bathroom remodel

Sheep moved, projects advancing

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I went over to Hermiston and took the pregnant ewes with me. I unloaded them into their temporary pasture and then worked on setting up the electric fence just inside the vinyl fence. The sheep have never been around an electric fence before. It has been years since we used one on our place. I just keep cross fencing the farm so I don’t have to move any chargers or electrical wire around. I had to do the part directly across from the neighboring field first. As soon as the ewes came out of the trailer the herd across the driveway came running over to see what was up. So both herds wanted to stand next to their respective fences. I was afraid the ewes would just hop through the vinyl fence. I got it up and then hooked up the charger and ground wire. I forgot to bring a tester and I really did not want to grab the wire, luckily several ewes tried to scoot closer to the vinyl fence and it was readily apparent that the electricity was on! Before I could get the next section up and energized I had one ewe try three times to get to the vinyl fence. Everyone else had caught on to the consequences and was avoiding the outer edge of the field. I think she got the message after the third shock as she just ambled into the field to be with everyone else and ignored the herd across the driveway.

Winter is coming so I planted a bin full of garlic and looked at tossing the green beans and tomatoes over the fence for the chickens but they are not frozen down yet and I may get one last picking off of each one. My beets I started in the fall are growing but they have some weird brown leaf thing that is stunting them. I am not sure what it is but it is not a bug. I am hopeful we can go another month without a hard lasting freeze so they will continue to grow. I will pick them once the leaves wilt down. I dug up half our potatoes and got almost 20#. We did way better this year by switching bins. Next year we are moving every single type of plant to a different bin. We win also be testing the soil and adding nutrients as needed in the spring. I will dig up the other potatoes in the next 2-4 weeks.

I did disconnect all of our yard and garden hoses. I blew out the lines going to all of our garden and to the lavender plants. By the time I was done we have several piles of hose with 15 hoses total being used. The tree orchard is slanted one direction so I just opened up the drain plugs at the end of each of the three lines.

The Gingerman and I removed the old dishwasher and installed and leveled the new one. I thought this would be a quick process. If you call a solid two hours to remove the old one, clean up the floor, change out the electric cord to the new dishwasher, install the new one, level it and then attach it to the underside of the countertop so it doesn’t rattle around fast then yeah it was quick.

We then set up the table saw and ran all of the bathroom cabinet pieces through it so I could hopefully take some of the wow out of the pieces. It helped. I won’t really know until I start the assembly but now I can actually start the assembly. I will be finding my Kreg tool that lets me drill pilot holes on an angle so I can glue and screw the pieces together.

I hav two main projects left, the gazebo floor and the greenhouse. It’s a race now to see what gets done.

I did finally capitulate and find a varmint rifle for the tractor. I needed something that could just be beat up. I ended up getting a single action break open 243, one shot with a Vortex scope and synthetic stock. I have a waterproof ammo carrier on the stock of the rifle. The entire setup was around $500. Now I just need to weld the holder onto the tractor and get it mounted. I bent one of the bucket support arms a couple of years ago and kept it thinking I may have a use for it in the future. I am going to cut it in 14” lengths, weld them straight up the arms of the bucket and put a piece of angle iron across the top. This way I can bolt the rifle holder directly to that angle iron. We will see how well it all rides soon.

Bathroom remodel day 47

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Well it’s that time again, time to actually go back to an old project and try to get it closer to the finish line. The bathroom is totally functional at this point. Never mind that there is no storage or that we cannot hide electronics. The shower has hot water that gets you clean, the sink dispenses water and the toilet flushes, the crucial tasks can be checked off the list. It was going to rain on Sunday so I decided to start in on the custom bathroom cabinet. I bought furniture grade 3/4” oak plywood at a paltry $95/sheet. I was disappointed to learn that it was necessary to trim all of the edges of the plywood to get rid of the damage on the edges. I don’t have a furniture grade table saw so I found this guide rail and put an expensive blade on my DeWalt skilsaw and made the first cut. I then had to go back and tape the edge I wanted to cut and cut through it again to get a clean cut. The first cut still caused some tear out on the laminate.

My goal is to get all of the pieces cut, then sand them all, then assemble them. I will stain it once I get it assembled. I am going to just go with the Tried and True finish. I like it and it tolerates moisture fairly well.

The guide rail did okay but I will need to run the pieces through a table saw. I have about a 1/8” difference near the middle. I need an expensive guide not a $30 guide if I want a perfectly straight edge. I did this a couple of weeks ago and have only managed to get most of the small pieces cut since then. I need some help getting the table saw down and running them through, Gingerman has agreed to help but our schedules have not been coinciding recently. I am working intermittent random nights for the last month with another month to go and it is really slowing down my projects. You tend to want to sleep the next day after being up all night.

Back at the Gazebo

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We have been processing fruit nonstop for a few weeks now. Annmarie was able to pick up 25# of #2 peaches on Friday for $22. We have been cutting them and freezing them in one cup portions for her to use in her smoothies. We almost have enough fruit to make it the entire year, the upright freezer is 2/3 full of frozen fruit. We are still getting half a flat of tame blackberries every four days. Annmarie made plum jam today and we are done with the plums. Luckily, I was able to give a large portion of them away. The sheep gobble them up as soon as I toss them over the fence.

