Time to Play Tetris

When we last left the CrapShack, it was shaking a taunting fist at our attempts to remodel. Or at least that is what it seemed like to me. I think we have assuaged the house's demons with costly repairs and (crossing fingers) we can move on with the business of making our house a bit more livable.

That is where Tetris comes in, everyone knows the video game where you have to rotate the pieces until they fit and you can clear the board. Well we've been playing it unsuccessfully for the past two years. We've had furniture and stuff in places where they didn't belong. With the pieces in the wrong place, the board got too high and we were in danger of losing the game. In fact certain rooms looked like they needed the intervention of Niecey Nash and the Clean House crew.

The near completion of the basement (it still needs baseboards and I have to redo the bar but its 95% done) has enabled us to use it again. Which means:

We can move the love seat from the living room to the basement;

We can move the chairs still in boxes from the guest room to the living room;

We can move the majority of the toys from the living room to the basement;

We can move the craft table from the dining room to the basement;

We can move the dining room table back to its original position;

We can eat in the dining room again;

We can move the bed from the guest room to Bunny's room for her big girl bed;

We can move the dresser from the guest room to our room for more storage;

We can make the guest room into Lion's room;

We can move the glider from Bunny's room to Lion's room;

We can move the crib pieces from the office to Lion's room and set it up;

We can move Bunny's mattress to Lion's crib;

We can refinish the dresser in the office and move it into Lion's room;

We can move the various and sundry pieces of junk from storage to Goodwill;

We can put seasonal things into storage instead of in the corner and

Finally we can enjoy our house again! (Until its time to redo the bathroom. And the kitchen)

Everything I Touch

breaks down.

Longtime readers of this blog are familiar with my ongoing struggles with my house. Basement issues - check. Bathroom not working - check. Garage falling down - check. And just when we thought we were turning a corner and getting the basement finished. It all goes to crap.

Last Friday we had torrential, horrible, crazy, oh my goodness the world is ending, 100 year flood type rains. We got somewhere between 3 and 4 inches of rain in a 24 hour period. Not good. Ironically we had those same types of rains last year (so I guess its not 100 year, more like 1 year) when our basement leaked.

And what do you know? Our basement leaked again. Not on the fixed side that we were about to finish by laying the floor. No it leaked on the other side and then trickled over and pooled on the fixed side. So that's a big problem. Huge problem really, we need to do something about the leak before we can lay the floor. We'll try regrading first and then who knows. We were out of the basement for over a year and we were so close to going back there I could taste it. And now we'll be out for a while longer.

And after the Ark floating rains, we had a good old fashioned August style heat wave of 90+ temps. Of course the CrapShack does not have central air. Don't be silly, why would it have central air. So we lugged out all of the fans and tried in vain to cool it down. We also got out our window air conditioner and put it in our window. Or should I say tried to put it in our window.

You see as we were adjusting it, it fell out of the window. From the second story. Bubs and I just turned to eachother and started laughing. Of course, with our luck, the air conditioner would fall out the window. It was bound to happen.

We did, however, have a bit of luck. We have these big ugly evergreen bushes out in front of our house. I hate them and have wanted to get rid of them for years, but we haven't. Well those big, ugly bushes managed to serve as a cushion of sorts. The air conditioner hit the bushes and didn't make it to the ground and didn't break. Thank goodness for that. Bubs went downstairs, managed to remove the unit from the bushes and bring it (and a few branches) back up stairs. We finally got it in the window, plugged it in and held our breath. It worked! We would be cool(ish) after all.

So to make a long story short(ish), our house keeps falling down around us. We cannot finish our remodeling project at this time due to the leaks. We still only have one functioning bathroom. We are hoping the garage falls down due to some act of nature. Oh yeah, the lawn mower and the vacuum cleaner also decided to stop working. And I'm about one leaky faucet away from a breakdown. Fun times.

Hallelujah Part 2

The work on the basement is done! Hallelujah!

Well before I get ahead of myself, the drywall work is done. But that is the first step in reclaiming our basement.

It took a little over two weeks to go from bare stone and studs, to this:




And finally to this:



Now we have to put down new flooring, re-do the bookcases, re-do the bar, paint the walls, move the furniture, move all the toys and tv from the living room and then we'll be back in business. Which should take about another 2(or 6) months.

Hallelujah!

I didn't want to jinx it. I was afraid if I said it aloud it wouldn't happen. But it did and now I can shout from the rooftops.

They have started the work on our basement!

For those of you who've been following for a while, you know I live in a stupid old CrapShack which keeps breaking down and may in fact kill me. So the fact that they have started drywalling the basement means that we may actually get back down there in 2009. Which means that my living room and dining room can go back to being used for their original purposes instead of being a complete and total disaster area.

I'm so happy I could jump for joy. You know what I think I will actually do that.

Home Improvement

Not that the CrapShack needs it or anything, but today they are finally starting work on our basement.

Its been about 4 months since we first noticed water in our basement. The basement was finished, it was our family room and Bunny's playroom. We moved everything we could into the living room and have been living in cramped quarters ever since.

At first we thought we could get the work done in May or June. But now its mid-August and its just starting. And once they finish the waterproofing work, we still have to re-do the basement, fixing dry wall and installing new flooring. We'd like to make some improvements as well. Its no telling how long that will take.

I'll be happy to get back in the basement by Christmas.

Mom its broken, mom its broken

Our house is broken. There is really no other way of putting it, its just flat out broken. We have an upstairs bathroom with a leaky shower and our basement leaks. See its really broken.

The shower has leaked for about 4 years. Everything else in th bathroom works but the shower. Luckily we had another tub and shower on the first floor so we were able to stop using it immediately. But we haven't been able to fix it because our roof leaked and was fixed first (See what I mean about broken - stupid old houses. Did I mention the new furnace and electrical work?). Then we needed to save up money for Bunny's adoption. (The choice between adoption and remodeling is really a no brainer.) It doesn't put too much strain on our day to day life, but it would be nice to have two working showers.

Well we decided to fix the bathroom this year. We figured between savings and our home equity loan we'd be able to completely redo the bathroom and still pursue our second adoption. We were excited about that.

But then it snowed almost 100 inches in Milwaukee this year and we started to get water in our basement when it melted. Now our basement was a finished family room. We had our TV down there and it was also Bunny's playroom. It had to be fixed right away, no question about it. So we tore up the carpet and got estimates for the work.

Everytime Bunny walks past the stairs to the basement, she looks down and says "Can't go down there, its broken. Daddy fix broken."

Hopefully the work will begin later this month or in early June. But then we will have to redo the basement once its done. So we will be without that room for a few months more. Now all of Bunny's toys are strewn about the living room and dining room. We've moved the TV up there too. Its not as comfortable as it was before but we can live with it for a few months. And apparently we can live another year without the new bathroom too.

Now you may ask why don't we do some of the remodel ourselves and save money. Maybe that way we can get both done. Well you see my beloved Bubs is not really handy at all. He can use a screwdriver, a hammer and nails and even a drill. He can assemble furniture. But that is really about it. Since I love him and all of his limbs, I would never ask him to touch a power tool nor would he ever offer too.

My mom keeps telling us to sell the house and buy a newer home with less problems. Because people like us should not own old homes. Well that's great in theory but you can't sell a broken house in this market. So here we sit with our stupid broken house and I've completely forgotten why I wanted to buy it in the first place.

So the moral of the story is don't buy an old house, unless you are handy with more than just a hammer and nails.