Post-clicky pipes

Now that we have our clicky pipes problem sorted - someone had to put all the carpets back ... so that was my job for today (that's me stapling down underlay before putting the carpet back down and stretching and tucking it under the skirting boards) while Sunshine installed a new (more efficient and powerful) radiator in the back bedroom. As it is shorter than the original radiator; some pipe cutting and moving was required ... Finally the upstairs is a MUCH warmer space than it has ever been ... just in time for the recent cold spell we have been having too.

Clicky pipes

The heating pipes in our house click - a lot! I think its to do with when they expand due to the change in temperature and hit nearby pipes and bits of floor joists etc. While i was away visiting Dadu, Sunshine decided that he was going to have a go at remedying the situation... As you can see, he has taken up bits of carpet in the upstairs bedrooms, and then lined joints with scraps of fabric ... and oh my has it made a difference!

Little bits...

Front Bedroom Part 12

Today Sunshine installed the new raditor in the front bedroom while I gave it a last coat of paint ... and we are now DONE in there! No more DIY - just the nice stuff of "decorating" ie "beautifying" :)

Bathroom Part 6

And after faffing with a broken shower for a few weeks in which we couldn't change the temperature - we bit the bullet and bought a new more expensive one and Sunshine installed it - its LUSH! Mmmmm.... nice whooshy showers now - with decent temperature control!

Kev Day

Kev was visiting again today to give us a bit of a push with the DIY ... So, you have:

Front Bedroom Part 11

I was shown how to mask off the wood from the carpet neatly, then Kev proceeded to paint the skirting boards at super-fast speed.

Hallway Part 10

This mess of wires really needed to get sorted - Sunshine was going to do it, but decided that Kev would be far better and faster at it ...

And while he was in the hall, he finished off papering the bulk of the left over walls and ceilings.

Bathroom Part 5

Unfortunately, even with all this moving forward, we had one room where things went backward ... there were two spots in the bathroom where the paint was not sticking properly. Kev pulled it all back and the reality is those two bits of plaster are not drying. He thinks he's dealt with one issue but, but we still need to look into what the issue is by the window. Anyways, it just means our lovely white bathroom has two blotchy patches again ... it needs to dry out before we can refill and re-paint.

At least everything has moved on a bit ...

Front Bedroom Part 10

Early evening push means the front bedroom has had its second coat of paint! Woo! We were so happy Sunshine had to do some posing while I did some exhaust-ing...

We even managed to go out dancing for a couple of hours after ... go team!

Front Bedroom Part 9

What a weekend...

Friday night we got through ALL the papering ... woo! The whole room, including this complex wall is done (I took the photo on Saturday morning as it got a bit too late and dark to take the photo Friday night).

Saturday, I got on with the rest of the caulking that I had started on Friday night.

Whilst Sunshine got on with the first coat of paint. After I was done caulking, I joined in the painting. We make a good team - I had the roller when he had the brush and vice-versa; and one of us would get on with cleaning and tidying whilst the other was busy doing something else.

Sunday we finished off the first coat of paint and now it looks like THIS! All beautifully white ... mmmmm...

We thought we'd get further and would have started clearing out the back bedroom so we could do that next week... but we hit a wall of tiredness so instead spent large chunks of today out in the sun getting some fresh (cold!) air; fixing our shower which suddenly decided that it was not going to give us hot water; and fixing the doorbell that suddenly decided to stop working. Still, it feels like this room is finally coming together. Yay :)

Front Bedroom Part 8

Ceiling doing ...

Ceiling DONE!

Three hour push tonight after work. We're shattered, but happy :)

Front Bedroom Part 7

Took these photos this morning as I can't get decent photos in the evening (when we usually finish our papering). This is what was done over all of Sunday and a bit of Monday night too. Yes, we are a bit slow - but we're being careful and thorough. All of the wall I'm backed up against (that you can't see) is done. And those 5 meter long ceiling lengths (and above the picture rail on the right and left) take a looooong time to do. It involves me pasting up a full 5 meter long length of paper; Sunshine then being up on a ladder with some of it stuck down and the rest being held up using a broom by me ... as we work our way across the room. And on the edge runs Sunshine then has to go back and mark and cut away all the paper that folds round.

We're thinking that maybe the next time we do this we set up a camera on timer with a tripod so you can see how its done. We're getting there though - and it feels like we're on the home run. Can't wait to paint it all white!!!

Front Bedroom Part 6

Solid day of lining-papering!

