this was Bruiser during the few minutes we had the drapes on the couch. He had to wiggle his butt under the bar and plop down.
By last night, the room was coming together. The other two bedrooms were completed today.
that orange-ish oak on the railings is getting stained gray this weekend
and here's the gray carpet that will be installed on the stairs in the next couple of weeks.
Sam's room is turning into the guest room:
Faith is pointing out the drawers are still out in the garage.
and this, once I repaint over that lime green, will turn into my office!
Nathan and Benny were done with the floors and were out by 2:30 and an hour later, the sliding glass door arrived for installation.
And at 7:30, he was done. Whew.
that pretty sticker has to stay put until the inspector shows up Monday to clear the install, but the fact that it's not fogged up with the broken seal and mold growing inside? That I do not have to lock the door with a screwdriver because the handle's been broken for years? THAT's a birthday present!
The blinds are built in between the glass, too, so no dusting!
I'd made a batch of everyone's favorite supper, Shrimp Enchiladas, this morning so all we had to do, amidst the craziness of home renovations, was pop them into the oven.
And Sam and Bob brought birthday pie to top it all off.
(Sammi presents on my lap. Biggest birthday present ever, under my butt.)
So, today did not go as planned. To get the entire feel of the ridiculousness of this saga, let's start at the beginning. Back in mid-June, we go in to Home Depot to set up the appointment to measure, as I'd already chosen the Pergo Coastal Pine for the floors. The man who helped us that night, Ross, was the manager of the area. I remember this specifically because he was going to try to get one of his workers to put in the order as they get credit for the sales and he does not. But he was the only one around, so he went ahead and got it going. He said, at that point, we'd likely want to do something different on the stairs, but neither of us can quite remember any follow up on that, except the impression that the laminate wasn't available as stairs. He said we'd get a call within 3 days to set up the measure and then 3 more days after that we'd get a call from Home Depot to see the final estimates for all the labor and materials and to schedule the install if we were happy with the numbers. It took 5 days before the call to set the appointment to measure. Then another week after that before the measure took place. I was with Bob Sr. and Nell in Dumas by that time, so Bob was the only one there as he went around taking measurements, at which point, he insisted on measuring the stairs because, yes, indeed, the coastal pine was available for the stairs and, of course we'd want it to match! We waited 3 days. Then 5. Then Bob called Home Depot to try and find out what the deal was. It took half an hour to finally get someone in flooring to pick up, constantly ringing, going back to the service desk, back to flooring, getting disconnected, etc. That was just a harbinger of things to come. When the guy finally picked up, he said it wasn't in yet, there was a delay with the stair measurements. Bob says, "we weren't even supposed to include the stairs. What's taking so long?" It's been more than two weeks of waiting now. The guy says, "I'll tell them you're in a rush." Uh, okay. If two weeks after a one week promised timeline is rushed? Finally, the following week, we get the email with all the estimates. We go in to Home Depot to set everything up. The total includes all of the upstairs loft as well as the stairs in Coastal Pine. The lady working flooring suggests that, since we've mentioned how nasty our carpet is and how the cats have not helped the situation, that we can cut away any corners were accidents might have happened and prime with Killz to make certain all pet odors are completely gone before they lay the laminate. But, we have to wait for the schedulers to call to get a date set! She tells us everything has to be special ordered, and once it comes in, Home Depot will deliver it, bring it inside 72 hours before the start of install (we paid extra for them to haul it inside), in order for it to acclimate to the humidity of the house. She told us they'd want to set it in each of the rooms when they brought it in. Since we had no idea how much or how heavy this stuff was, we were happy to pay the fee to have them do the lifting. Finally, after more waiting, we hear from the flooring people at the start of July who give us a delivery date of Friday, July 22 and the start of install Monday, July 25.
