Mukilteo Musings

Remodel Whining

Seriously, I do not feel sorry for myself. We volunteered to undertake a remodel adventure. But there are some things that kinda drive us a little crazy.

1. Catching me in my underwear. Ok, this has not happened---YET. My normal routine, if I don't have an arbitration hearing, is to hang out in my pajamas and sweats until I walk Apolo. But with plumbers and contractors and roofers around, I need to be fully dressed and showered when they arrive. Unfortunately, one never quite knows when they arrive in the morning or when they will be looking down the sky lights. Yesterday, a holiday for most people, was not a plumber holiday. As I walked out of the bathroom in my underwear to find my jeans in Lucas' bedroom, I saw the truck out his window. Knowing any second they would be in the house where I stood, I dove to the floor, slammed the door and put on my jeans on the floor. Close call.

2. We have no access to our closet during the day. Our master bath has a big walk in closet. The closet is not being redone but the torn up bathroom is between the bedroom and the closet. I have moved most of my clothes that I wear during the day to a chair in my son's room. They are piled on a chair because his closet is full of our daughter's clothes. Her clothes are in there because her closet is torn up. We are having a small bathroom added off of her room.

3. Decisions, decisions. All of a sudden, a plumber asks a question like, "How high up do you want your shower head?" What? Isn't there a standard number for these things? "Where do you want your bathtub faucet because it will not fit where it should be?" I have never thought about these things before. What if we pick wrong?

4. Lots of stuff is behind the walls. Our plan was to expand the sitting area in our master bath and have a six foot French door from the bedroom into the bathroom. But noooooo! There are vents and ducts and wires and built in vacuum pipes that cannot be moved without rebuilding our entire house. You do not know these things until the wall is torn off. So, we will have an "alcove" off the bedroom with a five foot French door instead.

5. Discovering we are redoing the wrong bathrooms. We have moved into our kids' downstairs bathroom. Our plan was that this bathroom would stay as it is for another five years or so because we are spending every last penny on three other bathrooms. The sinks, toilet, and bathtub in this particular bathroom happen to be bone and not pink which has saved it from the wrecking ball. But, as I was cleaning out the tub the other day, my foot almost went through the rotten soaked floor underneath the laminate flooring. In addition, we noticed the tile around the bathtub is soggy. It is in much worse shape than our master bath. What to do??

6. Ordering faucets online. We ordered a large number of items from an online warehouse including faucets, robe hooks, toilet paper holders, and TOWEL BARS. Everything except the toilets came in one large box and was delivered when we were out of town. As such, we did not look in the box within the short period of time they give you to catch errors. No towel bars were in the box even though we had been charged for them. E-mails to and from the company got a little nasty. Frankly, I could not quite believe it because we have spent thousands of dollars with them for toilets and accessories and the towel bars were only $100 out of the total. But, they were certain we had lost the towel bars and snarkily, they e-mailed me and told me to file a local police report. With a threat to report them to the consumer fraud division of our Attorney General's office for being an online scam, I finally received some very nice e-mails from a Mary who is sending our towel bars today at no extra charge.

7. Sewer outlet pipe is too small. Since we are adding a fourth bathroom, the sewer outlet pipe has to be bigger by an inch to be code. This single little problem may be the most expensive part of the whole deal. So at this very moment, they are digging up my front yard. Yikes! Watch that azalea!

No, I am not complaining. Believe me, I think about homeless people everyday and those who do not get enough food. Luckily, I go to a church where I can have direct access to some of these people and do something about it--even if in just a small way. I am also lucky that my priest went through a remodel of his kitchen last year. Actually, he bought a refrigerator that was too big for his kitchen so they ended up redoing the entire house. One thing led to another and this beam was rotten, etc. etc. They have a view home, too, and the banks never question dumping money into view property around here. The values continue to go up and up even when the rest of the country does not. If I am frustrated, I talk to him. He is great at putting these things into perspective.

Someday, this will all be done and I will put before and after pictures on here.