First floor RENO

So let's go from the beginning. 

Prep work. 

It is very important. Calculation of the materials, some inspirational  visuals also and of course some constructional calculations too. I was aware that we add very heavy kitchen island in the middle of the kitchen and this bothered me a lot. Our not finished basement did help to see and resolve the concerns. We added support wall that in the future will became wall between kitchenette and bedroom. Monetary calculations were almost right. They say when you to reno, double the budget, it wasn't so bad,  we were about 15% over. Let's say added the tax :)

Demolition.

To take kitchen out, we used kijiji (online selling second hand things), so somebody was ready to come and take off all kitchen with old appliances . Definitely good recycling work :) saved on garbage bin too :)

Ground breaking of the tilled floor. It was scary from the beginning, but actually it wasn't so hard to detach tile from sub-floor. Important thing was to begin at the right place (in the middle of the room) where vibration will do the job.

The worst fears did came to us when we needed to take a small addition of the floor, that was added later by former owners. Construction glue plus screws attached concrete board very strong to the sub-floor and no instrument would do the job (even power sledgehammer).  Good that the surface was small, so we took off about 1 cm and the rest poured leveling compound to even up with cement board. That were needed for porcelain tile.

 

 

Popcorn ceiling.

It IS easy job, just very dirty. So I did that before all the construction and floor installation.

Structural stabilization.

As I told earlier, I needed peace of mind that porcelain tile plus kitchen island with huge granite will keep the floor structure stable. We built support wall and I added  vertical studs connected all joists. Our joists are "hollow", so it was easy to do. 

 

Flooring.

With two big dogs decision about flooring material was "easy", it should be no maintenance floor, so the wood like porcelain tile was the best choice. I didn't go with traditional poured concrete and latch, decided to do easy (a bit more expensive)  way - cement boards. Good that I wasn't over confident and choose for tile  installation to use T-lock system. It's fool proof to do level floors.

 

Self leveling compound to level with cement board. Worked perfect.

Kitchen

I'm IKEA fan. There weren't even another consideration. It was easy to project with their software and my men are "profies" in assembling and installing IKEA kitchen. I "played" with online design and customized to our needs. New was island installation, but with that we dealt  too.

I love marble backsplash, could do just because the wet part was in the island. I would never put marble next to sink area. The stone is like sponge even if the sealer is present.

 

Focal point walls (living room and fire place)

It's easy to install and looks beautiful. But the stone itself is very very fragile. A bit of pressure and you have two pieces instead of one.

The fireplace was painted with heat paint, so the brass disappeared and the fireplace got its modern look

Laundry room

Part it was done earlier, part added during this summer. Cabinets of course are from IKEA. But countertops is different story. When I was looking for custom made countertop for laundry room, the prices even for cheapest laminate were too much. So I decided to DIY concrete countertop exactly the size I needed. I didn't want to pour and have very heavy piece of concrete, so if I need to reach back of dryer's vent or pipe I can just take out the "countertop" without a problem. So this "concrete" countertop is actually "lamination" of OSB with patching compound.  This solution did help me to decided and install small (narrow) utility sink too. You see, moment you out of standard sizes - prices are jumping up like crazy.

Actually I tried to laminate old powder room countertop, but somehow it didn't feel good. So at the end we got it done with our kitchen's countertop leftover.

 

Busy times

Of course the reno continue, and here are the proof -my very own “Red Room”. As we remember from Soviet Union era (it was room dedicated to V.U. Lenin and all other ideological things):o). In reality this is a very proper way to waterproof the shower. Liquid membrane called RegGard.

 A lot of tile cutting and installing, grouting next. 

 Also a little reroute from the basement projects – backyard rest area design. And of course it should be original, handmade and simple. School is over so I've had some help. Left a few things to pick up from IKEA as a back cushions and a glass table top, also I've found there some solar-powered lights, that gave me some ideas about lightening the area. We'll see...

Meanwhile life is going on and Jazz Festival in Montreal was calling and friends there were waiting to see us, so we lightly packed our bags and headed for fun trip to the north. What can I say, the organization and mood - perfect, you really feel the vibe. But some lessons learned - 1) must have folding chair (we are not getting younger and back problems let us know about that), six hours on feet and I was feeling every minute passing by, 2) it's a good idea to visit some paid concerts for more jazz and quality. But at the end we left Montreal with good impression and told our friends that we'd be back :o)

 

Joke for this post. A few weeks ago we had a sudden plunge in temperature - from + 35C to +10C. On my way to dogs park in the morning I met my neighbour and complained about the cold. He as always optimistic told me "You know why Canadians have big closets? because we do not separate summer and winter clothing" :o)

 

Reno continue: shower framing

Shower framing -  big work, especially when you do not have framing gun or impact driver, when for every screw you need pre-drill hole. Well.... you do what you need to do:o)  That means that frame is up... almost.

 My best tools last two weeks          Archie as usual inspects quality of work

and after sleeps well after hard work

Actually yesterday I was happy that all framing was done with screws. When trying to fit sink's enforcement details I came to the "Ops" moment.  It's hard to "move" mind from brick and mortar techniques that I so used to, to wood, OSB and dry wall. I realize that framing area where sink should go, was framed not wide enough. So ... unscrew and screw again, that was easy:o)

 Good and strong construction, but wrong place (see below)

B/W sink as you see is covered with mosaic attached with epoxy grout/mortar. Here I did mistake, not exactly mistake, but working with epoxy you should mix and use all quantity of material and I also wanted to use it as thin set and grout in one. I just didn't think that one thing is to use it for the floor (flat surface) and another for 3D object. Vertical walls began to sag because of thickness and freshness of the material (it doesn't set as quick as regular thin set) so I needed to put some support, but anyway got some big white/empty spaces which I decided to decorate with handmade resin/fluorescent/glow tesserae. I ordered fluorescent pigment will see how it goes.

Today  was HEAVY DUTY DAY : plumber worked more on rerouting /adding shower fixtures. I had another "Ops" moment with my sink :o( To my husband's delight (that he's got his way:o) we couldn't install sink above the toilet. I haven't took into consideration sink's draining height (OK I did but not enough) and sink got wayyyy to high, so we moved it  to the "normal" location - between toilet and shower. That made me very unhappy - I didn't want sink (even a small one) to block a small space. Well... you do what you need to do. Also we installed liner and made shower bed. It was HEAVY DUTY job. My men were mixing 3 bags of concrete by hand and I was dry packing "the bed" and checking right slope every step. I feel my every muscle today:o) Now we need to wait 15 to 28 days for concrete to cure, so will be able to apply liquid membrane. I know it's long wait, but definitely worth it. Slowly but surely :o)