Basement Additions: Bathroom & Egress Window

BEFORE:

Laundry Area/Pre-Bathroom 6/2010

Den/Recreation Area/Pre-Egress Window 6/2010

I am not a fan of contractors. I will admit that I can be a very difficult person to work with, especially if I hire you to do a specific job and you are not meeting my expectations or contractual obligations. Three things are very important to me: my son, my house and my money. Therefore, committing to a contractor to put in an egress window and a second (3/4) bathroom in my basement, affects two if not all three of the things most important to me.

I had anticipated blogging daily about the progress of the construction, but obviously I didn't. I didn't want to focus on the negative and the trivial. Besides, who wants to read about my daily issues exacerbated by home improvement woes? Yes, my thoughts exactly.

So in summary - the job is done and we are squabbling slightly over the final bill. The inspector required that a new stairway handrail be added as it was too short as well as a partial half wall on the other side of the stairs! I went out and purchased the vanity, light fixtures, floor tile & grout and was suppose to get a credit, which hasn't happened...yet. Little of any of the details were discussed with me. Tile went in before I was given the go ahead to paint the drywall, therefore I had to paint over my new tile! Trim went up pre-primed but not painted (Anyone who has seen me paints knows this is a double nightmare!), fortunately they didn't put up all the trim and I located the pile of pre-cut and was able to put two coats of paint on those before they went up!

AFTER:

New Hand Rail & Partial Wall 6/2010

Landscaping - they tore out two trees and all shrubs on the side of the house for the window and told me if I purchased plants they would plant them. Almost $100 later in perennial plants that I hadn't anticipated, I received the bill for landscaping of $95 for mulch, potting soil and grass seed.

Seriously? I could have done it for less! But I was told, "You weren't charged for labor." Great, since they didn't plant the plants where I had told them and they used cedar mulch instead of red that is throughout my yard. But at the time, I thought it was free.

Almost every day I came home to every light on in my basement and the house unlocked. One weekend I came home to the house smelling of turpentine as a bottle had been left opened and several dozen flies! They drilled a 3" hole out of the side of the house for an exhaust fan but didn't bother to cap it or fill it until they installed the fan!

I didn't have laundry usage for two weeks. When I inquired I was told to go ahead and do laundry. During the first load of laundry I walked by the drywalled bathroom and found a small pool of water on the floor. 11:00p.m. call to the contractor, eight towels later and laundry sitting in the tub mid-cycle = priceless. Water quickly creeped up the new drywall as the floors aren't level. The next morning, the drywall guy (who showed up 2.5 hours late on a Saturday and then subsequently locked himself out of the house!) took off the lid of the enclosed pump and found that the pump was wedged against the side wall. Resolved. BUT, wasn't it tested first? Guess not. I do have a nice utility tub and an extra floor drain too!

Apparently my house, which should be a bomb shelter, has nothing normal about it (including the occupants!) and has 10" cement walls with large rocks in it vs. the normal 8" walls. So I was charged an additional $310 drilling fee. In addition, the water drill caused lots of water damage to the concrete so I needed to clean and scrape up the walls to repaint. While doing this, I discovered that I had mold growing on one wall! I was appalled. Amazing the difference a dehumidifier makes - and the contractors kept turning mine off or not putting it together right and water ended up all over the floor, again. So I had to treat the wall, which then bleached out some of my black carpet. Really, how much better does it get? Oh how I love home improvement projects!

All in all though, it's done. I now have an additional bathroom and an egress window that anyone can break into or escape out of. Did I really think this through prior to installation? Nope.

AFTER:

(Oops, missed including the light fixture!)

New Basement Bathroom 7/2010

Egress Window 7/2010

Reorganized furniture and moved t.v.'s (big one is in the nook)


I'm just thankful that I received the grant money to pay for the majority of the window. On a side note, the licensing requirements are completed and my study was submitted to the state for approval on 7/12/10. Let the fun continue!

Baseball, Parenting & Honesty

I can't believe that it has been over a month since I posted. I haven't fallen off the face of the earth. Not yet, at least. Surely I hope if I ever do, that I have a great parachute or really strong bungee to catch me on the flipside!

Things have been relatively busy over the past month and things are finally beginning to quiet down. For the most part, the remodel of the bathroom addition is done (with the exception of payment) and the addition of the egress window. I now have to complete more painting that was affected by the work. So hopefully one or two more days of painting and it will be complete. I'll post pictures soon, or at least before I remodel the bathroom (since my timing seems a little off)! Of course it's sale day at Meijer - which means I'll be shopping for bathroom fun stuff and of course shower curtains!

Regular season of baseball ended last month and now we are in full swing of the "fun" weekend tournaments. Not sure what exactly is fun about losing EVERY SINGLE GAME, but what do I know? This past weekend was spent in a hotel almost 1.5 hours away with eleven 13 year old boys. I was a chaperone with three in my room. I seemed to have the late owls in two of them, that were up until 4a.m. night one and 2a.m. on night two! At least they were relatively quiet.

Speaking of quiet, I've never claimed to be able to keep my mouth shut. This past weekend, of course was no exception. One of the dad's and chaperones of the adjoining room told another parent that he was glad I was on their team, because if not and he was on the other team, what a B!@#$! I'm a rule follower...and the other team was taking in-field practice when it was not allowed, so I mentioned it, to the dad. I didn't even say anything to the other team or coach, but the dad did! But I'm the B!@#$! Go figure!