So each weekend and some nights, while I'm working long hours, I've sketched out a time line and to-do list to get everything upstairs boxed up and moved out into the garage in time to cut away the edges of the carpet the final weekend, although I was still a little foggy on how much room these boxes would be taking up in the center of each room. But come Thursday, we still hadn't had heard any confirmation that the stuff would be showing up, or what time to expect them. Friday morning, Bob tries to call Home Depot to find out. Again, endless transfers, rings without pick-up, returns to the service desk, disconnects. We're talking more than an hour of this nonsense before he finally gets someone, Joel, to confirm that, yes, all the materials had arrived, but the person who should have called to schedule the drop-off . . . didn't. Joel suggests that they could bring them on Saturday, but not really sure when . . . Bob expresses his extreme displeasure that his wife and mother-in-law's birthday plans made long ago are that day and this was unacceptable. Joel finds another hand and they show up at the house at 1:00 with a pallet of 66 boxes of coastal pine. Then he hands me a little repair kit and a tube of silicone and pulls out the paperwork for me to sign saying they'd delivered everything. Except, when we start looking at the paperwork, there are about ten lines of product, one of which is the silicone, one the repair kit, one line of 66 boxes of coastal pine, and seven more lines that are unaccounted for! He gets on the phone to call. Ha! After 30 minutes of not being able to connect with anyone to answer, he leaves and drives back to find out where the rest is. They are back at 3:00 with another pallet, of everything else, related to the stairs! And they do NOT have to put it in the individual rooms, so it's all in a giant pile in the front room, getting acclimated. Fine, whatever. At least it's here 72 hours ahead of install. But that brings us to today. And no phone call. No installers. It's nearly 9. And after 20 minutes of trying to call, Bob, who's wisely taken the day off of work, has to DRIVE to Home Depot to even get someone to help us. And, guess what? THEY DIDN'T ALERT THE INSTALLERS THAT THE PRODUCT HAD BEEN DELIVERED ON FRIDAY! No one was coming. So they call the installers, who say they'll have workers at our house between 1o:00 and 11:00 today. At 11:00, the guys call saying they are on their way, but will be about 15 minutes late. Cool. At least there's that. At 11:15 they're in the house. Nathan and Benny. Ten minutes later, they inform us that the Cap A Tread Home Depot had sold us only works on the top 9 stairs. The bottom four, which go wider, wouldn't work. Oh, and we are responsible for removing all the stairway spindles and balusters and putting them back on those stairs, too! Bob tries the manager of Home Depot, gets no voicemail and disconnected, so he gets in the car and goes there to find out what in the heck we're supposed to do. At 12:30, the guys haven't started anything in fear that the whole job is going to get cancelled. They are hanging out at their van when Bob calls from Home Depot, asking to talk to them. Turns out, he's being told that they DO have everything they need for the stairs and their manager has called them telling them to proceed. They have most certainly NOT gotten a call. We're all just stuck in the middle with people saying a dozen different things. Nathan asks me, "Did they (Home Depot, who is supposed to be our contact) ever call and tell you we were having van issues this morning, which is why we were running late?" Of course not! Bob gets back with a head filled with "it's fine!" and the guys finally show him what Home Depot is calling "fine". The bottom four stairs will not match. There will be a seam in the center of each because they have to interlock two of the floor boards together and a weird lip that they have to build on the front that will stick up just a bit to go over the front of the stair. Not only will it, in their words, "look like your drunk uncle built your stairs" but it wouldn't even be flush. Knowing my propensity for clumsiness, I could easily see myself breaking my neck hitting the stone floor at the bottom after tripping on them. NOT HAPPENING. Furthermore, Nathan and Benny will only agree to the upper floors, not the stairs, as they guarantee their work and despite Home Depot saying we can "try it" what they mean is, these guys will be on the hook for having to "fix" things we're unhappy with once they cut into the product to install it. Bob calls back and says, "This will not work. Period." We're set with an appointment tomorrow with the head of the flooring department and the head of the carpet department to determine how to take the funds we spent on the stair material (which we have to load up and return ourselves) and labor costs (both come to about $2700) and replace with just carpet, which makes me want to gag just typing that, but there really is no other choice if we want the stairs to actually look uniform, not create what appears to me to be a tripping hazard, and add to the value of the house, not detract from it. The only other options (custom built stairs all the way up) are much more expensive and I've spent all I'm going to spend with these guys. And, of course, this is going to entail ANOTHER wait to schedule ANOTHER measurement, and ANOTHER wait for the scheduling. At 12:45 Nathan and Benny finally start on the master bedroom floor, saying they'll do that room today, but will not be able to return tomorrow as the van must be fixed. Nathan promises, come hell or high water, they will be back Wednesday morning and finish by Thursday night. Except for the stairs. I worked at the dining room table in between all this madness and for hours afterwards. Fisher didn't seem to mind.
