Something we have incorporated into our most recent renovations is accessibility, and to make this fun for everyone, my latest blog post contains a musical parody element—so everybody sing along to the tune of ‘Safety Dance’ by those ‘80s one-hit wonders, Men Without Towels…I mean, Hats.

We can bath if we want to
We can leave your friends behind,
‘Cause your friends don’t bath and if they don’t bath
Well they’re no friends of mine
Safety Bath…it’s Safety Bath
Safety Bath…oh, Safety Bath!

Now that we’ve got the new flooring done in the bedsitting room, we’d like to get rid of the last evidence of vinyl flooring that covered the space, and that would be what remains in the adjoining bathroom.
We have plans to lay tile (probably white hex) and will probably incorporate radiant floor heating like we did in our upstairs bathroom a few years ago.
But something we’ve been looking at closely is the bathtub and its aging, fugly plastic surround.

This bathroom, by design, is an accessible one—there’s room to maneuver a wheelchair into the room, and it features a sliding pocket door, higher height toilet seat and grab-bars around the tub. When we saw this house, we thought it would suit our needs for a long time to come, since we have, in recent years, become a ‘sandwich’ family, caring for both a young child and an aging parent.
My mother-in-law will be 81 this year, and is experiencing increasing difficulties getting in and out of the tub. After her husband passed away, John was traveling into the city regularly to do simple home maintenance tasks she wasn’t able to, like changing a blown light bulb in a ceiling fixture. We decided it made sense to have her move in with us, since my husband is her only surviving family.
We’d like to ensure that she’s able to live independently for as long as possible without frustrations, so we’ve started looking at replacing the tub with a walk-in tub. Most designs we’ve seen have serious flaws—most notably an inward-swinging door, making it difficult should the tub’s occupant ever faint (or worse) and need assistance.

We recently discovered the Safety Bath, which seems to address these issues and actually doesn’t look too bad (as far as these types of tubs go). The tub has a very small footprint, allowing for side access in a typical 5-foot tub space, and although the company sells a skirting kit to finish off that extra space when retrofitting the tub, we think we would tile the floor instead (maybe add a nice hex tile motif in that space?).
Yesterday, John traveled to a specialty plumbing distributor in Cobourg with his mom (about an hour’s drive) to see one of the actual tubs (we’d enquired about them, and the manufacturer said they would contact us the next time one was shipped close to our area). Both John and his mother seemed satisfied with the quality and operation, and Deirdre (who was with them), thinks it will be like having an indoor hot tub (yes, it has massage jets).
If you visit the Safety Bath website, you can watch a short video about this innovative, Canadian-made product. Some of it’s boring, so you can sing the ‘Safety Bath’ song that we made up when we were watching it.
Here’s a company crying out for some slicker marketing. Great product, terrible product photography and a cheesy (albeit informative) budget video. They should really use our song!

I’ll apologize now for putting that tune in your head for the rest of the day.

technorati tags: home+renovation, accessibility, independent+living

Last friday, during my daughter’s ‘March Break’ from kindergarten, I sent her on a day trip to Casa Loma in Toronto.

_{Casa Loma}

Organized by the local daycare, the bus trip was hard to resist, costing parents the grand sum of one dollar. To tell you the truth, I was a bit jealous—it’s been decades since I visited this grand castle estate. I decided to buy Deirdre a disposable camera for the occasion, and to be honest, I figured that she’d use up the photos on her friends…and probably long before the bus even arrived in the city. I was so wrong.

When I picked up the film today, I was impressed at some of the things she’d found interesting enough to snap a picture of, and thought I’d share a few of those pics with you:

Deirdre told me that she would like to have a bedroom like this someday. I believe this is Sir Henry Pellatt’s suite, as Lady Pellatt’s room is very dainty and Wedgewood blue. I’d prefer this style myself. She also spied the rather shapely silver server in a display of militaria. For a five year-old, you have to admit the kid has pretty good taste…I think she’s been stealing peeks at the ‘oak pornography’ magazines her parents have hidden under the bed (Old House Interiors, American Bungalow, etc.).

Another thing she zeroed in on was the garden landscape architecture (too bad the flowers aren’t in bloom; the gardens there are really spectacular), and thinks we should do something like this in our backyard (currently a mess from constructing the addition…we’ve been talking about how we’re going to landscape around the house). Uhhh…sure.

Sometimes, your child surprises you in wonderful ways—I had no idea that she was really paying attention to these kinds of things.

Before I go ahead and show off the progress we’ve made on our addition, I thought I should take several steps back to the beginning of the process to give some background.
Like almost everybody else with no architectural knowledge or training, we started out with a wish and a fairly crude drawing (pen scribbles and chocolate milk stain courtesy of Deirdre).

