No more dangling on the hairy edge

Since we demolished much of the half-wall in April, navigating our staircase meant descending into a hole in the floor—and traversing our great room meant avoiding said hole.

This resulted in moments of heart pounding excitement. Such as when we maneuvered scaffolding over the pit in order to reach the peak for painting. Or carrying 16 foot long pieces of trim into the house and almost taking one step too far back when trying to place the bouncy boards on the great room floor.

But all that was to change on Friday. At last, we were ready for Railco Metalcraft to install our railings. They did careful measurements and we approved their detailed shop drawings for railings going on both sides of our steps from the deck to the back yard, down the side of the house where Wasko poured concrete steps, from the top floor to the landing, from the landing to the walk-out basement and even for the three steps up to the pending second bathroom.

Then my office phone rang at 10:45 a.m. It was Robert from Railco, who was having a problem with the install. The poplar surround changed the dimensions of the hole in the floor. The railing no longer had proper knuckle clearance to pass inspection. In a gentle voice, Robert explained that “they” did this, that and the other thing wrong.

I admitted, there was no “they.” It was us. We did it wrong. We approved the drawings and never looked at them again. We did the surround in order to hide the bad drywall, without considering the way this element would (or would not) tie in with the railings.

His tone softened further, but I could imagine him thinking, “Expletive! Now I have to come back and finished the job! Expletive do-it-yourselfers!”

We talked through the project; I thought Matt and I could handle it. So I told Robert to install everything he could and leave the rest for us to figure out. He gave me his mobile phone number and said he was just a call away if we ran into trouble. Matt and I conferred and agreed with this course of action.

What did we do this weekend? We pulled the trim off of the left side of the surround, purchased a new circular saw and used it to cut the poplar as close to the wavy wall as we could and I used an orbital sander to try to create a subtle groove to ensure there would be code-required knuckle room. We also ripped hardboard and painted it white as a low-profile trim substitute.

The railing overshot our surround, and this forced us to figure out how we’d finish the front of the stairs. Poplar. It had been the obvious answer all along, but our rush to complete the 18 treads blinded us to thinking about the project holistically.

All we had left was one board of the appropriate length, but with a crown that hadn’t been treated royally by the mill. It took me more than three hours of sanding to make it usable. (Meanwhile, Matt painted trim.) Yes, this was a far superior option to going back to Home Depot. Their sound system—controlled by Atlanta headquarters—crackles in a way more irritating than the endless whir of an electric sander and their peopled checkout lines never seem to move forward.

So undoing and redoing was all we accomplished this weekend, but we met our objective. The entire surround is poplar, and it looks the way it should. All the silver railings are in place and beautiful. And I no longer have to worry about dangling on the hairy edge. The great room now has fall protection.

Selective seeing

Last weekend, we figured out the landing for our staircase. The teak left over from the shed we built in 2005 looked great surrounded by the poplar we were using for the treads. All I needed to do was spend some time with the orbital sander to make the edges of the teak more level with the poplar. Teak laughs at sandpaper. Countless hours of sanding spread over two days, and the teak was still laughing.

On Sunday, we abruptly stopped trying to make progress, leaving barely enough time to prepare for our guests: Matt’s mom and two sisters. This meant a lot of spot cleaning. In other words, go ahead and look at this spot, but politely avert your eyes when it comes to that spot.

Moments before they arrived, Matt returned from the rented storage unit and we carried chairs from the truck, through the snow, down the hill and into the house. This was the first time in months our living room looked inviting—if you focused on the crackling fire instead of the stacked trim and tile on worn sub-flooring.

Our house tour included comments about what we will do, what a spot will become and admissions like, “and we have to figure out we are doing here.”

Gathering around the newly exposed kitchen island afterwards, we dined on Chinese take-out, toasting Jennifer’s visit from the frozen lakes of Minnesota to our frozen lake in New Jersey.

Thanks to bringing back a few sticks of furniture, adding a trio of VIPs and emptying several bottles of beer and wine, Matt and I started to see our vision for this project coming true: Casa de Roo as a cozy and fun place to hang out.

It had been a while since this was the case.

Flashback…

July 20 was the type of day that made a dame sweat as she stood still while minding her own business. It was hot, humid and not unlike getting a face full of pasta steam. It was the kind of Sunday that inspired us to wake up and say: Now that we have the permit, we should rent a storage unit and start getting our stuff out of the house! And so we did. A simple 10’ x 15’ metal box lacking both internal lighting and climate control.

Once the temperature “dipped” to just above 90 degrees, it was time to begin making use of our investment. We believed the crew would begin downstairs, and start schlepping the first truck load up the stairs from the utility room, up the stairs in front of the house and up into the pick-up. I could feel my blood pumping—in my face. One truckload was all we could take.

On July 27, Sam and Nick helped us move out bigger items. They are not only great workers, they are great fun to hang out with.

On October 1, we made the last critical run to the storage unit. The contractors were about to demolish much of our great room.

