My Closet - Before and Nearly After

One of the more frustrating aspects of this remodel has been that it seems like EVERY corner and surface of this house is grimy, dirty and in bad shape. There hasn't been a single closet or bathroom that's been good to go. Not a single light fixture that wasn't partially broken, chipped or beyond cheap looking. And the story was the same with what will be my closet. (Although I have to give a shout out to those bathrooms - a coat of paint and new light fixtures straight up brought them from 1983 to 2013...pictures to come once we unpack the shower curtains, etc out of the POD tomorrow night.)

The problems in my closet were two-fold - the first being it just felt and looked so dirty. There was old, gummy tape that couldn't be scraped off and tons of old nail holes where I imagine someone once hung all their neckties. The wood pole was splintered and the shelf above it had somehow warped and wobbled when you set things on it. But more importantly, the closet wasn't practical. It only had one rod to hang clothes on with lots of dead space below and above it.

So my simple plan was to basically mimic what was already done but instead have two rows of hanging space. But I couldn't for the life of me remove the old 1x4s that were nailed to the plaster wall without doing major wall damage. They were in there real bad good. I decided to just leave the wood and remove the shelf and pole.

Then Annie and I headed to Home Depot and bought half the store. I had a 10% off coupon which doesn't sound like a lot but it's about as much as you ever get off at Home Depot. So I bought everything I could think of that I knew we'd need around the house in the coming weeks. Including a very, very exciting present for myself. A finish nailer and compressor! I'd been dreaming about one for years now and we decided to cash in all our credit card points for Home Depot gift cards. So guess what came home to mama!

Yeah, that's right - both shopping carts AND the orange rolling thing behind it were full of the stuff I bought on this outing. It was embarrassing. And thrilling. All at once :) Some get their kicks from new shoes and clothes. I get mine from tools. They make me swoon.

And between having a miter saw and now having a nailer, this project was easier than I ever could have asked. The nails went in like butter, people! It was glorious. With every punch of air shooting through that compressor hose, I went weak in the knees. My whole DIY amateur carpentry future flashed before my eyes and seemed more feasible and exciting than ever. It was like Christmas morning. And the pre-packaged Closet Selectives I bought as a back-up backed themselves right back into the car to be returned.

And I'm proud to say that my dearest daughter seems to be following in my tool-loving ways.

Anyway, I'd describe what I did but it was super straight forward and I don't know any of the terminology.

As you can see I had to leave the pre-existing 1x4 up on the wall but it will be covered by clothes so it ain't no thang. And once I can get the rest of my tools and supplies out of our POD next week, I'll fill in the huge holes from where the old pole went.

I did grab some wood filler and caulk and fill in all these old holes.

Then we primed the raw wood and painted everything using the leftovers from a sample pot of paint that I bought for the exterior of the house. I think it was Analytical Gray. And, yes, I've been scolded by my local paint store a dozen times over for actually using those sample quarts on real projects. They tell me there are no 'guts' to those sample paints and that I shouldn't expect any durability. But if they want me to waste those quarts they need to bring their prices down all around. Gallons are a hair shy of $50 a pop and we've bought over 20 between the outside and inside of the house. So far. And I haven't even chosen colors for the nursery. Or the dining room. Or the kitchen. Or the entryway. You do the math. So needless to say the closet got the short end of the stick.

So while this doesn't win the award for coolest closet ever, at least now it fits twice as many clothes in it and is decently clean. Being that it was the only room in the house now on the more finished end of things, it was lucky enough to receive all the odds and ends that we needed to do away with during the week of refinishing floors which is part of the reason I didn't get around to taking better pictures. And in the event that everything goes as planned (which it has yet, too, so not holding my breath. I mean how many people can say that the guy in the middle of skim coating your ceilings died of a heart attack last weekend?) the carpet in the master bedroom will be installed after lunch today. Wall to wall sisal - including the closet. Thus the nearly finished part of this post title.

As far as a little update on the rest of the house, things are finally coming along! The hardwoods are curing after the last coat of poly Friday, but we're going to go ahead and move in tomorrow night. The kid in my belly is darn near ready to come out and I'd love for his first nap to be in a crib, not a pack n play. Major progress has been made in all three bathrooms. Some of the light fixtures have finally been hung. The living and family room have been painted. The electrician came over to undo what I had screwed up and we finally have power on the first floor again! Yikes - I'll stick to cutting and nailing wood in the future. Electrical is a little - lot - out of my league as it turns out.

