Wednesday, May 18, 2005
How New Dishes Led to a $17,000 Home Remodeling Project
I thought it was about time to get a new set of dishes. I had been using the ones my mom bought for me since I moved into my house in 1987. It was only a place-setting for 4 and I had broken some dishes and had a hodgepodge of unmatched things and I thought it would be nice to have a full, matching set for a change.
Not knowing much about dishes, I asked my friend Karen for her advice on what kind to get. She brought me a Christmas present the next day, a 4-place setting of see-thru blue Corel dishes. How very nice of her to do this for me. My daughter, Venus, bought me another 4-place setting so I had a complete set of brand new, nice matching dishes. I put all the dishes through the dishwasher first and then realized that I really had to clean out my kitchen cabinets before I put my new dishes away. 3 hours later the cupboards were cleaned out completely, washed down, old stuff thrown in the trash and my new dishes were stored neatly in my clean cupboards.
Then I opened up the pantry and decided I needed to clean that, too. Once clean I realized that the shelf paper was really dirty and should be replaced. The next day I had new shelf paper and the pantry was looking really nice. I was so proud of myself I decided I should thoroughly clean my entire house, something I hadn't done in literally years. I am a batchelor, you know.
Karen told me I could wash my hats in the dishwasher. I don't own a clothes washer. I have about 60 hats and have them hanging on the walls. I ran them all through the dishwasher. I put the vertical blinds from the living room through the dishwasher also. They all came out really clean and nice looking. Good job. There are closets and drawers in my house that I haven't cleaned out since I've lived there. 18 years of buildup and accumulation. Lots of cleaning and lots of stuff hauled out to the trash. I was simplifying my life. I love it!
I received a flier in the mail from Mid Florida Heating and Air advertising good prices for air conditioners and heaters. Well, I had been wanting central heat and air for years but had decided to wait until my house was completely paid for. That being the case now I gave them a call and they sent out a guy out to give me an estimate. $7,400 for a brand new install with duct work and an electrical upgrade. OK, I was expecting something close to that so I signed on the dotted line.
WOW! Central heat and air is amazing! Once installed and running it changed the atmosphere in my house completely. It felt so nice in there, the same temperature everywhere, no hot or cold spots and all with the touch of a little button. I had come into the 20th century finally in 2005. It felt really good. I looked at the carpet in my bedroom. Another item I had been wanting to replace for years. No better time to do that then now. I would get new carpet in my bedroom.
Of course, if I'm getting new carpet, I need to paint the rooms before the carpet is laid. Don't want to spill paint on new carpet. Time to get busy. Luckily for me at this time I was taking steroids, prednisone, due to some polyps that formed in my sinuses from allergies. Steroids give me lots of energy and I needed lots of energy for what was coming.
I looked at the carpet in the living room and said to myself, this needs to be replaced, too. OK, why not. Well, I may as well extend it down the hallway and into the computer room as well. It all could use a new look. What's a few more dollars? Well, looking at the floors in my bathrooms I saw how bad they getting and decided that perhaps tile floors would be a good thing to do for them. May as well go ahead and do that now also. Just a few more bucks. Got to go buy more paint as well. More rooms to cover.
Oh, and since I was getting a house full of new carpet, I probably need to upgrade my poor, worn-out vacuum cleaner also. A trip to the Vacuum Store led me to a quality, commercial-style, stainless steel upright unit that glides over the carpet like a dream. So easy to use and I simply love how it works. Just another $350.
There were problems underneath my hall bathroom floor. The wood was rotting from a slow leak underneath the toilet and needed new replacement struts and reinforced flooring before the tile could be laid. OK, it's all good. Only a few more dollars. It all looks really nice once it's all put down and I'm quite pleased with the new look. The price swelled to $4,000 but it's all good. However, my furniture is looking pretty sad now. Maybe it's time I bought some real furniture and got rid of the mish-mash of used and eclectic furniture I had. I hopped on the internet and used Froogle to start looking. What a good service this is.
I found a cool apothecary coffee table with a matching apothecary end table. I ordered one of each and later on ordered another end table to have a matched pair. Each piece had to be assembled, a fact I didn't realize at order time, but I managed to get them all put together eventually. It took almost a full day to do this but they look really nice in my living room. Homevisions.com is a nice store.
