That isn’t a frown…

If you ever happen to touch a negative and positive hot electrical wire at the same time, you may first notice a numbing sensation flowing through your fingertips and up to your forearm muscles. If your mind doesn’t register what is going on, the next thing you may feel is the heat generating between your fingers tips.. Luckily around this time, while I was actually experiencing this marvelous tingle on my forearm, my mind triggered my sensors within my hand to let go of the hot current copper metal…

Let me restart the story to a point before I felt the world violently shake between my fingertips…The morning started with me making coffee with no coffee filters… Yes the first hour of debating of what to do was pretty comical. However, thanks to all of the wonderful suggestions from my friend on Facebook, using the paper towel as a coffee filter actually works. Still not sure about the sock. However, talking with a friend, the sock practice is quite common.. Anyway, after satisfying my caffeine addiction, I had decided to install the baseboard trim in the spare bedroom.

I measured the room to determine the amount of materials that would be required. After completing the task, I realized that one electrical outlet was installed way too low. I re-calculated my numbers and determined that the new baseboard trim would certainly hit the outlet. I had decided to replace the outlet entirely. Thus when I removed the electrical outlet cover and to my surprise I discovered…

The outlet was broken and was attached by friction to the outlet protective cover. The glory of having an old house allows me to do more research in finding the correct circuit breaker switch associated to a specific room… I couldn’t find my electricity tester, so I decided to plug in a light. I figured I’ll hit the circuit breaker switch in the basement and then check if the light is on or off… If the light is off, then the circuit breaker switch is associated to that specific room.. Sounded like a good plan at the time.

After hitting the switch, I unfastened the treaded screws that held the outlet to the junction box. Once completed, I place my thumb and index figure on the electrical outlet to remove it. As I’m removing the outlet from the junction box housing, my mind instantly registers a discomfort that I have felt before. The vibration of my right forearm muscle began to increase and I instantly knew that the light bulb test had failed.. The light bulb had somehow blown out when I disengaged the circuit breaker switch. The current ran through me within a nanosecond. My mind registered that electricity was traveling through my body. The discomforting pain was felt like it lasted forever. Once my mind fully registered what was going on, my brain told my hand to disengage…

Now that I got that out to way, I had evaluated my fingers and hand. I was satisfied that I was safe, but I realized that my stupidity could have been more lethal. I was lucky once again. This was not the first rodeo that I’ve gone too.. But I need to make this my last… I need to find that electricity tester…

I dusted myself off and gathered my thoughts. At that moment I decided to completely shut the electricity off throughout the entire house. I safely replaced the electrical outlet and then installed the baseboard. The picture below shows the workaround of having the outlet too low.

After completing the baseboard installation, I move my building motivation to the kitchen… I’ll be painting the baseboard another day. A while back I had updated the kitchen and removed the trim from both windows. I was able to reuse the old trim.

I’ll need to next paint the trim in the kitchen to match the current colors. But that will wait until next time. I then moved to the living room. The window trim in the living room was also needed. This time I had to cut the trim from scratch. The old window trim had taken a trip to the dump.

Next on the list was the master bedroom closet. I’m not a fan of the sliding closet doors. Thus I’ve decided to install new bi-fold doors and replace the wonderful smiley face of a closet pole.

The wood smiling pole was tied at the center with a piece of string. The wood pole was retrained at three points, side walls and the string. I replaced the wood pole with a metal pole and four metal brackets. Each metal bracket are rated to hold 250 lbs. Thus, by installing the four brackets the weight capacity would be for a total of 1000 lbs.

Next on the list was to install the bi-fold doors. Of course, nothing is ever standard with older homes. The doorway opening for the closet was of course 1 inch smaller than a standard bi-fold door requirement. I had purchased standard wood bi-fold doors and figured that I could cut a 1/2 inch of wood per side of the panel. By modifying the standard door, I calculated that I would save about $100 from not ordering the custom bi-fold doors…

But after further inspection, I realized that I could remove part of the doorway wood and gain the required inch.

The bi-fold door preparation was complete. The closet doorway was now ready for the bi-fold door installation.  However, the exhaustion had started to kick in and I had to stop.

