What home improvement work did you do today?

Im moving into a my new home next week. Have a renovation planned; finishing basement adding bedrooms and bathroom, or converting garage to living space. Do I need an architect or can I just go with a renovation contractor?

 

Congrats on the new home.
As for your question - really depends on your budget and your ability to visualize and give good direction. Also depends on the contractor you find. Most good renovation contractors should be able to assist in design choices and help you with designing the space while keeping you informed on the budget of those choices. Some will have designers on staff. I’ve run across a few that were a designer and contractor pair that worked together…The design fee being reduced or waived if you used them for the construction as well.

 

I’m no concrete guy but I ‘fixed’ the edging since we built a new front patio and I needed to cut and move the edging. It will at least look better I suppose.

 

Factory sealed!

 

Uh. Come again?

 

I built us a new gate.

Old warped and busted:


New hotness:

 

Looks good enough to be a purchased radius piece you were forming to...Bravo was what I meant it to mean

 

Looks great! Add some inside corner braces to the back upper and lower corners to help prevent future sag. Local hardware store will have them. Turnbuckle works too

 

About 98% done with the bonus room upstairs. Making it a kids play area. Will mount a TV at the end on the slanted part so they can have their movies up there with their friends and nugget furniture. My oldest of the 4 (about to be 5 in Nov.) is 7, so this will evolve over time to be more age appropriate as time goes

 

Rattle canned a side table thing I found in my neighbors side yard and had some leftover granite we had cut to fit it.


Also set up my cornhole boards. Just enough room.

 

Hell yeah it’s home improvement! Lol

 

Looks great, but you know it will never change, you'll need it for kids 6, 7, and 8. The only thing that pulls out in your house is the truck out of the garage.

 

Wheelbarrow and spread 17cy of bark dust today, then went and spent a chitload on more plants.
Tomorrow we’ll finish the bark dust on the upper level on the right, do another area on the other side of the house (3cy more total), and get all the new plants planted.


(White spots on the house are caulk - we’re having it repainted next week).

 

I can't really fathom a comeback for that, St least one that's accurate

 

I will NOT show my wife that table.....nice work on creating from a rehab'd piece

 

Today I installed an Eley hose reel on house over the back patio area and connected a 100’ hose to it.

Spectacular quality. Now I want one of their hoses.

 

I bought one of their free standing reels a few years ago. Thing still works like buttah - I won’t get anything else moving forward.

 

Need pictures, thx.

 

Looked up a YT video. This is the first hose reel I've ever seen with large copper and brass components. Installing this may have to get another dog to gaurd it. This thing looks like it's on another level of quality with the price to match.

 

Ask and you shall receive:

 

The quality of hardware is what you’re paying for, even the hose it came with to connect the reel to the house faucet is next level.



The inferior red hose is to be ignored, it will be replaced. The gray hose running to the house is an Eley, and it is impressive. The hose hardware is the best I’ve ever seen, and the hose material is flexible, yet springy it wants to return to round and strait so it resists kinking or laying in a knot.

 

We’ve gone through enough cheap ass Chinese made plastic reels from Ace/Lowe’s,/Walmart that cost around $50 each to have paid for this solution a long time ago. All that plastic shit just gets murdered by the sun, then one day you go to use it and the cheap injection molded parts literally break off in your hand when you go cranking on it. This lives on the west side of the house and the afternoon sun in summer just bakes stuff.

I’m sick of cheap Chinese made shit. This Eley is all aluminum, copper, brass, and stainless fasteners aside from a solid plastic crank handle, and a plastic spool lock. Both of those can be replaced easily should they ever go bad which I doubt will happen.

 

I get it. I have one plastic hose reel that I paid 80.00 from.Suncast or some nonsense...its.been the only one so far that has held.up after six years. The Eley is definitely something on my wish list. Looks stout.

 

This one has lived in the bark dust in our front yard for more than 6 years at this point. Still works like new and I would have a hard time justifying anything but another one to replace it (or add to the fleet).

 

You have a hot and cold on your outside faucets?!

 

Went to the nursery yesterday and picked up a small Japanese maple, a Promenade Cypress Pom tree, a Weeping Golden Chain, several kinnikinnick, and some other various ground cover.
Got some stepping pavers this morning, put those in, planted all the new plants, spread more bark dust, then used my winch to pull out a dying 20’ lilac and some old deck footings that were buried under the surface of the ground.