I love to watch Cardinals baseball and I subscribed to the Fox Regional Sports Channels on my big dish satellite so I could watch lots of games. No longer. Fox Sports left the big dish and is only availble on the small dishes now. OK, time to leave the big dish and go to a small one I guess. I chose Dish Network because they carry the local channels for the Gainesville area. This is actually pretty cool. 4 rooms of Tvs, each can have a different channel and two rooms have a built-in DVD Recorder, like Tivo. This is an amazing invention! Pause live TV! So cool! I still have 5 months left on my subscriptions for the big dish but what the hell. I'll just have both available for awhile. Just a few more dollars.
The problem, I find out later, with Fox Sports on Dish Network, is they can target who gets blacked out from certain programming easier then was possible on the big dish, so every Cardinals game is blacked out in my area. So much for the reason I switched to the samll dish to begin with. I still can't see the Cardinals. Oh well, it was just a few dollars more. Actually, the DVD is enough of a reason to have made the switch but I didn't know that until I switched. It's all good.
Anyway, as I dismantled my waterbed to make room for the carpet installation, I poked a hole through the mattress. You cannot buy waterbed mattresses in the city of Gainesville anywhere. I looked and it isn't possible. I get back on Froogle and order one. Just a few more dollars.
Well, new furniture in the living room is fine but what about my bedroom. I want to keep the old-fashioned waterbed, I still like them this way. But my dresser and end table are trash. Froogle to the rescue. Also found a neat personal locker that holds a few hanging items and stores my pocket stuff and has a couple drawers as well. Nice piece of furniture. All of these had to be assembled, too. I'm getting better at this but it is time-consuming. Just a few more dollars. Thank you Homevisions.com.
Well, with 4 rooms of Dish Network and only 2 televisions, I had to do something. Froogle again and I found a really cool 17 inch, wide-screen, LCD, HD-ready TV that can be used as a computer monitor and only weighs 19 pounds. $529 and well worth the cost. That goes in the computer room. I can watch TV while I surf the web. Too cool.
So now I decide it must be time for a big screen TV in the living room, too. Froogle shows me a 46 inch, LCD that only weighs 69 pounds. Most prices are around $2500 but Froogle shows me one for $1685 plus $200 shipping. Sounds like a deal to me, so I order it. Add a matching TV stand for $300 and life is good. The stand takes extra long to arrive and when it comes, it has to be assembled, too. What fun. They look really nice in between the matching apothecary tables sitting on new carpet, especially from my brand new massage recliner.
Yeah, the old chair needed an upgrade, too. I moved it to the bedroom and for only $650 including shipping, I have a nice rocking recliner which has a built-in massage unit. This is luxury! I love that massage feeling. The Life of Riley indeed! The chair came in two pieces but it was really easy to snap together. Thank god! Homevisions.com again.
OK, now I have 4 TVs so I put the oldest, a 27 inch that used to be in my bedroom on the screen porch. Luckily I had cleaned off the screen porch and painted the floor the year before, so it really didn't need a thorough cleaning. Thank goodness! The entertainment center and TV from my bedroom go to the porch. It looks nice out there. I can watch TV or listen to satellite radio while I barbecue or just sit out there and relax.
The problem with sitting out there is the exposure to the neighbors. I needed blinds to cover the north and south sides. Froogle again to the rescue. Home Depot had the size I need and it's only a few more dollars. They look really good hanging out there and are a nice privacy addition.
All the curtains in my house came from my mom when I first moved into it. Probably time to replace those also. Why not? Just a few dollars more. Karen helps me pick out curtains for every room. They cost more than I thought but that's OK. I'm remodeling. Blinds are also a good addition to windows, I added those everywhere as well.
Oh, and I can't forget that Luna needed a new fence to keep her in the yard. A neighbor was complaining about her being out and roaming the neighborhood, so just a few more dollars to fix that problem. Except just one side of the yard didn't fix it. She found out she could get out over the back fence into the old goat pasture as well. Lovely! Another 100 feet of fence ought to fix that problem as well. Just a few more dollars.
So it's well into May now and my new dishes are working out well. I love them. And I love my central heat/air, new TVs, new carpet, new furniture, new tile floors, new curtains and new blinds. It's almost like I have a new house. Not really, though, but I like the newness of it all. I feel like I've completely grown up, domestically, anyway. It is nice. And it all started with a new set of dishes. Who knew that such a simple thing as dishes could lead to $17,000 in remodelling expenses. You gotta love it! I surely do.
