DIY Project woes:

Whilst trying to refinish my childhood bedroom suite for my son, was completely unhappy with the finish on the headboard. So, I punted. I got the stripper back out and started over. It only set me back a month or so.

3/16/2011 9:09:06 AM

Well there's your problem, right there. You're using a stripper to finish your furniture. You should probably be using a carpenter.

Strippers are best for polishing knobs, not finishing furniture.

3/16/2011 10:37:21 AM

Passed inspection on the kitchen and laundry room additions.

Have reached a roadblock more or less, until I can get the funding from the bank to finish it. Will be about 10-15k. Ugh.

Someone let me hold a dollar?

3/17/2011 12:10:55 PM

Started trimming the living room windows yesterday. Bought the wood on Friday and Cut it Saturday plus put the first coat of paint on. Yesterday was another coat of paint in the morning and hanging it at night.

We still have to counter-sink the nails, fill the holes, caulk, do a final touch up coat of paint and cut/paint/hang the crown around the top of the header board but it is looking good so far

3/21/2011 1:23:23 PM

Purchased 2 rolls of landscaping paper last nigh. hopefully by this weekend I will have removed all the pinestraw from around the house, put down the paper and put down mulch on top or it.

3/22/2011 7:57:16 AM

had to find a place for my new (to me) john deere, so i built a door to access the area under our screened-in porch... i'm cleaning and staining in a couple of weeks

the door is about 7 feet wide and 5 feet tall... i'm happy with how it turned out





[Edited on March 23, 2011 at 8:15 AM. Reason : .]

3/23/2011 8:13:52 AM

Just finished making a storage unit for our dining room that we're converting to a den. Got rid of the formal dining furniture and need a place to store the good china, large serving pieces, and other random crap that there is no other place in the house for.

It's two pieces bolted together for ease of moving and future flexibility. All together, it's about 5.5' wide, 4' tall, and 18" deep. It'll look a lot better after it's painted, but I think it turned out alright so far. Fully recessed doors that large are a pain in the ass!

Before doors:



Pre-paint:



[Edited on March 23, 2011 at 10:25 AM. Reason : pics]

3/23/2011 10:22:53 AM

good stuff. I plan to attempt to make some cabinets to mount in our bonus room/media room at some point. I haven't really attempted building any storage units yet. Just mainly a lot of trimwork.


We got around to taking care of some more stuff around the house this weekend. The only "before" pictures I have are what the lady had in the posting of the house when we were looking to buy. By the time we actually purchased it of course none of her furniture was there and she had painted all the walls "builder-beige" instead of the awful paint she had up.

Update in the dining room:

Before


Currently



As you can see we have added the chair rail, re-painted, hung curtains and some art. I still need to trim the window in there as well as the doorway on the left that leads to the kitchen. I also plan to replace the chandelier, add crown moulding, install hardwoods and add an area rug at some point but I have to keep to the monthly budget I set

Update in the living room:

Before


Currently



The big thing I did this past week in the living room was to trim out the triple-window setup we have behind the couch. I really love the natural light we get there, however I just hated the fact that the windows (like every window in this house) were only fitted with a sill and apron and no trim, just wrapped drywall.

The first picture shows the trim after it was cut and hung and received 2 coats of semi-gloss. The second picture is a panoramic that I tried to stitch together to show a better view of the window in the room. You can see the built in shelves I posted last year that we put in above the fireplace in place of the TV nook. I still need to trim that opening out.

Once again, so many things on the to-do list and I am impatient but I'm trying to adhere to the budget I set. Really happy with the progress so far though

[Edited on March 28, 2011 at 9:25 AM. Reason : .]

3/28/2011 9:19:26 AM

I got the retaining wall up finally for the little guys play set. I dug all that out by hand. Next time I will rent a bobcat or something to do that amount of digging. It took me a day to dig all that out and two days to set posts and put the wall together. It only cost around $250 for the material so for me that made it worth the trouble.

3/28/2011 10:09:42 AM

Looks good and:

Quote :

"It only cost around $250 for the material so for me that made it worth the trouble."

is the key to this whole thread for sure. So much stuff that can be done DIY for at least half the price someone else would charge to do it. I feel like so many people these days live by the "pay more for the convenience" motto and just throw money away on stuff that could be done on their own.

