We bought
Park’s Peak last Fall. It is Dave’s next
great reno project. Immediately we
decided we needed to convert the powder room on the 2nd floor to a
complete bathroom so that guests would not have to use the master bath
downstairs. NINE MONTHS LATER, just in
time for the Eclipse we have a new bathroom!
Dave did this virtually all by himself – using his skills at carpentry,
electrical logistics, plumbing and tile work along the way (and living by his
motto “never pass up the opportunity to buy a new tool!”). He became a master in details and
logistics!! And he did it in just 10
not-so-easy steps!!
Step
1 – Design the bathroom
This involved at
least 100 hours of plotting the house on Sketch Up. Why so long?
He had to learn the program along the way! But by careful planning he figured out what would fit and what wouldn’t! Then came the first distraction: putting the hot tub he bought before we even
closed on the 2nd story deck!
This became a major engineering feat!
However his plan of using the hot tub to soothe tired muscles during
construction proved a good choice.
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| Scaffolding to get the hot tub to the deck |
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| Success! |
Step
2 - Remove the floor
The original
powder room was raised 6 inches to allow the plumbing to be added to the post
and beam construction. Dave decided
early on that this was architecturally and aesthetically unsound – not to
mention our friends going to the bathroom at 2 AM after multiple bottles of
wine would have to remember there was a step both up AND down.
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| The old powder room |
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| The Floor is Removed! |
Removing the floor proved to be a
muscle-busting task. The hot tub proved
its worth! As the floor came off he
realized he had both plumbing and electrical “issues”. How could he add a trap to the tub without
the extra 6 inches underneath it? Where
could the new electrical wires go? But all of this would have to wait until
after second distraction: digging out and pouring concrete in the
basement. I mean a man has to have a
place to store his tools!! And the
master plan (see step 1) included a wine cellar/chacutery cellar. A man has his priorities!! And now after 15 cubic yards of concrete he
had a good place to set up his saw in the basement or the new “faux” slate
patio. Of course his tools in the
basement began to “migrate” to the 2nd floor – all except the one
tool he needed at the time. But this was
good for his leg muscles!
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| Digging out the Floor |
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| Pouring concrete |
Step
3 - Go shopping
Shopping is
not usually a man’s forte, but when it involved at least a dozen trips to Home
Depot and the tile shop, and at least 20 internet searches, it could be
endured. Always a fan of the extra room
curved shower curtains provide, Dave found a tub with a curved shower
door. Then it took a second trip to Home
Depot to show it to Deb. He wanted to
use the same tile he used in this renovation in Charlotte. “This will give us design continuity between
the two houses,” he said. Of course
having 2 boxes of tile left over from that project had nothing to do with it
(but fed his frugality!). It only took
5 trips to the tile shop, and a consultation with Pat Kelly, to pick out wall
tile to go with the left over floor tile.
The tile was picked out on the first trip, then there was the second
trip to re-think the edges, and three more trips to get the order right. During the design process, he figured he
would need a wall hung toilet because there was no place for a bottom outlet. That took at least 20 internet searches, and
at this point, the vanity was still not settled. Deb just can’t make up her mind whether to go
“cottagy”, or contemporary. And then
there was the third distraction: trying to find firewood so that he and
Deb can be at the house when it’s cold and dream and plan some more. One would think that finding wood delivery
in the mountains would not be a big deal.
Craig’s List yielded at least 15 folks advertizing in our area. Unfortunately 14 of them were the same guy
with different phone numbers!! You know
you are dealing with a red neck when the 5th excuse for not showing
up was “I didn’t know they would tow a truck from the WalMart parking lot!” Dave found a small amount of cherry wood he
was able to haul in his truck. His plans
were to mix it in with the other hardwood as soon as it is delivered. It got burned in the fireplace before this
happened.
Step
4 – Redesign
Now that he
had the tub and toilet picked out, it was back to Sketch up. He figured out how to enlarge the bathroom by
9 inches and gave Deb the number of inches she had to work with to find a
vanity. She began her own endless
internet search and on any of the countless trips to Home Depot, she could
always be found in the bath department, pondering. Which leads to the fourth distraction: picking
out carpet. This has been a “must do”
since buying the house. The orange
carpet upstairs is straight out of the 80’s and what were they thinking using
hunter green in the master bedroom?
