Page 5: The Last Stretch
42-Monday, August 26, 2024
I started the day painting the dining room window trim (2 coats), and a little strip of wall paint above the heat pump, which I’d not been able to reach while the flooring had been stacked in front. Afterwards, we took a run to the dump and town to pick up an early lunch, but found the deli closed, unfortunately–OK, Monday.
After a pickup lunch at home, I worked on some odds and ends while waiting for the countertop installers to arrive. They were due between 12 and 2, as we’d been told. I worked in the shed, hanging the old metal cabinet I saved from the kitchen and starting to organize things after using the shed as a catch-all throughout the past several weeks. I built a new shelf along one wall beneath the existing shelves. Then, I painted the walls in the small hallway, using more of the blue paint we’d used throughout.
The countertop guys arrived around 1445, and got right to work. I’d left a space in the trim around the kitchen outside door, anticipating the countertop overhang and backsplash, but I’d also anticipated that I might need to expand the opening, and sure enough, they couldn’t quite angle the countertop in without enlarging the cutout, which I did while everyone waited. Otherwise, the counter was done in about an hour, and looked terrific. We’d been told to wait a day before installing plumbing, to let the adhesives cure sufficiently, so with some reluctance we did.
The weather had been getting warmer and more humid since last week, and we returned to air conditioning during the afternoon. While I’m grateful for air conditioning, I sure like having windows open to communicate with the outside. I miss the sounds and air movement.
43-Tuesday, August 27, 2024
To begin, I installed the faucet, which wasn’t too bad. It happened to be the same faucet we had in Maine (chosen for that reason), and I’d forgotten that it came with a handy tool to help tighten the nut behind the sink, so I was grateful for that, though access behind the sink wasn’t too bad considering. The PEX hoses that came pre-connected to the faucet worked fine for connecting to our supply valves without issue, and after flushing the faucet as directed I made the final connections to the pull-out sprayer. I ran a short cycle on the dishwasher to make sure it filled and drained properly, and without leaks. All good.
I had a collection of plumbing parts for the drains on hand–some that I’d bought specifically for this sink, others left over from doing the bathroom sink a couple years before. I hoped I’d have everything I needed, but at the same time highly doubted I would. With existing parts, I did pretty well, but didn’t have what I needed to get from the trap to the drain pipe sticking out of the floor, so after trying everything I had, we went into Ace for some more pieces. As usual, I bought several different things, not knowing what would ultimately work, and in the end used just two of the items, plus a 1-1/2″ Fernco rubber clamp adapter to replace the 1-1/4″ one that I’d used when I had plumbed in the temporary laundry sink once the old kitchen was removed.
Other than one fitting I’d forgotten to screw tightly together after installation, the drains worked well with no leaks, and we were really looking forward to having a sink–and a whole kitchen–again. But our temporary kitchen had worked well, and in the end it was really the lack of a good sink that grew tiresome–washing dishes in the bathroom vanity didn’t work very easily, and I’d not been able to reconnect the laundry sink once the cabinets were installed, at least not without buying all new hoses and plumbing, which we deemed unnecessary.
With that, it was time to collect boxes of stuff we’d moved out of the old kitchen and stored in the shed, plus all the items we’d used in the temporary back kitchen, and spent time unpacking, loading and running the dishwasher to clean things, and getting a first-run of stocking the kitchen cabinets with what we had. There’d surely be some changes in the storage plan as we got used to things–there always is–but this was fun.
Later, we ran to the dump to drop off kitchen things we didn’t want any more, along with a couple old tables from the temporary kitchen that, while useful then, were now obsolete and I was more than ready to be rid of them. We took a drive by a property that Heidi had seen online that featured 6 acres plus a concrete garage, with a tiny little strip of water front land across the road. The price was low and we deemed it worthy of a drive-by, wondering briefly about using it for our garage/shop and storage versus eventually building something on the main property. It would have needed a lot of work, however, and in any event we were in no serious position to buy it. As it happened, within a couple days the property went under contract to someone else, making the point moot.
Back home, and with the countertops done, it was time to lay out the new rugs we’d bought for the house, which we’d been holding onto till we felt we were at a safe point where enough of the work was done (specifically painting and the new kitchen). We thought we’d try the couch in the alcove that used to be the dining room, as this was our long-term plan for the couch, and while we left it for a night we decided to move it back to the center of the room for the rest of our trip and till our new chairs arrived in October.
