from Bert's Dirts) to even out the lawn. We have continued to put dirt and compost on the lawn to try to improve it. This has been a long term issue.
When it does rain, it can rain hard. With a large one-story house, we have a large roof area, so we get a lot of water off the roof. We had gutters installed by Sears. $509.30. They had a number of problems. It took them 2 tries before they got things fixed well enough. The main problem was the angle of the gutters. I figured that if they were supposed to work as gutters, then if I sprayed water on the roof with a house, the water would run into the gutters and then down the downspouts. This seemed to be a foreign concept to Sears, and the first two times, water sat in the gutters instead of running off.
Sunday, August 9, 1987
Back Yard Fence
We need a fence. What with deer running thru the combined back yards and, of course, the kids, it seems like a good idea.
We called Austin Fence and they came out and measured the yard. We decided to run the fence along the entire back yard and the back of the extra lot next door. Six-foot cedar picket fence. Nothing fancy.
Austin Fence gave us a contract.
Since we added in the back of the extra lot, the total comes to $3112.50.
Thursday, May 28, 1987
Improving the Wooden Gables
May 27, 1987
The house is a one-story design with a 100% stone veneer exterior. Partly that was required by the Deed Restrictions for this subdevelopment; partly it was because we wanted to minimize the cost of maintenance for the house. No painting the house. Long lasting.
But it is not all stone exterior. The areas above the windows, the doors, the garage doors, are all a cedar wood siding. Rough cedar -- I would have preferred a finished surface which would have a wider range of finishing options, but there was no choice. I assumed finished, and the builder assumed rough, and with no communication about it, I showed up one day and it was all up. And rough.
The other area of wood siding is the gables. Although the house is one-story, the roofs peak on either end, and over the garage and the back and the roof peak is about 2 stories above the ground. There is a triangular wall area here, and this triangular area has a wood siding.
The builder, instead of using real wood for these gables had put up some kind of plywood siding. It looked really tacky, and was not weathering well. And this was only a year after it was put up.
So we decided to put a real 1x8 "lap&gap" cedar over the top of this plywood siding. I tried to do this myself. I bought the wood $318.36 from Stripling Blake. But it's fairly difficult to get to this area. I should have rented some scaffolding, but even with what I had, I worked on it all day (Memorial Day) and got nowhere. It was clearly time for a professional; I was out of my league.
We contracted with Gary Simon to do the work (Simon Construction). He did a great job. He used the material I had already bought, but rented some scaffolding and probably had a helper. $1088.30.
Plus, of course, $30.35 for trim and $78.17 for some 2x6's that were useful as part of the scaffolding.
Lesson learned: There is a limit to what I can do myself. Sometimes it just makes a lot more sense to hire a professional. I can do reasonable simple stuff, but to get a good job -- particularly for something that shows like stone work or carpentry it helps to have the proper tools and experience.
I can learn the skills, but it can take some doing. I learned basic framing redoing a garage when I was a graduate student, and could leave my mistakes behind when I left school. I learned to do sheet rock work when I worked on my brother-in-law's house, so I didn't have to live with my mistakes. I learned to do PVC sprinkler work on this house, but almost everything is buried, so it isn't supposed to show.
The house is a one-story design with a 100% stone veneer exterior. Partly that was required by the Deed Restrictions for this subdevelopment; partly it was because we wanted to minimize the cost of maintenance for the house. No painting the house. Long lasting.
But it is not all stone exterior. The areas above the windows, the doors, the garage doors, are all a cedar wood siding. Rough cedar -- I would have preferred a finished surface which would have a wider range of finishing options, but there was no choice. I assumed finished, and the builder assumed rough, and with no communication about it, I showed up one day and it was all up. And rough.
The other area of wood siding is the gables. Although the house is one-story, the roofs peak on either end, and over the garage and the back and the roof peak is about 2 stories above the ground. There is a triangular wall area here, and this triangular area has a wood siding.
The builder, instead of using real wood for these gables had put up some kind of plywood siding. It looked really tacky, and was not weathering well. And this was only a year after it was put up.
