The restoration begins...
Not a lot happened today. Sean hung one of the light fixtures that I picked for the guest bath (below left). I like it SO much better than the old ones. I can't believe I've lived here for 7 years and haven't changed those fixtures yet!
Sean and I spent part of the afternoon visiting tile and bathroom fixture stores and then Sean took off early to get his cell phone re-activated. We purchased the faucets for the guest bath... and maybe made a decision on the tile for the tub enclosure.
Sean installed one of the faucets in the guest bath.
The first unscheduled event...
I casually mention to Sean that the water cutoff valve at the side of the house doesn't work and that he'll have to turn the water off at the street before he starts installing the new shower valve. Sean points out that this really isn't a good long-term strategy (OK... I knew that already... but gosh, it's only been broken for 7 years or so... what's the rush??). Anyway... Sean started work on repairing the gate valve. In an effort to save time, I took two trips to Home Depot to get the supplies. Then Sean went to Home Depot to get the stuff we really needed. Oh well!
By days end, he has installed a shiny, new valve... which unfortunately is leaking!
Sean cuts out the entire assembly where the gate valve is installed. Upon inspection it is determined that the threads failed in the new valve. Sean has words with the folks at Home Depot... and comes home with another new valve (but not a threaded one). He assembles a new tower for the gate valve and installs it. It works perfectly (although Sean is more and more convinced that my house must be built on an Indian burial ground or something... too much bad kharma!).
Meanwhile, I skip my pottery class so that I can focus on remodel issues for the day. I spent most of the day running back and forth between home and Arizona tile before making my final decision on the tile for guest bath. Here's the tile I'll use in the shower enclosure, and a decorative accent that will be scattered randomly around the enclosure.
We're also going to tile the backsplash around the sink (although I'm not changing out the counter). It will be some pattern which includes the tiles shown below.
Sean gets called away on personal business, so not much is done.
Sean installs the new shower valve in the guest bath and pressure tests it.
Then he does some exploratory work in the garage to figure out where we will route the wiring for the whole house fan (which is still waiting for a separate circuit to be installed for it).
