Drawings for the Building Permit

Engineering Drawing

After we signed the contract (and made the first payment) on December 6th, the general contractor (TriStar) contacted the engineering company that they use.

The engineer (Bob) made a site visit, then took the hand drawings that our interior designer had helped us put together and turned them into detailed architectural drawings that are required in order to obtain a building permit.

This is a sampling of the drawings that Bob put together. There were about six different drawings in all including the building plans, plot plans, elevations, wall and slab plans, roofing and joists, and electrical plans. It took several weeks for Bob to get the drawings completed.

The drawings were finally submitted to the City in early January. TriStar warned us that it could take at least two to three weeks to get the building permit approved.

Hurry up and wait.

Elevations and Wall Section

What Sand Paper and Paint Have Wrought

The Front Porch Wrought Iron - Before

The fixer upper has some cool wrought iron on the front porch, on the car port, and on the back porch. Unfortunately, time and weather has taken a toll.

However, with a little time, sand paper, black paint, and rather tedious effort, you can bring the wrought iron back to life. I took advantage of a few nice weather days in December to work on the wrought iron in the front. The back porch will have to wait for another day.

After (Roses on Front Porch)

After (Front Porch)

After (Car Port)

Toys in the Attic

Homemade Cornhole Game

One of the things I discovered in the attic pull was a homemade "cornhole" game. It even had the bean bags in an old picnic basket. With a little clean up, maybe some paint and a few stitches on the bean bags ...the game may even be usable.

New Decking in the Attic

One of the other tasks on which I worked while the weather was still cold and damp in December, was to add new decking up in the attic. Since we will be significantly "downsizing" our space when we move into the fixer upper, storage space will be very important. We'll likely need all the usable space in the attic that we can get.

Little Pink Bathrooms, for You and Me

The little pink bathroom

The weather turned cold and wet in mid December. I couldn't make much progress on painting the outside of the house,so I turned my attention to the little half bathroom off of the back bedroom. The cool retro pink tile in there has led us to call this the "little pink bathroom".

There were several things that needed to be done in this bathroom.

1. The walls and trim needed to be painted.
2. The light fixture needed to be replaced.
3. A combination light switch/plug installed (there is no plug in the bathroom)
4. The toilet needed a new flush kit 
5. The faucet needed to be replaced
6. Cutoffs needed to be added to the faucet (you had to shut the water off to the entire house to replace the faucet)
7. The old linoleum floor needed to come up.
8. The concrete floor under the linoleum scraped and painted before putting down new individual linoleum peel and stick tiles (for now).
9. New bathroom door handle

Painting the bathroom vanity drawers

New Cutoffs

New Faucet

Scraping off the old linoleum

New peal and stick linoleum floor

Although plumbing is my least favorite (and probably my least skilled) remodeling activity, I struggled through. Getting the darn cutoffs not to drip was very frustrating (!) and required multiple trips to the water meter to turn the water on and off to the house.

However, once it was done, the little pink bathroom looked pretty darn good and will be quite serviceable, at least for now.