So we decided to put a real 1x8 "lap&gap" cedar over the top of this plywood siding. I tried to do this myself. I bought the wood $318.36 from Stripling Blake. But it's fairly difficult to get to this area. I should have rented some scaffolding, but even with what I had, I worked on it all day (Memorial Day) and got nowhere. It was clearly time for a professional; I was out of my league.
We contracted with Gary Simon to do the work (Simon Construction). He did a great job. He used the material I had already bought, but rented some scaffolding and probably had a helper. $1088.30.
Plus, of course, $30.35 for trim and $78.17 for some 2x6's that were useful as part of the scaffolding.
Lesson learned: There is a limit to what I can do myself. Sometimes it just makes a lot more sense to hire a professional. I can do reasonable simple stuff, but to get a good job -- particularly for something that shows like stone work or carpentry it helps to have the proper tools and experience.
I can learn the skills, but it can take some doing. I learned basic framing redoing a garage when I was a graduate student, and could leave my mistakes behind when I left school. I learned to do sheet rock work when I worked on my brother-in-law's house, so I didn't have to live with my mistakes. I learned to do PVC sprinkler work on this house, but almost everything is buried, so it isn't supposed to show.
Saturday, April 4, 1987
Making a new house a home
July - December 1986
There are a lot of minor things that need to be done to a new house to make it your home. Things that while minor may add up in the long run.
July 23 -- Add Brass Coat hooks to the Closets. Four hooks at 3.49 each. $13.96 Target.
August 2 -- Foam insulation (Great Stuff in a spray can) for the wall openings behind the Dryer Vent, the A/C opening for the wiring and tubes to the compressor, the electrical breaker box. $4.88
August 2 -- Add 1x4's about 3 feet and 6 feet the length of the garage. This provides something solid to put hooks into for hanging shovels and hoes and rakes and such. $21.00
August 2 -- Pour concrete around the water meter and cutoff access openings. Commonly these are just stuck in the dirt and over time, shift and collapse. By pouring concrete around the openings, they are stable and well-defined. 4 bags of ready-mix concrete at 2.09 each. $8.36
August 9 -- Install a garage door opener in the garage. $174.67. Sears.
August 30 -- Rebuild the wall behind the kitchen fan. The builder had botched the wall -- just sheet rock behind the fan over the stove. I rebuilt the wall and caulked the whole thing to keep bugs and debris off the stove.
September 27 -- Add a fire extinguisher to the utility room and a smoke detector to the kitchen. $40.02. Target.
September 27 -- Insulate the two hot water heaters with a fiberglass blanket. $27.66
October -- put medicine cabinets in each of the Master bathrooms and middle bathroom. These are built-in medicine cabinets that go into the wall, and have a mirror on the front. We prefer wood to metal. Hold the medicine cabinet where you want it to be and trace around the body. Then cut the sheet rock off along those lines. Be sure to avoid an area where there may be electrical lines or plumbing in the wall. You can try to figure out where the wall studs are and position it between them, or you can put it where you want and reframe the hole if it is not between studs. Put a header above the hole and a footer below it. Then just slide the medicine cabinet into the hole, and nail or screw it to the studs on either side and the header or footer. $226.16. Furrows.
December 7 -- Put white wire shelves just above the floor in the closets, for shoes. $38.83. Handy Dan
December 13 -- Take off each of the electrical outlet covers and light switch covers and put a foam template behind it, to seal out the cold air (or the hot air in summer, but in December, it's cold air). $6.33. More in January 1987. $9.89.
December 17 -- Install a Damper on the top of the fireplace chimney. We don't expect to use the fireplace much and when it is not in use, we would like to seal it off from the outside. This damper sits on top of the chimney, outside, up on the roof. A spring keeps it up, but there is a wire and a handle down in the fireplace that will pull it down and completely seal off the top of the chimney. $242.00 by Superior Chimney Cleaning.