Our concern? We wouldn’t want much more of our stuff back once the renovation is complete.

Scariest tool ever

How to finish the stairs has been an ongoing source of brainstorming for Matt and me. We decided on carpet. Then regretted it and looked at other off-the-shelf (and outlandish) options and then went back to carpet.

But we really didn’t want carpet.

At Lowe’s we saw it: Poplar. There was not enough, but it was beautiful enough to convince us to nix carpet for the stairs.

On Monday, we headed to Home Depot after work and loaded up the truck with 12” wide boards totaling 96 feet (about $500 worth).

We began cutting the treads on Wednesday. This was no easy task. Between the ham-handed framers and Igor the non-perfectionist drywall installer, the walls on either side of the steps were far from even. For each, we had to measure the inside and outside width of that step, check for the crown of the board, cut it as far as the saw would allow, flip it and complete the cut, dry fit, adjust as needed and number.

We got the first 10 treads cut length-wise before calling it a night. I spent Thursday dreading the next round; I came home to a brown-out. No heat, no oven—but no power tools, either. Rest for the weary! Woo Hoo! The electric company fixed the problem around 10 p.m.

The tools came back out on Saturday, including a brand-new, $70 blade for Matt’s compound miter saw. We cut the remaining eight steps length-wise. Then came the fun part. Not! Ripping the treads for width. One of the contractors left his table saw behind. Score!

No free lunch. The tool lacked guarding, so as we guided each tread through, trying to keep the wood straight, our main concern was keeping our fingers clear of the spinning blade. This was the scariest tool we had ever used.

Ripping was followed by sanding was followed by coating each tread with Pro Finisher Universal sealer. By the end of the night, I was ready to throw up on my shoes from stress and exhaustion. Matt filled the bathroom with candles and the tub with warm, fragrant water.

By 8 a.m. today, I was ready to get back to work as Matt shoveled snow.

We had considered ebonizing the treads, but didn’t for a number of reasons. For one, my mother sounded skeptical, which made me imagine that heading downstairs might feel like plunging into a dark abyss. At Target, most of the furniture featured dark wood. “Ah-ha,” I said while running an errand, “ebonized wood is trendy. I don’t do trendy.”

When Matt and I recalled why we chose poplar to begin with: Every board is different. The colors range from light to green to red to almost black. We wanted the wood’s character to shine through, and are using clear, semi-gloss water-base polyurethane made for floors instead of stain.

We do not really have enough room for this project, so I stacked the treads, set up my tools, grabbed my spectacles and learned I’d need to coat, let dry, sand, coat again and then, after a 24-hour wait, sand and add one or two more coats. I almost cried. To distract myself, I practiced my goezintuhs. Three goes into 18 six times. That meant I had only coated 1/6 of the treads so far. Despair. Matt came in to see me working on the floor, hunched over and snarling “worst project ever” at the boards.

Noting that this surely wasn’t the worst project ever and reminding me we still had trim and tiling to do, Matt went on to save the day by setting up a work area for me using a large garbage can with the still-boxed tile saw on top, protected by a garbage bag and covered in a drop cloth. This meant carefully maneuvering each wet board to dry on the floor, but I’d be able to remain upright most of the time.

Two coats later, the treads are beautiful as they wait in the great room. Although we made progress (including a marathon cleaning, organizing and insulating session by Matt), we are far from reaching the goals set on Monday.

See, until we complete the stairs, Wes cannot install the railing. Until we stop spreading paint, poly and sawdust on the sub-flooring, Tony cannot install the carpet. Until we do this step, that step cannot happen…like a domino effect of damnation.

Renovation tip: It takes longer and costs more. Yes, even when you are doing it yourself. Be realistic about how much a “weekend warrior” can really accomplish. Make sure your team has the measuring skills, power tool prowess, stamina, strength and stick-to-it-ness. Me? I’ve envisioned running away from home several times since we started on the stairs, but instead I just keep working.

We have stairs!

I was on the mobile with my brother, Kenny, when I got my first glimpse—and started taking pictures with the phone!

Since I couldn’t find the downstairs lights (they were probably removed as part of the electrical demolition taking place this week), I used two flashlights to help with illumination.

Now instead of a straight, steep shot down, we have an “L-shaped” staircase uniting the main and lower levels. There are 10 steps, a landing that will also take us to the utility room, and then five steps into the walk-out basement. The last step is, however, a doozie as we are raising the floor level to bring us above the concrete slab. Yes, we will be adding insulation. (I feel cozy just thinking about it.)

This means access to the laundry room. Why just this weekend I finally took my Mother’s advice and went to the wash-n-fold, glad I could throw money ($43) at the lack-of-utility-room-access-causing-an-underwear-crisis situation.

I will admit it: When Matt and I were looking for places to cut costs, we had considered building these stairs ourselves. Luckily, we got over that insane notion and left the project to the professionals.

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Epilogue: 9:23 p.m.

When Matt got home, he took one look at the stairs and pointed out the obvious flaw: the landing bypasses the utility room. Hmmm...