Front Bedroom Part 5

Weekend comes around and we start work again. Today was lots and lots of wall prep. Infact we started last night with sanding down the wall to make sure there were no rough patches; marking up deep holes; filling them in and then sanding them down again. Today was just more of that (much easier to do it in daylight!). You have to do several passes of this as its difficult to spot all the holes that need filling and sanding on just one go. You'll often find holes that need filling whilst you're sanding another filled one. Generates a lot of dust too so both of us ended up having quite salt-n-pepper hair and looking like old biddies ;)

To get to all the walls, we also had to drain and take off the radiator - man what a mission! There were lots of spanners and buckets and thumbs holding valves closed while one of us panicked and the other ran round looking for spare newspaper and rags to mop up the leaks. Got there in the end though ... as you can see, the radiator was inspected (and we assume installed) on 24th July 1972 - almost 40 years ago! I found some funky orange wallpaper behind the wall brackets - will have to take a photo of those soon.

And while we were at it, Sunshine decided that we might as well recess the plug sockets (they stick quite a bit out of the walls so we decided to get them inside the walls. Here is Sunshine doing the manly drilling-out-holes with a mega drill; setting in a new socket box, then plaster filling it into the wall. Three double sockets to do round this room. Also this room has only one light fitting (smack in the middle of the room) but I decided we need two. So we had to make two new holes in the ceiling; get into the attic and pull the current wire out; move it to one of our new holes; and fill the old hole. Eventually we can wire in to the second of our new holes too. I think that will work much better than the current set-up.

We wanted to start lining-papering today but all this prepping took a long time. We also had a 30th birthday party to get to that evening. So in the last hour we cleared everything up; vacuumed; put down dust sheets and brought up all the wallpapering stuff ready for tomorrow.

Front Bedroom Part 4

Day two of the weekend and we start by moving the shelves and sofabed so we can access the undone corner. On hand are the tools of choice - a thing to perforate the wallpaper to make the steam get in better; some scrapers to peel the wallpaper off; and some sponges as last bits mostly just needed a bit of soaking and cleaning off.


Once the final corner was done, I sat and slowly worked my way across that funny patch on the bottom right (of the picture below) of some strange glue residue that needed peeling away; whilst Sunshine got on with a first pass of plaster-filling some of the larger holes, dents and cracks in the wall. I must say the damage is fairly minimal and we are very lucky to have bought a house in very good condition. Our friends down the road whose steamer we keep borrowing, peeled their wallpaper off and all the plaster came of with it leaving bare brick!

Stopped before we got too tired - school night after all...


And as an aside - since I still needed to be able to work on my commission, we've set up a small studio/office in the back lounge (which is currently our living room) ... did all this only to realise we don't have easy internet access down there - so as you can see, the laptop (with wifi) is sitting on the chair on the right as I need to have web access, but I'm doing my drawing work on the desktop. Feels really roomy down there though- and I have enough space to set up the printer, scanner, wacom tablet and lightbox without constantly having to pull one thing out to make space for another ...

Front Bedroom Part 3

So after another half a day of packing and putting away the office, this is what we started with.


The wallpaper below the picture rail was a dream to take off - pick the bottom corners and pull ... The stuff above the picture rail and the ceiling on the other hand were a different story altogether and so out came the steamer. Poor Sunshine (because he is so lovely and tall) had to do the bulk of it as I just could not reach.


We got as far as we could (look at the mess on the floor! My job was mostly tidying up) before we called it a day as we had a dinner invite at the Domakke's. Just that one corner to go ...

Front Bedroom Part 2

The front bedroom used to house our office cum studio. No longer! It is (eventually) relocating to the front lounge. But in the meantime, its all in boxes ... so no "lucky finds" of vintage and retro kids stuff for a while...

Anyways, this had to happen so we can get on with redecorating (ie peeling off the textured wallpaper) in this room this weekend.

Front Bedroom Part 1

I realise that there hasn't been much house DIY updates recently ... well its because we haven't really managed to do any. Sunshine is back teaching, and I've got a commission on the go, and we've also had a steady stream of guests whom we've been accomodation in this here front bedroom ... as you can see, the sofabed that used to be in the front lounge, is now situated here (this used to be our office but we are moving the office to the front lounge).

We did though have a sudden urge to peel away the textured wallpaper last week (just before one of our guests arrived!) - as you can see above. I actually only remembered to take a photo today as I realised I hadn't documented it and there is a plan to get on with a bit more of this room this weekend. The wall stuff comes off fairly easily - but the paper above the picture rail is another beast. Me thinks there will be another showing of the wallpaper steamer soon.