1. A person got called to be a cub scout leader! Sure its for the Webelos, so we will likely still have bears and wolves, but at least someone got called! He is a grad student and has no kids of his own so he should be fine with 6 10 year old boys, right? I figure we plan to do things together at least once a week. Then we will have everyone work on belt loops together. I haven't told him though.
2. You know how I was excited that LINK was over until December? Well, I was wrong. We got asked for a sort of last minute assistance October 1st (yeah in 2 weeks!). Apparently one of the other churches has been having problems getting enough volunteers and running out of food, so they called us. It should be fun, I guess. I already plan on not going if possible. At least we won't have enrichment the same night.
3. Daniel's work changed their time off policy (AGAIN) so he can keep none of his accrued time off next year. He will be able to have one week off for parental leave though. He has 7 unaccounted for days we need to use in the next few months.
4. I made us a MAJOR to do list of 32 things. It has everything I want done before the kid gets here. It ranges from change light bulb in garage to replacing the windows. OK, so the light bulb is the exception to the rule. But still, that will be one easy check mark. I seperated the list by area. Exterior work, upstairs, and downstairs. I figure we plan the outdoor ones to be done first, and if the weather is rainy, we will do interior instead. The interior list is longer anyway. Some of the things I can do, but will be easier without a toddler's assistance. But at least we have it all out there now. All on the front of our fridge. Which needs cleaned by the way.
5. I am already getting Christmas gifts together. A wee bit early, I know, but this way I can order all the 'rewards' and more that take up to 8 weeks processing, and I will get them in plenty of time for the holidays. I got one in yesterdays mail. It was exciting.
6. We got a copy of Alice's birth certificate. We have proof that she is an infant for flight purposes, and she will be covered by our insurance next year. (They are having an audit.) Its only been 20 months, we aren't slackers right?
Anyway, I should get back to Yoga. Daniel called right when it started. He asked me to make the list, and I thought I should blog. Just so, you know it won't be just the annoyed Sunday post at the top. Lots of planing and cleaning to go too! Besides the list. Cause I didn't include current me only projects. Yeah, I am totally nuts.
Showing posts with label repairs. Show all posts
Showing posts with label repairs. Show all posts
Tuesday, September 15
Tuesday, April 14
Roof Repairs
Saturday was not rainy. That meant we did some roof action.
Good things:
1. roof repaired
2. no one got hurt
3. everything was cleaned up before the rain hit Sunday
Learning Moments:
1. Our roof was not installed correctly (go figure)
2. if you see water damage inside, you might find out that the wood under the shingles is rotted
3. leaving the car seat outside in the rain makes it wet.
4. basic understanding of roof anatomy and repairs.
Overall Daniel says the roof is ugly. This is because its hard to replace shingles that end up underneath other shingles. If we had the materials, or the perseverance, he would have bought a couple of additional shingles for the peak (different from regular) and madethe job faster and better looking.
Supposedly this is the biggest patch of hail damage, so as long as we don't get large amounts of hail soon, we should be fine for a couple of years.
Oh, and next time Daniel will take a couple of days off work, and just remove a whole section bottom to top and replace the strip. That's probably how we will end up reroofing our house when the time comes.
So yeah! One more home repair skill! Go us. (disclaimer: I was not involved in any of the roof repairs or work. I don't do heights.)
Good things:
1. roof repaired
2. no one got hurt
3. everything was cleaned up before the rain hit Sunday
Learning Moments:
1. Our roof was not installed correctly (go figure)
2. if you see water damage inside, you might find out that the wood under the shingles is rotted
3. leaving the car seat outside in the rain makes it wet.
4. basic understanding of roof anatomy and repairs.
Overall Daniel says the roof is ugly. This is because its hard to replace shingles that end up underneath other shingles. If we had the materials, or the perseverance, he would have bought a couple of additional shingles for the peak (different from regular) and madethe job faster and better looking.
Supposedly this is the biggest patch of hail damage, so as long as we don't get large amounts of hail soon, we should be fine for a couple of years.
Oh, and next time Daniel will take a couple of days off work, and just remove a whole section bottom to top and replace the strip. That's probably how we will end up reroofing our house when the time comes.
So yeah! One more home repair skill! Go us. (disclaimer: I was not involved in any of the roof repairs or work. I don't do heights.)
Friday, November 7
Rodent Problems? We have Solutions!
