Another Project Completed & the First Day of Vacation

Update on the drywall situation – it’s been hung and the mud coats are going on… there are 2 coats on it now and the 3^rd will go on tomorrow some time. To clarify, my awesome contractors hung the drywall for me and are looking after the mudding. Tuesday I will prime/seal and Wednesday I will paint.

2 sheets to the... uh, wall...?

A hole for the plug...

Metal corner bead

First coat of mud

My initial plan was to go up into the attic on Tuesday and lay out the insulation, but I had a mysterious and yet horrifically painful back and neck pain episode and have been the better part of crippled for almost a week now.  Much better than I was, my balance is still a little off and so I think that trying to balance around in the rafters of my house may not be in the best interests of me OR my house and so I will put it off until… well… later. I still plan to pull out the carpet this week though…

Last night, whilst quietly sitting on my sofa in the living room, not doing much of anything except appreciating a quiet Saturday night and basking in the fact that my week of vacation had officially started, a wasp flew in through my open doorway – reminding me that I had yet to hang my screen door – and while I was at it, I should have also mounted my door stopper to prevent the handle mashing into the drywall each and every time the door is opened…

Gamely, I pulled out all of my cool tools - the cool ones need power of some sort to be operated (and by power, I mean battery or electrical) laid out all of the other paraphernalia I was going to need and got to work.

First things first – because the door doesn’t sit flush to the frame, I needed shims.  My AMAZING contractor knew this and kindly cut me a couple and handed them over with the admonishment that I had better drill pilot holes because I really didn’t want to split the beautiful door mouldings he had put up.  I drew dots on the shims, taped them to the door frame and drilled all of the pilot holes.  I then put in the needed screws and mounted the frame side of the hinges. The shims split, but the door framing didn’t. Shims can be cheaply and easily replaced…

Next up, I pulled out the door and got ready to mount it.

Nope. The shims weren’t *quite* thick enough and so I had to pull them all back off, add something underneath (in this case additional shims made, ingenuously, with pieces of an unused paint stir stick.  NOW I know why they always give me two!!) move them BACK a little (I mounted them too close to the frame itself and the screen door would have opening issues) and re-mounted them all. More shim splitting, but again, its just the shims that split.

From the inside

From the outside

Split shim

Next up was drilling pilot holes to mount hardware on the door – easy-peasy and no mistakes there.  Door mounted it was time to put on the hooks and eyes for holding the door closed from either the inside if I’m home and the outside if I’m not home. Another minor location miscalculation and I had to re-drill the pilot hole for the one inside the door frame – but that will be super easy to cover when it comes time to paint the door frame and door.

Indoor hook & eye...  

Last but not least, the outside hook and eye and, of course, the handle…

Complete!

Next up was the door handle shock absorber (OK, really, I don’t know what to call it)

And last but not least, here are a couple of gratuitous doorbell shots – my doorbell is a turn-style bell that tinkles.  You turn the handle and it rings inside the bell inside the house – and isn’t going to be stopped by power failures… My Great Grandparents on my Mum’s Dad’s side had a doorbell just like it and when I saw it I couldn’t resist.  Grandma & Grandpa’s doorbell had been painted over a number of times – and I think the base plate was round… but it still makes me feel like a little kid when I get to ring it!

Now… if I could find some antique cut-glass doorknobs (which Grandma and Grandpa also had and I used to pretend were giant diamonds) I’d have them in my house as well!


And today - my first day of vacation - was spent doing VERY little.  Today I slept in and had a nap, ate breakfast outside, read for hours, puttered doing research on my computer (spoiler alert - I will have to deal with a Giant Hogsweed infestation) and generally just relaxing.  Great way to start a week off!!

With love across the waters,