Category: DIY

For the Do-It_Yourself person who loves to dig in and figure out how things work, and then fix them!

Categories
Dad Blogs DIY Family

Maybe I can invest the money I saved…

It seems that I’m forever fighting the natural flow of water around my house. Since we’ve moved in, I’ve ripped out all kinds of old drain lines and replaced them with new ones, but problems still keep popping up.

Most recently, the gutter on the highest part of my house (where I can’t reach) started just gushing over the side, gouging a hole in the ground where it splashed during a really rainy day. My first thought was that I had a clogged gutter, but I couldn’t be sure because I couldn’t see in it.

My local gutter guys wanted $110 to come clean it out, a price I didn’t want to pay until all the trees had dropped their leaves at least. But I’m a tad (just a tad) anal about knowingly having things wrong with my house and my not fixing them, so I started relooking at the problem and decided that perhaps the problem wasn’t in the gutter, but in the drain lines.

The original builders had used that cheapo corrugated plastic piping and I’ve ripped enough defective pieces of it outta the ground to know it was probably suspect. So I found the start of the pipe at the bottom of the downspout, and using some exploratory shoveling, found where it plunged deep into the slope of my backyard hill. I stuck the hose in it and turned the water on to see if I could find out where the water was coming out, if in fact it was, but I couldn’t find it.

To make a long story short, I ended up ripping the whole thing out and here’s what I found:
IMG_2432

I replaced this plasty-crap with about 25 feet of 4″ PVC piping. Miraculously, I dug under two sprinkler lines and didn’t break either of them.

IMG_2431

It was a banner day…but I have a feeling my back is going to be screaming tomorrow.
Now I just have to get that retaining wall done, but then I’m sure it’ll be something else…

Categories
Dad Blogs DIY Family Life in these United States

Adventures in pipe replacement – part deux!

georgia My plumber arrived on time yesterday morning, apparently from Georgia (formerly part of the Soviet Union, not the state in which I live), and commenced working. However, based on a previous conversation I had with his office, I was under the impression that he would be using a pipe replacement technique in which they slide the new pipe inside the old pipe and then pull it all the way through, splitting the old pipe in the process. The idea here is that you can run a new line without ever having to fire up a trencher.

That was not to be the case.

By noon, I had a very circuitously trenched path from my water shut-off valve, down the hill, around my grass, through where some of my prized bushes were placed, under my sidewalk, and then through yet more bushes (flame creeper azaleas).

When I saw the path of death and destruction, I nearly cried. Me, a grown man.

The fellow doing the work, in broken English, explained why the “split and replace method” didn’t work and why he had to trench, and then I explained how he’d just destroyed about $300 worth of plants, not including the $600 Seiryu Japanese Maple that he laid his boring pipe against and rubbed off a 1.5″ strip of bark, right before WINTER!!!!

I was pretty upset.

By 4:30 p.m., he had the pipe in the ground and was just letting the PVC set before turning the water on and I began the arduous task of getting my plants back in the ground. Unfortunately, he put the pipe right under three of them, which meant, despite his having buried the pipe 13″, I still had to raise the mounds up where I put the plants just so I could cover the existing roots.

I fumed. I “huffed.” I made very annoyed screeching sounds when I talked. It was not my finest moment, but this was like having someone come into your house and write all over your walls with pink magic marker and then having the paint store tell you that they don’t sell your particular color anymore!

In the end, he helped me put everything back and I watered it in as best I could. I surveyed the damage again this morning and it looks like most of my big stuff will make it, though I lost an entire section of Creeping Jenny and probably two Flame Creeper Azaleas.

Here’s a before and after:

IMG_2347 IMG_2353

It’s hard to tell the difference here, but there is one. If nothing else, the difference is in my psyche!

But we have water now. I washed dishes, I cleaned, I wiped things down, I FLUSHED! (repeatedly). It’s a great feeling. Honestly, I don’t know what people did before modern plumbing. I really don’t!

Categories
Dad Blogs DIY Family

As if the gas shortage isn’t bad enough

Our old house had polybutylene pipes. If you’re not familiar, they are a plasty-crap invention from the 80s that have since become one of the biggest homeowner liabilities in the industry. Apparently, the chlorine in the water eats away at the pipes until they just burst.

Ours finally burst over our kitchen in the old house, flooding two floors. We ripped all the poly out and replaced it with copper, replaced all the sheetrock and then promptly moved!

Here’s some pics from that little joy:

DSCF0567  DSCF0566

DSCF0569 DSCF0565

When we moved, another of our criteria (in addition to sidewalks) was a house with copper pipes. Our current house has copper pipes on the inside, but a poly line running from the main to the house. One of my first orders of business when we moved in, was to get it replaced.

But, I never did.