44-Wednesday, August 28, 2024
I worked on some small kitchen details in the morning, then we decided to go out and check out some of the antique stores, specifically looking for some bedside tables, but in the end we found a nice little drop-leaf table that we thought would work well between the chairs in the living room (when they arrived), and also bought a couple miscellaneous bowls (mixing bowls) and an interesting old cookbook or two. I like to find old, illustrated cookbooks from the 50s or 70s, especially those spiral-bound Betty Crocker ones like Dinner for Two. Not only are the social anachronisms funny (if also mysoginistic and sad), but the recipes can be horrifyingly amusing.
In the afternoon, I built some simple corner trim to cover the raw concrete edge leading into the kitchen near the chimney, where the old wall had been attached. From existing pine stock, I glued and tacked together the piece outside, then fit it into place, where it fit so well as a friction fit that I didn’t end up bothering with any construction adhesive, as I’d originally planned.
Next, I addressed the exposed pipes above the cabinets. I had a plan to use the unneeded 4×8 cherry plywood panel to box these in as simply as possible, and wanted at least to cut the panel into the pieces I needed before we left from this trip. As it happened, I continued rolling along with the project and made better progress. To secure the panels, I installed some cleats on top of the cabinets, glued and screwed as needed, and a short vertical cleat on the outside wall to help support the panels. I left the assemblies as is for the glue to cure overnight, but looked forward to installing the cover panels next time. I caulked the seams and nail holes on the new corner trim before ending for the day.
45-Thursday, August 29, 2024
I installed the plywood panels above the cabinets, a fairly simple installation with as few screws as possible–just enough to hold things, while making removal easy for access should it be needed. The length required one long section and a short piece to fill it out.
On a roll, I kept working, using more of the plywood and some leftover solid cherry trim pieces from the kitchen to build out the bottom and exposed end of the upper box, enclosing everything but the pipes and wires that ran down the wall and behind the countertops.
I finished up with another friction-fit box cover for these, again built out of the cherry plywood (with mitered corners cut on the table saw since I didn’t have enough solid cherry to otherwise hide the plywood edge grain). I’d never expected to get these trim sections built on this trip and it was never a priority–but the circumstances just worked and I was pleased to have the work done in any event.
We chose to donate the old range and microwave to Habitat for Humanity, but they weren’t able to pick them up till the end of next week. So with the back room awaiting some final details, I moved out the stove and stored it beneath a tarp outside so we could get on with things. I removed the temporary range wiring from the panel, which Matt had just run out the bottom of the panel for the purpose.
With the room more or less cleared out, I prepared and installed the first row of new flooring along the starting wall, and also glued in threshold pieces at the hallway door and the short door into the little storage nook. This technique had worked well for us, and once the adhesive cured overnight we could get to the flooring in this final room tomorrow. Meanwhile, Heidi painted two coats of white trim paint on the new closet door and trim in the office.
Finally, I painted the new corner trim in the kitchen with two coats of the off-white paint.
46-Friday, August 30, 2024
We headed out in the world again for breakfast, groceries, and to return some extra and unneeded paddles for the kayaks, as we’d not realized the kayaks came with their own paddles.
Back home around 0900, I got geared up to start the final flooring in the back room, and we worked from 1000-1300 to install the flooring there. It was a very small room with little need to crawl around from side to side, and the rows were short enough that I decided to go with 4 rows each time versus three. This left us with four full boxes of flooring leftover, and one full container of adhesive. Though I’d ordered an overage, mainly anticipiting more waste or boards that we deemed unusble (and neither was the case), it wasn’t a terrible overage. We used 25 boxes of flooring and 4, four-gallon containers of adhesive.
Afterwards, using up scrap, I installed flooring in the bedroom closet to finish things up. This left virtually no scrap other than some short cutoffs.
After cleaning up from the flooring efforts, I repositioned the cell phone booster, which I’d moved once from when it was installed on the old window trim, and now repositioned it where the booster and most of the excess wiring would be hidden behind furniture when all was said and done, with only the antenna visible (as required) up near the heat pump head unit. We need this booster to get a usable signal in the house; otherwise, we used to have to go out on the patio for a signal. The new bedroom rugs arrived and we spread them out–just some small ones on each side of the bed for a soft landing, and a larger one at the foot for accent.
