Saturday 2/26 - Mon 2/28

On Saturday, we spent the day prepping and planning for the flooring. The contractor and his floor guy came at 1:00 and were there for an hour working out the details. The plan is that they will start in the bedroom and prop the bed and mattress on the wall, do most of the floor then put the bed back and do the rest. We have a massive California King bed, and there isn't room to put it anywhere else in the house. I'll have the bedroom ready for them first thing Tuesday morning and once the bedroom is done I'll release the rest of the house room by room, keeping ahead of them with the prep. Each room needs to be made ready by removing everything other than furniture and putting away or relocating breakables like computer equipment, etc. This plan is great for me because I only have to have one room ready when they start and then all I have to do is keep ahead of them as they work. It also gives me a "clean" room early on were I can move the computer to so I can work and be out their way. Keep in mind that 4 people agreed to this plan - C, me, the contractor and his floor guy.

By the time they left we were pretty well set for Tuesday. C and I had a lot of work to do on Sunday and we had to order quarter-round on Monday to match the flooring (it's for the back door - we didn't know the details of how it was going to be finished or what we would need until today).

On Sunday, we did some things around the house in preparation for the flooring. We emptied 3 bookshelves and boxed up the content, backed up the server and set up a computer workstation in the kitchen so I could always have a workstation no matter where the crew was working.

Monday was a crazy day. I finished getting ready, put away all the valuables and fragile stuff and got the dogs ready for their week at "camp" aka cage-free daycare.

All seemed to be in good order but you know that's not how it turned out.

Week ending 2/25/11

On Saturday, I faxed the signed contract to the contractor at about noon. He didn't call, but that's cool... Monday was fine. Of course, no call on Monday or Tuesday morning and I finally called him Tuesday afternoon.

He called on Wednesday and we are starting Tuesday.

I'm REALLY stressed about this - I took the call while we were walking the dogs because if a contractor calls you YOU TAKE THE CALL because there may not be another chance! But the problem is that I didn't have time to think it through and consider what we need to get done in the meantime and how much time we have between now and then. I really should have had him start a week later.

Thursday I went to Lowe's to get some putty for the laminate baseboard and they didn't have what I needed. I had seen a similar product and I though it was what I needed but it wasn't. The worst part is that I had to stop at Home Depot on the way home! Ugh. My local HD sucks - the contrast between them and Lowe's is striking.

Week ending 2/18

On Sunday, we went over the first draft of the contract from the contractor. It wasn't as bad as usual.

I sent him my changes and on Tuesday, we got the revised version and surprisingly he got everything this time. It usually takes two revisions. I don't understand how someone can build a house, but can't take a typed list of requests and include it in a contract on a first try.

We have two lightbulbs out in the kitchen that need fixing. One bulb broke while the painters were here, and this week I pulled the bulb from the other fixture which is identical so I could buy replacements. After I got them, I realized both fixtures were loose and the bulbs couldn't be installed. This is why I say you don't actually finish a fixer upper house, you just move to a new point on the list. One big job gets finished, and 6 small ones get added.

Week ending 2/11/11

Saturday was a day from hell. We spent 6 hours prepping for the flooring. One of the parts of the flooring job is to replace a cabinet over the fridge. Our prior contractor screwed up the measuring in the kitchen so that the existing cabinet is too low for the fridge to fit under once the flooring is in. Had he installed it even 1 inch higher all would have been fine. We ended up having to buy a shorter cabinet and wasting about 10 inches of space on top of the fridge.

I bought the replacement cabinet a long time ago because Ikea changes the designs of it's kitchen cabinets fairly often and I didn't want to get shut out. We had it stored in the garage and when we went out to get it the cabinet box (not the door, which we wouldn't be able to replace) had taken some water damage. We had two periods of intense rain lasting 10 days each this winter, and we think that the garage had some water leak in at the floor level. It doesn't normally get water, but there was a lot of rain for a long period. Fortunately, the door was fine, and the cabinet box is replaceable.

We also had to buy kickplates for under the kitchen cabinets. The thing is, these pieces come in 7 1/2 foot lengths and we purchased 7 of them. Our prior contractor never installed them before we fired him for not showing up. Now, all but one of the pieces are GONE! Yes, gone, simply vanished. As much of an ass as he was, I don't think he was a thief and they weren't worth much - only $15 per piece to buy new and not of much use outside an Ikea kitchen. I have no idea how you lose 6 pieces of 7 1/5 trim lumber but he did it. One of my biggest complaints about him is that he would start something, scatter the pieces throughout the house, leave for the day and then come back the next day and start something else. So although I can't imagine how something like this could be lost, if anyone could lose it he could.

Today was all about fixing contractor screwups.

Even though we had all the part numbers and specs, we weren't able to order the parts online so it was off to Ikea for a dreadful Saturday visit. One thing about Ikea - I hate walking through the entire store when I know exactly what I want. I was there probably a dozen times when we were doing our kitchen so I know an unmarked shortcut to the kitchen department. Fortunately, when we got there they were remodeling the kitchen department which meant nobody was there! Yay! We found out they didn't have our parts, but another Ikea (about 45 minutes away) did. So off we went, only this time we had to go through the ENTIRE store to exit. Ugh. We did a lot of weaving around people out for an afternoon of recreational shopping.

After 45 minutes in traffic, we go to the next Ikea and found the kitchen department. We split up to save time, and I placed the order for the cabinet while C went to self-serve to scan for the kickplates (they told us at the first Ikea that they were in self-serve). I met up with him in self-serve, and we hadn't found them yet so we asked someone. Turns out they're NOT in self-serve, but the guy who helped us was able to order it for us. We got it ordered, stood in a long register line and paid, then waited a few minutes to pick it up before driving over an hour home in traffic.

I need a week to recover from a day like this!

Week ending 2/4/11

On Saturday, I finished the document for the contractor and called him to schedule time for him to come over for the estimate. I don't expect a call back on a Saturday, but he didn't even call back on Monday. Keep in mind that contractors are hurting for work and I've been a good customer for this guy. Why don't I hire someone else? As bad as he is, he's by far the best we've been able to find.

I finally called him on Tuesday and he claimed he didn't get the message. Yeah right. We set a time for Thursday for him to come and see the job.

On Wednesday, the wall base was delivered. Aside from being 20 minutes later than the end of the 4 hour window all was fine.

On Thursday, the contractor did show up and look at the job. We'll see how long we wait for the estimate. For the painting, he took 9 days to get us an estimate for a 4-day job.