Toilets: Master Bath

We suspected the master bath toilet just needed to either have the bolts tightened or maybe have it reseated before we moved in. After we got there though we realized that though it was a newer toilet, it was a tiny round bowl toilet that was really just not for us. In addition, Mark took one look at the bolts and said "this is coming out!" While the ceramic parts of the toilet were fine, the metal bolts were totally rusty and corroded and awful. And it rocked a lot, which is not good.

So, using our 10% off coupon at Lowes, we added a new toilet to our already giant shopping cart. This happened to be the same trip that we bought a washer & dryer, refrigerator, a new living room rug, and a hundred other things we "needed". We chose a chair height, oval bowl that fits into the space of a round bowl by utilizing a smaller tank. The only negative was that it didn't have the low flow flusher, but we can always add that later and it already is a pretty low flow toilet.

We waited until our resident expert Annie was in town and then Mark and Annie tackled the project. This is my retelling based on their notes.

First they removed the old toilet. This included cleaning up the flange, removing the gross remnants of the old wax ring, and plugging up the sewer pipe with a rag.

Next, the new toilet had to come out of the box. Annie wisely suggested doing a dry fit with the new toilet and they traced with pencil the landing spot for it. Then the toilet came back up to have the new wax ring affixed to it. In order to make the wax ring soft enough to stick, it needed to have a blow dryer blow hot air on it for a bit.

Finally, they set the new toilet (with wax ring) back into place and bolted it in. Tada! Except... it still wiggled. A lot.

Mark testing out the toilet fit with Sadie's supervision

So Annie and Mark decided to pull the new toilet back up to investigate. And when they did so, the entire flange from the sewer pipe came up with the toilet! At this point, I came into the room and discovered both Annie and Mark laughing maniacally. Mark just says to me "This project just got a whole lot bigger!"

For the next couple of hours, Annie and Mark discussed, debated, researched, and watched various videos on the internet. They finally decide what part they need. Go to ACE hardware, buy the part, come home, and it doesn't fit. So they hit the internet again.

Finally we go to OSH to get the correct parts, which turned out to be a replacement toilet flange that tightens to fit the sewer pipe.

Old flange with new flange installed

Then, after watching very useful this old house videos, they install the parts.

BUT WAIT! Before they can install the parts correctly, Mark has to chisel out some of the old tile mortar that for some stupid reason a previous owner had put around the sewer pipe. In addition, he had to sawzall some of the subfloor. It should be mentioned that Mark did the chiseling with a flat head screw driver and a hammer.

"Oh honey I'm so glad we bought a fixer!!"

Finally, Mark prevailed and he and Annie got the new part installed, refit the toilet and discovered... that it still rocked back and forth. A lot.

Not to worry though! The determined team figured out that the floor itself was uneven with a bit of a rise directly under the toilet. They hit the internet and discovered they could use plastic shims to even out the toilet.

New flange with outline for toilet and shims in place

After another run to OSH to acquire the plastic shims and a new wax ring, cleaning off the old wax ring goop, they finally installed the toilet, shimmed it, tightened the bolts, and finally the toilet was in useable working order and did NOT rock!

New low flow, clean, stable, non-leaky and non-rocky toilet!! 

Whew! All I can say is... I'm glad I stayed well out of the way of this project. And the one job I was given (taking pictures) I didn't do all that well in since the pictures are off color and I missed many of the good action shots. I was too busy fixing other things! But the bottom line (haha bottom) is that now we have two fully functional toilets in the house. And that's something to post about!

Toilets: Green Bath

Before we moved in we knew that our toilet situation needed help. As my dad so gently put it, we desperately needed a better place to put all our crap. We guessed that our master bath toilet needed to be re-seated and the family bath (aka green bath) toilet needed some new inner parts. Here's how it the green bath toilet got fixed and updated.

As you can see, "Green Bath" is an appropriate name

The problem was that the toilet would continually fill until the tank overflowed. Then it would keep overflowing. There also was a small leak somewhere that we couldn't identify. Finally, the whole toilet seems to be original to the house, meaning it was a far cry from low flow.