March 1987 -- Adding hooks to the closets was fairly easy. Buy the hook, find a stud behind the wall and screw it on. But we also wanted to put hooks on the inside of the door to the main closet, so the kids could hang up their coats. The door is the standard hollow-core door with just a thin plywood veneer on both the inside and outside, nothing to screw into, except around the edges, top, bottom and sides. So we got a piece of molding at the hardware store. In our case, a scallop molding. After finishing it to match the door (stain and polyurethane), we could glue it to the inside of the door and then put the hooks in it. $38.88
April 4, 1987 -- Replace the front door light switch with a timed switch, so that the lights come on (and go off) automatically. $22.48.
There are a lot of minor things that need to be done to a new house to make it your home. Things that while minor may add up in the long run.
July 23 -- Add Brass Coat hooks to the Closets. Four hooks at 3.49 each. $13.96 Target.
August 2 -- Foam insulation (Great Stuff in a spray can) for the wall openings behind the Dryer Vent, the A/C opening for the wiring and tubes to the compressor, the electrical breaker box. $4.88
August 2 -- Add 1x4's about 3 feet and 6 feet the length of the garage. This provides something solid to put hooks into for hanging shovels and hoes and rakes and such. $21.00
August 2 -- Pour concrete around the water meter and cutoff access openings. Commonly these are just stuck in the dirt and over time, shift and collapse. By pouring concrete around the openings, they are stable and well-defined. 4 bags of ready-mix concrete at 2.09 each. $8.36
August 9 -- Install a garage door opener in the garage. $174.67. Sears.
August 30 -- Rebuild the wall behind the kitchen fan. The builder had botched the wall -- just sheet rock behind the fan over the stove. I rebuilt the wall and caulked the whole thing to keep bugs and debris off the stove.
September 27 -- Add a fire extinguisher to the utility room and a smoke detector to the kitchen. $40.02. Target.
September 27 -- Insulate the two hot water heaters with a fiberglass blanket. $27.66
October -- put medicine cabinets in each of the Master bathrooms and middle bathroom. These are built-in medicine cabinets that go into the wall, and have a mirror on the front. We prefer wood to metal. Hold the medicine cabinet where you want it to be and trace around the body. Then cut the sheet rock off along those lines. Be sure to avoid an area where there may be electrical lines or plumbing in the wall. You can try to figure out where the wall studs are and position it between them, or you can put it where you want and reframe the hole if it is not between studs. Put a header above the hole and a footer below it. Then just slide the medicine cabinet into the hole, and nail or screw it to the studs on either side and the header or footer. $226.16. Furrows.
December 7 -- Put white wire shelves just above the floor in the closets, for shoes. $38.83. Handy Dan
December 13 -- Take off each of the electrical outlet covers and light switch covers and put a foam template behind it, to seal out the cold air (or the hot air in summer, but in December, it's cold air). $6.33. More in January 1987. $9.89.
December 17 -- Install a Damper on the top of the fireplace chimney. We don't expect to use the fireplace much and when it is not in use, we would like to seal it off from the outside. This damper sits on top of the chimney, outside, up on the roof. A spring keeps it up, but there is a wire and a handle down in the fireplace that will pull it down and completely seal off the top of the chimney. $242.00 by Superior Chimney Cleaning.
March 1987 -- Adding hooks to the closets was fairly easy. Buy the hook, find a stud behind the wall and screw it on. But we also wanted to put hooks on the inside of the door to the main closet, so the kids could hang up their coats. The door is the standard hollow-core door with just a thin plywood veneer on both the inside and outside, nothing to screw into, except around the edges, top, bottom and sides. So we got a piece of molding at the hardware store. In our case, a scallop molding. After finishing it to match the door (stain and polyurethane), we could glue it to the inside of the door and then put the hooks in it. $38.88
April 4, 1987 -- Replace the front door light switch with a timed switch, so that the lights come on (and go off) automatically. $22.48.
