Luxury of owning a home

Remodel Tragedy #1

Alright, here are two stories from our newly found glory of owning a home. Story number one takes place a mere three days after we were handed the keys. Yes - 72 Hours into owning a home and this happens...

We were blessed to have all of our family and friends over to help repaint walls, trim, doors, the fireplace, ceilings, cabinets and anything else that could use a face lift. Well at the same time we had our other three friends that are very handy changing bigger items... A/C fuses, thermostat, fans, fixtures, etc...

The upstairs bathroom sits directly above our family room with wood flooring. A good friend of ours was helping to change the Wax-Ring on that toilet and I guess forgot to check it twice. I come over to visit the house after work because we still hadn't moved in yet and guess what I see...

What is that you ask? Well, since I have lived in a one story house since I was born, I have NEVER seen a bubble in a ceiling. I could practically hear the paint stretching to make more room before it would just burst. But I didn't need any type of experience in water leaks to know the leak must be really bad since the giant pool of water on our hard wood floor was about 4 feet wide. I of course start to panic because water damage to a home is never a good thing. I scramble to find a water valve for the house and shut off that water, I race to find buckets and trashcans to catch the water still that is slowly dripping out of the paint bubble and I call Zack to voice my panic. We...meaning Zack....make the executive decision to get it fixed the very same night. So, two hours later....

O-M-G

Yip. Giant hole in ceiling. Simple as that. They ripped the ceiling apart to take out any wet drywall and replace it ASAP. Final stats.... Days owning home: 3.5 ; Dumb friend not double checking wax ring: 1 ; My Panic Level on a scale of 1-10: 957 ; Dry wall replaced: 8 feet x 4 feet ; Man Hours spent: 12.


I don't have an "After" picture but it pretty much looks like any other standard ceiling, which is just the way I like it.


Remodel Tragedy #2

Here is an email I sent my mom while in the process of getting the new carpet installed. Sorry, I didn't get picture but I am very good at painting the picture.


"I am sure I mentioned to you how excited we were to be getting our new carpet installed today, well guess what? The carpet company screwed up and it won’t be installed for another week or more! In some instances this would be OK, however Zack and I decided to save some money by tearing out the old carpet ourselves. Here is the kicker- we pulled the old carpet out just before noon yesterday, the carpet company called at 2:00pm, a mere two hours later, to say there was a mistake and the install has be pushed back. I guess the employee who scheduled the install was an idiot, and did not see that the padding wasn’t in yet. We are still waiting to here when the padding can be delivered and cut. Yes that’s right, we are now living on dirty, uncomfortable, torn up plywood until they decide when it can be installed. "

"Picture it. Upstairs we have no furniture, no beds, no office area, no dressers, nothing on the walls … NOTHING. You can’t even walk up there with out shoes on because there are staples in the floor and constant piles of saw dust, splinters and padding residue, which even a Shop-Vac can not get all of it to vanish. Downstairs in the Dining room and Living room is the majority of our furniture and accessories from upstairs. It is almost stacked to the ceiling, leaving those spaces inhabitable. The Family room w/ the fireplace had to be cleared to make room for our mattress to be “set-up” on the floor, to save us from being forced to sleep on our couches. (Side-note: Zack finally gets to watch TV in bed, he’s pretty content) "

" Just to sum it up: Clear space in my house that is unaffected by the unfortunate experience of this home improvement, is in the front entry way, kitchen and stair case. All of my free time will be spent cooking, staring at the front door, or running up and down my stairs. "


Update: We got through that tragedy and have beautiful carpet to show for it. Totally worth it. We actually had fun living in the living room. It was like upscale camping.