One Man's Trash Is a Great Project for Another Man and His Daughter

Everybody knows the saying One man's trash is another man's treasure. That is why garage sales, Goodwill, and the tv series Storage Wars exist. People love finding hidden gems in the things that they pull out of the garbage. And some people have garages full of these finds, just waiting for time to fix it, repaint it, salvage it, and make it a great treasure. I know because I have several of these projects in my garage. 

I have a whole side of my house full of logs from cut down trees, just waiting to be chopped into firewood. I have tools just waiting to be rebuilt or refinished. Tables needing to be resurfaced. So many projects (and after I finish this post and my wife reads it I will probably spend some time listing some of these things on Freecycle to get rid of them). 

A few months ago somebody posted on Freecycle that they were getting rid of a tandem bike that was a project bike that they lost interest in. My ten-year-old loves projects, she loves spending time with daddy, and she loves bike riding. So this sounded like a perfect pickup. I arrived home that evening with a beat up, ready for the recycle bin tandem bike with two flat tires, shredded seats, and no hand grips. And my daughter was thrilled. 

We spent the next several weeks, and countless trips to the bike shop, fixing the bike. Replacing seats, tires, tubes, handle grips, chains. If there was something that could be replaced, we replaced it. And let me tell you, that first ride with her was terrifying. 

Seriously, if you have never been on a tandem bike before with somebody who is EXTREMELY excited and bouncy and you're the one trying to keep the balance and steer the thing, then you don't know what fear is. 

But seriously, this was a really fun project to work on with my daughter. And while I probably could have purchased a used tandem bike for what I spent in parts, the time that we spent working together will always be a great memory. 

Adding a Closet to an Upstairs Landing

When my wife and I first saw our house, we knew it was the perfect house for us. It had everything that we could ever want - enough bedrooms, a huge yard, a workshop, not too many square feet. It was lacking nothing! 

After we moved in, we realized that, while we still loved our house, it had one quirk. It had weird closet space. Every bedroom had a closet, the master bedroom had two (we converted

one into a desk space), but there were not common closets. No coat closet, no linen closet, no junk closet, no central closet. Nothing. Nada. Zip. 

After years of trying to figure out which wall to knock out to add a closet, we decided to add one at the top of our stairs where our 1980's cabinets and countertop were rocking out. We ended that dance party by tearing out the cabinets. This was about the same time I got my new Greenworks 24V driver and impact driver set. Demo and construction were a great way to break these tools in, and I was really impressed with the light weight and power. From start to finish, these two wonderful tools got the job done. 

Patio Bar Rehab for Less Than $200

I tend to be a glass-is-half-full kind of guy, which is especially beneficial in the year 2020. So while there are so many things going on right now that are not great (one of my favorite current sayings is, "Look out the window and see which chapter of Revelation we're in today"), some things have been beneficial. I have gotten to spend a lot more time with my family. I have walked hundreds of miles on all of my conference calls/phone calls/virtual meetings. And I have been extremely productive with house projects.

One project that I have been putting off for a few years is refurbishing my patio cabinets. The cabinet doors wouldn't close and were hanging off the hinges, the drawer bottoms were falling apart, the veneer was peeling off, and I was getting weekly calls from the '80s asking for their mauve back. So once I finished painting my downstairs, laying bricks around the border of my yard, and installing new banisters in my stairway, I figured it was time for me to slay this beast.

Quarantine Home Projects: Get the Kids to Help

For the past ten weeks or so, my job as a principal shifted significantly, as did the jobs of quite a few people in the world. I went from interacting with hundreds of people every day, shifting gears every five minutes, and bouncing around my school for 11 or 12 hours per day, to mainly doing one of two things: sitting in front of my computer monitoring online classes or doing my normal email tasks, or having my headset in on a webinar, conference call, or phone call. Rather than sit all day, I walk during conference calls. I spent so much time on the phone walking around either the park or my school that I completely wore through my shoes, and then could not find anyplace to purchase shoes because of the quarantine order. Needless to say that at the end of the work day I was ready not to sit on my computer or in front of a screen.

Unclog Your Drain in Three Minutes (with No Drain-O or Chemicals)

Long hair was not part of my childhood. I have four brothers, and we spent much of our young lives with buzz cuts. It was cheaper for my mom to cut our hair, and we spent so much time in the pool that it was just easier not to have hair when you're in and out of the pool all day.

Fast forward to today. As a dad of two girls with long hair, there are so many things that I didn't experience growing up. Gobs of hair wrapped around the vacuum cleaner beater bar, hair bands and clips on every surface and under every chair and couch cushion, hair getting stuck to my beard (not that I had a beard as a kid...). Okay, so many of the things that I didn't experience growing up have to do with hair. More specifically, long hair.

And with long hair comes drain clogs. But before you grab that bottle of harsh chemicals to try to speed up your drain, here is a quick three-minute fix to unclog some of the slowest drains.