All righty then. So yesterday when Daniel called on his break I was still grossed out by said mouse. (See my last post for more info on that.) I asked him if he would come home early, thinking he would work a couple more hours and get home with some daylight still. (just an FYI his first break is at 11, lunch at 1:30, so I thought maybe lunch?) He said he would check his benefit time and call back, or call at lunch. Instead of calling he was home within 30 minutes. Sweet!
Meanwhile, I had moved the fridge, and tracked the possible entry as next to our back door where we had never replaced the trim. We really should do that as its getting cold and I am sure adding trim helps stop cold air from coming in.
I had also noticed that the temp solution we had done last year with Mama Cook was warped and leaving a welcome sign to our home. This was noticed a couple days before, but we hadn't done anything about it (read we only have time for these things on weekends as the sun is gone before Daniel gets home) My thought was affirmed when we looked outside and found pink snow! It might be somewhat hard to see, but its on the ground by the bottom of the house.
Operation close the hole began. We were somewhat cautious of potentially coming upon a nest, and praying we wouldn't. Just in Case, Alice was put in a safe place.
Ok, ok. Daniel did all the dirty work. I stood inside with a broom and the door open. Just in case we had a runner, I could sweep him outside. And this is what we found.
Yeah, I forgot to take a picture of the tunnel in that hollow area behind the orange cord. It was very much a mouse tunnel to the inside. I immediately put in in the trash bin. As you can see the source of the 'pink snow' is this random pink styrofoam thing. Call it yet another 'good enough' solution from the previous owners. And as you can also see, Termite Damage! (Don't worry both sides of the duplex have been treated, and there was a second stud put in to help out with the termite damage.
Then we found it. The Stairway to Heaven!
OK, forgive the sideways pic, I don't want to mess with changing it as the baby is awake and wanting to play with the computer mouse (oy ANOTHER mouse). So we found tunnels and mouse poo making a stairway through our insulation. And we cleaned it out.
yummy. Right into the trash. Of course we cleaned out both sides, and put up new siding (which we had palnned on doing at some point anyway, but we didn't want to start a project when we the other side took FOREVER and a broken air conditioner to get done). So fast forward a few hours and some board cutting....
By 4pm we had this:
And it was caulked by yours truly. Note, the door trim is absurdly fat. Its 'cause Daniel wanted never rot. We will be replacing it with standard wood most likely. After we go to the beautiful Home Depot for Date Night. Yeah, spending even more money! (As a side note, Daniel told me we need to spend $400 less this month than last, that's totally impossible even if we don't buy trim from Home Depot. Hence, the spending more money comment was in fact sarcasm. The fact that I explained that is irony. And, that is the end of today's lesson.)
In fact, we have been really productive in the house department lately. Here is a picture of some of our handy work:
That was acquired from the curb, via the neighbor's $12,ooo remodel project including new cabinets. Granted, they are not the same as the rest of the kitchen, but I was wanting some shelves and this can hold our bulletain board and cute canisters. Plus its the only cabinets they didn't break down into pieces. ANd it was FREE! All we had to do was mark studs, and screw it in. Between that, and my caulking lots of windows, it feels like lots of house work getting done, and none of it was cleaning!
So, now that I have bleach, I have to put the baby in lock down and bleach the kitchen. If you wanna read something scary, look up the CDC.gov info on cleaning up rodent infestations. Yikes.
Meanwhile, I had moved the fridge, and tracked the possible entry as next to our back door where we had never replaced the trim. We really should do that as its getting cold and I am sure adding trim helps stop cold air from coming in.
I had also noticed that the temp solution we had done last year with Mama Cook was warped and leaving a welcome sign to our home. This was noticed a couple days before, but we hadn't done anything about it (read we only have time for these things on weekends as the sun is gone before Daniel gets home) My thought was affirmed when we looked outside and found pink snow! It might be somewhat hard to see, but its on the ground by the bottom of the house.
Operation close the hole began. We were somewhat cautious of potentially coming upon a nest, and praying we wouldn't. Just in Case, Alice was put in a safe place.
Ok, ok. Daniel did all the dirty work. I stood inside with a broom and the door open. Just in case we had a runner, I could sweep him outside. And this is what we found.Yeah, I forgot to take a picture of the tunnel in that hollow area behind the orange cord. It was very much a mouse tunnel to the inside. I immediately put in in the trash bin. As you can see the source of the 'pink snow' is this random pink styrofoam thing. Call it yet another 'good enough' solution from the previous owners. And as you can also see, Termite Damage! (Don't worry both sides of the duplex have been treated, and there was a second stud put in to help out with the termite damage.Then we found it. The Stairway to Heaven!
