Xiaoniu 小妞

Okay, so today isn’t Easter, but I was too busy doing stuff on Easter Sunday to actually make a posting. Oh well.

We spent time at my parent’s house on Saturday visiting with Jessie, Chris and Grandma. Everybody else was coming on Sunday, but that is the one day that Sue’s parents could come up to see our place. So, we didn’t spend Easter with my family this year.

I know that Sue was at least a little nervous and I was just curious as to what her dad’s opinion of our house would be. After getting up at 4:45 in the morning, driving home (2 hours) and making breakfast they arrived. Her mom gets out of the car and gives me the okay hand sign. Very sweet, but she’d probably like just about any house we bought. Dad on the other hand is quite a bit more selective.

We spent about 15-20 minutes walking around the house and checking out the yard. After all that he thought the house was good. The only thing he didn’t like is the front porch. He would have loved the house if the porch was in the back instead. It blocks light from coming in the front windows. Other than that he didn’t have any negative comments. He suggested we just fix what needs to be fixed and don’t worry about updating things in the house yet. We’ll see. Neither of us like the wall paper and it doesn’t take much to remove it and paint the walls instead. We’ll probably do it anyways.

After breakfast we all drove to Amy’s house to help her get some things done. On the agenda for dad was a new toilet and two new doors. I already told her my dad offerred to do the toilet, but she already asked her dad to put it in. He insisted on installing it first thing. On top of that we had a discussion over whether or not he actually could install it seeing as we didn’t by any parts to the do the install. You need a new wax ring and bolts. He said that wasn’t necessary and that he could use the old one. We caved and let him go for it.

After 15 minutes he came out and asked us to get some bolts for the toilet. He couldn’t use the old ones. Hmmm. We ended up buying a wax ring that came with new bolts. He had no choice, but to use it. At least it is in with new parts now. Less chance of piss water leaking onto the floor.

While he worked on the toilet and between trips to Home Depot I spent my time installing a new curtain rod system in the living room. The one that was up there was far too weak to hold the thick curtains she has. It takes time and a lot of screws to install the new one, but it is worth it. It is much stronger and is installed properly with wall anchors. Amy has to do some hemming on the new sheer curtains she has up.

After that I moved on to finishing the file cabinet. The new parts came in and I was able to finish assembling the drawers. It looks pretty good. I wouldn’t mind having one myself. It seems pretty sturdy and certainly weighs enough. 149 pounds for a two drawer file cabinet. Damn MDF is heavy.

Another trip to Home Depot was in order. After removing the door in the garage they noticed that the rough opening was 1 inch too short for a standard size door. The door that they took out was 79 inches, not 80. They had to remove the sill plate and replace it with a new one. Off to Home Depot to pick up some cement. On the way back I passed them on the road. They were off (third trip) to get some other things they found out they needed.

When I got home I started to install the new, custom blinds that Amy bought. I got as far as putting one blind in the baby’s room, reinstalling the curtain properly, and installing a blind in the bathroom. By then the guys were back and needed the drill. Without a way of making holes I was up the creek. I cleaned up and went down to see how things were going.

They got the door installed and the new sill poured. Dad got his mind set that he must try to install the other door. Well, when we found out that the first door was too tall we measured the second one. It was 77 inches. A whole 3 inches shorter than a standard door. Not one to be stopped by meare inches of wood and concrete we removed the door to install the new one.

It took hours of removing, trimming and replacing trim and stuff on the new door jam before we realized it just wouldn’t fit. A little more inspection and we found out that the piece of wood on top of the jam was just sorta handing around. We yanked off the wall board and found we could remove the wood and replace it with a new piece. The actual strutural wood was 8 inches higher. This one was put in just to hold the wallboard on. Rip, break and hammered out the hole was enlarged.

After some more struggling the door jam was installed. The door was attached, the jam was screwed in and the handles installed. Now it is almost 10pm. Everybody is in a good mood, but nobody has any energy left.

Dad gave me some homework to do. I get the pleasure of installing new trim, filling in holes, and something I figure I’ll do myself: fix the door so that it is plumb. A crash course in door installation. It looks like we’ll need to install some insulation too. There is nothing keeping the cold out of the house. No insulation. Weird. No wonder it is cold downstairs.

Thankfully dad’s next day off is Thanksgiving. At least we get to take a break until he comes up again.