Two Months of Updates, All at Once!

Why?

...Well, because honestly? There wasn't much going on with the house for a month and half. And if I had posted what did go on with the house, it mostly would've consisted of me typing swear words as fast and as hard as I possibly could.

The demo work was done relatively quickly. Before I knew it, the kitchen and bath had been ripped out of the house almost entirely. And then it sat. And sat. And sat. It sat because, apparently, my contractor hadn't been paid by the bank that was holding my 203K loan. Of course, because no one told me that my contractor wasn't getting paid, all I could do was shoot increasingly frustrated emails and phone calls to him and to my consultant until I finally went, "Uhhh. Guys. You realize I'm paying rent AND a mortgage right now, right? I mean... right?"

That got me some answers and the answers led to me making a rather snarky phone call not only to the woman at the bank, but to her supervisor. It turns out that the reason we never got the check was because they filled the paperwork out for the wrong address. Really, given the fact that they already owe me $700, I shouldn't be that surprised. I am, however, angry and disappointed.

Eventually, my contractor was paid and work on the house was done. The bathroom has been mostly tiled - and incorrectly, I should note. I pointed this out to my contractor and took what tile I could back to the supplier in order to exchange for the right color. The people at Avalon Tile, at every location I've dealt with, have been nothing but fabulous about the process. The tile that needed to be popped off the wall so the color could be switched out? Was somehow grouted into place. I don't know if my contractor did it, or one of his subcontractors did it, or what. I honestly don't. I don't know how the miscommunication occurred. I knew what I wanted from the start, Tony convinced me to change my mind, and they way they installed the tile is neither. It's some sort of bizarre hybrid of the two that just looks wrong. I have a phone call into him about it, one which he'll hopefully return, as my message started with "I have the next check from the bank in my hand." We'll see what he says... and it had damned well better not be that they can't fix it. Otherwise, I may well threaten to keep that check until they do.

The back door was replaced, which is great. What wasn't great was them doing it without warning and without leaving a key in the lockbox, as the front door is totally borked and we'd been using the back door to get inside. This resulted in a near-fiasco when the Ikea delivery men came with our new entertainment center and couch, including me practically breaking down in tears on my front step. (That, apparently, was the exact sacrifice the front door required as part of some arcane ritual to get the damned thing open.) The couch should hopefully go nicely with the antique dining room furniture I found for $80 on Craigslist and paid more to move than I did to buy, after getting screwed by two different moving companies. Thanks, Angie's List. Your recommendations were pretty much terrible!

The furnace has been replaced and the air conditioner attached to it, though the thing is so huge I'm not sure how we're going to fit a dryer into the basement unless we rip out the utility sink. The roof has been replaced, the electrical service cable has been replaced, some of the basement wiring has been fixed (while some hangs loose), the bathtub has been installed, the kitchen floor tile is done, and the cabinets are supposedly on order. Of course, the cabinets have been supposedly on order since November, so we'll see how that goes...

In the meantime, I've been running around like a crazy person, buying things for the house since Black Friday. I've discovered a new found love of Home Goods, of Etsy, of Target, and of Ikea. My poor boyfriend has tolerated my metldowns in Jo-Ann Fabrics and Avalon Tile, as has my poor mother in VIP Building Supply. And, after all that, the house is still nowhere near ready. And really, all I can say in reply to the dozens of people who have kept asking me why we haven't moved in is the same thing I'm going to say to you now:

"After all that? We still don't have a toilet."