New house, new renovation project :)

[skwerl]

Gabe, I'm envisioning a black wrought iron handrail on the staircase that comes up and continues as a 'fence' or railing from the top of the stairwell back to the wall.

 

[Gabe]

Gabe, I'm envisioning a black wrought iron handrail on the staircase that comes up and continues as a 'fence' or railing from the top of the stairwell back to the wall.

That's a cool idea!
I'm seeing dollar signs just thinking about it, but we'll see, I like it!!

 

[Shotokan1509]

Are you on find the draft duty today? -10 with -30 windchill down here has helped me find a few spots haha

 

[Gabe]

Are you on find the draft duty today? -10 with -30 windchill down here has helped me find a few spots haha

Lol, no I already know where they are, just need to fix them.
The front door had some copper "insulation" around the opening, I hated it so I recently removed most of it.
Apparently I should've waited a few days.
It's 50 degrees by the shoe rack in the entryway, it's 70 degrees in the living room

 

[Gabe]

We contracted a local metal worker to build us a new railing for the top of the stairs, finally.

A few days ago he stopped by with a piece he built to do some test-fitting and re-measure a couple of things.
We're loving the way it will look:

The last couple of days I've been doing some clean-up/re-organizing in the garage.
On my side I put up a few new shelves, moved all the gardening stuff into the outside room that's under the sunroom, added a few more hooks onto the plywood panel that's hung on the wall behind the car, and re-arranged the jack stands/floor jack/misc other stuff so I now have twice the room I had in-between the side of the car and the wall.

Today I started working on the girlfriend's side of the garage.
Cleaned, then removed all the things that were hung on the old rotting plywood panel that was hung on the wall behind her car, then removed the panel and threw it away.
There's a shelf there that I will continue using, I strengthened it a bit and added a piece at the end against the wall so it has another shelf under it going all the way to the wall now.
Then put on a thin skim coat of joint compound on that wall, filling in lots of nail/screw holes and covering the brown color of the drywall.
I'm planning on upper cabinets in that area, and maybe a few more heavy-duty hooks

 

[skwerl]

The railing looks sharp, very nice choice. Completely different from what I imagined but looks great!

 

[Gabe]

The railing looks sharp, very nice choice. Completely different from what I imagined but looks great!

Thanks.
We had looked for different designs for months, and finally found the pic below, we printed it and gave it to the metal worker dude, and he is doing a great job copying it!

 

[Gabe]

Today I went back to the garage and made up a couple of supports for the 14-foot ladder, to finally get it away from in-between the Shelby and the wall, where it was sitting on the floor leaning against the wall.

I used some leftover 2x8 studs I had, made up a shelf for the ladder to sit on at one end:

And a support at the other end that has a piece of leftover heavy-duty thick metal clothes rod that slides out to one side:

The metal rod only slides out to one side, toward my car, and I have a small L-bracket on the outside of the hole to keep the rod from backing out unexpectedly, probably overkill since the weight of the ladder keeps that rod in place.
As I slide the rod out to the left, it rests on the garage door beam that's nearby, I put the other end of the ladder up on the shelf at the other end, then lift the ladder in place at this end and slide the rod under it to keep it in place:

I also put up a couple of hangers on the wall in front of the Shelby for the light aluminum 7-foot ladder we have:

 

[Gabe]

Back in the garage today, installed a shelf on the wall behind my car, above my toolbox, and hung a couple of power-tool holders under the shelf, made up of 4" PVC pipe:

The mess to the left of the new shelf will be removed and proper cabinets and shelves will be installed.
There's a toolbox under that mess somewhere too.


.

 

[Gabe]

New railing finally installed at the top of the stairs.
Custom-built by a local company, freshly installed this morning

 

[Gabe]

Played a bit in the back yard over the last few days.
Build 2 raised beds for veggies my fiancee wants to plant, this is one of them waiting for it's location to be prepped:

And I bought a small fire pit thingy from Home Depot.
We wanted a stone/brick unit, but at more than 4 times the price of this one, we decided to just go with the $89 Home Depot piece.
Already fired it up:

And something I should've done before firing it up, I built a brick base all around it, filling in the space in-between the bricks with small rocks and dirt:

 

[TheSuit]

Played a bit in the back yard over the last few days.
Build 2 raised beds for veggies my fiancee wants to plant, this is one of them waiting for it's location to be prepped:

And I bought a small fire pit thingy from Home Depot.
We wanted a stone/brick unit, but at more than 4 times the price of this one, we decided to just go with the $89 Home Depot piece.
Already fired it up:

And something I should've done before firing it up, I built a brick base all around it, filling in the space in-between the bricks with small rocks and dirt:

Looks excellent on all! My wife and I are trying our skills at growing some food. So far it's looking promising but time will tell.

I like the fire place as well. The brick base is a nice touch.

 

[Gabe]

Looks excellent on all! My wife and I are trying our skills at growing some food. So far it's looking promising but time will tell.

I like the fire place as well. The brick base is a nice touch.

Thanks. I'm no gardener, I do what my fiance tells me to do, lol.

Today we got the second raised bed installed after prepping the surface, and I filled in the first one.

The small one in the back will be removed and either re-used elsewhere or disposed of.
Whatever the little woman wants, lol

 

[skwerl]

^ I have a framing nail gun which is perfect for stuff like that. Once the boards are cut you can shoot the box together in about 2 minutes. It's been real handy building walls and stuff like that. If you can hold the board in place with one hand then you can nail it.

 

[Gabe]

^ I have a framing nail gun which is perfect for stuff like that. Once the boards are cut you can shoot the box together in about 2 minutes. It's been real handy building walls and stuff like that. If you can hold the board in place with one hand then you can nail it.

I want to get a nail gun eventually.
I used decking screws to put the wood together, and large fender washers so the screw heads don't sink into the wood too much.
I also have a bunch of screws at weird angles to try to make the framework that much stronger.
They're far from flimsy. The fiance and I picked them up and they felt nice and solid.
They're 4'x8' ... bought 8'-long boards and used 3 for each bed, with one making up the ends after being cut in half, then a 4'-long 2x4 for the middle.

 

[Shaggy]

I want to get a nail gun eventually.
I used decking screws to put the wood together, and large fender washers so the screw heads don't sink into the wood too much.
I also have a bunch of screws at weird angles to try to make the framework that much stronger.
They're far from flimsy. The fiance and I picked them up and they felt nice and solid.
They're 4'x8' ... bought 8'-long boards and used 3 for each bed, with one making up the ends after being cut in half, then a 4'-long 2x4 for the middle.

Fiance! Congrats. It was only a matter of time.

 

[Gabe]

Fiance! Congrats. It was only a matter of time.

Thanks, it just happened Saturday morning ... she walked out of the bedroom to see this in the living room, with me on one knee:

Holding this, a design she picked, 2 rocks signifying the 2 of us:

And she said YES

 

[ZmanM3]

Congrats!

 

[ksack]

After building her a house, I'd hope she'd say yes. Congrats to both of you!

 

[Shaggy]

Thanks, it just happened Saturday morning ... she walked out of the bedroom to see this in the living room, with me on one knee:

Holding this, a design she picked, 2 rocks signifying the 2 of us:

And she said YES

Even looks like she had been prepared for this with the one nail on her ring finger being a different color...the color of diamonds.