Before we bought our house I had never owned or operated a power tool in my entire life I don't think. I'm certainly no expert craftsman but I feel if I've gotten the results that I have with no training then anyone can.

3/28/2011 10:20:38 AM

we have those pillows.

that is all.

[Edited on March 30, 2011 at 12:55 PM. Reason : wrong room]

3/30/2011 12:55:20 PM

They went great with our rug so we had to get them

3/30/2011 3:45:30 PM

i'll be the first to admit that they are mad comfortable to nap on.

thread-relevant tidbit: helped my father-in-law build a playhouse for his daughter. will post pics soon.

3/30/2011 5:40:06 PM

I played around some in my backyard:





and worked on a new pavilion, except I didnt actually do any work

3/30/2011 9:57:09 PM

We started demo on the old kitchen yesterday, started knocking the wall out and taking out the cabinets and counter top. We got a little further along than you see here. The bar is removed and the header for the old window is out.

It'll be microwave dinners for a while, and we'll soon be doing dishes in the bathroom sink, but it's progress.

4/11/2011 9:41:41 AM

Good to see you moving along with this. Let me know if I can help.

4/11/2011 1:34:19 PM

Built a dresser for my son's nursery with the help of a friend. The guy has the hand of Midas, we didn't use any plans and it was the first time crafting something like this for either of us. I was pretty happy with the way it turned out...only real snag was sanding out some sawdust I dropped on the top during the last coat of polyurethane.

Dimensions are 33x54x19 (hxlxd)

Got this far before I realized I should take pictures of this


Framed in the box


Ripped the drawer runner tracks


Interior of the drawer tracks, feet & back attached


Front shot of the tracks, dresser feet, and back attached


Framed in the drawer boxes. Getting the bottom track grooves just right was a bit of a challenge


Bottoms set in the drawers


Drawer boxes set in the frame


Drawer front attached


Laid the top down for show before we cut it


Stained the drawers


Two coats of stain


The grain of the wood really came to life once we got the stain done


Front view with the top attached


Stained the knobs. They were the only piece we didn't fashion from scratch.


Project complete and placed in the room

5/5/2011 8:03:30 PM

that's awesome... gotta feel proud about that, especially since it's for you son's room

5/6/2011 8:44:18 AM

Slow progress is slow.

But still progress, I guess.

5/9/2011 11:37:34 AM

^ your mudding/taping style makes me feel better about my mud adventures

5/9/2011 7:37:43 PM

The weird part is that where you see the small piece of Sheetrock at the top of the far wall is where it extends out where the carport used to be. There is a steel beam running the width of the carport, so we had to piece around it.

This was definitely the worst room of the bunch in terms of looks lol.

We're covering the whole place in primer tomorrow night (yay spray guns). Just finished a little more stucco faux finishing on the ceiling tonight. That's a messy adventure.

5/9/2011 9:21:44 PM

Here is a before and after of the front yard: We cut down about 10-12 trees a little over a year ago and were left with a desert. The people that owned the house before us never had grass so it was a fun project to get something to grow.

Before:


After:



This is the only picture I have of the backyard when we bought the house. I ended up cutting down the tree at the deck and as you can see, no grass. I have since built the play-set the retaining wall.

Before:


After:

5/17/2011 5:32:06 PM

NICE!

5/17/2011 7:46:13 PM

wow your yard looks fantastic!

5/17/2011 9:00:54 PM

^^^ that's looks really really good, awesome work...

i wish i could get some grass to grow like that - i've pretty much given up and accepted my grass/greenish weeds mix

5/18/2011 8:37:56 AM

^^^^how steep is the grade at your house? We have a sloping yard too (slopes from left to right). I can stand on one side of the backyard and its about 5 feet below the other - yard is about 100 feet wide. Trying to figure out what to do with the yard to make it a little more usable

5/27/2011 1:15:24 PM

Gahhh. That yard looks fantastic. Makes me think that there is hope for ours....maybe one day.
Also, I think I love your house.

5/27/2011 8:07:30 PM

FYI, grouting slate tile is the worst.

7/5/2011 11:43:45 AM

Daughter's wooden bench took a beating in the sun and rain, so I sanded, stained, and added a few coats of poly to restore it to better than it was new.

before:



after:

7/5/2011 1:46:46 PM

very nice, Bobby!

