House Wins a Battle

I have to admit defeat in the latest battle in the war against the house. I think House's surveillance team somehow found out about my mother-in-law's anticipated visit even before I did and launched a preemptive attack.

There was little House could do to make the situation any worse in the guest room. That room is part of the 1940's section of the house. We replaced the leaky window there but we still needed a window frame. Without the window frame, we could not hang curtains or blinds, so privacy was a problem. The door that wouldn't close was a privacy issue as well. The ceiling paint was peeling in places and patched in others. During the remodel, one of the walls was replaced; the new wall was primed but unpainted and had a visible scar at the top, where the new drywall met the old plaster and chicken wire. Baseboards were missing.
Getting this room guest-ready would be a challenge, but we could have pulled it off, if House hadn't launched an attack from the direction of the main bathroom.

The main bathroom is also from the 40's and the previous residents of the house had textured the walls with pimples that attract mold. They had also punched several large holes into the difficult-to-repair plaster/chicken wire walls. And of course, we only have ourselves to blame for the nice new window lacking a window frame and covered with a classy Star Wars pillow case.

In spite of these issues, remodeling the bath was a low priority to me. Sure, it was ugly, but it was roomy and functional.

That changed when House broke the toilet and a large pipe in the bathroom wall.

My oh-so-handy husband removed the offending toilet and replaced the pipe, but he had to sacrifice most of the bathroom wall in the process.

We were left with one teeny tiny inconvenient bath, hardly ideal for entertaining houseguests.

We fought back hard. We found a very cool wainscot that looks like clean, shiny tile to cover the damaged walls in the bathroom and my husband sanded and plastered over any pimples that were still visible. He framed the bathroom window and part of the guest room window and repaired the guest room door. I painted the guest room, primed the bath and hung curtains. My family helped us out with painting, wallpapering, baseboards, and some creative woodwork to cover remodeling scars.

In spite of this heroic effort, we didn't manage to get the new toilet installed before my husband's mom arrived. Lack of a toilet is an unforgivable flaw for a bathroom. Apparently, we didn't test the door repair enough either, because it locked our guest in her room the first time she closed it. There were enough other details left undone that I have to admit we just didn't pull it off.


I hope House doesn't hear about my pregnancy; the nursery is one of the few rooms we've finished and I really want it to stay intact.