Installing a Shower Fan

11/05/2009

A few months ago I replaced the hard drive in my macbook pro. Apple considers this part not user replaceable. I think I would consider installing a shower fan not homeowner installable, unless of course, your husband is awesome.

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Installing a shower fan in the bathroom seemed easy enough to me. You just pop the sucker up in the ceiling, right? (Doesn’t it look so cute and simple?) It turned out to be a most-of-the-day project cutting a hole in the ceiling (making a huge mess)…
Jason squeezing into a tiny space in the attic between the ceiling joists and roof joists to mount the fan motor enclosure to a joist, attach the ducting from the motor to a vent in the roof and running electrical wire from the motor and down through the wall…
Cutting a hole in the wall to make room for the new outlet/switch box (another big mess), making sense of the old wiring (which is not grounded, by the way) and figuring out how to wire the light switch for the fan off of the GFCI outlet next to it.
Then there was a lot of cleaning, a little drywall repair and some paint touch-up.

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I must say, I learned a whole lot about running electricity and ducting. And best of all – it works! We now have a fan in our bathroom to suck up all the shower steam. No more open window in the winter! And, now it should be much smoother process when we install the same fan in the new master bathroom. (This one is in our “hall bathroom” which will someday be the kids bathroom.)

Catch up on the adventures of our master bathroom renovation here:
Bathroom Renovation Stage 1
Bathroom Renovation Stage 2
Bathroom Renovation Stage 3
Bathroom Renovation Stage 4

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Posted by mahlbrandt

Bathroom Renovation Stage 4

11/04/2009

Ok, so I’m reluctant to even call this a stage because it’s kind of in-between two stages. We did demo 2 weekends ago and last weekend we started reconstruction. It’s so fun to start framing the walls! I already feel like I have a laundry “room” and we can finally get a sense of the size of the shower.

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We got this far—framing the walls that divide off the laundry room and walk-in shower—using only the repurposed wood from the toilet closet Jason tore down. Talk about reduce, reuse and recycle!

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We need at least 4 more 2×4’s, maybe more depending on what kind of built in shelves we decide on in the shower. That’s not bad, though! I’m sorry these pictures don’t give you a scope of the whole space; they were all taken from the doorway.

I’m excited to get back to work on the bathroom this weekend. First priority: clear out all the debris we can’t reuse (door from toilet closet, wood door jam, broken slabs of drywall…) We still need to move the HVAC air vent on the floor before we can finish framing the shower. Then on to more fun stuff: pouring the concrete shower pan. Not sure if we’ll get that far this weekend.

In case you missed it:

Bathroom Renovation Stage 1

Bathroom Renovation Stage 2

Bathroom Renovation Stage 3

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Posted by mahlbrandt

Weekend Update

11/02/2009

Hot date with my Jason on Friday night! Hardware store, dinner at an Indian restaurant and a movie (Away We Go) cuddled up on the couch at home. This is what happens when you’ve been married a while I guess. I love it though.

Home projects Saturday! We installed a shower fan in the hall bathroom (mounted in the ceiling, installed ducting to vent through the room, ran the electrical wiring … big deal!), fixed the vent duct above the stove which had been blowing food steam into the attic, AND framed the new walls in our master bathroom! (More on the last project later this week when I get some better pictures.) Here are 2 sneak peaks:

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Sunday after church and a lunch at Blue Coast Burrito, I hit the road with my work buddy Lindsay toward Evansville, IN for a Leeland, Brandon Heath and Francesca Battistelli concert (“Follow You” Tour). It was really good but a looooong drive and we didn’t get home until the wee hours of the morning. This rose has nothing to do with that but isn’t it lovely? It been hanging on for almost 2 weeks now!

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Bathroom Renovation Stage 3

10/29/2009

Demo has begun! This week Jason started tearing down the wall and door frame around the toilet closet and the wall behind the former sink. It’s a dusty mess—which makes doing laundry interesting—but it’s so nice to see major progress!

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What’s next: clean up the debris, move the air vent in the floor (over about a foot) and then build the new walls!

In case you missed it:
Bathroom Renovation Stage 1
Bathroom Renovation Stage 2

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Posted by mahlbrandt

New Old Chair

09/30/2009

Seven years ago, when Jason and I were engaged, we attempted to re-cover one of my parents’ old chairs with a tight-fitting slip cover and new chair legs. Sadly, the cover didn’t fit well and the legs made the chair unstable. I’m happy to report that our first real chair upholstery experiment came out much better!

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When got this mid-century chair at a thrift store for $6.99, it had this horrible off-white ’80’s zig-zag fabric. The custom upholstery tag under the chair revealed that it was not the original covering.