They left at 4 with my bedroom completed. We've rebuilt the bedroom and my corner office and the portable AC, as removing all the standing fans in every room as well as that unit made all of the upstairs running at about 80° this afternoon. At least I have a place to sleep and a place to work while the rest of the upstairs waits . . . And here's where we're at:
Bruiser awaits treats, not caring a whit about floors.
Faith isn't too impressed either.
My plan is to set up my office in what was Nick's room, but for now, this will do.
because this is what the rest of the upstairs currently looks like
and that horrible, horrible carpet is still here.
I'd love to set it on fire right about now.
The bright spot of the day was a call from Marci this evening, who said she had another birthday present to deliver, if I was up for it. We're going back to the Balloon Fiesta in October and she's booked us for a hot air balloon ride taking off during the mass ascension on Sunday morning! Talk about a change in perspective!
other than the morning dawn walk, there's 12 hour work days and the rest of the time not spent sleeping, boxing up and moving the entire upper floor into the garage for this coming week's new floor. Saturday was a nice respite, with Mom and Dad taking everyone to lunch for our Mom and Tori birthday celebration. We had to do it the weekend before since Sam will be setting out for Florida this Friday.
Sammi made the cake, complete with blue icing . . . which is my favorite color, but not necessarily on teeth.
only took relighting the candles 4 times to get this shot!
Currently working from the dining table and waiting on the floor guys to show. Supposedly by my birthday, I'll have a brand new shiny floor and stairs and that hideous carpet will be long gone!
Funny story, way back on Dec. 16, when we were at Hollywood Studios at Disney World, I'd set my phone alarm to remind myself to try and nab tickets from the Adele fan pre-sale link. Spent about 20 minutes in the ticket queue after clicking "best available" thinking I was going to have to try again the next day during regular sales. But then, it popped up with "you may purchase 4 tickets", I clicked purchase, and went about our vacation.
It wasn't until we got home that it occurred to me it might be a good idea to find out where our seats ended up. Floor, row 11. WHAAAAA?
And then, with Sam and Amber claiming tickets #2 and #3, we found ourselves stuck for a 4th. Everyone we asked either wasn't a fan or couldn't go. Mind you, floor tickets much further back were going for $1500 and up a piece and stayed at that price for six months. I couldn't resell our 4th on Stubhub, because the entire point of the fan pre-sale was to reduce scalping. Really? I can't find a single person among our friends willing to spend $200 for a $2000 ticket?
So, I take to Facebook and post on my Highlands Ranch Ladies group. "Um . . . anyone available to go with us Saturday July 16? Row 11, $200?"
And that's how we found Britney, who is a huge Adele fan, lives in Casper Wyoming, but was already going to be in town that weekend visiting her aunt, Kendra, who is a member of the group, and who had nose-bleed tickets for Sunday's concert. So yes, Britney is going to both shows.
But wait, it gets better. . . row 11 turned out to be ROW 1 AT THE STAGE. (Rows 1-10 were weirdly off to the far side of the stage lined up perpendicularly.)
We really weren't believing our eyes as we walked up from the back of the floor, looking for CCC Row 11. It kept getting closer and closer. And our seats, 10-13, were on the inside of the row, exactly at the stage and closer than even the center section.
Our staff guy was super nice. And amused at our shock and awe.
Adele's eyes on the screen behind us were not static, but did not open. It was as though they filmed her sleeping in full-on cat-eye makeup for a good while to run in a loop. And then, they opened. And you heard her voice ring out with "Hello" and the crowd went absolutely nuts. She appeared on a stage in the center of the floor for the first song, then walked up the center, to the right, directly in front of us, where she grinned and waved at us. Incredible.
I was too caught up in soaking in the moments to mess with my phone very much, but when she asked us to all pull out of phones and turn on our "torches" while she sang "To Make You Feel My Love" I snapped this one:
Sam's favorite: Skyfall
For her last number before the encore, she returned to the center stage and some really cool effects.
Her encore: When We Were Young
And then the one that always brings down the house: Rolling in the Deep
CONFETTI CANNON!
What a night.
Sam's video of Rolling in the Deep:
(Mine is just the very end that Sam didn't film through)
And that confetti? 10 different Adele hand-written notes. I think I ended up with about 20 of each.
Found myself tagged on Facebook from Sam and Amber still basking in our amazing night, too.
Google ended up auto making a video from the phone downloads that turned out pretty great.