47-Saturday, August 31, 2024
Our immediate neighbors, who we’d met briefly once before, had invited us over for the evening, so we mad a quick trip to the store so Heidi could bake a hostess gift (lemon bars. Afterwards, I prepared and installed the new TV mount and tv above the fireplace, about the only place we had available even if it hadn’t been the best spot. We bought an inexpensive (OK, cheap) TV to mount here, and it was a tight fit above the light fixtures. I added a 2×6 to the wall first, bringing the top section of the terraced chimney out flush with the one below and giving me a good area to mount the mount. I used glue and tapcons for the wood, and installed the mount with four longer tapcons through the wood and into the masonry. We’d had Matt install an outlet in the ceiling for this purpose.
Next, I cut, but did not yet install, the threshold moldings for the back room, as I needed the nail gun but didn’t feel like getting out the compressor and rigamarole at the moment. I mowed the yard again, and assembled new stools for the peninsula bar, before it was time to get cleaned up and go next door for a fun evening.
48-Sunday, September 1, 2024
Anxious to finish things up, I started early painting the back room with one coat of the blue paint we’d used throughout the living area. We contemplated other colors, but nothing exciting came to light, Heidi wanted a contrast between the walls and trim, and we had plenty of the blue paint on hand, so ultimately we went with that. I made sure the one coat covered well and didn’t see reason to bother with a second in this utility room.
Afterwards, we painted the trim with two coats of the off white, as usual, finishing in time to go to town for lunch at Shore Deli…or not, as it was closed yet again. We’d been by there three separate times earlier in the week, only to be disappointed to find it closed. Later, we found they were having staffing issues, but it’s a tough way to run a sandwich shop. They make really good sandwiches and we were disappointed for the 4th time. We had to settle for a chicken sandwich elsewhere, which was fine but nothing like the sub shop.
Back home after lunch, I installed the oak quarter round molding on the pantry (back room) and hall, and at the front door threshold. Then, I moved on to the 5″ tall baseboard in the office, though I couldn’t install the decorative top molding for now since my original wood order had included only a few correct pieces, with several pieces of completely different trim that must have been filed in the wrong bin. I only noticed this many days, or even weeks, after the delivery early in the project. I caulked the seams and nail holes ad needed, and laid the small Persian rug that we’d used in the temporary kitchen, finishing up for the day around 1715.
49-Monday, September 2, 2024 (Labor Day)
We were surprised early in the day at 0715 by Rafek (Dock Boy 2) and crew, whom we were not expecting per se as I’d heard nothing from him since the phone call more than a week before. Rafek is from the Czech Republic. They were here to drop off a vehicle, for the barge was supposed to be coming in later in the day. That was really exciting! As it happened, the barge didn’t show up after all, and sometime during the day (I was busy and didn’t notice when) the old truck they left behind disappeared. Hopefully tomorrow? This was a major letdown, even if I figured it was some minor reason it didn’t happen (which as it turned out it was).
I turned to the bedroom paint. We chose Revere Pewter, the gray/mushroom color we’d sampled, and it was a good choice. Painting this room was a bit of a pain since there was a lot of stuff in the way and little room to get rid of it. Actually, the whole project had seemed like multiple rounds of that little game with 8 sliding numbers and one empty space, where you had to move all the pieces to move one piece a space. At some point in the morning I noticed the heat pump, dispensing delightful cold air, had just stopped working, and had no power. Same with the control head in the living room, though the separate unit in the office was fine.
After trying a few obvious things, like resetting the breaker and checking the filters (as it happened, they were filthy from construction), all to no avail, I called the company that installed the units, and we experienced good response and service from the answering service and on-call tech, who sleepily called us within 20 minutes and then came out to check out the problems shortly thereafter. Somewhere in there, the units started working again on their own–weird. The tech looked things over and couldn’t find a problem, and everything worked fine most of the day, but late in the afternoon the same problem occurred, so this time we shut down and would call in the morning. The single unit in the office actually could keep up pretty well on its own, and in any event the weather was due to change by morning, with more drier and cooler air on the way, so it wasn’t an air conditioning crisis. Yet.