Between the age of the carpet, and the mice – dirty doesn’t begin to
describe it!! David said, “You know the perfect carpet for this place? That
carpet we chose back in 1975 in our first house!” Deb actually found the carpet sample in the
“keep forever box” but one more internet search confirmed that it was both
discontinued and not replaced with anything remotely similar. Plus all of our friends looked at and said,
“That looks so 70’s!” (Isn’t retro in?) Now Dave must be dragged to at least 5
carpet stores in Hendersonville and Asheville only to discover that “baby sh*t
beige” and gray are the only colors being sold under $50 a square yard. Deb continued to search on her own, but
finally gave up and choose the first carpet she looked at on Trip #27 to Home
Depot.
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| Orange carpet in the upstairs bedroom |
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| Green carpet in the master bedroom |
Step 5 – Scheduling and Logistics
Dave ordered
the curved tub, but soon figured out that he cannot get it, the sheetrock he
needs, doors, and all of the plumbing supplies in Bert, the truck, or Bob, the
Jeep. And Home Depot kept calling to
say they are “in”! Then there was the problem of getting the tub to the second
floor. He guilted his son Clay into
contributing a weekend of slave labor and the use of his truck to haul the
needed items from the Home Depot in Hendersonville and then up to the second
floor. Scheduling Clay and the pick up
at Home Depot became a logistical nightmare, and on the appointed weekend, it
rained. They beat the worst of it up the
mountain by just a few minutes and got the sheetrock under cover just in
time. The tub took at least a six pack
of beer to get it up the stairs and in place.
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| Curved bath David found shopping at Home Depot on line |
Which leads to the 5th
distraction: discovering Hickory Nut
nano brewery. This happened on the
weekend before Clay came to see us (see Step #4: multiple trips into town looking for
carpet). Of course we must show it to
Clay and have him meet the British brewer.
Step 6 - Figuring out the plumbing
Dave’s
design (see steps 1 and 4!) had the plumbing going through the wall and out of
the adjacent closet to keep everything off the floor. But the trap for the tub has David stumped –
he knew what needed to be done but couldn’t figure out how to do it by himself. He continued with the carpentry and continued
to research the internet until the 6th
distraction brought some serendipitous results. The skylight in the loft had failed “many
moons ago” and was both leaky and inoperable.
Dave bought the biggest replacement possible and to accommodate his
short wife (and granddaughters!) he decided to move it down the roof about a
foot. Weighing in at over 400 lbs. this was going to require more muscle than
the hot tub could soothe! AND Deb
continued to lay down the law about NOT getting on the roof or using the chain
saw when he was by himself. It was time
to contract it out to younger professionals.
Rob and Jeffery were employed for 3 days plus all of the hamburgers,
steak and beer they could eat. Dave knew
he had made a good choice when Jeff picked up 2 sheets of plywood and hauled it
to the porch with very little effort. Dave’s jaw was dropping. So what did this have to do with figuring out
the plumbing? Jeffery’s first love is
plumbing. Not only did he confirm that
Dave’s plan would work, but he helped him align all of the pipes, a job
impossible for one person alone.
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| Jeffry and Rob in the new skylight |
Step
7 – The tile
Having tiled
the kitchen and bathroom in Charlotte, Dave was feeling pretty confident about
this part, except he had never done vertical tile on walls. Again, the internet and youtube became his
best friends and he measured and re-measured.
These resulted in Deb making one more trip to the tile shop for some
“insurance tiles” that ultimately went back.
Clay was using Rob and Jeffrey to re-do his bathroom and sent his dad
pictures of their tile job and his displeasure with the way the tile aligned. His dad confirmed that it should align and
Rob and Jeffrey agreed to fix it and then highlighted it on their Facebook page. But now the pressure was on. Dave’s tiling better meet these higher
standards. But then came distraction #7: staining and varnishing the doors in the
newly built vestibule at the top of the stairs to give the loft, bedroom and
bathroom some separation and privacy. To
accomplish this, Dave tapped into some more slave labor: from his wife and daughter this time. Deb had stained the door frames and then she
kept the granddaughters so that Emily could have some special father-daughter
time while she stained the doors and consulted with her dad on the cutting and
placement of the wall tiles. He predicts
that MLE will tile a bath or at least a new backsplash in the next 5
years. She became an excellent
apprentice.
Step
8 – Seal, grout, and seal some more!
With the
tile in place, it was time to finish it by sealing it, grouting it, and sealing
it yet again. Dave worked on this while
Deb moved into painting mode. It was
time to set a deadline so that this project would actually get finished. Originally, we were supposed to go out West
for the Eclipse, but those plans were replaced when we sold our RV. We decided instead to have an Eclipse party
at Park’s Peak since we are not far from Zone of Totality. But, of course there was distraction #8: a call from
the Wassums upon their return from California.
