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After hours of painting, we finished painting the bedroom. Next we need to paint the floor to seal the previous owner’s pet smells, then get the carpet installed and move all the furniture back in.

I’m ready to have my clothes back in the bedroom instead of all over the house!  Jessica’s dresser is in the front room, my hanging clothes live in Amelia’s closet but my dresser is in our guest room.

The finished paint job looks good. It's still a little splotchy in this pic since it's drying, but I'm happy with how it turned out.

We’re tearing out the final flooring that we haven’t replaced in our upstairs: the master bedroom carpet.

It’s gross. Dirty, dog peed on, and just plain nasty.

Check out the path worn into the carpet as you enter the room:

Ew!

Here’s a quick preview of what it might look like when we’re done painting and have some new, clean, fresh carpet.

Color preview for master bedroom

Jessica and I own a lot (that is, a parcel of land) around the corner from our house.  It’s a full acre and we’re responsible for the upkeep, like mowing and such.

I tried push-mowing it once last year and didn’t get very far. After a couple of hours, I figured it would probably take another four or five hours to mow. Luckily, a friend gave me a riding mower for free; I only had to get it running.

I got the mower running, but the land is still a half-mile away. Once a week I drive the mower down the street, garnering strange looks.

So, I’ve started looking at sheds. 

Questions

Pre-built or build myself? It’d be nice for the building to appear magically one day and be ready to use, but is it worth the premium I would pay?

Materials? Wood. Plastic. Vinyl-covered steel.

Foundation? Do I put in a pad? Level off the ground and put in a raised floor? Install piers? The more permanent options mean that I wouldn’t be able to move the building later.

Size? Size and cost correlate, so I’m stuck between not wanting to run out of room but not wanting to spend $4K on an out-building.

Amenities? Seriously, I never knew sheds had so many options.  Lofts, skylights, solar lights, extra wide doors, and so on.

Next

I’ll be collecting options. I do want to get this done in the next few weeks as the mowing season approaches.

I'm ripping out drywall because it smells like pee.

I took this picture in progress. I ended up ripping out all the drywall along the stair to the left as well as some more on the main wall.

We’ve had an issue with the pee smell for several years, partly from our own cat and partly from the previous owner’s dogs, we believe. When it gets warm and humid: eww.  We’d tried painting the plywood, but that didn’t do the job.

After removing the drywall, I could see on the back where the urine had soaked in and spread up, which is pretty nasty.  Also, there was a lot of sawdust and hair trapped below the drywall, between it and the subfloor.  That sawdust absorbed some of the stink as well, so a good scrubbing with a wire brush knocked it off hopefully.

I’ve let it dry out a few days now and I’m going to apply a couple coats of Kilz soon, then I’ll patch-tape-mud-sand-paint the areas that I’ve cut out.

Jessica and I hopped out of the car last weekend, only to be greeted with a loud THWANG from above.  One of the garage door springs snapped and sprung back. Luckily, it had a safety cable run through it or we could have had serious problems.  As it was, it whacked the ceiling and scraped a bunch of the popcorn ceiling off, but that was the extent of the damage.

I replaced the springs last weekend and thought I’d write this up so I can remember how to do it on the other door.

Weigh your garage door. Raise door. Put a clamp up high on the track to hold the door in place.  Remove both springs. Put a bathroom scale on the ground. Lower the door (with a friend) onto the scale.

Buy double-loop springs: The original builders grade springs were single-loop and that’s where the spring failed.

Check how the springs are attached: I had to get a link to connect the spring to the existing angled steel. Again, a single loop spring would be easier to install by just sliding it over the steel, but would wear on that spot.

Install a safety cable! Who knows what could have happened if Jessica had been hit by the spring? 300 pounds of tensioned spring flying around could make for a very bad day.

This is a single loop spring that connects directly to the angle steel bracket of the garage door opener

My replacement spring, with the double loops at the ends

The link I used to connect the spring to the angle steel bracket. This link rates at 880 pounds while the garage door weighs about 300.

The link, spring, and safety cable.

We had some carpet installed and I thought I’d try out a time lapse video. It’s kinda interesting, actually.

I’ve always enjoyed high-speed and slow-motion video because of the perspective they bring on something that happens every day.

For some reason, Vimeo’s embedded Flash viewer sucks. So, here’s a link instead: Carpet Installation Time Lapse.