H&G check in

[simpsongal]

I thought our regulars might want to post a 'what am I up to.'  I don't think I have anything worth a separate thread (soon ...but not yet), so I was hoping others would join on what you're working on

- We opened a HELOC this past spring for big house projects (YAY!)

- We had our architect out this week, he's doing some drawings for our mudroom/bathroom addition.

- The GC for our master bathroom project was supposed to order materials pre-covid but now he's busy on commercial projects.  We're giving him some space, but we wanted to get our master bath project done before the addition....I have some material picked out but wanted to see others (I'll post when I have a more complete idea to share).

- I've given up on most DIY house projects at the moment.  Having my 3 & 6 yr old here while DH and I worked full time, we were in survival mode.

- I finally got inspired to do something and purged and organized our garage and a few other spaces in the house.

- Gardening - I did a lot of transplanting and dividing since we were SIP.  I ordered some tiny hydrangeas that we planted.  We did small garden beds since we tore out the big garden last year (strawberry patch, 10 tomato plants, herbs).  I've been doing a ton of tree trimming too.  Enjoying using the sticks for kindling in our Solo Stove 

- I tried staining our fence but the stain I got off amazon was lousy and not worth the effort.  Maybe in the fall....

[redheadk]

I finished my part of my grandmothers condo refresh! It’s being cleaned and the handyman is reinstalling the smoke/CO2 detectors (long story).

I’m restaining my stair banister with gel stain in java. It’s an enormous improvement over the orange oak. Super glad I’m doing it before the house interior is painted!

We’ve done a lot of gardening lately and a ton of work to our backyard. We are done with the front until spring, it’s just too hot here to do any major landscaping. We ARE getting a new fence next week.

I finally chose all of the fixtures I needed to choose before we could start on the interior painting, with the exception of bathroom fixtures. I’m torn on the bathroom fixture colors. I need to decide, but we are g having the painting done until either dd is in school a bit of it’s cooler. I can’t hang out upstairs for 4 days with 3 dogs and dd. They are painting EVERYTHING (walls, woodwork, ceilings) and removing wallpaper so it’s a lot.

[dr.girlfriend]

I bought a big new American flag and a big new Pride flag for our new front door/porch, but then quickly realized it was beyond my skills to install the flagpole holders. I've asked DH to arrange for a handyman to install them for my birthday. We also got a Ring doorbell that we need to install once we figure out where to put it so that the flags waving don't set off the motion alarm. :-) Otherwise, I've totally ignored my yard...my contractor is dodging my calls about the grass he was supposed to plant, but I have a giant thing of poison ivy growing up the front of the house that I have to deal with so I think I might try to get some lawn guys to come trim hedges, pull the ivy, and take away all the sticks we have since the county stopped picking up bulk trash / yard waste.

[dutchgirl678]

Great idea!

We had our backyard done last summer. We used an existing line of credit with Citi to get a loan and had three years to pay it off. But at 9.99% interest, we wanted it paid off sooner and as of two months ago we paid it off completely. We got lucky with a tax refund and putting a lot of extra money towards it every month.

This year I used our raised beds to grow 6 tomato plants which are all doing well now. I tried to grow from seed, but set out the few plants that were growing too early and they died because it was too cold. So then I bought some small plants at a local garden center and at our CSA farm and they are doing great. I also bought a snap pea plant and a marionberry plant and they are doing well. In our narrow border which gets a lot of shade I planted some boxwood, fuchsia, astilbe, bleeding heart, and some ground cover and all are taking off. And in a corner we planted a big oak leaf hydrangea with white flowers and it is starting to flower. But we recently got some plants from a friend including a giant boxwood and managed to kill them all .

Thinking about painting some of our rooms (they all came in the same builder's paint), particularly the guest bedroom, the master, and the office. But haven't had time yet. I'm thinking about a light sage color for the guest room and a light blue/gray for our master and maybe a darker/bolder blue/green/gray mix for the office. I just need some time off from work and see some samples.

[mrspez07]

We’ve been busy with this ^ since Memorial Day. I got a quote to have it done and it was going to be 9K, so we decided to do it ourselves. We ripped out the struggling turf, we’re converting the spray irrigation to drip and we (DH) dug our the area for the small wall in front. The ornamental grasses near the brick wall and all the other plants and the bigger wall in the back were existing.
It’s probably too hot now to plant, so we’ll wait until fall, but we’ll be going xeric, except for the red oak we’re adding for shade. The above pic was a week ago, below is tonight, after a bunch of rain.