_{(click for larger photo)}

While our budget didn’t allow us to enlist the assistance of an architect, our contractor was able to take that scrawl and make a drawing sufficient to submit for building permits. Below is what the plan looked like after we gave it to James.
I’ve made some notations of my own on this version to help further illustrate how the kitchen/mudroom addition ties in with what we started with. I’ve also indicated the new location of our washer and dryer (which we’ve just moved into the mudroom), and where a utility sink will eventually go once a counter is built.

_{(click for larger photo)}

The oak flooring we just had installed covers all of the existing bed/sitting room (the entire space is not on the drawing, but what is visible is designated in blue), the existing kitchen eating area (specified in green) and the area of the addition labeled ‘Kitchen Sitting Room’. The ‘Side Entry’ area (aka the mudroom) has a porcelain tile floor, and the existing kitchen prep area (what’s visible is indicated in orange) will be getting new linoleum flooring.

Below are these same coloured areas indicated on a survey of our property. The dark purple shows the new addition, and the darker shaded blue of the existing addition show where a bath and the former laundry area are located. The oak flooring for this section covers everything but the bath.

_{(click for larger photo)}

The existing addition and the area in green (which at one time was the back porch of the house) incorporate a flat roof, and we have continued this on the new addition. While I imagine it will prove to be a supreme pain down the road, we chose this route so as not to destroy one of the only exterior architectural features of the original house—a 2nd floor ‘sleeping porch’ at the back which extends out above the kitchen prep area (orange) and basement stairs (light maroon) and is clad in painted cedar shingles.

In our next anatomy class, we’ll look at the backside of my house and some early construction photos of the serious booty we’re giving the Salvaged Beauty.

technorati tags: home+improvement, DIY, renovation

I’ve noticed some recent discussion among the housebloggers pertaining to children—and more specifically, how those of us who have them manage to get any home renovation work done.
Some of you are new parents and understandably nervous and worried about how your activities will impact your young child; and others are maybe considering… well, let’s just say it must be Spring.

I’m certainly no expert on the subject of parenting. But I can tell you that if there’s one thing any kid loves, it’s a disaster area. I mean, c’mon—just go into any child’s room and you’ll see firsthand I speak the truth. Kids thrive on destruction, even at an early age. What’s the best thing about blocks? Why, the fact you can knock them down, of course!
Seeing the processes involved with change is great early education—maybe that’s why Bob the Builder is so popular with youngsters—so why not be the star in your child’s development?
This is obviously not giving you carte blanche to go on stripping lead paint or doing asbestos abatement with a child in the house, but I think new parents can be slightly paranoid at first about continuing with home improvement projects. Keep the projects within reason, your tools and harmful substances locked up and areas of potential danger off limits to young children for sure—but remember, that same innocent little angel is going to be eating bugs, dirt and far more unpleasant things in less than 10 months time.

Our daughter Deirdre was introduced to gonzo-style home renovating from a very early age. In this photo, taken when she was a year old, you can see that she’s being properly shielded from the harmful effects of viewing abhorrently bad kitchen wallpaper by wearing safety glasses.

Watching daddy saw pieces of wood or mommy paint a colour on the wall is far more interesting than any children’s show going; you might also be surprised to learn that the sound of certain power tools (at a reasonable decibel level) can be more effective in lulling a child to sleep than Baby Mozart. And a house under renovation, when viewed through the eyes of a child, is as filled with wonder as any amusement park.

I guess what I’m saying is don’t be afraid to take off the kid gloves and put on your work gloves.

technorati tags: home+improvement, houseblog, DIY, renovation,

Thanks to that - huge – geek over at Bungalow Dreams, I’ve been inspired to dive into the depths of hell and have managed to surface with some flaming ‘blog bling’.

I should preface this by saying that while I think I have a fairly decent eye for design, my only experience in formally learning anything to do with computer language was back in high school. That memory is pretty vague, since we learned Fortran and Cobol (long forgotten)...and used punch cards.
HTML wasn’t too hard to grasp in the beginning, because the whole ‘nested code’ thing was very much how I remember having to format word processing documents back in the days of WordStar. Then they had to go and complicate everything. Yep, I probably should be reaching for the Nice ‘N’ Easy now, but for some demented reason, my husband thinks those grey hairs are ‘sexy’.

But I digress…on to the good stuff. I did a fair bit of poking around and learned a few neat tricks today:

Styling my blog’s blockquote was something I’d been trying to do for awhile. Today, I think it came together. I just had to understand where to put it, and how to do it. An unexpected accomplishment (I was actually trying to figure out how to do something else when the dim bulb finally lit).