Anyway, I got the bedroom painted–one coat again, as it covered well over the white we’d used in here a couple years ago–and afterwards, we did the two coats on the trim. It was early enough int he day, and the paint cured fast enough, that I finished up late in the afternoon with the oak base molding, which was nice since now we wouldn’t have to shift everything around again to make space for the installation another time. This left me three pieces of the base molding for the office, which wouldn’t quite be enough, but Lowe’s had some unfinished oak quarter round that would make up the difference satisfactorily, and we needed to head up there sometime in the next few days for a few other things anyway.
50-Tuesday, September 3, 2024
I opened all the windows when I got up, as it was nice out now. Early, I did a few jobs, including caulking by the cutout in the door trim near the countertop in the kitchen, installing some brown caulk for visual purposes in a few gaps around the flooring and molding, and that sort of thing. I called Thornton Services at 0800, and they’d send a tech later on to look at the heat pumps again.
Meanwhile, the dock barge finally showed up around 9, manned by a Jimmy Buffet-like character called EJ, and his dog Marley. The rest of the crew showed up a little later with a work trailer and flatbed, and it took some jockeying around of things in our small yard to figure out where they should put things. We ended up moving my enclosed trailer to a lousy spot down by the front door, at an angle, but that was OK for now since all I was doing was slowly getting stuff in there stored for travel later in the week.
As always, in the midst of all this chaos the Thornton tech showed up, since everything always happens at once, but we got his van in and he spent some time troubleshooting. The issue appeared to be in the outdoor shutoff, where he said the ground wire pulled right out when he touched it, and said it was arcing. He checked things out thoroughly and tested the whole system in practical use for over a half hour before calling it good.
Meanwhile, the dock guys worked to remove the old dock, the first step. They cut the old dock into sections and pulled it out with the barge crane, then basically disassembled it into component parts and loaded it on the flatbed trailer. The left two partial pilings in the water, and then everyone got sidetracked because Radek’s truck had a radiator hose leak, and suddenly, when we turned our attention to other things, the next time we looked everyone was gone, leaving those stubby old posts and the full trailer of debris. I figured they had a plan, so it wasn’t my problem, but tomorrow’s events would highlight this as a waste of potential time and efficiency. Radek had told us they planned to cut some overhanging tree limbs by the dock tomorrow, so we looked forward to that.
Meanwhile, Heidi worked on the ever-present need to de-vine some of the trees, and I shuffled things around between the trailer and the shed as needed, with some stuff to come home with us in the trailer this time (since it was available), and other things from the trailer eventually needing to go to the shed, like the spare trim lumber.
51-Wednesday, September 4, 2024
In the morning, EJ and Dominic (Radek’s son) were on hand, and quickly pulled the two remaining pilings (I had to wonder why they’d not finished this yesterday?), then strapped down the debris trailer and departed with it (another thing it seems would have been easy yesterday…what do I know). There were no obvious signs they’d be back, but I hoped they would, in order to make progress and cut the limbs. It was starting to be clear why these guys all seemed to be constantly behind the eight ball.
In the meantime, we prepared the bathroom for paint. The bathroom had always been the “best” room in the house, and had required no immediate improvement, but it had always been on our mind, and now, with time available, it seemed like a bonus to go ahead and paint the room. First, I removed and raised the shower curtain rod, which was just too low and let the curtain hang in the water. We removed whatever we could, and prepped and filled some old screw and nail holes hither and yon. We painted the bathroom with a light purple color that should have been called black raspberry, but was actually called new age. I did one coat all around, ensuring that I had good coverage. Then, we turned to two coats of off-white on all the trim, which was pretty minimal in this small room. The painting was done before 1300. It seems I didn’t take any pictures till the flooring was done later in the day.
EJ and Dominic were back in late morning to cut other parts of the tree, which they did quickly, then loaded the debris in their pickup and departed at 1230. That was it for the day, as they didn’t return. No wonder the business name is Perpetual Marine.
Next, we decided to go ahead and install some self-stick 12×12 vinyl tiles we’d bought for the bathroom some time back, mainly as a temporary improvement. Someday, we’ll actually remodel the whole bathroom, but that can wait. I’d like to build a custom stall shower and have more room where the washer/dryer are located, which is very tight right now behind the 6′ tub enclosure.