We bought an all in one flapper kit from our favorite hardware store, OSH (Orchard Supply Hardware.) We also bought a 1flush/2flush retro grade kit. Mark replaced the flapper, float, chain, valvue and pretty much every working part inside the tank. After a few adjustments, we had a working non-overflowing toilet!

Then he installed the low flow flusher, which is a pretty cool thing. It fit right into our old toilet (I feel certain Mark made an effort to buy one that would fit) and you calibrate it for how big of a flush you want for your big and little flushes. Now we can flush without wondering if we're losing 5 gallons of water per flush!

Modern plumbing meets original charm!

However, after replacing all of those parts, there was still a small leak. Mark turned off the water to the toilet, took the hoses that attached to the wall to OSH, got some local friendly advice, and replaced them. Voila! The green bath now has a non-overflowing, water saving, non-leaky toilet. Winner!

Yardwork, AKA Clearing Out The Jungle

I have so much to blog about and I've literally been too exhausted to pick up the camera and get the SD card out of it. Lucky for you I managed to persevere and get some updates drafted and here's the first of them!

One the second day we were in our house, Mark had a visit from the City of Lafayette Code Enforcement Agent. Apparently someone had called and complained about the vacant house and the state of the yard. Mark was able to explain that we just moved in, had big plans to fix up the place, and so forth. Considering the complaint was from before we owned the place, it was really no big deal and the agent was quite friendly.

This isn't even the before picture... but it's pretty close.

Weeds!

Considering that we knew we had at least one neighbor feeling pretty unhappy about the state of our yard, and the fact that the weeds were taller than me, we decided to make weed whacking a priority. Mark bought a fancy new weed whacker from Home Depot and we went to town. We tore out a big section for the dog to use in the back, cleaned up the curb side so we could park on the street, took out old invisible fencing wire, and did an overall general lopping/whacking of weeds. We also cleared out the pathway on both side yards. Finally, we trimmed down the giant juniper and shaped up the single hedge in front we think are going to keep. The yard waste bag count was 27! I think the end was higher than that plus we had about four cans we filled.

Still ugly... but a least it's not a fire hazard!

Now we can park in front of the house without getting attacked by weeds.

 We also cleared out the path to our side yard and waged a bit of a hedge war with the juniper.

Path to side yard... turns out there's cement under there.

The whole backyard was just as much of a mess as the front yard.

Backyard jungle

We bought some cute little pre-fab white picket fencing to mark off Sadie's potty spot. She's such a good dog that after three times going on command she now uses this area exclusively. The white fence is more of a visual marker for us than for her. No more worrying about stepping on a bomb while playing outside!

Sadie's potty spot

That hedge (in the center) has got to go.

After the backyard was mostly kinda cleared, we hired a fencer/landscaper to come in and remove the giant hedge on our property line and install a fence and a gated area for Sadie. We went with a cheap option and I'm still on the fence (cough) about that decision. But we have a functional and affordable fenced yard now complete with safe dog run for Sadie.

Ahh now that's a yard Sadie can play in

Sadie loves the extra 4 feet we gained by clearing that hedge!

Sadie's dog run

Obviously this was more of a demo phase for our yard than anything. Before we can get into real landscaping though, we want to have our sewer fixed (permits are in process!) and get our retaining wall fixed (have to wait for the sewer to be done). THEN we've got big plans for adding grass, clearing out some space on the hill, and bringing the whole yard to a much more appealing state. Maybe the people from Curb Appeal want to come do it for us and put us on TV?

We want to give a HUGE shout out to Annie and Stephanie, who literally made all this yardwork possible! 

