Saturday, April 12, 2008

Rub A Dub Dub: Our First Fixture

After much consternation, the tub is installed..

We Got Drywall (Week 8)

Technically it's sheetrock that has started to flesh out the scrawny skeleton of our home. After so many months of using our imaginations, the smooth surfaces enable us to see our place as it will be. We dig it.

BEFORE--The Skeleton


AFTER--Cool Nook
If you have any ideas of what we can put in here--let us know.
 
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BEFORE: Entrance to Family Room



AFTER: Stunning

Sunday, April 6, 2008

Houseguests!




This weekend we entertained at Chez Hainz! Our first guests were our lovely and ever patient neighbors who were curious to know what was behind all the banging and buzzing. We toured them through the maze of framing and clouds of dust. I think they were most relieved to see that we were putting double sheet rock and lots of insulation in the wall between our house and theirs. :)

Our second set of special guests were Nick's sister and her husband in from Chicago with our utterly adorable nephew. They wasthey scampered like mountain goats up onto the dropped ceiling and checked out the views from above. We hope that they next time they visit, we might actually have walls and even some furniture.



The Words of the Prophet...

...are written on the subway walls.

After spending a large part of our Saturday counting electrical outlets, looking at tiles, worrying about our toilet, we walked into the 14th street station and saw this...

 



Should we just sell now?
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Tub O' Troubles (Week 7)

This week, there was some bad news on the bathroom front. Here's a quick run down of things that were stressing us out...

1) Guest bath shower measurements were off. Implication: A tiny little shower (even for New York). I had nightmare visions of my 6'4" father coming to stay and getting stuck in our shower when he bent over to grab the soap.

2) Toilet in master bath placed too close to the wall. Implication: Bruised knees when doing one's business. Not cool.

3) Tub too darn big. Implication: PANIC. Tub is the one thing we ordered that cannot be sent back.

What to do? Serious creative problem solving was required. "The Team" gathered at 8 am on Thursday morning and we put our heads together. Here's what we came up with...

1) So that my Dad won't get stuck in the shower...we've reoriented the studs and expanded the shower a few inches into the "hall" which somewhat disrupts the clean line of the wall, but in this case function triumphed over form. We want our guest to enjoy bathing when they come to stay.

2) We're rotating the toilet 90 degrees so that we can sit on the throne without banging into the wall. This is going to require some plumbing wizardry (and some extra cashola-ugh), but our contractor thinks it's doable. We think it's well worth it.

The Original Plan--Too Cramped For Us Giants


The New Plan--Toilet Faces Out (Please note large pipe that has to be reworked in order for this to happen)


3) And as for the big tub. It's staying. But a door is going. We used to have two entrances to the master bath, now we have one in order to make room for our mighty tub. Every time you make an unanticipated change when renovating, you go through the mental exercise of convincing yourself that this is what you should have done anyway. So we've persuaded ourselves that eliminating the door will give us more privacy. The privacy that we wanted all along. I'm buying it.

The Tub Arrives--Can You Say Ginormus!?!


Unveiled--It's A Beauty, But Too Darn Big


Problem Solved--The tub will live here. Bring on the bubble bath!