Completion of the chairs and a new door

This week was a slow week as far as documented progress.

I don't want to get too off-topic, but it's worth noting we spent at least two nights this week glued to the TV, watching the horror at the capitol unfold, and the subsequent proceedings. I really struggled focusing on much else.

To be fair, we are also at a kind of strange place in the remodel; we are waiting on the transition pieces for the floor so we can lay the tile in the entry and start on the trim, so they don't feel finished, but there isn't much we can do.

We cleared out the guest/craft room and moved everything to the other guest room (and dining room) to start on the floors in there while waiting on the trim.

We primed the floors and leveled them with self-leveling concrete like we did in the rest of the house. We struggled a bit with the self-leveling concrete this go-round, or more specifically, with the drill, so the first bucket was much drier than normal and left a lot of valleys we needed to fill.

The darker area in the second picture shows where we've used featherfinish concrete to fill the valleys, we still need one more coat and should be ready to lay floors early next week.

While we waited on the floors to cure we decided to finally replace the door from the laundry room into the garage with an exterior door. There had been a hollow core interior door there previously (we believe the laundry room was added after the original build), and there wasn't a threshold, so critters (mostly spiders, but the occasional lizard) could crawl right in (yikes), plus it provided little to no insulation from the heat of the garage. We ran to Lowe's and grabbed a door and Scott got to work on putting it in.

Scott did a great job with the door; as you can see, it took some finagling to get it into place. We've bought all new doors for the house in the last couple weeks (more to come on that), so we've learned quite a bit about standard sizes. For this door, we bought a 30"x 80" door, you can see from the video it was a pretty tight fit, but Scott got it in perfectly.

Check out that sweet threshold (last pic)! No more ducttape holding the (ugly,, dirty) vinyl down! Woo-hoo!

We still need to add trim around for it to look and be "finished" but it's a working door and I love it!

The old door opened into the laundry room, the new one opens out into the garage, giving us more usable space in the laundry room. This was an easy decision for us, but tonight after dinner we had a conversation about which direction a door swings vs where the hinges are, vs which "hand" it is, and have determined it is a seriously convoluted process.

If you're interested in exploring this topic click here and prepare to be frustrated and confused. I recommend reading with a friend and alcohol for a really spirited conversation 🤣.

While Scott was putting in the new door I was off camera FINALLY finishing my chairs. Last week I got through the sanding (down to 220) and this weekend I did 2.5 coats of clear polycrylic (sanding between coats, the last was just a "touch up" not a full coat).

These chairs were a serious labor of love. I've never reupholstered anything, and never refinished even one dining chair, let alone 8. It was seriously time consuming, not hard, but tested my patience.

Our dining room is currently holding our guest bed, so next week I'll get a shot of the chairs in their new home, at the table!

On an un house-related note, last week Scott put his beer he brewed into a keg and we had our first glass (and many after) this week!

He brewed a session IPA, its too hoppy for me, but Scott, my mom, and my dad all approved!

Sunday Scott drew up plans for the barn door we'll be putting on our master bath. We've knocked out almost all if the arches in our home and I begged Scott to let us preserve one, so this is the one:

I think this arch is super cool, but there is zero privacy in the bathroom because there is no door, so we have to fix this.

We love the idea of a modern barn door, but with our dresser right next to the doorway, a single barn door would have to slide all the way behind it, which I know would make me hesitate to use it. The alternative is a double barn door so there are smaller doors on each side that meet in the middle.

Scott does up some plans and we headed to Lowe's.

While at Lowe's Scott was looking at tools, drooling over a $300+ jointer. We have bought a lot of tools since starting this project, and probably borrowed as many, if not more, from Padre. A jointer is something he didnt have, but it's not entirely necessary for our current projects. If you don't know (I didn't) a jointer cuts off the side of a board making a perfectly straight, square edge. It's really important if you are joining boards together (think like for a tabletop) and would help prevent rounded edges from making grooves in the table surface. We aren't currently doing that, but might be in the future.

Enter, Craigslist. I found one listed for $60 so we headed over to buy it.

That's a steal and will open up many more project possibilities in the future! Stay tuned, we'll be using it soon.

When we came home with our materials and new jointer Scott got to work setting up a work space and I put the cushions on the dining chairs. Amazon deliverd our sliding door hardware, perfect timing!

Just as we were ready to get started, my parents pulled up so we decided it was a great time for a break. The break turned into hours of chatting, a pizza delivery, many glasses of Scott's beer, and a Bear's game.

They headed out around 8pm and Scott asked if I wanted to work, but its only 50ish degrees outside, and this couch is pretty comfy, so this update will be the end of our work for the weekend :)

I'm looking forward to laying floors in the guest/craft room next week and getting that room organized (I've really been missing my craft supplies!), but it was nice to end this weekend with a little relaxing.