I’ve been pretty busy with working on the apartment and interviewing potential tenants for upstairs. I’ve had about 10 showings of the apartment thus far. Out of the ten, I’ve had 2 interested in my place in the first floor. I have one person that actually put in an application for my unfinished place. So on May 1st my apartment will be available. Next month is going to be extremely aggressive in getting the first floor into an acceptable living place. Additionally, I have a potential tenant ready for the second floor. I’m happy to report that things are going extremely well… Until next time, happy building…

Time to install the floor…

For me, returning home from any trip is always pretty dreadful. It’s not that I hate travelling I actually like it… It’s really just the feeling of having to return and deal with things around the house.. The enjoyment of going on any trips is the excitement of not doing any house work… Although in reality, I’m only delaying my responsibilities for another day… or actually….another week…

The month of October has been pretty exciting in the travelling department. The lower back pain that haunted me during the summer has made me a travelling fool for the month of October… I have to admit, the cold weather has helped with my travelling decisions. I was fortune enough to travel to San Francisco, California and San Juan, Puerto Rico… With the relaxing view below, you can see how the trip was worth it… Ok, I have to admit, the view of my foot and crusty toes may not help in your decision.. But, the warm water, 95 degree weather and cloudless sky might influence you…

My girlfriend and I, sitting by the beach in San Juan taking in some rays…. Boy did I need some sun 

Here I am at Fort San Felipe del Morro “El Morro” in San Juan

Sentry Box at the “El Morro”

A couple of house in Old San Juan

While walking around in Old San Juan, we came across some property that looked pretty interesting and decent (Picture below)…Then of course the gears in my head started to crank… The smoke started to flow from my ears…What if I purchased a vacation home in Puerto Rico? What if I purchase a little house that I could rent year round? What if I purchase a 2 family home in Puerto Rico? One permanent resident and vacation home… HOLD ON!!! Pump the brakes… Pump the brakes… I need to slow things down… I need to finish my original project before I jump onto another one… Ok let’s move on… But the idea is certainly in the back of my mind…

The house on the right is the property we came across…

Anyway, now that I have fulfilled my vacation quota for the year, I guess it is time to really get back to working on the house. I can now say that I have a new motivation in getting thing done. Like the vacation home idea, but also the news that I will be hosting both Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve at my house this year… You know what that mean, set a bunch of goals to finish certain projects before the holidays and actually do one project out of 25… 

However this year, I feel pretty confident that my project list will be much least than last years. This year, the biggest project was the kitchen and that is almost completed… After this weekend I’m certainly one step closer in finishing… This weekend I decided to finish the floor.

  The green monster

I first had to clean the room and remove all of the stuff from the floor… After doing so, I realized I had missed painting the base boards…

 

Once the trim was completed, I began to remove the excess shims from the cabinets…

It is certainly not an Angel moment unless I get injured somehow… So here we go… I was using a utility knife to cut a line across the wood shims… After doing making the cut, I would take a flat head screwdriver and lift on the shim and snap, the shim is cut perfectly in line with the kitchen cabinet.. Easy, right? Ok so, I’m on my hands and knees cutting and lifting, tooling along… I’m on the 4th one, when  I’m lifting on the screw driver, my hand slips off… I slip forward towards the floor, my hand instantly tries to brace for the impact against the cabinet and floor… But instead of feeling a solid thud, I feel a sharp pain in my left hand ring finger… As I quickly remove my hand from the sharp object that stabbed my finger, blood trickles down my finger…A shard of glass was momentarily stuck to my finger and fell to the ground…

  Good cut… Bleeding through the bandage..

After cleaning and placing a bandage on my finger, I started to clean the floor. I swept and mopped up all of the dirt prior to placing the peal and stick tiles down.

 So it all started here…

 

Well the kitchen is almost there… About 95% complete thus far… I still need to fix a couple of electrical outlets.. I also need to install the window trim… But until next time, happy building and Happy Halloween… 

I give you cabinet doors...

A couple of weeks ago, I was flying home from San Francisco and had a brief stop in Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. As I sat by my departing gate, I began to think about my life of travels. At that moment, I happen to notice three young men walking together towards the exit of the airport. The three men were dressed extremely different from each other. However, their stride was together, as if they are going to the same destination. Each person was carrying a vanilla envelope with their military orders taped to the outside.

Seeing these three young men, reminded me of my walk with my vanilla envelope. I remember the bus ride to Sand Hill, Fort Benning, Georgia back in 1993. The moment the bus entered the base, I remember a big knot formed in my throat. I also remember my gut turning when the bus stopped... I remember the Drill sergeant walking onto the bus. The bus was extremely quiet while he stood there… You could have heard a pin drop if it did. The Drill Sergeant inhaled for a second and began to yell. All I remember him saying was, “Get off my bus!!!”

But that was many years ago, as I sat there at the airport, I had looked at their young faces and was reminded of my baby face when I reported for duty. I had such a young face, that I was able to shave every other day. Today, that is a different story... Looking at these young men now, I’m proud to see that young men and women are still answering the call of duty. But, I certainly pray for them. I pray for these young men to come home quickly and safely… These days, the demands on the military forces are extremely high.