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Because the chair was so inexpensive, we were prepared to pay some good money for new upholstery to return it to a retro, vintage look. With a bolt of $35/yard fabric in our hands, my eye caught the clearance shelves at the fabric store. We were able to walk out with 1 1/4 yards of light blue woven upholstery (exactly what we were looking for), for only $9!

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(Sorry about the poor photo quality. Someday I’ll learn how to use a DSLR properly.) We had originally planned to recover the off white vinyl footstool in the same fabric. There might be just enough but it will be really close. I’m leaning towards leaving the footstool as is. It currently has an imperfection on the top from a hole that was repaired, which bothers my perfectionist husband.

What do you think? Recover the footstool? Leave it?

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Retro Starburst Clock

09/22/2009

I’ve been looking for an authentic mid-century modern starburst clock for the dining room since we moved into our house 2 and a half years ago. Oh, I can find ’em … on eBay for $70-200. But I’m looking for the ≤$20 version— the kind you find at yard sales or thrift stores or in your grandma’s basement. Speaking of yard sales, we got this modern, plastic, imitation retro clock for $3 (talked down from $5 … we’re such cheapskates).

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Jase surprised me the other day (I LOVE surprises!) by spray painting the clock face and spokes, installing new hands (the originals looked really cheap) and putting the whole thing back together. I really love how it looks now.

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But, of course, this is just temporary until we find an authentic “atomic” clock. (Like that alliteration?) And in typical Jason-and-Martina-fashion, we’ll most likely find a steal on the antique real deal and sell the modern imitation for 3-4x more money on craigslist or eBay. Cuz that’s how we roll.

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We decided to go with the white chairs in the dining room rather than the blue ones.

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“Hey, where do you keep your coffee, sugar and flour?”

09/15/2009

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That’s a running joke in this house thanks to our funny friend Matt.

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This is not a new MCM find but I don’t think I’ve blogged about it before. Jasey and I found this canister set at a yard sale earlier this summer marked for $3.

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The owners offered to sell it to us for $2. I would have been thrilled to pay full price!

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Five Times the Fun

09/10/2009

Friday afternoon while I was enjoying a Pumpkin Spice Latte with my friend Rachel (after getting dismissed from work early!), I got this picture text from my hubby:

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I called back immediately and said, “Where are you? Where did you see those chairs?” A couple hours and 6 antique stores later we had these 2 turquoise chairs and 3 similar white ones puzzled into the back of our little Ford Focus. Here are the blue ones after my awesome husband spent hours scrubbing off mildew stains, washing, sealing, and painting the very rusty legs:

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(Yes, the color really did become more intense once they were clean!) It’s hard to tell from a distance but these two actually have a very retro concentric circle pattern.

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We have 4 wood and chrome Gilbert chairs from IKEA around our dining room table but we’ve been thinking it would be nice to add 2 more unique chairs at the heads of the table. I love how these match our color palette.

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We purchased 3 identical white chairs. All 5 of the chairs had been stored outside and were horribly dirty. I really didn’t think these could come clean. Thank God I’m married to a goal-oriented, super hard-working perfectionist because he got this white chair looking like new! (Two more to go.)

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I LOVE LOVE LOVE the mid-century modern style of these chairs. They’re just plastic, not fiberglass like an Eames or Herman Miller (or a Modernica replica) but the were only $9 average and they’ll suite us just fine.

We did see a black Herman Miller chair at an antique store in Nolensville for $85 if anyone is interested…

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Paulding Lamp {mcm thrift store find}

09/09/2009

Our newest mid-century modern find: this unique lamp. If we hadn’t just come from browsing at Wonders on Woodland* and selling them a 1970’s lamp, hubby and I might have passed this one up at the thrift store.

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I find the pattern on it quite interesting.

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And, I love how it matches all the blues and greens in our living room.

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The best part: the lamp only cost $5.99 (plus a $24.99 shade from Target). I’m so happy that my husband enjoys the hunt as much as I do. Last weekend we went to no less than 4 thrift stores, 8 antique stores and 1 yard sale. We didn’t find anything we were looking for but in addition to the lamp, we found 5 great chairs — I’ll show you tomorrow!

*We happen to have Nashville’s coolest MCM antique store—Wonders on Woodland—in our neighborhood. Tell me that’s not the sweetest thing!

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Bathroom Renovation Stage 2

09/03/2009

If you missed the before pictures, check out Bathroom Renovation Stage 1.

Recently, hubby and I (ok, I just supervised) took out the pedestal sink and light fixture above it and sold them. (Yay craigslist!)

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Then we decided to start our reno by tearing out the tiny, poorly-installed corner shower. I hope we can sell the salvageable parts of it, as well. Here’s the hole where it was:

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Next step in our mid-century bathroom renovation is taking out the walls around the toilet closet and moving the HVAC duct in the floor.

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