Doors, Dirt, Festool, Face Frames, and Fan

We have been so busy working both inside and outside of our house that I have not had much time to update this blog for the past week. We continue to make progress putting our disheveled house back together.

I'll start with the outside.  Lat week Steve of Economy Stump Removal came and took out the three stumps in our back yard.  Then he "followed the roots" of the main huge tree and pretty much made most of the back yard look like an angry ocean in the midst of a hurricane.  We were not upset about that because we needed to get those roots out, and we knew that Travis would come and smooth the yard out with his tractor.

Steve runs the grinding machine to remove
the large cottonwood stump in the middle of the back yard.

Steve and his son, Kyle, hauled away a huge trailer full
and a truck full of wood chips.

On Monday of this week, we noticed that water was standing in some of the deeper ruts in our neighbor's yard, causing a muddy, smelly mess.  To solve that problem, Rick shoveled 10 wheelbarrow loads of dirt from the back yard into the neighbor's yard to our south.  I distributed and smoothed the so the rain would not settle in deep puddles anymore.

We tried to be good neighbors by filling
in the ditches in our neighbor's yard.

The next day, while we were out of town, Travis came with his tractor and somewhat leveled the back yard. He wanted to do this so the yard would have a chance to settle before he returns at the end of August to add topsoil and grass seed to our yard.  He smoothed out the neighbors' yards to the east and to the north, and he spread out grass seed in the hopes that some of it would take.  Thankfully, we got a good rain last night, and today it has been misting/ raining all day.  That is just what the seed needs.  I hope that at least some of it takes and fills in.

Inside the house, Rick finished the pocket door and hung it.  We now will be able to close off the noise in the laundry room when we run the washer or the dryer.  The door matches all of the others in the house, and I think it looks really good.

Our new pocket door as seen from the kitchen.

We discovered when we took down the door molding to that room that the paint next to the door in the kitchen was peeling away from the wall.  We use Benjamin Moore Aura paint, so we knew that cheap paint was NOT the problem.  I was able to peel all of the paint off that wall in big sheets like one would do to remove old wallpaper.  Rick took one of the sheets to the paint store, and the owner told him that the problem occurred with the original plaster job of the house.  Apparently, the plaster was not mixed properly, leaving an unfinished and chalky surface.  Paint will not stick to that forever.  She told us to wash the wall with TSP, rinse it well, let it thoroughly dry, and then prime it with an oil-based primer.  Once that primer dries, we can paint the wall with a latex paint.

Once the pocket door was in place, we were able to buy, cut, and install the drywall in the laundry room on that side of the door.  We are still waiting for the plumber to install what needs to be done on the other side of the door, but at least we can finish this corner of the room.  That will allow us to start to build and install cabinets.

Drywall completes the pocket door wall. Rick
has since plastered the corner.

Yesterday I washed the wall twice with TSP, rinsed the wall twice with water, and we are letting it thoroughly dry.  Rick bought the oil-based primer, so that will be our next step.  We want to repaint the kitchen anyway, so we will start with that wall and with our new paint color.  Neither one of us really wants to paint the kitchen RIGHT NOW, so that task may just have to wait in line until we finish other jobs.

Thank God the wall I had to wash down was
not too large!  Once this dries, we can prime and
paint it, but that will force us to paint the entire kitchen.

We received a call from Shawano Wood Products that the 1 1/2 inch red oak that Rick ordered had arrived, so we took a drive to Shawano to pick it up.  Today we spent the day building the face frames for all of the cabinets in the new laundry/ craft room.  We bought a new Kreg K5 pocket hole screw system, and it worked beautifully as we put together the face frames for the cabinets.  I even drilled some of the holes... until the collar slipped on the drill bit and I did not notice it, so I ruined one piece of wood.  That was the end of my pocket hole screwing career.

Face frames for the lower cabinets line the wall.  The gap
in the middle will be where the desk will go.

All of the face frames await further construction
as we build the cabinets.

Our final task of the day was to install the new ceiling fan for the room.  Originally I did not want a light in the fan, but Rick and I found a fan that we both liked while we were at Lowes' in Appleton.  We like the sleek look to the fan, the size, and the fact that since it is remote controlled, we have no chains hanging down into the room.  The fan was a wiring nightmare, but it now is up and works well.

Before...

and after we installed the new ceiling fan.

We have had a very successful day, and we certainly are looking forward to dinner and resting this evening.  Tomorrow, if the rain ends tonight, we will be off to buy plywood so we can make the boxes to the cabinets.  For tonight, though, I am just going to rest.