Pictures are here.
OH
Not knowing much about dishes, I asked my friend Karen for her advice on what kind to get. She brought me a Christmas present the next day, a 4-place setting of see-thru blue Corel dishes. How very nice of her to do this for me. My daughter, Venus, bought me another 4-place setting so I had a complete set of brand new, nice matching dishes. I put all the dishes through the dishwasher first and then realized that I really had to clean out my kitchen cabinets before I put my new dishes away. 3 hours later the cupboards were cleaned out completely, washed down, old stuff thrown in the trash and my new dishes were stored neatly in my clean cupboards.
Then I opened up the pantry and decided I needed to clean that, too. Once clean I realized that the shelf paper was really dirty and should be replaced. The next day I had new shelf paper and the pantry was looking really nice. I was so proud of myself I decided I should thoroughly clean my entire house, something I hadn't done in literally years. I am a batchelor, you know.
Karen told me I could wash my hats in the dishwasher. I don't own a clothes washer. I have about 60 hats and have them hanging on the walls. I ran them all through the dishwasher. I put the vertical blinds from the living room through the dishwasher also. They all came out really clean and nice looking. Good job. There are closets and drawers in my house that I haven't cleaned out since I've lived there. 18 years of buildup and accumulation. Lots of cleaning and lots of stuff hauled out to the trash. I was simplifying my life. I love it!
I received a flier in the mail from Mid Florida Heating and Air advertising good prices for air conditioners and heaters. Well, I had been wanting central heat and air for years but had decided to wait until my house was completely paid for. That being the case now I gave them a call and they sent out a guy out to give me an estimate. $7,400 for a brand new install with duct work and an electrical upgrade. OK, I was expecting something close to that so I signed on the dotted line.
WOW! Central heat and air is amazing! Once installed and running it changed the atmosphere in my house completely. It felt so nice in there, the same temperature everywhere, no hot or cold spots and all with the touch of a little button. I had come into the 20th century finally in 2005. It felt really good. I looked at the carpet in my bedroom. Another item I had been wanting to replace for years. No better time to do that then now. I would get new carpet in my bedroom.
Of course, if I'm getting new carpet, I need to paint the rooms before the carpet is laid. Don't want to spill paint on new carpet. Time to get busy. Luckily for me at this time I was taking steroids, prednisone, due to some polyps that formed in my sinuses from allergies. Steroids give me lots of energy and I needed lots of energy for what was coming.
I looked at the carpet in the living room and said to myself, this needs to be replaced, too. OK, why not. Well, I may as well extend it down the hallway and into the computer room as well. It all could use a new look. What's a few more dollars? Well, looking at the floors in my bathrooms I saw how bad they getting and decided that perhaps tile floors would be a good thing to do for them. May as well go ahead and do that now also. Just a few more bucks. Got to go buy more paint as well. More rooms to cover.
Oh, and since I was getting a house full of new carpet, I probably need to upgrade my poor, worn-out vacuum cleaner also. A trip to the Vacuum Store led me to a quality, commercial-style, stainless steel upright unit that glides over the carpet like a dream. So easy to use and I simply love how it works. Just another $350.
There were problems underneath my hall bathroom floor. The wood was rotting from a slow leak underneath the toilet and needed new replacement struts and reinforced flooring before the tile could be laid. OK, it's all good. Only a few more dollars. It all looks really nice once it's all put down and I'm quite pleased with the new look. The price swelled to $4,000 but it's all good. However, my furniture is looking pretty sad now. Maybe it's time I bought some real furniture and got rid of the mish-mash of used and eclectic furniture I had. I hopped on the internet and used Froogle to start looking. What a good service this is.
I found a cool apothecary coffee table with a matching apothecary end table. I ordered one of each and later on ordered another end table to have a matched pair. Each piece had to be assembled, a fact I didn't realize at order time, but I managed to get them all put together eventually. It took almost a full day to do this but they look really nice in my living room. Homevisions.com is a nice store.