We've Been Busy

We're proud to present:

A list in no particular order of the things we have done since moving in (much of it with the help of Annie and/or Stephanie)

• Fixed the family bath toilet, installed dual flush system, fixed leak
• Cleaned mold/mildew in master bed/bath
• Fixed kitchen door latch
• Yard work, weed whacking, ripping out blackberries, trimming an out of control juniper, trimming and shaping the hedge in front of master bedroom. Created over 27 bags of yard waste.
• Reinstalled registers over heating/ac ducts
• Had a locksmith change all of our locks
• Cleaned garage floor
• Bought appliances
• Flew to Blacksburg and back to get cats
• Built cattery
• Washed walls
• Cleaned kitchen including wiping out all the cabinets and drawers and putting contact paper in the drawers, and bringing a disgusting oven back into usable condition
• Bought appliances, had them delivered and installed
• Had AC repaired
• Home inspection for insurance purposes completed
• Bids on a fence scheduled, done, and fence contractor booked
• Moved furniture into house after putting felt pads on all of it
• Made DMV appointments
• Changed our address with lots of places
• Picked a living room rug and ordered a rug mat for it
• Replaced entire toilet in master bath, including the unexpected challenge of replacing the flange on the sewer pipe
• Washed all the screens, tracks, and window sills
• Fixed kitchen sink sprayer
• Had cable tv/internet installed
• Cleaned light fixtures and ceiling fans, installed/replaced light bulbs
• Demoed cabinet above fridge to make space for the new one
• Made a decent dent in unpacking our boxes, including most of the kitchen and the entertainment system
• Made a total of fifteen trips to various hardware stores to complete the above tasks

So... who wants to help with the rest of the list?

We're home!

It's been a crazy couple of weeks but we're finally at our new house and have managed to get the house into a mostly livable state! Here's the update so far.

A couple of days before our movers were supposed to show up they called and asked if they could come a day early. After a quick phone call to my dad (who was flying in to help us drive cross country) and a survey of our mostly packed things, we decided that yes, we sure would be ready for them a day early! We finished packing on Sunday evening, the movers came Monday morning, and on Monday night we picked up my dad from the airport and got a few hours down the road.

Just one of the several piles of boxes waiting for the movers

Our first big stop was at my aunt and uncle's house in Glen Carbon, Illinois. They were so nice and let us crash there with our dog too. We got to see lots of family including a cousin I'd never met before. There's no doubt though, we're related! Meeting family is so awesome and I'm so glad it all worked out. My mom joined us and after a day of resting and catching up, we hit the road again.

Uncle Terry, Me, Dad, Cousin Tori.
Redheaded Family! 

The cross country drive was about as good as it could have been. It was uneventful and calm. Sadie did really well! We actually had a harder time with her during the few days preceding the move and while at my aunt & uncle's house. Now we know, right? She's a great traveler in the car though and mostly just slept.

Our last stop was in Reno where we gambled, met up with another cousin, and allowed ourselves to admit how tired we were. The drive from Reno to Lafayette is only about 3.5 hours so we slept in and then drove to our new house!

We didn't catch all of the state signs but we got most.
12 states in less than a week, not too shabby!

We had the hardwood floors refinished but they weren't quite done when we arrived. So after a quick tour through the house we headed back to a hotel to rest. The next morning, our movers arrived at 7:30am with all of our stuff, but since the hardwoods were just finished the night before we couldn't move any of our furniture into the house! We had the movers put the heavy big furniture in the kitchen on the tile and everything else went into the garage. This is also about the time that we realized how much dust and debris hardwood floor refinishing creates. Every single surface in the house needed to be cleaned. Separate from the hardwood dust, the house had been vacant for nearly a year and needed a good scrubbing anyways.

Yeah... we have a lot of work ahead of us

Needless to say the first two days were insanely busy with cleaning and repairs. Then I left Mark up to his own devices while I flew back to Blacksburg to get my kitties. Annie met me there and after a few delayed flights and a mad sprint through Atlanta, we managed to make it back to SFO on schedule.

I look so happy here because I haven't figured out that "a lot of work" means "A LOT OF WORK!!" 

The next few days were filled with a million projects, cleaning, shopping, cleaning, and projects. Stephanie was able to come and visit for a couple of days and we put her to work too! Coming soon will be some more details about a few really big projects, including (spoiler) the cattery Mark built, the brand new toilet Mark and Annie installed, and the insane amount of yard work we've done.

We're currently on a weekend trip to Santa Barbara, where our friends got married last night. When we get home, it's just going to be us and the furballs and the thousands of things left on our list to tackle. In fact, tomorrow construction starts on our backyard fence and dog run!