Fixing Leaking Showers – Replacing Handle Cartridges

Posted on October 15, 2026 by Marisa

It all started because we have been putting off replacing the guts in our half bath.  It escalated quickly into replacing shower/tub cartridges in two other bathrooms.  In hind sight I would say replacing the toilet guts would have been much quicker and much easier especially since we have the replacement parts sitting in the cabinet in that bathroom.  Let our problem become your life lesson.

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DeWalt DWHT83550 ToughSeries 8-3/4 in. 340 lb. Capacity Review

Posted on October 1, 2026 by Marisa

You know how Bill got these?  He waited for me to think of a project I wanted them for.  He never told me he wanted them.  He just waited.  Finally that patience paid off and I told HIM I wanted them.  Because he loves me he agreed we should get them.  Sneaky so and so.

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Strip And Refinish Walnut Drop Front Desk

Posted on September 23, 2026 by Marisa

This secretary desk is a beautiful drop down front, desk made from what we believe is walnut, that had aged a deep almost black color.  I believe it had a lacquer finish originally.

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Stripping Chalk Paint From White Oak Veneer With A Shellac Finish

Posted on September 18, 2026 by Marisa

Please don’t yell at me.  I feel bad enough as it is.

I have my maternal and paternal grandmothers sewing machines.  They are well over 100 years old and I did a terrible thing to them.  I painted over them with Anne Sloan Chalk Paint and then put on her protective wax.  In a world of regrets this is up there on the list.

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Custom Duvet Cover With Snaps

Posted on September 11, 2026 by Marisa

I love our down comforter.  Okay it’s not real down, it’s a much less expensive version but I still love it.  It’s been ripped, lost some filling and repaired.  It’s now more of an almost crispy, orange/yellow because I did not know about that whole bleach/well water laundry thing when we first moved here.  It’s seen some things.  Lately I’ve thought about replacing it.  I started thinking maybe it was time to get a new one after the last husky related rippage.  It was a fairly large, jagged tear that made it look like it was snowing in the bedroom when I went to go to bed and fluffed the blankets.  This was the second tear in as many weeks.  Also the most dramatic tear which left me wondering if I could even fix it.

I’ve tried duvet covers.  The comforter always made it’s way down to our feet or off to one side or in a corner.  Perhaps I could have solved this by adding ties to our comforter and then adding more ties to the cover.  I even thought about just buying a new insert that had ties and then buying a cover that had matching ties! There has to be a better way.

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Change Old Door Hinges Without Buying New Ones

Posted on September 3, 2026 by Marisa

“Have drill, will screw things up.”

Last week I went into Bill’s office to get a drill.  He naturally, and with some fear, asked what I was doing.  I explained that now that I have repainted the mudroom door the ugly hinges needed to be fixed.  These hinges are probably as old as the house which puts them at over 30 years.  They work fine.  They are heavy duty external door hinges.  They have also been painted over numerous times, as many times as I have repainted that door.  They are ugly, they have been ugly for years, I actually hate the fact that I painted over them.  I also did not know exactly how to fix the damage that past me had done.

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Color Fixing Edge Banding And The Cut Edge Of Vinyl Plank Flooring

Posted on August 27, 2026 by Marisa

Quick post.  Interesting news is that we have added a new season!  We now have Winter, Spring, Summer, Monsoon, and Fall.  Notice I did not say “good news” I said “interesting news”.   It has forced us to take a break from all the things that  need doing outside and brought us inside to wrap up some projects.   Have you ever walked into a room and thought, “This is nice I think I could stay here forever”?  On the flip side of that is when you walk into a room and you hurry through it as fast as you can because something just doesn’t feel right.  That’s our mudroom.

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Building a Step

Posted on August 27, 2026 by Bill

Sounds kind of boring.  And it probably is.  The floor of our mud room is about 12 1/2″ lower than kitchen hallway floor.  For the longest time we had a large wooden block step there.  It wasn’t very big, and we thought a larger platform step would be better.

We decided on a 49″ x 22 1/2″ platform, with a 1/2″ overhang from the base.  So we made the base 48″ x 22″.  No overhang on the back, as it would be attached directly to the wall.  The wall juts into the room about 4 inches on the side of the doorway.

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WARRIOR 6 Amp Rotating Handle Variable-Speed Reciprocating Saw – As A Meat Saw

Posted on August 7, 2026 by Marisa

Does it work as a meat saw?  The answer is yes and no.

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Framed Door for Greenhouse

Posted on July 29, 2026 by Bill

We love our greenhouses.  They aren’t fancy.  They weren’t expensive.  They are cheap.  But they’ve given us some protected areas for starting and growing a variety of plants.

While we love them, the door zippers are frustrating.  They are the cheapest, weakest, most poorly made zippers I believe on the whole planet.  Every tab broke off of them, so I had to use a piece of twine tied to the tab loop in order to close them.  The cover is stretched so tightly over the frame that there was a lot of stress put on these zippers, causing them to be very difficult to close, and they would separate under the stress.  Numerous teeth broke, making zipping and unzipping very difficult.  We knew early on that we would be building something to replace these doors.

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