Week 27

The steady march towards completion continued this week, with several things getting finished.

Monday & Tuesday were quiet. A lot of looking at things & measuring things. Mr. Bunkport also taught me how to apply tung oil to the new counter to seal it. I put on three layers this week, with another two or three to go. It's a nice honey color now (sorry, it's hard to see the difference in pictures, so I left them out).

After that's done, I am going to see if tung oil will stain the interior of the windows a similar color; if not, I'll get a honey colored stain & use that instead.


Wednesday

The plumber made his final trip to Mars on Wednesday. He vented the water heater and washing machine drain:

If you click on this photo to make it bigger, you can see that the red house has a large statue of the RCA-Victor dog on the roof:

Pickles noticed it one time going out on a walk, & got very, very concerned. Who is that & how did he get up there?! She has since forgotten about it.

Anyway, while the plumber was here, he also added an outdoor faucet for the back yard:

The electrician also completed his work. Outside lights:

I'm torn -- they look kind of dinky up on that big wall, but we also wouldn't want something bigger -- the yard is tiny, and anything bigger would be kind of excessive. Maybe they should have been placed lower on the wall. Well, either way, they work & that's great. We an always make a change later.

He also reinstalled the light over the back stairs:

To get the dog up & down the stairs at night, we've been relying on the neighbor having a string of decorative lights turned on. It was a little dicey on the couple of nights they had them turned off.

He also installed the rest of the recessed lights and the bathroom fan:

Thursday

Thursday was a clean up day, and also the day that Mr. Bunkport started building a bathroom door out of other reclaimed materials from the house, plus a large piece of frosted glass he found for $10 or $20:

The room is so tight downstairs that we don't want to have normal, swinging doors taking up space, so we're going with a barn-style door. Same idea as this.

Friday

On Friday, they began the installation of the fire door between the garage and new room:

And the tile-setter prepared the surface for the redo of the bathroom tiles:

Saturday

After a long day on Saturday, the tile was completed:

Here is what it looked like the first time, for reference:

The difference is that the tiles are much more closely set, and have a dark grey grout instead of white. It's a much more modern feel, versus a more institutional look. Although at this point, having a bathroom that looks like it might be in an insane asylum might fit our mental state more closely.

While he was toiling away downstairs, we were cleaning the house upstairs, clearing away the last of the mess and dirt and dust, and getting ready for a little birthday party.

We have our dining room back!

There are just two things still waiting to go elsewhere: one large neon sign just out of the shot and that small wooden shelf to the left of the built-in. What a relief to have all that stuff out of there!

I was hoping to have the stored stuff out of our offices and yard, and back into the garage this weekend. Mr. Bunkport said that I could stash it all in one corner of the garage -- it just seems like it will be in the way, though, so we decided to just leave it be for a little while longer.

Five people came over for the party: Amanda, Matt, Susie, Paul, and Jon. It was a DIY theme, where everyone made some wonderful food or did some kind of clever craft, plus DIY mini-pizzas for dinner. Those five people, plus AJ, myself, and Pickles, that equals seven humans and one 50-pound dog. All in the kitchen. All at the same time. All doing things. Without any accidents or trampled toes. It's easy to get caught up in the list of things that still need to be done, & miss the forest for the trees: what a wonderful space we now have!

Here is Amanda hand-stuffing olives with blue cheese and anchovies, and Matt making a complex piece of origami:

The finished piece, in a place of honor among the plants:

Susie making a Thai chili paste that is going to blow the top of my head off later (which is a good thing):

I was remiss in my documenting, & didn't take pictures of her making Ethiopian mead (honey wine), or of Paul making three types of pickled garlic, but here are the jars up on the top of the fridge, ready to begin their fermentation:

I also didn't get a photo of Jon and his three types of homemade cured fish, plus all the delicious things he brought to accompany them. He was dissatisfied with the texture, but my two cents is that it was absolutely delicious!

Meanwhile, AJ was starting a cultured butter, making pizza crusts for people to put toppings on, & making this blueberry pie (pastry also from scratch):

Thank you everyone, for such a wonderful evening, and thank you for leaving all these creative, delicious things behind for me to admire, look after, and enjoy!

Amanda also brought a little extra special something for me to put in the home brewery once the construction is done:

As you can imagine, I have encountered many creative pronunciations of my name. Most recently, "Di Psoriasis." My favorites of all time are "Destroyers" and "Duserhaas." Amanda was a German major, so that last one caught on as a nickname several years ago. Three years ago, as we were looking for a house, I decided that I wanted the new house to have some kind of space to turn into a brewery, and that the brewery would be called the Duser Haus. In my head, I pictured some sort of old style sign on the door...and Amanda produced exactly what I had in mind! Thank you very, very much, Amanda!!!

Next up: installation of bathroom door, sink, and toilet. Plus other odds & ends. Getting closer!