And dear, sweet John has finished his FOURTH - and final - coat of paint on all the ceilings throughout the whole house. Plus priming all the walls that previously had wallpaper. In case you're wondering, this is what that looks like.

John is a worship pastor at a church in Brookside and after service last week someone came up to him and told him he had some paint on his ear. And in his hair. Oops. My bad. I probably should have added it into our wedding vows somewhere that in exchange for all his house labor I'd be sure to thoroughly check his face and clothes for paint before he embarrasses himself. But in my defense he had paint on his eyelash and when I pulled it, he freaked out and wouldn't let me near his face the rest of the night. What more could I have done??

Anyway, nothing like working yourself to death only to still have a room that looks as far from unfinished as one can look.

But Annie has had some major bonding with her grandparents these last few days, and John and I have come a heck of a lot closer to a liveable living space for tomorrow. 

The Problem With Making Mud Pies

I snap so many pictures of the house project on my phone that there seems to be an unending number of things to focus on with the renovation on this blog. But obviously life as a family continues to march on between the plumbing and the electrical. And nothing about life with a 2 year old is normal. So weaved throughout this post are VERY random iphone pictures of homegirl from the last few weeks.

Anyway, beyond the obvious discussions about paint colors and whatnot there have been a lot of conversations and considerations about balance when it comes to this house remodel. Considerations in the context of finance and considerations in the context of family and considerations in the context of faith.

Financially, we've tried to balance what we can afford with what the house can handle for resale down the road. The last thing we want to do is drown our savings only to never make that money back if we ever decide to move. So figuring out how much the neighborhood can handle has been a huge question mark. If we repave the driveway will we get that money back? But everyone else on the block has a partially unpaved driveway so maybe we're over-investing in that way. Would the kind of family who would want to live that far east care about having marble countertops? Or are the people willing to spend that kind of money wanting to be on the Kansas side anyway? Thoughts like that are constantly being cycled through our minds as we pick between high end and middle of the road finishings. And knowing all the while that to base our decisions off of the unknown person who may or may not ever buy this house in the future would be silly, too. Because, heck, this could be our forever house. Or at least our 10 year house. And even if it's only our 3 year house, don't we want to enjoy it for those 3 years?

But then there's the very big consideration of balancing family in so far as this remodel is concerned. How do we create a lifestyle where we can focus more on our kids and our marriage than on the project happening in the next room? How do we make sure we're not shuffling our kids off to watch a movie so we can finish up the closet we're building or the vanity we're trying and failing to install? How do we manage not to cry when Annie grabs John's roller full of primer and smears it across the living room walls we'd finished painting the day before? Because she didn't ask for this remodel. And her childhood shouldn't be dictated by it. So how do we find that balance? And yes, we could go ahead and replace the garage door to fit 2 cars this fall. But by doing so we'd be ripping up the patio and a lot of the yard. Is 2 cars under 1 roof worth removing the opportunity of playing in the backyard with our kids this fall while the work is being done? Are new curtains worth having to clear off the dining room table of the sewing machine every night in order to have dinner?

Living through remodels is stressful. We've never done it on this large a scale before but I tell you what if I didn't have some sort of painting/tiling/molding project going on every week of the year at our condo last year. And it was trying on our family life.

I'm a big believer in your home needing to be a place where you can breathe. That it ought to be a place of peace for you where you surround yourself with beautiful things that you love. But getting to that point can be messy and chaotic. And it begs the question, is it worth it? There's a balance that John and I wrestle to find. How do we create the home we want to raise our family in and yet not destroy our family in the process of creating it?

And finally, and most importantly, there's this Jesus guy and how he fits into our remodel. I know, you're thinking, what? Kylie, he doesn't fit into your remodel. But, for real, you have no idea. It's a big deal to Jesus what shade of green you pick out for your nursery. And he's not a fan of popcorn ceilings. So get 'em gone, people.