Tuesday, July 15, 1986
Telephone wiring
July 1986
The first change I made to the house was to install a patch panel or switch box in the garage for the telephone lines. We had two lines coming in -- the assumption was that we would probably need one for a phone line and another for a computer modem. We had 5 phone outlets in various rooms in the house -- one in the kitchen, another in the living room, the office, the master bath, and the "computer room". Since we didn't know what lines would be needed or used for what, I wanted both lines to come to one place and then be able to redirect them to any of the 5 phone jacks in the house.
At the time, there really wasn't much available to do this. Now, you can get complete systems at Home Depot (among other places) which provide a complete wiring panel. But even now, these units are expensive and rather limited in what they can do.
What I did was to get just a metal box -- like the box that the circuit breakers are in -- and attach it to the garage wall. I ran the two incoming lines down and attached them to two of the standard phone jacks. These are small square units with an RJ-11 jack in the middle of the face.
This allowed me to run a patch cord from the incoming line to an outgoing line. It is fairly easy to get a small bar with one incoming line and 5 outgoing jacks, which makes it easy then to run one incoming line to up to 5 outgoing lines.
This worked for 10 years or so, but after the divorce, Leanne moved in, and wanted a phone in her bedroom. Jeanne had insisted that there would be no phones in the children's bedrooms, so no lines had been run to the bedrooms (except for the master bedroom). I could run the lines to the bedrooms, and install the outlets in the rooms, but there was no room in the patch panel box for the extra lines. So, temporarily, to get things working, I just tapped into the line in the attic and let it go with that.
Later, after Leanne moved out, my daughter Kathryn moved into the back bedroom and wanted her own phone line. That was not difficult, since we had provisions for two lines to come into the house, but Kat really wanted to be able to answer both her own line and the line for the rest of the family. She bought a two line phone, but I needed to run additional wire for the second line.
And we needed extra lines for a new computer in the dining room, and by the TV and to the kitchen counters. And it was difficult to label the plugs so we knew which was which. With 4 bedrooms, we could label the plugs "Bedroom 2" and "Bedroom 3", but which was which?
So clearly, I needed a better patch panel. We lived with this until I replaced it with a better design in 2007.
The solution I currently have is to paste a copy of the floor plan of the house -- clearly showing which room is which, -- on to a piece of plywood. The floor plan is about 2 feet by 3 feet in size. I marked on the floor plan the position of each telephone outlet. Then I drilled a hole at each of these points. I mounted the floor plan in the attic, and ran the actual wires to each of the corresponding holes, thru the hole and to an RJ-11 jack. Doing the same for each of the two incoming lines, and then running them to a 1-to-5 distribution bar.
Now it is easy to make up little patch cables and run a patch cable from the incoming distribution bar to the plug for any of the lines in the house. And I can easily tell exactly what line is where -- no need for knowing which is "Bedroom 2" and which is "Bedroom 3", or if the phone on the counter between the kitchen and the living room is a kitchen phone ("Kitchen 1" or "Kitchen 2"?) or is a Living room phone.
The cost of this was fairly minor. Fourteen RJ-11 jacks. These are somewhat hard to find now, but I believe I got them at Radio Shack. The plywood backing. The copy of the floor plan. The tool for making patch cables. The real cost, of course, over time, was the wire to run from the attic to all the rooms in the house and the boxes and outlets for the phones.
$98.37 in 1986.
The first change I made to the house was to install a patch panel or switch box in the garage for the telephone lines. We had two lines coming in -- the assumption was that we would probably need one for a phone line and another for a computer modem. We had 5 phone outlets in various rooms in the house -- one in the kitchen, another in the living room, the office, the master bath, and the "computer room". Since we didn't know what lines would be needed or used for what, I wanted both lines to come to one place and then be able to redirect them to any of the 5 phone jacks in the house.
At the time, there really wasn't much available to do this. Now, you can get complete systems at Home Depot (among other places) which provide a complete wiring panel. But even now, these units are expensive and rather limited in what they can do.
What I did was to get just a metal box -- like the box that the circuit breakers are in -- and attach it to the garage wall. I ran the two incoming lines down and attached them to two of the standard phone jacks. These are small square units with an RJ-11 jack in the middle of the face.