[Susie]

Nothing major here.

We tried to get a tree taken out in our backyard, but we got a quote, sent back the acceptance... and over a month has gone by and we can't get a call back.  I'm frustrated.  

I did a bunch of transplanting.  Moved day lilies around, moved some hostas, moved a hydrangea, ripped out an azalea, put in two new hydrangeas, added a couple more astilbes... started our tomato and herb garden from seed and eventually planted those outside.  Did my usual flower boxes on the deck railing with herbs and wave petunias.

My biggest house project was doing a lot of basement clean out, and painting the workout room.  I also put down foam puzzle piece flooring.  The room isn't done yet, but definite progress.  I can't imagine when I'll feel comfortable working out at the gym again so it will be nice to have a nice, purposeful, decorated, functional place to work out.

I hear you on survival mode.  My kids are 4 and 1, and it's been tough.

[thejackpot]

mrspez07, looks like it is going well. Can't wait to see the finished look.

We are doing some things - getting rid of a huge tree in our backyard, we are replacing the brick of our flower gardens with wood and some of the concrete is getting redone. Those aren't exciting projects but I will appreciate the improvements.

[ellipses84]

Not necessarily a regular but I try to pop in occasionally! All my home projects have been purging / organizing. Since I’m not busy working anymore, my family members are all hitting me up for design advice. I already selected paint colors for the exterior of my sister’s house and advised on some other changes, and she asked me to design a new deck they are going to DIY. I thought about doing a mural wall in her playroom just because I’m itching for more of a creative outlet. We were supposed to move to a bigger house but it was delayed so I’m just pinning/IG’ing inspiration and planning.

[InBetweenDays]

We live in an urban neighborhood with a smallish lot (8,800 sf) that is mostly front and side yard so we don't have a ton of privacy. Our street is really popular for walkers and runners - we'd like a bit more privacy but love feeling connected to our neighborhood and people passing by so we don't want a tall hedge or privacy fence.

There's a lower part of a yard that is about 1,200 sf below a retaining wall we built about 10 years ago. Used to have the kids playset on woodchips and an old concrete area where they played Foursquare and basketball. We swapped the playset for a trampoline a few years ago and they never play on the concrete area anymore. So we're completely redoing it. We pulled up all the woodchips, we're going to tear up the old concrete, and then repour concrete over the entire area. We're not doing one large slab, we're going to do 9' square slabs with 6" in between for steppable plants and a long planting area over a trench drain along the fence. Then we're adding a hot tub, pizza oven, large table, a firepit, and a lot of large pots. We got these tall linear steel planters that we're going to put on top of the wall so the area will be private. We're hiring out all the concrete work but I can't wait until it's time to plant the planters and beds above the wall.

The kids trampoline will go in another part of the yard. (Ignore the lacrosse goal - it just gets moved there when we're mowing 😊)

[InBetweenDays]

And here are the steel planters (just placed there to make sure we liked them so not necessarily the final placement). They're meant to rust so they're no longer black.

[orval]

We are starting a partial bathroom remodel next week. After months of trying to find a decent contractor - we found one!
We are redoing our shower, taking out a huge jacuzzi tub/replacing with freestanding, new tile floor, paint, lighting, mirrors. We have a large '90's bathroom so even though we are not doing the vanities it is still a $20k job. I am excited because our shower is nasty with yucky grout that won't come clean.
We are keeping it fairly neutral - kind of a coastal look with wood look tile floors. We have exisiting white vanities with cream tops.

[simpsongal]

I love seeing these updates! And some of your diy projects are very impressive!

[mrsukyankee]

We've had some delays in projects, but after moving into our house, we at least have a few things planned and they are finally moving forward.
We did get rid of three trees in the backyard (very small urban space). They were very tall, quick growing and diseased so worth doing. We had the stumps ground so that we can put in fake grass in the entire area.
Projects to do:
- build a space for the pizza oven as well as the roof cover
- build some planters to use next year

Kitchen work starts in July & fake grass in August

[carmenere]

I’m not a reg but I’ll share.