Ok, I'm kidding. Those things are just big deals to me. But Jesus is a big factor in this remodel. Because spending more time on Pinterest and Lonny than in the Word is a problem. Or maybe it's not something you judge by increments of time. But caring more about getting in your design blog fix in than in spending time with the Lord is a problem. A big one. And I do it. Nearly daily.

As basic as the 10 commandments, we're told not to put other gods before Him. And though we may not have wooden statues or golden calves that we bow down to, we easily worship other gods before Him every day. Tim Keller says in his book Counterfeit Gods that an idol is anything more important to you than God, anything that absorbs your heart and imagination more than God, anything you seek to give you what only God can give. It is in such a controlling position in your heart that you can spend most of your passion and energy, your emotion and financial resources on it without a second thought. The true God of your heart is what your thoughts effortlessly go to when there is nothing else demanding your attention.

An idol is a good thing made an ultimate thing. I believe that designing your home is a good thing. But not when you live and die by it more than you live and die by Jesus. Not when it becomes the determining factor of most decisions you make. Not when it's what you turn to get your affirmation, your acceptance and your approval.

And for me, in a remodel like this, it's the greatest threat. The biggest problem of this remodel is not whether the countertops will be installed on time. It's not whether the hardwoods will dry in time. It's whether designing this house will clutch my heart more than Jesus. It's whether I make an idol out of it. It's whether I'm more concerned about creating a beautiful room than I am about my relationship with God. And today, I am. Today and yesterday I focused more on making a statement with the backsplash than I did on Jesus.

Maybe for you it's your job. Or it's your idea of the perfect family that has become your idol - that has consumed your thoughts. Maybe it's your body. Or your income. Maybe your idol is the image you give of yourself on Instagram. Maybe it's all of the above. I have a long list of idols, too. But the house is at the top.

I've never forgotten a lyric I heard Mac Powell sing years and years ago. He said, "Lord, take from me my life when I don't have the strength to give it away to you." That's how I feel. I'm not saying we're pulling the plug on the kitchen remodel. I'm FOR SURE not saying that. Because, by golly a plywood box of a kitchen with no appliances is no way to live!

But God, rip down this house from the highest place in my heart. Put it in its right place. Put it in a good place. A healthy place. And God, create in me a clean heart. One that adores you above all else. One that is more concerned about carving out time with you than about carving out time with a stack of Domino magazines.

So, yes, this remodel has been stressful. There are have been unforeseen construction problems. And financial considerations have weighed heavily. But above all, before all and beyond all, there's the problem of my heart and whom I've given it to. I've given it to a house with chipped brick and patched stucco, creaking hardwoods and uneven ceilings. I love, love, love how C.S. Lewis says it in The Weight of Glory:

<<The books or the music in which we thought the beauty was located will betray us if we trust in them; it was not in them, it only came through them, and what came through them was longing. These things—the beauty, the memory of our own past—are good images of what we really desire; but if they are mistaken for the thing itself they turn into dumb idols, breaking the hearts of their worshippers. For they are not the thing itself; they are only the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never yet visited.>>

I think God has placed in me a passion for design. I believe that. I believe it's a good thing. I believe it's something I ought to pursue and develop. But I can't let myself believe in it. And if I did let myself continue to believe in it as I have recently, I would be selling myself short. If I let myself be fooled into thinking it's the ultimate giver of satisfaction and joy, I'd be sorely dismayed.

<<It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.>>

Lord, let me not ever again believe that more joy will come from a finished house than from a relationship with you. Let me not be satisfied making mud pies. 

This Is NOT Courtesy of Google Fiber

Some blogs you read might tailor their posts to specific topics. Not I. No, not me. If for no other reason than that I rarely finish a single project in a timely manner. I tend to opt for putting my thumb in every available pie at once. So before and afters are hard to come by. More like before and lots of durings. So that said here's a meandering post about everything and nothing. A lot that has begun. Nothing is done.

How about I do a run down of hiccups. This will be the fun post John and I get to reread a few years down the road and pinch ourselves for making it through the unforeseen road blocks. Before I start though, I figure I ought to let all you well-wishers know, we lost the upstairs laundry. Womp, womp. The bid came back crazy high and something about paying several k's to launder my clothes seemed nuts. Whether upstairs or in the basement, I don't enjoy the laundry. I'd rather splurge on countertops. You feel me? Oh, and we lost the laundry chute, too. Maybe I already mentioned that. It became the new air supply so that we could open up the entry to the kitchen. Paying to have that wall in Annie's bedroom patched became hiccup number 1. Plus it meant doing away with the old air supply on the right. Plus it meant cutting up the chair rail. Glory.