OK, forgive the sideways pic, I don't want to mess with changing it as the baby is awake and wanting to play with the computer mouse (oy ANOTHER mouse). So we found tunnels and mouse poo making a stairway through our insulation. And we cleaned it out.
yummy. Right into the trash. Of course we cleaned out both sides, and put up new siding (which we had palnned on doing at some point anyway, but we didn't want to start a project when we the other side took FOREVER and a broken air conditioner to get done). So fast forward a few hours and some board cutting....By 4pm we had this:
And it was caulked by yours truly. Note, the door trim is absurdly fat. Its 'cause Daniel wanted never rot. We will be replacing it with standard wood most likely. After we go to the beautiful Home Depot for Date Night. Yeah, spending even more money! (As a side note, Daniel told me we need to spend $400 less this month than last, that's totally impossible even if we don't buy trim from Home Depot. Hence, the spending more money comment was in fact sarcasm. The fact that I explained that is irony. And, that is the end of today's lesson.)In fact, we have been really productive in the house department lately. Here is a picture of some of our handy work:
That was acquired from the curb, via the neighbor's $12,ooo remodel project including new cabinets. Granted, they are not the same as the rest of the kitchen, but I was wanting some shelves and this can hold our bulletain board and cute canisters. Plus its the only cabinets they didn't break down into pieces. ANd it was FREE! All we had to do was mark studs, and screw it in. Between that, and my caulking lots of windows, it feels like lots of house work getting done, and none of it was cleaning!So, now that I have bleach, I have to put the baby in lock down and bleach the kitchen. If you wanna read something scary, look up the CDC.gov info on cleaning up rodent infestations. Yikes.
Tuesday, September 16
I fixed the back door!
So our back door stopped opening. It had been fine, then it got really hot and we finished putting the back of the house back on, and tada...its no longer functioning.
It only took a couple of months of me not being able to open the door to see if I could fix it without removing door trim and the whole nine yards. You see, there had been this little Styrofoam pad thingy on the top of the door and I took it off when we put them in (cause I thought I should) but it left behind some glue residue.
Well Being the smart one I am, I got a butter knife and a folding chair and Monday night I scraped glue off the door.
In about half an hour I had lots of little glue blobs sticking to my hands and fingernails, but the door opened and shut just fine.
I did wish I had some goo gone, but it was a such a small area I let that wish go away.
After cleaning off the glue, I wiped the residue with an alcohol based cleaner.
Thats it folks!
On a side note, I actually opened the door myself before scraping it. I hadn't been able to open it all summer (you know since it hit triple digits around the beginning of July). In celebration I pulled up some of the weeds growing in the back yard. (We are going to have a fall project of pulling up everything growing in the back and seeding and prepping a garden spot.)
I stopped when I ran into leaves of Three let them Be!
(Turns out they had thorns on them which equals brambles (blackberries/raspberries) and not poison ivy! Of course once I did that research I had rinsed with cold water, wiped with alcohol soaked cotton ball, AND showered. Cause you know you can't be covered in poison ivy when you have a tiny someone that wants to live on your lap.
It only took a couple of months of me not being able to open the door to see if I could fix it without removing door trim and the whole nine yards. You see, there had been this little Styrofoam pad thingy on the top of the door and I took it off when we put them in (cause I thought I should) but it left behind some glue residue.
Well Being the smart one I am, I got a butter knife and a folding chair and Monday night I scraped glue off the door.
In about half an hour I had lots of little glue blobs sticking to my hands and fingernails, but the door opened and shut just fine.
I did wish I had some goo gone, but it was a such a small area I let that wish go away.
After cleaning off the glue, I wiped the residue with an alcohol based cleaner.
Thats it folks!
On a side note, I actually opened the door myself before scraping it. I hadn't been able to open it all summer (you know since it hit triple digits around the beginning of July). In celebration I pulled up some of the weeds growing in the back yard. (We are going to have a fall project of pulling up everything growing in the back and seeding and prepping a garden spot.)
I stopped when I ran into leaves of Three let them Be!
(Turns out they had thorns on them which equals brambles (blackberries/raspberries) and not poison ivy! Of course once I did that research I had rinsed with cold water, wiped with alcohol soaked cotton ball, AND showered. Cause you know you can't be covered in poison ivy when you have a tiny someone that wants to live on your lap.
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