Browsing Tag

Home Ownership

DIY Not?

Posted on September 20, 2013

As I’m currently sitting in a hospital room waiting for the circle of life to begin, I have some time to reflect on other, somewhat less important, topics. Here goes.

As some of you may know, we recently purchased a house. As the house is relatively new (only about 10 years old), it didn’t require any major renovations, or anything of that nature, for us to be able to move in and be happy/comfortable.

All we really did is paint the inside, change the locks and make a few other basically cosmetic changes. Nothing big and nothing that required a reciprocating saw or a sledge hammer. I can’t decide for sure if I’m disappointed about that or not.

Now that we’ve been in the house a couple months, I’ve become more or less hooked on DIY TV shows (that and increasing my arsenal of cool tools). In particular, I watch several shows on the DIY network including The Rehab Addict and Holmes Make It Right. Or, really, anything with Mike Holmes.

These shows are pretty interesting and often very informative. I’m also entertained and I usually learn something. They do, however, have one downside: I now want to redo the entire house (or most of it anyway).

Since I’ve been watching the shows I look around the house and I see a lot of things I want to upgrade or improve. I could redo the bathrooms, change the stairs, add a room above the garage or upgrade the kitchen. There’s just so many possibilities. In short, I now have a DIY issue.

I don’t think it’s really going to be much of a problem as long as I keep in mind the fact that the last time I did any real construction, or anything like it, was over twenty years ago. At the time I was pretty good at it, but again, it was a long time ago.

Sure, things haven’t changed that much, but I do think some more information and thought is required before I tackle any real DIY projects at home. However, that doesn’t mean I can’t keep building my collection of awesome tools, right?

Picking Up the Pieces and Putting Them Away

Posted on July 2, 2013

As I mentioned previously, we moved. In fact, we did the whole thing last Saturday on what was, up to that point, the hottest day of the year. Not a great day to be hauling boxes and whatnot from one place to another.

In truth, we had movers do the majority of the actual hauling. We just have way too much stuff and, more importantly, H is gestating Project M at the moment so she shouldn’t really be lifting anything. And as we know, I’m extremely lazy (and have a useless back). So, movers.

The movers were mostly okay and managed not to break 99% of our stuff. Sure, a couple things were damaged, but it could have been a lot worse. Most importantly, they got everything in the truck, got it to the new house and put it pretty much where it goes. All for a reasonable fee. I’m calling it a win and moving on.

Although, I did call the moving company to tell them about the few broken items (again, none of them were critical or irreplaceable) just to see what they would say. They haven’t called me back yet. I suspect I will be politely told to suck it up, but we’ll see. I could be surprised.

Now we are in the process of unpacking and putting stuff away. I only hate this part a little less than packing. Although, one highlight for me was finally being able to install my Nest thermostat and get it going. Yes, I did it myself and managed not to be electrocuted.

Plus, starting to set up my office and getting Internet installed were also very good first steps. It’s amazing how much we’ve come to rely on having super speed Internet. You really miss it when you don’t have it for a couple days.

There are many other aspects (good and bad) of moving and home ownership I won’t get into now. Suffice it to say we are slowly getting back to normal.

Or, as normal as we get.