Adventures in Remuddling

The living room was cleared of stuff recently. There’s no more mattress pads or desk or computer there. The office is now in the den/study room.

Remodel work has obviously slowed down. Mostly because there’s not as much to do and we’ve lost steam.

This weekend, we even carved a pumpkin because Halloween is right around the corner.

Continue reading “Halloween Around the Corner” »

I decided to install a new thermostat. Supposedly the newer programmable ones can save you money in energy/fuel costs by having the room temperature set colder when you’re away at work during the day. However I work from home. Whatever. It came with a $25 rebate from the local utility, so what the heck, I installed it.

We had an old school classic round thermostat. It’s actually a Honeywell T87 series.

Continue reading “New Thermostat” »

I’ve lived most of my adult life with Tig, assuming “adult” starts at 18, and we’ve been together since I was 22. Not having lived through a period of single-with-career, I’ve never had the autonomous experience of picking out furniture by myself. We first started out scrounging furniture off the streets of San Francisco, then progressed to yard sales. The pinnacle was dropping a nice sum on the only couch we could agree upon in a department store.

Continue reading “It takes two (to pick furniture)” »

I used to not be able to live without a TV. Those days are long past, and we have not had a TV set up in over 9 months.

But I finally caved in and brought out our old TV from its box.

Ain’t she a beauty?

Continue reading “Finally a TV” »

Week Four was devoted to the living room. I wanted to focus on the two areas that were cluttered. I spent an afternoon listening to parts of every record and weeded them down to one box. That freed up some space behind the chair. Then I unearthed a tiny bookcase that I had found in the basement. It was used to hold an assortment of pots. After cleaning it up and coating it with water-based polyurethane (the paint was chipping and I didn’t want the possibility of lead chips all over the place), it looked somewhat usable. The bookcase now holds our books which previously stacked in little piles against the wall.

Continue reading “Week Four - Cleaning up the living room” »

We had a few months to enjoy our finished dining room.

Currently, all of our living room furniture is now in the dining room. Why is that you ask?

Continue reading “Cozy Dining Room (temporarily)” »

Original Living Room Wall (picture taken during home inspection)

The wall looks decent in photos. But already, you can see gaps (the black lines) between the moulding and the wall/ceiling. Up close, you can see cracks in the plaster. There is an especially long crack spanning the entire length of the ceiling. Also the sconces are not exactly the prettiest. It’s apparent that we don’t have the same tastes as the previous homeowners (chandelier, plates, etc). And they don’t work. The switch on the wall does not turn on/off the sconces, it only controls the outlet directly below.

So what’s in store for the living room?

Continue reading “Updating the Living Room” »

This is our living room

This is Tig unable to do our living room for a few days

Continue reading “Wounded Knee” »

Well I’m back on my feet working again, maybe not at 100%, but good enough to do some damage.

The living room project requires some preparation before the real work can begin. This means laying down red rosin paper for floor protection and sealing off the doors to the other rooms. Here I used plastic sheeting and taped it to the trim. The goal is to isolate dust and debris; once all the work is done, I just peel the red rosin and the plastic away for easy cleanup.

Next step is to upgrade the electrical wiring.

Continue reading “Living Room Prep & Rough Electrical Work” »

Here’s how I fixed the cracks in the ceiling and walls of our living room:

Here’s the crack in the ceiling. It actually runs the whole length of the room (essentially cutting the ceiling in half).

The first step I took was to widen the crack. Yes, you actually have to make it worse before it can get better (this seems to happen a lot in home renovation, whether you want it to or not).

Continue reading “Fixing the Cracks in the Living Room” »