Incorporating Technorati Tags was another boggler, but I think I found an elegant ‘cheater’ way to do this (which will be of special interest to Ranch Redo and Bungalow ‘23, who are also hosted by Blogsome, but might work for others as well—try it).

I discovered this post on how to create a Technorati ‘bookmarklet’. This places a bit of Javascript code right on your browser’s bookmark toolbar (I’m using Firefox). Now, when I write my post, I just have to click on my bookmarklet and enter my tags and it generates the code to copy in at the bottom of my post. I even geeked out a bit and managed to personalize the code a little so it’s right justified.

Some of you are probably laughing now, but I feel like I’ve just split the atom.
Bungalow Dreams (Monica & Marc), you deserve all the credit here. Thanks for spreading the blog love.

technorati tags: technorati, blogsome, houseblog, insomnia

“Hi, Sienna? It’s Salvaged Beauty here. So sorry to call, ‘cause I know you’re really busy there at that fancy film awards ceremony and all … but I think that’s my Houseblog you’re wearing, and I kind of need it back.”

REVISION: There was a watermarked preview photo here of a great dress from WireImage, and they finally got back to me after I emailed them about usage—to view the photo, you would actually have to sign up on their website (and a basic—free—account only gives you access to preview photos from the last 30 days). Too bad, ‘cause she was on the cell phone and everything in that shot. But, you’ve got to respect copyright.
If you’re curious about the dress, I suggest you check out this post from Go Fug Yourself. Scroll down to the third photo.
Then look at the header for this blog. Definitely separated at birth.

Sheesh. Celebrities just think they can get away with wearing anything.
I didn’t know Bradbury and Bradbury was doing ‘Ready to Wear’ these days—but can I order that dress without the puffy sleeves?

_{(* Sienna Miller wore this little number to the 2006 Independent Spirit Awards on March 4)}

History and Shakespearean prose tells us that a soothsayer cautioned Julius Ceasar to “Beware the Ides of March”. Of course, we all know that old Jules thought it was hogwash, and ended up getting knifed in the back after meeting up with some buddies at the Senate that day; but in these modern times, the usage of the word ‘Ides’ has been lost along with a lot of other jargon from the Roman calendar.

But I’m pretty sure that ‘Ides’ roughly translates to ‘Break’ – as in ‘March Break’, a time when all avenues to home improvement salvation and retaining your own sanity are lost.
A time when there are no plumbers, no electricians and no contractors…they are all taking luxurious, expensive vacations…that you paid for.
A time when you will still be without a washer and dryer, a time when you will not be able to work on anything worthy of this rare stretch of time, because the person who you need to finish their job before you can proceed is…on vacation.

It’s a time when you will have no hope, a time when all hell is bound to break loose…if it ever thaws, that is, because hell generally freezes over during March Break in Canada. It’s a given.

It’s a time when your five year-old will demand every scrap of your attention and waking hours, because every single one of her friends and their families are taking expensive vacations…somewhere warm and exotic.
It’s a time when you long for the week to be over and it’s only Wednesday, because you know that the closest you’ll get to actually being warm will be when you open the door of the industrial-sized dryer at the Laundromat…the most exotic location you’ll visit this week.

It’s that seven days of the year when you become acutely aware of your failures – you’re not able to provide a trip to Disneyland for your child to yak about in class next week, because your house has eaten up any possibility of a family vacation for the next several years. Your home is a complete disaster area, and you can’t even enjoy the simple (and free) pleasure of puttering in your own garden this week, because only idiots would step outside in this weather. If you dare plan any ‘educational outing’ with your child that involves visiting a museum, science centre, planetarium, art gallery or zoo, you will stand in line for an eternity with 10 million impatient, screaming children. And their parents, who are visibly losing it. As are you.

March Break. In my experience, its only existence is to suck the last remaining bit of life from your work-weary body, and your last shred of logical reason. It’s quite possibly the most foreboding and dangerous time of the year. So beware the ‘Ides’ of March.

Especially if you come anywhere near me on Monday and look restored, rested and tanned.

This past Saturday was a diversion from our normal weekend fare of hanging out in paint-stained clothing and getting really dirty working about the house. We actually cleaned ourselves up a bit and headed out to attend my cousin’s wedding.

My husband will tell you that any social event that involves wearing a suit is worthy of loathing, and the feeling was probably mutual among the men seated at our reception table. Like John, both of my brothers, as well as my brother-in-law, do not possess the easy finesse that so many men have when wearing a suit. Instead, their awkwardness brings to mind a guy about to have his first prom photo snapped in the living room of his date’s home…by her father.

