Comments on: House Renovation: Ceiling & Frozen Pipes

By: Stephanie

Stephanie — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 15:29:00 +0000

I was just forwarded to your wonderful blog by someone on a forum while I was looking for English garden photos. It’s insane how many of us there are renovating old houses. We’re renovating a 150+ year old house (not sure on age, we keep finding things that would suggest its older but the first record of it with the town is in 1870) in Eastern Ontario. We’ve found all manner of strange building practices, and just the other day we removed the toilet in our downstairs bathroom and almost fell through a rotted area of floorboards. Yikes. I love all your bathroom inspiration photos too! We have similar taste.

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By: Virginia

Virginia — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 00:55:47 +0000

If you don’t laugh, you’ll surely cry! Funny post to read but glad it’s not me. I know the feeling though!

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By: melissa

melissa — Fri, 25 Dec 2009 01:19:54 +0000

Katy:
I don’t think it’s possible to do a renovation without a good poop story. (Not that the fact you’re in good company makes you feel better when you’re in the middle of it.) My best friend owned a small “Denver duplex,” which is a small house that shares a wall with an adjoining house. Her neighbor was renovating a bathroom and decided to snake his pipes. His plumber kept feeding the snake down the drain – far longer than the snake should have gone. When my friend got home from work, she discovered that the plumber had snaked from her neighbor’s pipes into hers – thereby spreading poop all over her tiny, adorable, and now odiferous house. Suffice to say that her closet was right next to the bedroom, and the neighbor’s insurance company paid for a whole new wardrobe…
Best of luck and happy holidays.

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By: Jenn

Jenn — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 20:11:59 +0000

I’m glad you shared this story–so many people think a home renovation is something that happens on HGTV in in half an hour. If you want to restore a home you need to prepared to get your hands dirty, and spend lots of time and money. Personally, I totally think it’s worth it, but a lot of people might not.

Meanwhile, no need to be embarrassed about this one. This happened to me a few months ago, and I live in a circa 1970s apartment building!Not nearly as charming :) Stay strong!!

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By: Katy Elliott

Katy Elliott — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 20:03:42 +0000

Thanks everyone for all your great comments. I was fearing everyone would boo me and tell me how gross we are.
Thanks to all my home renovations friends for sharing your stories!

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By: heather

heather — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 19:57:07 +0000

oh the frozen pipes! i don’t think it’s embarrassing at all. it’s sort of a (crappy) rite of passage.

ours froze last winter when it went about 15 below in upstate new york. we had several inches of water in our basement. bless the wet vac! thankfully we turn our water pump off when we leave the house and head back to the city on sundays, or we would have had several feet, no doubt.

keep up the good work!

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By: S@sha

S@sha — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 18:46:45 +0000

Just the other day some of my fellow house renovating friends and I were commiserating about how it makes you both love and loathe your home at times. Some days you curse the day you ever bought the place and wonder what else could possibly go wrong and what you’ve done to deserve such bad luck, and others you can’t imagine living any where else. In the long run you’ll love it more than you hate it, so keep slogging through!

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By: jen jafarzadeh

jen jafarzadeh — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 18:43:57 +0000

thanks for sharing the full story, Katy. sounds like you guys are taking it with the good humor that you can “laugh about it now”. I’m super impressed with Greg. If that were Dan and we had poop in our tub, the neighbors would be hearing him curse the poop and I would probably cry on sight. And we would have no idea how to fix the problem! good thing we’re still renters.

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By: emily at thirtyeight20

emily at thirtyeight20 — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 18:37:47 +0000

I feel for you Katy! I also work from home and am in the midst of a major renovation of a rickety old house. After a year without it, we finally had heat installed last week. Posts like this make me realize there are kindred spirits out there!

Just moments after I read this post, I walked into my bathroom to discover that the water I had left trickling this morning (we use that trick too!) had stopped… Sure enough, the pipes are frozen somewhere for the 2nd time this week.

Fortunately my husband (3rd generation plumber!) is on his way home, but until then I will be completely freaked that sewage will start spouting out of the shower drain… which, thanks to your story, is now on my top 10 list of fears!

We get through it though, don’t we? When our houses are finally done, we’ll look back at how fun, ridiculous and awful it all was! Good luck and happy holidays. :-)

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By: kk

kk — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 18:24:38 +0000

katy i hate to laugh at such a miserable experience but you really made it funny (and it had an ok outcome). thanks for cheering me up. happy holidays!

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