“Are you home? Want to play
bridge Saturday night?” Absolutely! At lunch on Saturday, Dave justified our
sudden departure this way: “the grout
really needs to dry some more and I’d be rushing to clean it and seal it.” Translation:
“I’ve been at this for 2 weeks and need a break and some good cards and good
wine!” (We had both – depending who you ask about the cards!)
Step 9 – The first flush!
Before the first flush comes distraction #9: a cord of wood and a new mountain
view. Having given up on the first 14
wood guys (who were all the same redneck!), Dave got a call back from #15. Yes, he could deliver wood and while he was there
Dave asked him if he could also limb up a few trees to improve our view. Our long view suddenly became even longer and
we think we are seeing Russia! Or at
least Tennessee! In between gawking at
our new view, Dave slowly got the tile finished and all the tile and plumbing
ready to accept the new wall hung toilet.
Between varnish coats on the 3 doors, Deb painted the wall behind where the
vanity and toilet would be hung. Clay
donated his old vanity (design problem solved!
See step #3) and we discovered it
is the same color as the stain of the doors.
Things were falling into place. However,
a slow drip leak was noticed in the rough toilet plumbing. Dave predicted that it will cure itself with
the minerals in our water, but it continued for several weeks. Maybe a few flushes would cure it. The toilet was hung and the leak continued,
though it did not get worse. A call to
the manufacturer resulted in the shipment of a newly threaded and better
valve. We decide NOT to complete the
sheetrock on the bedroom side of the wall until the bath gets a thorough test
run over the Eclipse weekend. Meanwhile
Deb had been painting her arms off before the carpet came and we kept tripping
over the 7, yes SEVEN!, beds in the loft and bedroom. This provided distraction #9A: a trip to
the dump and a surprise visitor. With
much effort, the extra mattresses were loaded in Bert and Deb set off to the
landfill on the other side of Asheville.
While painting, she had stripped the walls of the former owner’s
pictures and had made a large Goodwill pile.
She also laid down the law that the 2 recliners must go! We had not in 9 months reclined in them. On the way to the dump she called the Hickory
Nut Community Center in Lake Lure and they put her in touch with a recent house
fire victim. Before she could even make
the round trip, they arrived and Dave gave them not only the recliners and some
“antique” dining chairs, but some box springs that were destined for a 2nd
landfill trip and several pictures and lamps from the Goodwill pile (actually
anything they wanted or could use!). Deb
was especially glad the ship’s wheel had found a new home, but she did notice
that between the time she called Dave and told him folks were heading up Park’s
Peak (and he might want to get dressed!!) and the time they got there, Dave had
removed the framed peanut feed sack picture and it now holds a place of
prominence in the basement rafters!
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| Feed sack picture and ship's wheel in stairway |
Which brings
us finally to…
Step 10 – finishes, finishes!
Dave had
been nervous about installing the shower door.
Measurements and re-measurements indicated that the tolerance may interfere
with the edge of the tiling. It would be
close. Meanwhile there was distraction #10: the carpet was ready to install and
before that could happen, a list of at least a dozen items had to be
completed. Deb’s painting clothes now
looked like a Jackson Pollack masterpiece and the old carpet complemented her
attire. Since the plumbing was now behind
the closet, we had decided to put vinyl rather than carpet there. This meant we need at least 2 more trips to
Home Depot. Plus Dave had to put up a “cheat
wall” of sheetrock in the bedroom, so that the carpet people will know where to
start and stop the carpet. While spray painting a chair for the bedroom,
Deb not only got paint on her clothes but walked barefooted through the
overspray. David earned his “hubby halo”
helping her scrub her gloss black feet with mineral spirits. As he was about half way through he said, “Remember
this when you get ticked off at me next time!”
The day before the carpet came; the doors were installed in the shower
and fit perfectly. Deb’s wine cork
framed mirror got an earthquake hanger to MAKE SURE it stayed in place and she
and Dave brainstormed on how to complete her 3rd idea for a towel
rack! With folks arriving in just a few
days, the carpet was in, and the bathroom was finished, but the well was
running dry! There is always something!!
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| THE FINISHED BATHROOM!! |
Now to start
planning the kitchen renovation: I
wonder what event I can cook up to get THAT completed. They say there won’t be another eclipse like
this for 300 years!!!