But what my immediate family may lack in the ‘polished image’ category, we more than make up for in other ways. Our relatives never fail to extend us wedding invites, because we are practically famous for our refined skills in a particular wedding tradition.

At most reception dinners, guests gnaw on their rubber chicken and make polite conversation in between the monotonous speeches, pausing every once in awhile to tap on their glasses with the flatware—a universal signal that the bride and groom must kiss.
In recent years however, the level of difficulty for this tradition has been elevated, with guest tables now having to sing a song containing the word ‘Love’ before the happy couple will lock lips.

Previously anonymous guests suddenly have an early opportunity to publicly humiliate themselves in front of family and friends, make a lasting impression on the generally uncharted ‘other’ side of the room, and give everyone lots to snark about over the hours-long dinner.

As a party game, this new trend is kind of like American Idol meets Fear Factor meets Jeopardy. Coming up with a song your table can sing is actually one of the hardest elements, and then of course, there’s getting the courage up to perform it for a room of 200 or so.
Eventually though, the battle’s on – table #6 warbles “Love Me Tender”; old aunt Mabel’s table counters with “Love is a Many Splendored Thing”; a table of young women (friends of the bride, perhaps?) launch into the abysmal “Power of Love”.
At this point, everyone at my table grabs another stiff drink because, let’s face it, most people just can’t sing well, and attempts at this ‘new tradition’ range from being ridiculously funny to being downright painful to watch. After listening to the guys at table #18 drunkenly croon the theme from The Love Boat and a group of new empty-nesters attempt Barney’s “I Love You, You Love Me”, we are sufficiently liquored up and ready to play.
Our relatives had actually been watching our table for a while now, their pleading eyes silently screaming “Save Us, Please!”, because they know that in this arena, the table where my siblings and I sit will emerge as champions of this vocal assault.

It’s not just that each child in my family was blessed with a certain degree of natural musical talent (at best, there’s my brother Michael, who could be a decent lead singer for just about any rock band out there; at worst, my sister remains on-key and doesn’t attempt any vocal gymnastics); strangely, each of our significant others were as well. We all sing passably, and the majority of us can also play an instrument.

And while none of us pursued music as a vocation, my family raised the blood sport of ‘The Love Song Wedding Game’ to a high art form many years ago at my very own wedding, when my brother Michael and cousin Steve led their table in the most awe-inspiring a capella rendition of Led Zeppelin’s “Whole ‘Lotta Love” the world had ever heard.

Not only was the singing dead-on, but there was even hand percussion and mouthed lead guitar effects incorporated into the performance. I tell you, jaws literally dropped (and mine was one of them). It was, in a word, amazing.

Since then, my siblings and I have been expected to re-enact this experience at every wedding we attend, and we’ve discovered that it’s a great icebreaker when bringing two unfamiliar families together for the first time. Over the years, our repertoire has grown to accommodate events where we don’t really know many people. This weekend, for instance, because we’d never met the bride or any of ‘that side’ of the room, we started off with Stevie Wonder’s tasteful “I Just Called to Say I Love You”. As always, my brother sang the lead like an angel, and we had some nice layered harmonies happening. Meatloaf’s “Paradise by the Dashboard Light” followed some time after that, getting more tables involved in the fun and singing along, and we wrapped it up during dessert and coffee with our now-legendary lead balloon of a wedding ‘Love’ song.

While we may detest dressing for these occasions, ‘maa-wage is a bwessed awangement’, and failing to have and contribute to a good time at a family member’s nuptials would be…inconceivable.

So there was an early knock at the side door this morning. I’d almost forgotten that I’d called Bob (our very accommodating plumber) the other day, hoping he could temporarily hook up our washing machine at its new location in the mudroom (the scene of yesterday’s bloodbath).

Although the space is far from finished, our former laundry area is newly clad in what realtors love to describe as ‘Gleaming Hardwood Floor’ – and since we may have a bit of bad mojo happening here right now, there’s no way I’m about to tempt fate.

The puzzled, tentative look on Bob’s face as he entered our home was soon relieved when we explained the reason for all the blood at the doorway. Personally, I wouldn’t have blamed Bob if he’d turned on his heels at that point and said, “You know, I’m still waiting for a part to come in; I just wanted to drop off this PVC pipe on my way to another job.” But Bob’s a real trooper. Bob is venturing into the ‘Scary Place’ to run plumbing.

The ‘Scary Place’ is our cellar’s crawlspace; and to enter, you have to step up onto a milk crate and heave your body through a hole in the wall that looks like it was created by the blast of a phaser beam. This is where we stash Xmas decorations and other detritus that we’ll probably never look at again, yet seem to hang on to anyway.
If you have the slightest aversion to spiders, or are even mildly claustrophobic, you will never go in there.

