Can I update our small, tired 70’s bathroom without spending a fortune?
I set the budget at $1000, including a new toilet, faucet, lighting and flooring.
Can I update our small, tired 70’s bathroom without spending a fortune?
I set the budget at $1000, including a new toilet, faucet, lighting and flooring.
When we did our renovation a number of years ago, I found this Hansgrohe Metro kitchen faucet at the Home Depot on sale for 20% off. It looked like a solid unit so I picked it up and got it installed. It worked well for the first 6 years or so then it started leaking where the braided hose connects to the sprayhead. I checked out other videos online to see how to fix it and rather than call in the plumber, I contacted the manufacturer and they sent me a new hose to install which fixed the problem. Pulling the unit apart wasn't too much of a pain - in fact it was easier than I expected since I didn't have to use any specialized tools like a basin wrench or a torx driver. The only tricky part was working under the sink where space is at a premium. It now works again, hopefully for at least another 6 years!
[The one that works! I actually wrote this post standing up.] Anyway, I have a secret – I have been coveting a standing desk for a few years now as I have some issues with my neck and back that require me to take breaks frequently. Of course I forget to do this so usually at the end of the day I have aches and pains to remind me of my forgetfulness (is that even possible?) Anyway the ones I have seen online look great but are often out of my snack bracket in terms of cost , or are not quite the right size to fit in my very tight home office. So I did what any moderately driven architect would do – I set out to try to figure out how to build my own. Of course when starting any project, we always recommend to our clients at Incite Design that they set objectives for what sort of results they want and some constrains which usually involve time/cost/quality in some combination. I of course wanted all three but the laws of project management have shown me over the years that you can only have any 2 of the three. So I improvised. I found a few designs online, which looked really good, but looked like a full time standing desk- I needed a convertible. Other also seemed intriguing but appeared to require some time in construction, which I wanted to minimize. Others involved changing out a large portion of the existing furniture in order to have enough space to move in the new standing desk. Which wasn’t going to work for the reasons listed above. But overall it had to be simple and cost-effective. Because my desk is located in a corner I started to think about using the wall and if there was a way to somehow use that to help lift the monitor. I figured the monitor going up and down was the most important factor to manage as the keyboard is light and can sit on something portable and the track pad is Bluetooth wireless and can go anywhere. So I started thinking about laundry elevators – those things which you can use to hoist your laundry line up and down to put clothes on them on washday. I had about 20 minutes over lunch one day and I found something at the local home improvement store. It could work but I thought that it was a bit too big to fit in my diminutive space. As I was leaving the store I went through the plumbing aisle and saw the iron pipe and fittings. Maybe I could make something work from there? Sure enough, I found what I was looking for. I grabbed what I though I needed and threw it into the car. It took a few days for me to get an hour or three to be able to assemble it (not really assemble as I had to drill a few holes, test and adjust) but the result is what you see here.) The monitor slides up and down on the pole attached with heavy-duty wall plugs to the wall and I grab a footstool and platform to hold the keyboard and track pad. Those with keen eyes will notice I repurposed the platform from the monitor stand that I used to use. I am pretty satisfied with the monitor setup, but honestly am not thrilled with the keyboard and track pad configuration. Yes it works and gets me out of the chair so I can type standing, but it looks a little, ‘meh.’ So I will be continuing to think of that as I continue to use it. But for under $35 (not including my time of course!) it’s a good temporary solution until I can save up for one of these! What do you think of the setup? Let me know if you have any questions and I'd be glad to answer them!
I was wrong about why our new Miele dishwasher wasn't getting our dishes clean. So I went out and looked at a few posts and decided to try something radical.
Just a word of warning- if you and your partner have "discussions" about how to load a dishwasher, you could find all sorts of things to argue about with this unit!
So as promised here is a bit of a review on some of the choices we made for our first floor renovation. Lets start with the Franke sink and Hansgrohe faucet.
So, I was so excited to be done the whole reno thing that I forgot to post! Well, in hindsight, it just seemed like we would get really close to being done then something would crop up to push back the completion date a bit further out.
Both the electrician and the tiler came by today (in that order) and it was great to see some of the last things get done. It seems like the last 5% or so has taken the same time as the previous 95% (and somehow, at least as frustrating.)
Well, it looked like almost everything was done and then this happened....
Well I was right: the second coat of stucco was pretty messy as shown in these photos, but in all honesty, they did come back to put a third base coat down to make sure that they had it all covered properly before they sprayed it.
The stucco guys were here today to patch the area where the bricklayer filled in the windows. Tomorrow (I hope) they’ll be back to scratch coat the entire wall to even it out. Judging by the mess today just from the patch, the next coat will be messy…. Very messy.
After a great week of work last week (and frantic efforts to get us up and running for the long weekend) not too much happened this week. As it was a short week, the contractor was only here a few times to do some minor things. That’s usually the way it is when getting close to the finish: there are many small things to do and often they don’t make as big an impact as putting in the countertop.
I didn’t think anything was going to be happening at the house this week because we were waiting for the countertop to be installed. We were told that it would take 10 business days for the counter to be fabricated so understanding human nature I thought it would be fortunate if it did arrive on the 10th day. Well as good luck would have it I was wrong!
Last Friday the contractor put in a temporary sink just as we were leaving to go away for the weekend. Which was a great thing as we haven’t had water on the main floor for about 6 weeks. But as we were going out the door, I heard them say, “Wait its leaking!” This is not what you want to hear as you leave the house for two nights and you have newly installed hardwood floors. Hardwood and water; not a good mix.
While out of the city last weekend, we unexpectedly came across a solution to some of our furniture problems.
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