New Blog Crush (and DIY Confession)

I have my regular blogs that I visit daily (most of them only post about once a week, but the day of a new post changes). Today, Not Martha had commented on a link to another blog, saying that she loved what he had done with his apartment, but mostly that she was bookmarking to remind herself that some favorite window shade was back at Ikea. It intrigued me enough that I clicked over...he had me at his first sentence,

"Thus far, it has taken me roughly two months to redo the horrendous caulk job in my bathroom."

Daniel, of Manhattan Nest, goes on to round out the paragraph with,

"What should have taken no more than a few hours has been stretched into a drawn-out, casual sort of affair, with long periods of rest punctuated by short, manic spurts of activity. So far I’ve succeeded in scraping away and replacing all the caulk around the top of the tub, but have been unsuccessful at working my way down to the floor. Don’t even bring up that spot between the sink and the wall or you’re dead to me. " (emphasis mine)

A man who knows our life!! What was supposed to be just stripping out molding caulk and replacing turned into a discovery of 2" of black mold on the sheetrock behind the surround, so we had to rip out all of the surround, a third of the sheet rock, and replace. We started our shower repair on President's Day (February 20th) and it's almost Memorial Day and we're not done. Granted, just after that I went down to Portland for my mom's major surgery and it was a stressful time. Plus, we had many steps we needed to do outside and with Seattle weather, that severely limited what weekends we had available to do certain tasks. Each step has incurred one or two curveballs, requiring umpteen trips to McLendon's for materials and advice. By the time we hit May, we're just so sick and tired of the stupid project that neither of us wants to acknowledge we're in the home stretch! We just don't want to deal with it anymore, even if I miss having a bathtub and our upstairs bathroom put together and fully functional. However, maybe by finally admitting to it here, the guilt and embarrassment will be enough to get us to finish it this weekend. Maybe.

When that ever happens, I'll celebrate by a little pictorial review of the process.