Our master bath remodel starts in two weeks, and we just decided to change from a tub to a walk-in shower. But last night we realized the layout of the shower won’t work with the vanity we ordered 🤦🏻‍♀️ so I have to call the contractor tomorrow and figure out what to do about that. I really don’t want a smaller vanity but the bathroom is tiny.

The next project after that is painting and re-facing the kitchen cabinets.

[sandandsea]

We have started meeting with people on our landscape project. We met with 2 contractors and have our second meeting with the pool people this week. I think we will actually go back a step and meeting with a designer next week as we know what we want but the contractors seem to need more guidance and hand holding than we thought so we’re backing up a step.

[mrsukyankee]

Good luck with it, carmenere. I hope you can figure it out.

[rubytue]

I’m not a regular here, but have been visiting more lately. I have become quite the gardener this year, focusing on out outdoor spaces. We are in a townhouse, but a fairly large yard for a townhouse. I added a new flower bed for wildflowers and 4 raised beds for veggies. Also, ripped out a bunch of hostas and replaced with caladiums and elephant ears. I’m also upping my game this year and trying a few tropicals, and will remember to bring them in for the winter! I have a tendency to forget and lost two lime trees and two bananas. But this time, I have a cold hardy palm (windmill) and a Meyer lemon!

In my front yard, I want to pull out my azaleas and replace with hydrangeas. And move my peonies.

Inside, I can’t even be bothered to clean 😂

[mrsukyankee]

@hiphopanonymous, I think our new kitchen cabinets will look very similar in colour to the island colour you posted.

I think the lvt your husband chose will be lovely with what you have. I'd choose something simple as your backsplash if you go with it.

[aprilsails]

Some @@@

Well after two weeks with hardly any rain (in June!) my husband is losing his mind and I think we will be getting an irrigation system this summer instead of next. Our neighbour across the street had amassed quotes from 7 different suppliers so we will use whoever they go with probably, basically piggybacking on their installation.

This means we won’t be buying all new living room furniture for a year which is both extremely annoying and at the same time I don’t care. No one will be coming over and the small residents of the house are still highly destructive, both cats and humans.

What is killing me right now is that we can’t get our blinds order in or installed, and I’m guessing there will be a big backlog when we do. We had finally prepared our order to do all the upstairs bedrooms with light blocking shades and the supplier was going to bring over the book so we could confirm the colours and that was supposed to be March 18th and obviously hasn’t happened. My baby is waking up soooooo early in the morning. Sob.

[ssmjlm]

We've gotten small projects done here and there. Now that it's summer we're at the beach house more often bc it's too hot to be working outside and I don't want to shock the plants in the heat.

We ripped out one of the boring builder holly bushes and transplanted a japanese maple from our patio that came from my parents house actually. Then my dad brought me 4 more tiny maples from their house. 1 went in the patio spot and one by our shed. The last 2 I just stuck in our wooded area, TBD.

DH is trying to get our surround sound system re-done. We cannot get the indoor and outdoor speakers to work together.

Next up is repainting E's room since I re-did some of the artwork on one wall and of course the builder paint is crap as they all are.

[Mrs.flang]

We had our landscaping finished up last month (which was about 18 months since our huge renovation was completed).

These pics aren’t that great, but we got new steps and walkway, and had the front beds done, and then 10 arborvitae put along the road to the right for privacy (we have no fence between this side yard and our small “back” yard).





Here’s a before picture from May 2018 right before we started the renovation. Yikes I had forgotten how terrible it was. 😳

[boiler717]

Our new backyard is pretty great! We went from a 0.75 acre wooded lot that backed up to a creek and woods to a 0.1 acre city lot. I was really worried about the lack of privacy but our yard is super private and the perfect size. We haven’t done much but add our furniture and resand the paver patio. Landscape wise we are working on getting the neglected grass back in shape. My planters are gorgeous this year! I’ve had this tiered herb garden for 3 years now and I love it.

[dottyblue]

My house feels like it's falling apart 5 years after purchase, so that's fun. It was built in the 1940s, so wear and tear is to be expected but I feel like EVERYTHING is breaking.