This allowed me to run a patch cord from the incoming line to an outgoing line. It is fairly easy to get a small bar with one incoming line and 5 outgoing jacks, which makes it easy then to run one incoming line to up to 5 outgoing lines.This worked for 10 years or so, but after the divorce, Leanne moved in, and wanted a phone in her bedroom. Jeanne had insisted that there would be no phones in the children's bedrooms, so no lines had been run to the bedrooms (except for the master bedroom). I could run the lines to the bedrooms, and install the outlets in the rooms, but there was no room in the patch panel box for the extra lines. So, temporarily, to get things working, I just tapped into the line in the attic and let it go with that.
Later, after Leanne moved out, my daughter Kathryn moved into the back bedroom and wanted her own phone line. That was not difficult, since we had provisions for two lines to come into the house, but Kat really wanted to be able to answer both her own line and the line for the rest of the family. She bought a two line phone, but I needed to run additional wire for the second line.
And we needed extra lines for a new computer in the dining room, and by the TV and to the kitchen counters. And it was difficult to label the plugs so we knew which was which. With 4 bedrooms, we could label the plugs "Bedroom 2" and "Bedroom 3", but which was which?
So clearly, I needed a better patch panel. We lived with this until I replaced it with a better design in 2007.
The solution I currently have is to paste a copy of the floor plan of the house -- clearly showing which room is which, -- on to a piece of plywood. The floor plan is about 2 feet by 3 feet in size. I marked on the floor plan the position of each telephone outlet. Then I drilled a hole at each of these points. I mounted the floor plan in the attic, and ran the actual wires to each of the corresponding holes, thru the hole and to an RJ-11 jack. Doing the same for each of the two incoming lines, and then running them to a 1-to-5 distribution bar.
Now it is easy to make up little patch cables and run a patch cable from the incoming distribution bar to the plug for any of the lines in the house. And I can easily tell exactly what line is where -- no need for knowing which is "Bedroom 2" and which is "Bedroom 3", or if the phone on the counter between the kitchen and the living room is a kitchen phone ("Kitchen 1" or "Kitchen 2"?) or is a Living room phone.
The cost of this was fairly minor. Fourteen RJ-11 jacks. These are somewhat hard to find now, but I believe I got them at Radio Shack. The plywood backing. The copy of the floor plan. The tool for making patch cables. The real cost, of course, over time, was the wire to run from the attic to all the rooms in the house and the boxes and outlets for the phones.
$98.37 in 1986.
Initial purchase
The house at 10601 Barker Ridge Cove was built to order. At the time Jeanne and Jim were married, with two children. Their previous house (706 Harris Avenue) was only a two bedroom house, and the children were to the point where they needed their own rooms. So Jeanne started looking for a bigger house.
She found a house she liked -- a newly built house -- but it was on a busy street, so we arranged to have it built on a different lot, on a cul-de-sac. The lot was bought on 5 Nov 1985 ($50,000) and we contracted to have the house built on 20 Nov 1985. The contract for the house was basically to build the same house layout, but with some changes:
1. All hardwood floors (no carpet). This was to try to help with seasonal allergies.
2. 2x6 exterior walls (not 2x4 construction). This to increase the amount of insulation that could be put in the exterior walls.
There were a number of change orders during the construction -- at least 4 -- that were meant to improve the bathroom and kitchen fixtures and such. These cost about 10,000 above the contract price, and were paid directly to the builder during construction.
We closed on the house on 15 July 1986. At closing, we had borrowed a mortgage loan of $200,000 at 8.5% interest. The total cost of the house, including the lot, was $280,057.08.
I have a complete file folder covering the building itself, but, at least for now, that is another story altogether. The construction was mostly adequate, but not outstanding. Although the builder was a "custom builder", he really did not understand how to build a really quality house -- he just repeated the same old things he had always done. His ability to communicate with his customer was marginal. All in all, he was, at best, a mediocre builder.