7/5/2011 5:05:54 PM

^^that looks awesome!

finished painting the den/kitchen and book shelf. also put up crown molding.

7/6/2011 2:42:38 PM

^is that Carolina Blue?????????

7/6/2011 3:41:34 PM

^^How difficult did you find the CM to be?

[Edited on July 6, 2011 at 4:21 PM. Reason : looks good btw]

7/6/2011 4:21:25 PM

Quote :

"^is that Carolina Blue?????????"

My first thought as well.

7/6/2011 9:06:39 PM

Quote :

"^is that Carolina Blue????????? "

it's 'santorini blue' which has a lot of grey in it, but yeah, it's a lighter blue. (it was leftover paint)

Quote :

"^^How difficult did you find the CM to be? "

it's not too bad after you figure out the cuts. i saved two pieces that were correctly cut to use as a guide. you end up with a lot of waste until you get the hang of it. i would say having a nail gun is a must. i bought a 3 gal compresser and tank at harbor freight for ~$40, a nail gun attachment for ~$20, and an obscene amount of nails for ~$10. also, i used the "perfect cut" crown from home depot that is supposed to make things a lot easier.

7/6/2011 9:13:40 PM

This was right after the initial cleaning. It's been cleaned 4 times since and looks much better now. But it's still a gigantic pain in the ass.

7/7/2011 8:17:49 AM

Im guessing that's the laundry room? I think your green may be brighter than my yellow. Haha. Floor looks good!

7/7/2011 9:02:57 AM

Yep, it's the laundry! Green isn't quite as bright as in the picture, but still pretty damned bright. Distorts everything else if I stay in there too long.

7/7/2011 9:05:00 AM

Well it looks great. Let me know if you need any help.

[Edited on July 7, 2011 at 9:07 AM. Reason : .]

7/7/2011 9:05:00 AM

Finally got time to install the trim and finish the built-in bookshelf project we started awhile back. Totally changes the look of the living room having this done. I was really happy with how the trim turned out.




[Edited on July 16, 2011 at 10:22 PM. Reason : ]

7/16/2011 10:20:14 PM

Kind of a do-it-yourself. I had a landscape guy I know help out since its a two man job. I wasn't about to carry those timbers around by myself and he had some helpful tools.

I lost the before pics of the old wall that was leaning out about 20 degrees and didn't have any sort of steps leading down. We really wanted some nice steps to walk down since our wedding will be in the backyard.





All I have left to do is backfill the wall some more and fill in the steps.

7/20/2011 5:05:28 PM

sunrooom with paneling and linoleum. I think the sunroom was an addition to the house and didnt really seem to fit.

Before


After - Painted with carpet installed

7/22/2011 5:22:39 PM

This thread makes me want to own a house.

I'll have to move home from Europe and go ahead and get that awesome career under my belt.

7/27/2011 6:05:36 PM

Quote :

"^is that Carolina Blue?????????"

i am happy to report that we will be changing the wall color to red this weekend. not looking forward to the actual painting but i'm excited about the eventual result. Also finished painting our cabinets last night. i hope to have some before / after pics this time next week.

7/29/2011 2:10:58 PM

I have been working over the last 3 or 4 weekends on some garage organization. I was able to do this without spending a red cent. The cabinets are re-purposed from an old workshop at my parents house and the countertops are recycled construction debris that was going to be thrown away.

The next step are shelves between the corner and the hanging cabinet, and of course, unboxing all of my stuff and loading the cabinets.

[Edited on August 1, 2011 at 1:48 PM. Reason : BIGGER]

8/1/2011 1:47:15 PM

it's coming along...

currently my house is filled with motorcycle parts and tools

8/13/2011 10:00:26 PM

awesome nic! how big is it going to be?

8/15/2011 10:26:52 AM

Hoping to have pictures of more slate laid down after tonight.

Additionally, should have pictures of our cabinets when we can get them made and installed. That will take my FIL and I quite a few weeknights to knock out.

8/15/2011 10:53:13 AM

got a little more down tonight. Only about 200sqft left.

8/15/2011 9:09:40 PM

slate is so awesome. good job

8/15/2011 9:43:47 PM