In the past year we have already:
- replaced the dishwasher and oven
- had 2 pinhole leaks in pipes in walls, prompting a whole house water treatment system to be installed. Leaks were numbers 4 and 5 in less than 5 years of ownership
- had a septic blockage caused by kids flushing kleenex and napkins down the toilet ("But mom! You always do!" No. I don't.)
- had 3 kitchen cabinet doors break in 2-3 pieces. They are literally falling apart 35+ years after installation
- had 3 trees taken down due to rot

Next up is getting a HELOC in place so we can repair/replace the following:
- driveway which is sinking and heaving
- drainage. All our downspouts back up and there is evidence that the underground drainage pipes have collapsed from age
- screened-in porch: floors to be sanded and restained, screens replaced, railing put up (currently wide-open screen that the kids could fall through) and fully repainted
- replace rotting stairs on back porch
- 28 windows, many custom sizes and my trim is going to be impacted (it is an integrated part of the existing windows and will need to be fully repainted after removal/installation)
- full gut of only full bathroom to replace failing plumbing and improve setup.

We are going to DIY as much as possible, but the list is becoming overwhelming.

[Wallflower]

In February/March, I stripped the wallpaper from my upstairs guest room and painted. This was the wallpaper I hated the most, in a house full of dated wallpaper, so it's a huge relief to get it done. I'm slowly moving from that room just working as a catch-all for stuff I don't know what to do with to a properly decorated room.

Now that we're into garden season, though, I'm just so happy about how one of my gardens is coming along. I've redone almost all the garden space since I moved into my house 5 years ago. My front garden is mostly hostas that I've added and split, little by little over the years, and they're starting to really fill in! I'm also getting smarter at spraying so the deer don't treat the garden like their favorite buffet.

The most-hated wallpaper:


The room, painted:


The front garden:

[bhnumbers]

I love seeing all the updates and the before and after photos!

We haven't done much inside the house yet, but outside is looking much better theses days with more improvements on the way!

-finally figured out how to furnish our screened porch. I wanted lounge seating and a dining table and I'm happy with how it has all turned out. I stumbled onto an early sale at World Market and loooove the outdoor furniture we got. The only thing left to do out there get a larger ceiling fan.


-another "finally" is having a new fence installed. The one we have is a nasty, rusted, old chain-link fence that's probably been there since not long after the original house was built in the 1940s. We're replacing it with a cedar fence and it's happening this coming Monday.

-I had a local nursery do a custom potting job with the large planters got for the back of the house. I'm really happy with how they turned out.

[hamster]

Not a whole lot...

- We got grass planted, finally ridding us of the giant mud lit from the addition excavation and new septic field.
- Finally found some new patio furniture. Not quite what I wanted but apparently that doesn't exist lol. I'm in love with our new picnic table.
- The patio cover ceiling needs painted. While the painter is here I want a quote on painting our pine paneling in the living room. There's just to mental or physical bandwidth for DIY right now.
- I wanted new mulch this year but not happening at this point.
- We built a permanent brooder for baby chickens, and a second coop. This allows us to raise meat birds and pullets (young hens) to sell.
- We still need to build our pantry shelves.
- We are going to put LVP in the living room. Need to talk with the contractor about where to logically stop given that we still want to re do the kitchen at some point. Just waiting for the material to go on sale.
- We are exploring moving the garden to the front yard. This will require fencing it in, which we had loosely discussed anyway. Trying to gather quotes for that. The front is unused space, and we can make it a lot bigger. This frees up our existing garden for our perennial fruits and veggies, or fencing in a pool or something.

Ok, now that it's all typed out I guess that is a lot!

[sandandsea]

We got the quote for the spa/pool for our backyard project and high level is $80-100k for a 8x14ft ish “spool”. Not going to happen so we are going to go look at above ground hot tubs as $10-15k is way easier to swallow.

[simpsongal]

Jun 25, 2020 23:30:27 GMT -5 sandandsea said:

We got the quote for the spa/pool for our backyard project and high level is $80-100k for a 8x14ft ish “spool”. Not going to happen so we are going to go look at above ground hot tubs as $10-15k is way easier to swallow.

fwiw, in nova that’s what I’ve heard they cost to install too. Good luck with the hot tub and yay to saving money!

[thejackpot]

We decided to get the kids bathroom redone and signed a contract this week. The bathroom is so tiny and there is a huge tub in there that makes giving baths a nightmare. It should get started in two weeks! I am going shopping this weekend to firm up some ideas. I am so glad we are doing this and if we don't do anything else big this year, I am ok.