Hiccup number 2 from the past couple weeks was dealing with moving the gas line to our new range only to discover a long ago hidden air supply to the kitchen. Basically the old owner has been paying to pump cold air through a duct that was blocked by hardwoods and a stove. Lovely way to spend your money. And to spend ours in fixing it...Because - you guessed it - by fixing it, we had to rip up and replace more floors.

Hiccup number 3 (which turned out to foreshadow many more problems) involved this pretty little number below.

I came over to see the progress on the hardwood floors only to find that they discovered some loose floorboards in our family room. This was NOT the sort of progress I was hoping to see! They cut a chunk of hardwood out and found this crumbling subfloor with a huge hole. Water damage. Mercy me! Nightmare, people. We had to install new subfloor AND new hardwoods. Plus the problem isn't exactly fixed. Because fixing it would entail dishing out beaucoup bucks to replace these gracefully aged (ha!) windows and the siding surrounding it.

After a little bit of wavering the floor installer decided we ought to just roll with new subfloor and caulk the gaps on the outside where the water has been coming through whilst the money to replace all the windows doesn't exist. 

Here's to hoping for very little rain throughout the years...

So while that guy was installing new floor, I gave installing a new vanity in the first floor bath a go. So, it turns out measuring with tape is mighty important. I most definitely drilled new (permanent) holes in our tile to secure the pedestal sink only to find I was about a 1/8 inch off. Porcelain ain't exactly one known for its capacity to forgive. A 12 inch spread is a 12 inch spread, people, and there ain't nothing gonna change that. I had to readjust everything and drill new holes. Too fun!

And after all that fun I had to patch the floor tile from the old vanity's footprint. 

Two white 4x4 tile options later, I decided neither looked good and went for the less offensive of the two. Below you can see the 4 tiles I went ahead and installed and below to the right, my other option. Luckily the new vanity covers most of it anyway so I doubt anyone will be the wiser. Final pictures of the cleaned up bathroom to come in a couple weeks. But long story short, I chipped away what was left of the broken tiles and used a premixed adhesive/grout to both act as thinset and later grout.

And all the while that we've been poking around doing odd jobs here and there in the house, we've continued to come back to this beautiful room. Imagine your newborn baby's head resting softly against his mattress pushed up against this doll of a wall. I know - it makes you cringe. So we've invested an insane amount of time into cleaning this room up. The wallpaper was unimaginably difficult to remove. And then we had to scrape the walls, pay to have them skim-coated TWICE, sand them and now we're on to priming them. 

There you go. An edited list of the many things that have gone not as planned in getting this house ready to live in. There's more. Much more. Like ripping up the carpet in the den only to find more damaged subfloor (similar story to what the hardwood floor installer found). We took a hose and sprayed it on the windows outside to see if the water damage was from 20 years ago or 2 weeks ago and cried as the water cascaded to the interior through every crack and crevice of every window...My dad said we may have to rebuild the whole wall from the outside in - roof to foundation. So my carpet order for the den has been put on hold :(

And there's the thing about not having air conditioning over this past 97 degree weekend. 

But perhaps my least favorite hiccup of the week was watching Google Fiber get installed for all our neighbors and wondering why they weren't knocking on our door. So I called Google and spoke with one of their representatives. To my shock and his, there was a glitch after our sign-up. And even his supervisor couldn't figure it out. But sometime in the last few weeks our account and physical address got separated and we were deactivated. I'll make this long story short and sum it up by saying that with a receipt and confirmation in my hand that Google fiber sent me two months ago I was not about to let them tell me that they were sorry but we'd missed our chance to now receive the service. So after a tense talk with another supervisor they "tricked" the system into thinking our address was in a still-open Fiberhood and re-signed us up. Sadly though we still missed our neighborhood's installation timeline. And Google being the fine folks they are have no clue when we'll ever get ours installed. Sometime in the next couple months, they said. Major womp, womp. So now we continue on without internet for another indefinite period of time. Blog posts will be thanks to mooching off someone else's internet for yet another season.