08 / 02 / 2021
One of our frequent sayings while working on this project is, "why can't anything be easy?!" But as we think about it, we realized that there have been a few easy things: electrical, drywall, and painting! Though each has had puzzles to solve, they've been pretty smooth sailing. Thank goodness for hiring the right people to help us.
Update - as we post this, we have officially been granted occupancy (8/24/21)! This update is outdated but hold tight as we catch our bearings and finish these updates to catch you up to where we are now.
The interior transformation has finally begun, and the house is starting to look more like a home! Though the drywall dust and fumes from priming the steel walls were hell, we can now say we have beautiful walls and ceilings. The detail our drywallers took to work around the dents and bumps in our used containers was a feat in itself. Then, after evaluating the curse of over-spray, our painters painstakingly painted all our beams and railings by hand. It was hard work, but it's all paid off.
Other updates, before painting, Jason welded and finished installing our stair railing. We spent Father's Day 2021 camping out on our upper deck and enjoying the stars with David. Our tub arrived but has to wait for installation until after the tile, but that didn't stop Gretchen from taking an imaginary dip while sitting in its temporary home. We've had settlers in the new house, and thanks to squatters-rights, we couldn't kick them out. Luckily, they moved out on their own after a few weeks. ;) And we celebrated another birthday with Gretchen kidnapping Jason for a couple of days to get him drunk.
After painting, we were able to install all of our lighting fixtures and switches...and while we still had scaffolding on site, Jason took the opportunity to install our Big Ass Fan in the atrium. We've taken daily trips to Lowe's and Home Depot to buy everything from light bulbs to shims and wood for the siding supports. Oh, and we started installing our kitchen cupboards!
We had initially hoped to keep the container floors exposed in the home, but their condition when we got them was poor and became even worse after a winter exposed to rain and snow. So we hired a company called Decopour to pour concrete on the first floor containers. To save ourselves some money, we chose to seal them ourselves, which may have got us a little high from the fumes, but we powered through and rocked out to some tunes in the process.
Our next update will include tiles and (basically) finished bathrooms! We just need to find the time to gather our notes and create the post! Stay tuned.
