very simple

Not counting weekends, yesterday was day 16 of my “no more than 10-day” renovation project. But I feel like reaching the point where they’re installing decorative moldings might be a sign that there’s a light at the end of the tunnel.

Spring seems to have finally arrived for good, and with it, the blooming dogwoods in my neighborhood. I’m torn between the joy of winter finally being over and the dread of the inevitable allergies that accompanies this event.

As its the weekend, no discernible progress on the apartment, other than the fact that I bought paint yesterday.

Moldings went up today. Plus some replastering and priming of the walls. Picking up paint this weekend.

I really hope this finishes up this week, or that it’s close enough to finished that I can move back in. I’m stretching my parents’ hospitality to the limit.

Plus, I’d really like to sleep in a bed again one of these days.

more progress. The floor is done, the plumbing is slowly getting reinstalled, and they’ve started installing the wood paneling (which will look much better once the trim and paint is added today and next week).

Now to just get the 800 tons of construction equipment out of every spare corner of my apartment. Very grateful to my parents for letting me crash for as long as I have, but the air mattress is not doing my back any favors. The money I’ve saved on a hotel may end up getting spent on traction by the end of this!

…and they’ve started actually installing the floor.

No *actual* floor yet, but the subfloor is in, so that’s progress! Plus, the walls are now fully grouted.

This was the first weekend that I’ve officially missed photos. My excuse is that between my brother coming home from Africa for a few days and my need to catch up on much sleep, I just forgot. Oh well.

In other news though, my brother is home for a few days. He’s transitioning from one job in Senegal to another in Afghanistan. If nothing else, he certainly knows how to keep us worried! But he’s going to be doing some really good educational development work over there with a major international organization actually based in the Middle East, so we’re rooting for him.

Pictures to return later. I’m hoping they’ve started on the floor today!

Getting around to posting progress photos from the past three days, by the end of Friday, they had started grouting the shower surround. They still need to put in the floor, but that should hopefully be Monday. Slow going, but it’s going. Plus, they got rid of most of the debris on Friday, so the rest of my apartment is now only a moderate disaster zone.

Not a great photo from last night, between the fact that it was about midnight and this is stitched together, but they’ve started installing the tile.

At the rate we’re moving, this should be done in about 6 months, but now that my parents (and in particular my dad, who arranged for this whole project in the first place) are home, I have reinforcements in pressuring the guys to get everything done.

I will be so happy when this is over.

Finally!

Tile finally arrived today, almost a full week after it was supposed to show up. Yet another delivery window of 10-2 which resulted in the delivery actually arriving after 3pm. So pretty much an entire lost day as far as productive work in the apartment, but now we get to start moving forward again, and I’ve dug out the air mattress at my folks as they return tomorrow, so I lose the bed.

More than the delay, I have to say I’m most offended by the runaround, revisionist history and outright lying that the store engaged in. Today, they refused to refund even a portion of the exorbitant delivery fee that was originally charged because they claim the delay was completely reasonable and apparently entirely the fault of my contractor for not communicating with them enough. Nevermind that I, personally, was on the phone with them multiple times every day getting a different story each time, including last Thursday, when they placed all the blame on the manufacturer for shipping it wrong. Their truncated chronology jumps from Tuesday, when the tile was supposed to arrive (even though no one contacted myself or my contractor to schedule), directly to Good Friday, when my contractor refused to wait for a significantly delayed after-work-hours delivery. And that refusal apparently absolves the supplier of all responsibility for the delivery failures on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and the actual scheduled delivery window on Friday.

Hopefully this is the *thing* that goes wrong with the project, as at least one snafu is inevitable and this one doesn’t involve anything leaking or exploding.