Renovating Weeks 6-8…

Wow have I been slack with blogging recently!!
I guess that’s partly because we’ve been unpacking and just enjoying being in the house with no pressure to do anything, but it’s also because I felt like we hadn’t actually done anything the last few weeks either.
But I was wrong. After looking back at what I’ve blogged about, then seeing that house as it is now, we have actually done quite a lot over that time which I haven’t yet shown.
It has just been at a (very) slow leisurely pace, and very bitsy – for example… hang a mirror now, hang a heating towel rail a day or two later, go toilet shopping and get the vinyl installed 2 weeks later etc…
So it doesn’t feel like much, but over a few weeks it does add up to a lot.
Which means… dun dun dah,
that I have a few more before and after shots to show you….

First to be finished, was the laundry…

This was a suprise finish in a way. As in – open the old cupboard to disconnect the old washing machine and SURPRISE the cupboard is full of mouldy rot. Ewww.
It was so rotten that it made us unsure as to whether that damage extended to the floor underneath.
Nice find!
So, that forced us into ripping the laundry cupboard out and replacing it with a new super tub months earlier than planned.
That in turn then caused us to paint it much sooner than planned, because we figured that while there was no tub installed that would be a jolly great time to paint the wall behind!!

So one thing led to another in the laundry and Inez ended up starting painting this the day before we moved in and putting the finishing touches the day of the move.
The plumber then plumbed in the new super tub about 20 minutes after the movers left (so that it wasn’t sitting in the middle of the kitchen and we could actually walk around!).
Talk about cutting the timing fine!

But despite the little added financial pressure having to renovate the laundry early has caused, I’m enjoying it being done for sure!
In doing so we were able to swap the placement of the washing machine to the other side of the tub, and put our freezer in it’s place. That makes loads more sense not just in terms of moving washing from the washing machine to the dryer, but also in terms of walking from the kitchen to get food from the freezer.
Much more functional – It’s the small details in life that make the difference hey!

We are yet to find a lampshade that suits, hang hooks, “accessorize” the laundry but that will all come with time.

The next area to get finished was the downstairs bathroom…

Downstairs we worked on getting rid of the blue trim in favour of painting them Dulux “antique white USA”.
We also carried this over to the walls, painting over the bright stark white with the much more warm antique white USA.
It is amazing what a difference painting the walls a different white has made to this space – it was very cold and clinical feeling before, now it feels much nicer to visit.
We also put new vinyl down.
So very little changes really down here, in fact it probably only cost a few $100 dollars at most for the changes we made and would have certainly been the least expensive room in the house to renovate, but boy it is much nicer now!!

Next up was the main bathroom upstairs…

The main bathroom got much more of the royal full renovation treatment. I’ll give a full breakdown when we’ve completely finished and I do the full room reveal – for those that are interested in the finer details.
We pretty much changed up everything and this certainly wasn’t the least expensive room in the house to renovate. But I think we did really well for our humble budget and what a difference it has made.
The vinyl was only finished yesterday and it has finished the room beautifully!!
I keep having to find excuses to walk past to admire it 😉

Especially as it was one of the rooms that got worse before it got better and for the last few weeks we have been living with this…

Hmmmm…. Dirty!!

We are also nearly finished the “wee room” aka the upsairs toilet…
Progress had been at a standstill on this room ever since the vinyl layer came the first time and found the rotten floors… Once the builder came and replaced the floor we’ve been living with it unsealed for the last few weeks to make sure there weren’t any further signs of moisture. But thankfully there weren’t and yesterday the vinyl and a new toilet went in…

As with many things we’ve found as we’ve gone through, we hadn’t planned on putting in a new toilet. But the old one had a) about 5 pipes entering or exiting it which could all be the potential source of the leaks and b) it was SO NOISY!

Seriously, it hadn’t even been something we’d considered being a problem, but the old style toilet was literally deafening after it was flushed and seemed to take about 10 minutes to noisily fill back up. Not to mention it was completely un eco-friendly in its water use.
All 3 bedrooms are right outside the toilet, so that quickly became really annoying at night since Abbie and I are both really light sleepers.

Now since we’ve changed the toilet, as you can see I have some more painting to do given that the new toilet is a totally different shape. Gah.
But at least there is now only one tiny water pipe at the back which you can’t even see, rather than 5. Much nicer!
We also wait for the builder to come back and put on new skirtings.

I know that we will be better off in the long run by having to replace the floor and ending up replacing the toilet also, but given that we rushed to finish painting this room so that we didn’t have to be careful with the new lino, it’s kind of a little niggle of mine now.

The current status of the renovations is that we have more or less finished 7 rooms and only have 2 more rooms, and the painting of the doors to complete now.

Progress on those final rooms has slowed remarkably now that the house is liveable and we are enjoying living in it so I highly doubt I’ll be having weekly renovation updates from here. Maybe monthly might be more achievable?
As soon as the new curtains arrive this month though I will hopefully be able to do some more detailed room reveals.

I’m also having a total wobble on what to do about the kitchen…
I did have a plan, but then just as I was working up to starting painting I’m wondering whether I’m taking the lazy option too readily and whether I would in fact be better taking my time, planning some more, and actually doing the colour scheme I want!!
But since that would require painting of laminate cupboard doors and benches I’m totally freaking out and indecisive about it.

Will the safe, lazy (and cheaper) option or the scary but most desired finish option win?!
Hmmmmm. Not sure.
I guess we will soon see.

In the meantime I have this dirty little secret to take care of…

That is 10 of the 12 more doors I have waiting for me to paint them.
Among those are the doors to the 2 bathrooms and the toilets.
Yes must get on to those promptly so that visitors can at least pee in peace 😉
It’s not such a great feature to have right in our grand entrance way to great the guests in the first place either…

I am supposed to be starting those doors today, and I did dress in my painting clothes for the first time in weeks, but I’m thinking that this stack of magazines might proove to be a little more enticing…

Tut tut tut.