I love to watch Cardinals baseball and I subscribed to the Fox Regional Sports Channels on my big dish satellite so I could watch lots of games. No longer. Fox Sports left the big dish and is only availble on the small dishes now. OK, time to leave the big dish and go to a small one I guess. I chose Dish Network because they carry the local channels for the Gainesville area. This is actually pretty cool. 4 rooms of Tvs, each can have a different channel and two rooms have a built-in DVD Recorder, like Tivo. This is an amazing invention! Pause live TV! So cool! I still have 5 months left on my subscriptions for the big dish but what the hell. I'll just have both available for awhile. Just a few more dollars.
The problem, I find out later, with Fox Sports on Dish Network, is they can target who gets blacked out from certain programming easier then was possible on the big dish, so every Cardinals game is blacked out in my area. So much for the reason I switched to the samll dish to begin with. I still can't see the Cardinals. Oh well, it was just a few dollars more. Actually, the DVD is enough of a reason to have made the switch but I didn't know that until I switched. It's all good.
Anyway, as I dismantled my waterbed to make room for the carpet installation, I poked a hole through the mattress. You cannot buy waterbed mattresses in the city of Gainesville anywhere. I looked and it isn't possible. I get back on Froogle and order one. Just a few more dollars.
Well, new furniture in the living room is fine but what about my bedroom. I want to keep the old-fashioned waterbed, I still like them this way. But my dresser and end table are trash. Froogle to the rescue. Also found a neat personal locker that holds a few hanging items and stores my pocket stuff and has a couple drawers as well. Nice piece of furniture. All of these had to be assembled, too. I'm getting better at this but it is time-consuming. Just a few more dollars. Thank you Homevisions.com.
Well, with 4 rooms of Dish Network and only 2 televisions, I had to do something. Froogle again and I found a really cool 17 inch, wide-screen, LCD, HD-ready TV that can be used as a computer monitor and only weighs 19 pounds. $529 and well worth the cost. That goes in the computer room. I can watch TV while I surf the web. Too cool.
So now I decide it must be time for a big screen TV in the living room, too. Froogle shows me a 46 inch, LCD that only weighs 69 pounds. Most prices are around $2500 but Froogle shows me one for $1685 plus $200 shipping. Sounds like a deal to me, so I order it. Add a matching TV stand for $300 and life is good. The stand takes extra long to arrive and when it comes, it has to be assembled, too. What fun. They look really nice in between the matching apothecary tables sitting on new carpet, especially from my brand new massage recliner.
Yeah, the old chair needed an upgrade, too. I moved it to the bedroom and for only $650 including shipping, I have a nice rocking recliner which has a built-in massage unit. This is luxury! I love that massage feeling. The Life of Riley indeed! The chair came in two pieces but it was really easy to snap together. Thank god! Homevisions.com again.
OK, now I have 4 TVs so I put the oldest, a 27 inch that used to be in my bedroom on the screen porch. Luckily I had cleaned off the screen porch and painted the floor the year before, so it really didn't need a thorough cleaning. Thank goodness! The entertainment center and TV from my bedroom go to the porch. It looks nice out there. I can watch TV or listen to satellite radio while I barbecue or just sit out there and relax.
The problem with sitting out there is the exposure to the neighbors. I needed blinds to cover the north and south sides. Froogle again to the rescue. Home Depot had the size I need and it's only a few more dollars. They look really good hanging out there and are a nice privacy addition.
All the curtains in my house came from my mom when I first moved into it. Probably time to replace those also. Why not? Just a few dollars more. Karen helps me pick out curtains for every room. They cost more than I thought but that's OK. I'm remodeling. Blinds are also a good addition to windows, I added those everywhere as well.
Oh, and I can't forget that Luna needed a new fence to keep her in the yard. A neighbor was complaining about her being out and roaming the neighborhood, so just a few more dollars to fix that problem. Except just one side of the yard didn't fix it. She found out she could get out over the back fence into the old goat pasture as well. Lovely! Another 100 feet of fence ought to fix that problem as well. Just a few more dollars.
So it's well into May now and my new dishes are working out well. I love them. And I love my central heat/air, new TVs, new carpet, new furniture, new tile floors, new curtains and new blinds. It's almost like I have a new house. Not really, though, but I like the newness of it all. I feel like I've completely grown up, domestically, anyway. It is nice. And it all started with a new set of dishes. Who knew that such a simple thing as dishes could lead to $17,000 in remodelling expenses. You gotta love it! I surely do.
Pictures are here.
OH
# posted by OH @ 7:09 AM 