I started the initial layout from the hall door, and, using a printed seam on the old floor, laid out the new tiles going in from there. This required a few cuts along the nearby wall, but afterwards Heidi could lay all the full-size tiles pretty quickly, while I worked on some of the cuts. We wanted to avoid moldings and trim, so I worked to make the tiles fit against the existing base trim and cabinets as closely as possible. I got all the stuff on the left side of the room (behind the door, along the vanity, and around the toilet) by the end of the day, leaving some custom pieces along the tub and in the laundry area for the morning.
The paint and basic floor tile made an inordinate improvement to the feel of the space, we thought, all for a day’s work.
52-Thursday, September 5, 2024
I finished up the vinyl tile installation in the bathroom, taking about an hour to finish. Afterwards, I loaded up the truck with trash for the dump, and some various returns, including the long, incorrect molding for the baseboard (the wrong pieces had been sent in my original order). There was no sign of the dock boys by 10, so we departed for our errands, returning with replacement molding and some oak base molding to finish up in the office. We also stopped for some basic groceries to get us through, and lunch, returning home 1330-1400. There was no sign of the dock boys, which was a little frustrating.
Since we were departing soon, I decided to move my trailer back up to flat ground where I could easily access it for final loading and eventual hitchup on departure day, and to ensure it wouldn’t get accidentally blocked in in the meantime. The fact that my trailer ended up in front of the dock guys’ trailer was just a bit of chest thumping, I suppose, though I was trying hard to be equanimous regarding the dock and any delays.
I set up the bare oak molding and sprayed it with several coats of satin varnish. I could have bought pre-finished oak, but it was stained and the wrong color, and this way the oak matched the flooring pretty well. Certainly good enough for a little base molding in the office. I rounded out the day with some pre-trip checks, just checking trailer lights, securing some of the load in the trailer, and checking the oil and DEF in the truck.
53-Friday, September 6, 2024
Down to the little odds and ends now, I reinstalled a mirror in the bedroom with command strips, as I’d removed it for painting earlier, and also resecured the cell booster with more of the velcro strips, as I’d not had enough of them before. Then, I got to work on installing the oak base molding in the office, and also the decorative primed pine molding above the baseboard, finishing around 1045.
The dock boys arrived around 9 and cut more of the tree, and were apparently awaiting Radek, who was to arrive with a load of poles and lumber. EJ said, “we won’t take long once we get rolling”. We’ll see, right?
Radek arrived with the trailer load of supplies at 1130, and after some discussion we decided to cut one more large overhanging branch, with EJ up in the tree like a monkey with a pole saw. It took a bit, but eventually they succeeded. It was nice of them to help us with these limb removals, which wasn’t really part of the original deal, so that made up for a lot. As always, around the same time the guy from Habitat arrived, but wouldn’t get out of his truck till we corralled the dogs (these vicious golden retrievers).
Once the limbs were cut and the trailer unloaded, that looked to be it for the day in dock world, which was frankly fine with us. They make their presence known. Once everyone left, we took a side trip to another antique store that Heidi wanted to visit, and, upon returning home at 1430, I cut the bathroom door shorter so it would fit over the new threshold molding at the doorway, then relaxed the rest of the day.
54-Saturday, September 7-Sunday, September 8, 2024
The last day is always tough. We’re ready to go, but our preference to avoid traffic is not to travel during the days, but overnight. So I try to leave just enough to do on the last day that, if I spread it out really carefully, will keep me busy. I worked for a while to try and catch up these logs, which I’d fallen far behind with, then packed up the stationary tools, lawn tractor, kayaks, wheelbarrow, bikes, and other things into the shed for storage. The 755 had to stay outside.
Drove in to the dump for a final stop, and took a hail Mary by Shore Deli–and they were open! Yay! We had a late lunch/early dinner and enjoyed our subs. Afterwards, I hooked up the trailer, checked everything over, and all the other things I do before departure. Took the dogs for a walk,m stored the outdoor furniture cushions, and cleaned the house. There was little more to do but wait till it was late enough to go to bed for a rest till our departure, which this time happened at 2320, with a safe and uneventful trip home towing the trailer. This required several more stops than we would normally do, since fuel economy drops by about half with this trailer, but we were home in Maine by 1230 on Sunday afternoon.