I’m convinced that Bob isn’t afraid of anything – not the monsters that apparently live under my house, spiders, or even the fact that the last person I snapped a photo of (James’ young apprentice) suffered horrible consequences less than 24 hours later.

Bob even asked if I wanted a gratuitous ‘Plumber’s Crack’ shot – but I declined, saying that the abundance of people with the wrong body type squeezing into low rise jeans these days has ruined the gag appeal of such photo ops forever.

I’ll bet Fearless Bob has seen some pretty scary shit in his time. Really.

So thanks, Bob, for dusting all those cobwebs out of the ‘Scary Place’ with your head. I’m glad it’s you – and not me for a change – who will be frantically picking bits of web and arachnids out of your hair until you find the closest shower.

We added the final element to the kitchen addition triad this morning when much blood was spilled on the battlefield of home renovating. Not mine, and that’s a bloody good thing, since I’ve contributed a lot of sweat and possibly all of the tears.

I’ll state one of two morals contained in this post first: Do Not Reach Across a Moving Table Saw Blade. Ever.

Our contractor’s apprentice made this unfortunate and frankly, stupid mistake today and was severely cut. James handled the mishap very professionally, and it was obvious his only thought was the well-being of his worker.
I was in the front part of the house with my daughter when I heard A. yell loudly from the mudroom, where the table saw was set up. Before I could even make it to the back of the house, James (who had been laying floor in the bedsitting room) was on the scene, had grabbed a whole roll of paper toweling from off the kitchen counter and had wrapped the man’s arm immediately. In the blink of an eye they were out the door and in the truck (yes, that one) on the way to the hospital, which is thankfully just two short blocks from here. James’ only words were, “don’t worry, I’ll be back later.”

When I looked in the mudroom, I must admit my stomach did a little flip. There was quite a bit of blood on the floor, the rug at the doorway and some large splashes on one of Deirdre’s winter boots, which she’d kicked off at the door earlier in the morning. Since I had to send her off to school in a short time, my first thought was getting the blood off her boot before she saw it. Thankfully, it cleaned up quickly with some cold water. The rug I just rolled up and tossed, and the tiles were sponged up.

Then I looked at the mudroom wall beside the table saw and noticed a straight, horizontal spatter line about eight inches long…shades of RSI: Renovation Scene Investigation. Gulp.

To be completely truthful, when I saw the blood on my very recently painted wall, I kind of went all Lady MacBeth, my only thought being, “Out, damned spot!” I really didn’t think there was much chance it was going to clean up (eggshell finish, you know), but some careful dabbing with only cold water proved me wrong.

Product Tip: The brand of paint we used on this wall was CIL Realife 100% Acrylic Latex Eggshell. I’m mentioning it because John and I actually had a small tiff about this paint when he’d picked it up. I thought, because it’s a fairly inexpensive consumer brand, it wouldn’t perform as well as other paints we’ve used. I have to admit the paint has great coverage (no lap marks) and better scrubbability than just about anything else we’ve used.

The only place where I couldn’t remove the blood was a small drip on the unfinished wood trim around the mudroom door, but since we’re staining it down the road, it won’t be noticeable (and was probably meant to remain). And of course, the snow at the side door looks a bit scary.

Upon his return just over an hour later – after contacting A.’s parents, filling out a WSIB accident report and waiting for a family member to arrive at the hospital – James and I had a short discussion about what had transpired earlier.
He was understandably disappointed, because this injury should NOT have happened had his apprentice been following the absolute basics of what he’d been taught in terms of safe equipment operation.

James also brought up something that I think deserves repeating here: Whenever you hire anyone to do work in your home, make sure they have proper liability insurance and worker’s compensation to cover accidents or injury to themselves or their employees while they are working within your home. Without it, you could be liable under your own homeowners insurance (at least that’s the way it is here in Ontario).
No one needs to have their insurance rates skyrocket because somebody they hired wasn’t using their head while performing their job. Accidents happen every day, everywhere, and what happened in my house today should be all the reminder you need. Hire professionals when required, and get it in writing.

At 6:30 pm (7½ hours after the accident happened) A. came to our door to pick up his walking shoes. His mother was driving him home from the hospital. He’d just had surgery on his arm, and was bandaged from elbow to wrist. So this was more than just a cut.
Please everyone, use commom sense and be careful. This was preventable.

Amazingly, a lot of reno work was accomplished today, but I’m going to leave that post for another time. It’s been a rather long day.