I mention this observation because, I’m proud of these young men. But most importantly, when you happen to see a young man and/or woman with a vanilla envelope, you’ll have an understanding what they are about to do. That they have joined a brotherhood of men and women that volunteered their lives to protect us and our way of life…


The layover was really because I took a mini vacation trip to San Francisco. I was able to see the Golden Gate Bridge, a Giants Game and Alcatraz. Here are a couple of pictures from my trip.

Golden Gate Bridge from Fort Point

Here I am standing in front of the Golden Gate Bridge

If you ever happen to be in San Francisco and plan on taking an Alcatraz tour… I recommend the night tour. The tour was a lot of fun and extremely informational. Also a little spookie...

But my first free weekend since returning, I was able to install the cabinet doors… Here is a picture of my kitchen with the cabinet doors and hardware installed..

The only thing that is left in the kitchen is the floor and window trim… After that, I can move onto another project within the house.. Until next time, happy building…

If this was your vacation, I'd hate to know what you do for fun...

Now that the bat situation is somewhat under control (I like to believe it is). I can now move onto other things around the house. Over the previous week, I’ve been on vacation from work. It was the perfect time to begin a large project. One that would require a lot of attention once it began. The biggest problem was that I had a serious back problem that required a lot of attention. So I called in re-enforcements to help me with the kitchen… my nephews. Without their help, I’d probably still be struggling with lifting the cabinets alone.

Prior to the bat situation, I’ve been patiently working on the kitchen. I started with the ceiling, by exposing the wonderful tin and installed the crown molding. I also half heartily painted the walls… I wanted to paint the walls completely prior to installing new cabinets but my vacation time was coming on too quickly. So I paused on the painting and started the kitchen update.

Let’s review the reasons for the cabinet update

Cabinet doors did not close properly

Drawers face missing or damaged

Repaired drawers with duct tape

Duct tape drawer

No dishwasher

Everything needed to be removed from the kitchen prior to actually doing any demolition. For the next week, my house was completely turned upside down from empting the kitchen.

Kitchen table with pots and pans in the bedroom

Cleaning supplies and utensils in the living room

Before

Once the old cabinet was removed, through the wall it would appear that there was a door. It looks like the previous owners had installed a wall to cover up the door that goes into the back hallway. I’m ok with the wall because it gives more space for cabinets in the kitchen.

Next was the main cabinet. The base under the sink was pretty dilapidated. Additionally, the faucet was old and it leaked. The wooden handles were started to get moldy as well.

The plan was to remove the dual sink and replace it with a single sink. To fit a new dishwasher within the current space, I had to get a smaller sink base thus it required a smaller sink.

A new drain assembly will be needed. A new hot water outlet will be needed as well to supply the dishwasher.

Within 30 minutes, the entire kitchen was completely demolished.
I then installed a new subfloor to support the new cabinets.

For the new subfloor, I cut out holes for the water, drain and power lines. I created a template to cut the holes out.

Once that was completed, Fredy started to help out by drilling in support boards into the walls

The cabinets were then drilled into the walls, shimmed and then together.

Once the cabinets were in place, Fredy helped me put the counter top on.

The main cabinets were then installed. For the sink base, I used the same template that was used for the subfloor to cut out the access holes.

Fast forward a couple of screws, shims and heavy lifting, the kitchen cabinets were completed. The new kitchen cabinets now have an access spot for the new dishwasher.

 For the new dishwasher, I then needed to install a new water line to the existing hot water pipe. After shutting off the water supply, a new “T” copper spacer and valve were soldered on. To protect the cabinet from getting burned by the torch, I used a flame retardant cloth.

Once that was completed, it was time to install the new sink. I used blue painters tape to outline the new sink. Note the light coming through the window...

Because of the limited space using the Jig saw to cut out the access hole for the sink, I had to use a hand saw to clean out the last remaining portion of the counter. You may notice the darkness out of the window. It took a long time using the hand saw...

Once I was conformable that the sink would fit within the new access hole, I installed the faucet and drain to the sink. The new sink assembly was then installed to the counter using clips and silicone.

The next portion of the kitchen upgrade was installing the new drain assembly. The PVC piping was aligned prior to being cementing together. Note the black marker lines to ensure that the PVC piping was assembled properly. Also note the new drain pipe for the dishwasher waste line.

The moment of truth!!!!!

Yes!!!! Water is running with no leaks…

I can happily state that the main renovation of the kitchen is completed. The next portion of the upgrade is to finish painting, install the dishwasher and upgrade the floor. I also want to upgrade the kitchen hardware. I’m certainly pleased with the upgrade thus far. Yes I still need to wash dishes by hand... But not for long...

The upgrade thus far would not have been completed if it wasn’t for my great nephews, Fredy and Devyn. Without them, I probably would have destroyed my spine. The bonus was listening how they both enjoyed learning how they were able to use power tools. Well until next time, happy building...