I also may have made some parenting and authority comments to the coaches children. Although he did ask after if I was for hire. I also might have told the coach that he needed to grow a backbone, and soon. Then of course comments were made about my aggressive driving and physical resemblance to Danica Patrick. And if I didn't say too much over the weekend, coach emailed today to ask for input about the last two tournaments. I may have given him my three cents worth. Surprisingly, he was appreciative and responsive and knew that I would give an honest response. So maybe some people still appreciate and want to hear the truth.

Well, maybe those are just people who you aren't dating.

Marriage Proposal...

Is a marriage proposal still a marriage proposal if it's from a married man and you aren't a resident of Utah?

Happy Monday! =)

Dating

As most of you are aware, I may have a little experience with dating. I joke that I'm an excellent first dater, but I really do believe it's true. It's all the rest that come after that where I have difficulty! But this blog isn't about my dating.

My son turned 13 earlier this year. Tomorrow he will graduate from 7th grade and officially become an 8th grader. His school will be adjacent to the high school. Big League! I didn't have my first "group" date or solo date until I was...fifteen.

This morning I was on FB and was updating my account with the new privacy website feature. Instead of having my son do his as well, I quickly logged on to his account to disable his as well.

I'm not the most meddling of mom's by any means. I trust him enough to do his homework. He's an all A student, so I have no reason not to. I don't have access to the school portal, I've only ever communicated by email with one of his teachers and that was in response to scheduling conferences. I'm very open with my son - numerous times we've had the "sex talk". I don't look through his book bag. I am however nervous now that he is thirteen about how he will fill his summer, sans daycare.

Last Friday night, the neighbor had a handful of girls staying the night. My son was shooting hoops and the harem of girls came over to play and talk. He then went to the park and two neighbor boys joined in the group. He came in the house at 11p.m. I was just about to call him in, but I was actually pretty excited about him actually engaging with kids around the neighborhood without my prodding! He had to be up at 7:15a.m. for a baseball game, so I was letting him deal with the ramifications of his actions. After the game, he napped for two hours, he was so exhausted!

On FB, he became friends with RUR's daughter. When he first joined he asked if he should. Since RUR and I dated briefly, the kids did meet, but they didn't really know each other as they attend different schools. Until the fall that is...on several occasions, they will be on FB chat. I don't ask questions. If he wants to talk about anything, he always can.

So this morning, I looked in his inbox of messages. There were some emails with someone, that I believe is a female, but I didn't actually verify it. Both first and middle names are neutral names that can go either way. The conversation was initiated by the other person with the topic being RUR's daughter, Friday and the beach. My son commented that he has never dated and his dad never lets him have anyone over (although he could say that about his mom too - although I WANT him to have people over, he chooses not to. Maybe that has something to do with his "LIKE"ing "My mom is crazy" on FB, or maybe not!). He went on in another response to say that his mom and her dad dated and that may be weird, but he doesn't care. So I have no idea if he doesn't care about liking her, doesn't care that their parents dated, doesn't care about what?

How does one handle this? RUR and I still occasionally talk. I'm struggling with whether or not to bring it up to my son which would then acknowledge I was on his FB page or to contact RUR to get his take. But then again, I don't want to meddle, but I also think she's a good kid and has good parents, so why not offer to make it easier - drop off here or there, rather than them doing something without parental awareness? Is that enabling?

When is he going to be 18, graduated and out of the house? Kids dating...the do's and don'ts...any advice?

Pictures & Dating

There have been very few times that I've actually enjoyed looking at the picture of someone I'm dating. Don't get me wrong, that doesn't mean that I find the person I'm dating to be ugly, I just don't have the need to stare at someone's picture. Granted, I have, but never really stared at someone's picture that I have never met.

Before I just met someone, he admitted that he stared at my picture for 30 minutes. That creeped me out! He was just amazed at how beautiful I am. Creeped me out, again.

There are two people, neither of course that I am dating, that I do like their pictures. Something about seeing them, seeing their smile, knowing who they are, makes me smile. I suppose, if I was creepy, I could find myself staring at their pictures for 30 minutes, but I don't. I met them, we went out and it didn't work. Is what it is. I'm not creepy, I'm not stalkerish, some people just take better pictures or maybe some, we just have a better connection.

The dating site seems to be more of a joke. I am getting burned out, very quickly, which is more than typical for me. I was called shallow twice yesterday. One by the creepy picture guy that when we met, he stood 5'9" (instead of his reported 5'11") and was about 300 lbs. (instead of his"average" larger strong frame he reported). So while we had shared good communication via email, looks do matter. There has to be chemistry and physical attraction. If that makes me shallow, so be it. I am shallow. Ironic thing though, I may be shallow, but he pursued me because of a picture, did he not?

Then there was another that messaged me. He is 6'5" and "thin" but states he is missing his four front teeth. I responded to his message and we chatted for a few minutes. He told me everyone is a liar online so I inquired about his teeth. A good smile is HUGE for me - it says so many things about a person. Even if a person has good teeth and they don't smile, I'm not interested in them either. I want someone that cares for himself and enjoys life and he easily smiles. I would never say, "You had me at hello." I would say, "You had me with your smile." It's true! So I inquired if he had a partial which I was corrected that it is called a "flipper" and that his had broken. I messaged him that a smile is important to me. He said, "wow. I hope you find a guy with a great smile that will cheat on you with your best friend or sister." Ok then. Glad that his first message to me was, "Hey cutie, you are cute." So I'm suppose to think that a man without four front teeth is cute?

Apparently YES, I AM THAT SHALLOW.