The result is a pretty good house, but with some serious drawbacks. The house is too low -- it's built on the side of a hill, with the asphalt of the cove above the house, so you look down on the house from the street. This makes it difficult to bring in better dirt for the front lawn, since there is not sufficient clearance between the top of the yard and the top of the slab. If the ground level were to be higher, dirt would be against the stone wall of the house, which would increase the risk of termites and other bugs in the walls. The slab should have been an extra foot thick, which would make the house a foot taller. This would improve the view from the street and allow more, better soil in the front.
It would also have allowed the hot water pipes -- which go thru the slab -- to be insulated. I asked for them to be insulated before the slab was poured, but the builder argued that the lost space would make the slab too thin where the hot water pipes would be, and increase the risk of the slab cracking (at some point).
A thicker slab would also have helped limit the small amount of settling that we have experienced.
There are other design improvements that could be made. Two of the bathrooms are against the exterior walls. Simply flipping the layout left-to-right in these bathrooms would have put the plumbing (water supply lines) inside the house, rather than on the exterior wall, and would have eliminated the yearly concern over the pipes freezing in the winter.
The house is nearly 3000 square feet. While that has been fine with two children, we chose a one-story design, in part, to allow us to grow old in the house. But without the children, the house is probably too big for just the two of us, and it is not easy to shut off the unused wing of the house.
But, all in all, the house has worked quite well over the years. I would like to think that the changes I have made over those years have improved it.
She found a house she liked -- a newly built house -- but it was on a busy street, so we arranged to have it built on a different lot, on a cul-de-sac. The lot was bought on 5 Nov 1985 ($50,000) and we contracted to have the house built on 20 Nov 1985. The contract for the house was basically to build the same house layout, but with some changes:
1. All hardwood floors (no carpet). This was to try to help with seasonal allergies.
2. 2x6 exterior walls (not 2x4 construction). This to increase the amount of insulation that could be put in the exterior walls.
There were a number of change orders during the construction -- at least 4 -- that were meant to improve the bathroom and kitchen fixtures and such. These cost about 10,000 above the contract price, and were paid directly to the builder during construction.
We closed on the house on 15 July 1986. At closing, we had borrowed a mortgage loan of $200,000 at 8.5% interest. The total cost of the house, including the lot, was $280,057.08.
I have a complete file folder covering the building itself, but, at least for now, that is another story altogether. The construction was mostly adequate, but not outstanding. Although the builder was a "custom builder", he really did not understand how to build a really quality house -- he just repeated the same old things he had always done. His ability to communicate with his customer was marginal. All in all, he was, at best, a mediocre builder.
The result is a pretty good house, but with some serious drawbacks. The house is too low -- it's built on the side of a hill, with the asphalt of the cove above the house, so you look down on the house from the street. This makes it difficult to bring in better dirt for the front lawn, since there is not sufficient clearance between the top of the yard and the top of the slab. If the ground level were to be higher, dirt would be against the stone wall of the house, which would increase the risk of termites and other bugs in the walls. The slab should have been an extra foot thick, which would make the house a foot taller. This would improve the view from the street and allow more, better soil in the front.
It would also have allowed the hot water pipes -- which go thru the slab -- to be insulated. I asked for them to be insulated before the slab was poured, but the builder argued that the lost space would make the slab too thin where the hot water pipes would be, and increase the risk of the slab cracking (at some point).
A thicker slab would also have helped limit the small amount of settling that we have experienced.
There are other design improvements that could be made. Two of the bathrooms are against the exterior walls. Simply flipping the layout left-to-right in these bathrooms would have put the plumbing (water supply lines) inside the house, rather than on the exterior wall, and would have eliminated the yearly concern over the pipes freezing in the winter.
The house is nearly 3000 square feet. While that has been fine with two children, we chose a one-story design, in part, to allow us to grow old in the house. But without the children, the house is probably too big for just the two of us, and it is not easy to shut off the unused wing of the house.
But, all in all, the house has worked quite well over the years. I would like to think that the changes I have made over those years have improved it.
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