Work Continues in the Mud Room . . .

We have been getting the glass block window framing ready to go for the glass block window.

First we had to tear out the frame that was already there . . .

And then rebuild the frame to fit the new window.

I wanted a little deeper sill for plants since this is a north facing window.  And also a bit of a rounded finish on the ends. 

The metal bar at the bottom and along the sides is to help the mortar stick to the bare wood better.

And then the installation.  Man, I'll tell ya, the guys on the YouTubes make it look so easy!!  NOT!!  You would think that those guys on YouTube had installed block windows a million times!!

So, here is how we ended a long day - with a big mess on our hands that we will need to clean up and apply more mortar.

But it's in and now that the mortar is dry, it is solid as a rock.  So, we think we will be spending Saturday cleaning and making sure that the mortar is everywhere it is supposed to be!!  :-)

I Took a Bath Saturday Night . . .

in our new bathtub.

Last Friday afternoon, Judah, our plumber was to come and finish up the plumbing in our bathroom.  But the job he was doing right before ours took longer than he thought and he didn't get everything done because he got here so late.

He did though, get the tub installed!!

Then, Saturday afternoon, his Dad came and did just enough additional plumbing so we could take a bath.  YAY!!

So, I took a bath Saturday night!!

We Had a Productive Week . . . .

The rest of the decking boards in the mud room got laid . . .

And we decided to wait until the back door got installed before staining the rest of the boards because it is taking about a week for the stain to dry.

Today Kelly spent the whole day, with a little help from his Sister, getting the back door in.  If you remember, this is the $10.00 solid wood door we got from Habitat for Humanity ~

I started stripping it but didn't get very far.  Well, today it is hung and ready for the finishing touches next week!!

And as you can see, we cut out the top two panels so I can put a window in there.  That way, the mud room will have more light!!

 It's still a little scallywompus but we are going to get that fixed!!

This was a very exciting project to get done!!

Wow!! Hot Water . . . What a Concept!!

This has been quite the month!!  Life here at the ocean has been full of fun and frustration!!  Always with a renovation, I know, but these past two weeks have brought the ultimate joy of finally having hot water!!

We were having such a difficult time figuring out how to do the venting for the plumbing in the bathroom that we decided to splurge and buy 3-4 hours of real live plumbers!!  Well, those 3-4 hours turned into 6-1/2 hours with two plumbers doing their thing!!  YIKES!!

It was wonderful though!!  First, we now have hot water!!  We're in heaven!!

Plus we are all plumbed for the kitchen sink, where we now have the hot water and plumbed for the washer and dryer and the utility sink in the laundry room.

And we have a toilet in the SCARY bathroom ~

But alas, after 2 flushes it stopped working!!  Now the plumbers had told us there was standing water in the pipe leading to the new toilet but they didn't say or know why.  I think they may have known but just didn't want to tell us!!

So we spent $145.00 to have the toilet snaked and nothing changed.

Because  . . .

we had MAJOR septic tank issues.  The young man that snaked the toilet went out and looked at the septic tank and pulled out the pump and broke off a piece of PVC and said there was no electricity to the pump!!

ELECTRICITY???  A septic tank has an electric pump that needs to have electricity flowing to it??  Whaaattt?? Well no wonder the septic tank had major problems.  There has been nothing to pump the literal crap out of the septic tank for as long as I have lived here (almost 22 months) and probably even longer!!

Oh, my!!  So, that cute young man, his name is Tommy, said he could fix the whole system the next day (yesterday).  And dang, he actually came out, did the work and now the toilet flushes.  In fact I know that from personal experience!!  :-))

This is Tommy working on the septic tank!!  Man, he must have a nose of steel to work around that smell all day!!
 

 This is the old pump!

And this is the new used pump!!

Needless to say we are totally broke and will just have to work on projects for awhile with stuff we already have around the house.

The plumbers come again on March 21st to finish up the bathroom plumbing.  At that point we will have a vanity with sink - hot and cold water!!  Yay!!  And the beginnings of the tub/shower!!  Before the plumbers come back out we have to level the floor joists in the bathroom, lay down a new plywood sub-floor and get the tub in place.

Until next time, thanks for sharing this fun journey with us!!