My parents came up for the weekend to help. At first I didn’t think we needed their help, but it turned out to be a godsend, and we certainly appreciated their coming.

Here my dad and I discuss the bathroom renovations (in a completely gutted 1st floor bathroom). We later installed a temporary toilet (more on that in the future).

discussing the bath

Then my parents were instrumental in clearing out the 2nd floor bathroom. I removed all the tiles and “mud job” (concrete supporting the tiles), which was almost 2 inches of solid concrete! The first floor bath only had a 3/4″ thick mud job. The wire mesh embedded into the concrete was tough as nails. It was a difficult task, but much easier when all the fixtures were removed and I had three people taking away the trash.