I woke up this morning after CareerMom had left for a 6 a.m. aerobics class and heard the sound of running water through the pipes. Wondering where it could possibly be coming from since no one else was awake (and with a sense of pending doom in my chest), I slowly walked from bathroom to bathroom checking for a  flowing toilet, or a running faucet that perhaps the kids left on. Nothing.

I checked the basement, fearing a foot of water and ruined collectibles…nothing.

I went outside to the faucet where the main line comes in…NIAGARA FALLS!

So, we’re unlucky in that our water main burst last night, but lucky in that there was zero damage to the inside of the house. I called and left CareerMom a message on her cell to pick up some water on her way home, and then I left a message with one of the plumbers who gave me an estimate for the work.

Hopefully, they’ll come right out, but I have my doubts. Could be a sucky coupla days around here.

UPDATE: Due to the hazard of digging and possibly hitting another utility line, we won’t be able to get it fixed till tomorrow. So, looks like showering at the gym; baths at grammas, and dining out! Oh, and begging the neighbors for water to flush the toilets.
Ah, deeeeep cleansing breaths. Happy happy joy joy thoughts.

Categories
Dad Blogs DIY Family Marriage

What? You don’t like the dogs playing cards picture?

color wheel As much as I like to pretend that I don’t care what other people think, the truth is that I do. But not so much because I want their approval as much as I like the validation for my ideas. Is that different? I can’t tell, but I think so.

For a guy, I like to think that I have a pretty good eye for decorating and color. When I was single, I got lots of compliments from…um…people visiting my condo; I can match clothes when CareerMom and I go out (what few times we do), and I can even be trusted to pick up household knick-knacks on my own without CareerMom having to return them in the dead of night to keep from hurting my feelings.

Wait…

No…

It’s Ok…after some self-introspection, I’ve reconfirmed that I’m hetero!

Anyway, we’re in the process of updating our house as I’ve blogged a few times. This includes new paint, some new appliances, lighting, etc. Now, barring winning the lottery, I’m making these updates as I can afford them, which means I can replace approximately 1.2 fixtures per paycheck, or 1 appliance every 6 months (washer and dryer count as two appliances) without having to serve beans and rice to the kids for a week of dinners.

We’ve come to a point though where now that I’ve re-painted, some of the window treatments that were leftovers from the old owners, no longer “fit” the decor. Some of these windows are oddly shaped, in strange places, or have some characteristic that makes your typical “drapes with a swag” an unattractive proposition.

CareerMom’s sister hired an “interior decorator” to come in and create a design for her house and CareerMom wanted to do the same for ours. I did something similar with our landscaping. I had a guy create a plan that I could implement on my own as my finances afforded, and that’s worked out well, so I agreed with CareerMom that it sounded like a good idea. I was afraid of the cost, but the lady she’s using works for a local decorating and fabric store and so she works for one flat price–not the by-the-hour charge many of them use.

I happened to be working from home the morning the designer dropped by and CareerMom took the morning off so she could shadow the designer as she wandered around the house. For about an hour and a half, the “designer” mumbled to herself while walking around measuring walls and windows, making the occasional comment about this or that.

So now that she’s come in and mentally critiqued our house, she will go create a plan. I’m a tad fuzzy on her deliverables (and her credentials frankly), but CareerMom didn’t question it and I’m no dummy, so I’m keeping my mouth shut.

To her credit thus far, she did make a couple of good suggestions for our dining room, which I at first thought were ridiculous, but after having lived with them for a few days, have decided that I rather like, so I’m open to her other ideas. But the one thing she did comment on while she was here that got my hackles up, was as she walked into the kitchen and said, making that little pinched look with her lips and forehead, “Hmm, the older shiny brass fixtures and newer stainless appliances are throwing me off!”

I held my tongue, in part because I agreed, but mostly because I didn’t want to upset CareerMom since this was “her thing.” But I really wanted to ask “design-lady” how many of her clients can afford to come into a “new to them” house and wholesale remodel in one fell swoop!?

Sure we only have one stainless appliance right now and the rest are black, but that’s only because the old black dishwasher broke and I had to replace it and wanted to move towards stainless. And yeah, the hood on the stove is shiny brass, but to update it, you have to buy a whole new hood and one like that, with a different finish is about $1,000! And I’m sorry that the perfectly operational sink fixture is shiny gold instead of a nice brushed bronze, but they ain’t cheap!

SO LAY OFF LADY!

That’s what I was thinkin’ anyway. In actuality, I just nodded along and bit my tongue.

But as she left, she did say one thing that I agreed with, “You seem to be into comfortable rather than glitzy, so my design will reflect that.”

It’s true; neither naked Greek statues nor ostentatious grandfather clocks will probably ever grace my foyer, but daggum, when I sit down at night to watch “The Office,” I’m comfortable, and frankly, that’s all that matters! (did you see Jim propose to Pam?)