We have a few Italian plums still ripening on the two trees and some nectarines. The nectarines have about 1-2 weeks before they are ready. I will need to keep checking them every four days to make sure they do not get away from us or else the yellow jackets will be the only ones eating nectarines. Mr Rainman had told me that they propped up their fronds from the asparagus plants. He said that the plants shot right up once they no longer had to worry about stabilizing themselves. Who knows, we propped them up with bamboo stakes and tied them onto the stakes. So time will tell if he is right. The new parts to our trumpet vine are finally taking off and we may be able to get it to grow on our new trellis around the living room window. I have been trying to get the bush to spread out that way with very little success but this may have been the year for expansion.

I went to town and got 45 bags of sand for the floor in the Gazebo. I had to empty out the gazebo first then clean up all of the organic matter and then to make sure the floor is flat. I was hoping I could just toss the sand down and spread it out then slap down the tile but I am told that I need to spread the sand out, hit it with the compactor and then work on getting it all smoothed out. This is going to necessitate repairing the drive cord on the compactor first. So I guess the best way to get started is to unload all 45 bags and spread them out on the floor. But I do not want to do this until the compactor is functional. Otherwise the cats will use the sand like a kitty litter box. I don’t really want to be chucking cat turds out of the sand as I am trying to lay bricks down. After the Gazebo floor is done the greenhouse needs to go up next. Unfortunately, I need to install a small fence to go around the greenhouse first. I don’t want the sheep or cows rubbing on the greenhouse.

Bathroom remodel day 46

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I was able to leap forward this weekend on the bathroom. I managed to get the new mirror hung, the towel racks hung and I was able to shorten the one side of the middle drawer. My cutout measurements were accurate but I needed to shorten the middle right side drawer. It needed to be shrunk by 50% to accommodate the new drain pipe. My guesses for the other drawers worked out and it was fairly simple to make the alteration. I have even started to put some of my belongings down in the bathroom. Annmarie has the upstairs bathroom so I use the one downstairs and I plan on thinning out all of the items before I bring them back into the bathroom.

The only thing I can do now is to cut the three corner trim pieces. I have not done it yet as the Gingerman has my finish nailer so he can finish the baby nursery. I will need to at least get them cut, stained and fit tested so they are ready to be installed. It looks like I really need to work on getting the custom cabinet built. I plan on storing all of my electronics in one compartment, cleaning supplies on the bottom section and towels near the top. By the time I get the towels, hand towels and wash cloths in the cabinet it will fill the entire thing. I think I can get the cabinet built in a weekend but it will take both days to get it done. I realize that this sounds optimistic but I still think it can be done. But honestly that might just be the body of the cabinet and the front face and cabinet doors may take another day all by themselves. They seem like they should take no time at all but I realize that is never the case. I have the plans all drawn up with measurements for all pieces and a sketch to use to assemble them. I was even able to find the plans two weeks ago. They were buried in between some tile boxes in the old house.

I did dig around today looking for some rifle brass and a die set. I found one box in our closet, four boxes in the attic and two boxes in the old chicken coop. I am still missing two boxes at least. I am pretty sure they are in the attic but we did a huge clean on the attic this year and I think I moved them into a different stack up there. I will need to move every single box in 2/3 of the attic. Gingerman and I moved all of the boxes in one corner today without finding those missing boxes. I know they are missing because I could not find the die sets that I know are there. This is just a case for me to get the old house “man room” completed so I can set all of this stuff up and get a better handle on what I have available. I want to get a jewelry table set up also. I am going to take one corner of the room for this, I want a lot of light and an overhead exhaust fan installed so I can use a small torch.

Bathroom day 45

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It has only been 45 days on the bathroom project over the course of 26 weeks now. Mind you I told the wife it would only take four weeks. I may have been a little off on my estimate. Normally, you can take my estimate and multiply by three and be spot on. That is not the case this time.

I only needed to install the sink plumbing and I would be done with all water in the bathroom. To do this I needed to change out the wall supply valves so they were 3/8” outlets. I figured this was going to be fairly easy as the nut and crush washer were going to stay on the copper pipe and I just needed to change out the valve body.

I should know better by now. I am cursed when it comes to plumbing. I changed out the first valve without incident. I then did the second valve, again fairly easy. I figured that I should check both valves before I hooked up the sink in case I had a slow leak around my swap. I went back to the main water shut off in the laundry room and opened it up. I got distracted by something and was in the kitchen when I thought I heard a weird noise coming from the bathroom. I went into the bathroom to a fountain. I had both valves pointed to the ceiling and the second valve I had not closed. I was spraying water all over the wall, the light and ceiling. Luckily, the floor slants towards the toilet so the water was just pooling on the floor. I had about 1/2” of water on the floor. It took me another hour to get the bathroom cleaned up and dried. I did not get electrocuted when I cleaned all of the water off of the light. Neither valve leaked once I actually shut the valve.

I hooked up the sink without any further incident. I even cut the Pex pipe and used the parts Delta sent me to get a seal on the Pex. I wanted to run the water but the drain was not yet installed. So I tried to install the drain from the parts I had on hand. Nope, it was not going to happen. Sixty dollars later and two trips to the local store and I had purchased enough parts to be able to plum the drain. I then did turn the water on and it did indeed work and drain perfectly. This entire endeavor took me a whole day. I just do not get along with plumbing, we are enemies.