Greenworks 60V Mower: Generation 1 vs. Generation 2

Six years ago to the week I posted a review of a Greenworks 40V Twin Blade lawnmower that I had been using for quite some time. At that point, I thought it was the best mower that I had ever used. Three-and-a-half years after that, I got to test out the new version, a 60V Self-Propelled single blade lawnmower. I was such a fan of my 40V mower, I didn't see the need to upgrade. But the 60V mower won me over with its long run time, wide cutting path, and its overall power.

Last fall Greenworks announced a second generation of their 60V mower. Just like last time, my first reaction was to stand by my trusty old mower. But looking at the list of new features made me want to see how the 2nd generation 60V mower stacked up to the 1st generation as soon as it became available.

Grill Tool Rack Made From Scrap Materials

In case you missed the point in the post about my Weber Performer, I love grilling. There is something about fire and vegetables and meat and cooking that is peaceful and relaxing. The perfect burger sizzling away, corn on the cob roasting, slices of grilled pineapple warming over the flames... I'll have to finish this post later. I'm getting really hungry.

I'm back.

Building with Scrap Wood and Helping Your Kids Decide What To Do

One of the difficult things about living in Arizona is that it is like living on the face of the sun. A short trip to the store means getting third degree burns from the seat belt in the car while the air conditioning functions as a blast furnace. You have to park half a mile away from your destination for a sliver of shade from a scraggly desert tree, and your shoes melt to the asphalt as you walk across the parking lot. The idea of a trip to the store is so disheartening that you decide to skip the whole ordeal. By the end of the summer, when everybody is ready for a reprieve from the heat, we typically have a rise in temperature and it gets even hotter.

A few weeks ago when my kids were going nuts and I was trying to find some way to get them to burn up energy, my wife had a great idea. She recommended that I take them into the garage and let them hammer and nail some scrap wood. My three kids were all excited about going out and pounding nails into boards, my wife was excited about a quiet house, and I was excited about spending time with my kids in a place that somehow manages to be hotter than it is outside.

Storage Coffee Table with Puzzle Tray

Spring is a very busy time for educators. We're preparing for standardized testing, Advanced Placement testing, end of the year ceremonies and celebrations, etc., etc., etc. It is the time of year when my sanity starts to slip, and I need to make a focused effort on taking care of myself.

There are many things that I do to keep my sanity, but one thing that keeps me going is a good project. Having a project that I can focus on, especially one that takes both mental focus and sweat, is my way of recharging. A few years ago I had a stained glass project that kept me going through the end of the school year. This year, I had a woodworking project. 

Knots and Wormholes: Why I Like Working with Imperfect Wood

My wife's grandfather spent his entire life in Fonda, Iowa, which is a lot smaller than it sounds (and it sounds pretty small). He and his brother had a portable sawmill, and when a storm would pass through the area, they would go around milling up wood. He had an incredible supply of black walnut in his basement, and often, when my wife and I would visit, I would spend time just looking at the lumber. What can I say... I'm a wood junkie.

He passed away several years ago, and none of his sons were into woodworking. So one summer, my father-in-law loaded up his boat with hundreds of board feet of black walnut and drove it out to Arizona (you may be asking why he loaded up his boat. Many of the boards are twelve feet long or longer, and the center of a boat is the best way to transport that much lumber of that length).

As we were unloading the walnut from the boat and stacking it up in my workshop, I noticed that quite a few of the boards had knots, rough edges, and wormholes. The knots and the edges are something that I'm used to working with, but the

Tips for Building Projects with Kids

Recently, while going through old pictures, I came across this video. I was building an arbor for a grapevine, and my two girls, about 3 1/2 and 1 1/2 years old, were helping. After watching this five times and getting over my uncontrollable weeping, I started reminiscing about the days of working on projects with them when they were cute and extremely unhelpful. Oh for the days when a two hour project would merely take four hours...

As I watched the video, I had several great reminders for tackling projects with kids in tow.

1. Let the kids "help" - You will notice that Little A, who was around 2, didn't care that she wasn't actually doing anything. She wanted to be with daddy, "working" just like I was. A plastic drill and letting her smash away on the lumber while I'm working makes her happy and includes her in the project.

1.1. Let the kids actually "help" if they can - Find something that they can do. At 4, Big E was great at fetching screws, and she enjoyed contributing. As the kids get older, give them more and more responsibility. If my 10-year-old is still doing nothing more than fetching screws, then I haven't let her grow in her responsibility and we're both missing out.

2. Let them experience real tools - Obviously I'm not going to let my four-year-old loose with a circular saw. But letting her become comfortable with and around tools will help both of us in the future. She will want to help me with more and more projects, and I will get free labor quality time with my daughter.

3. Give them the extra help when needed - Big E got to drive a screw with my screwdriver, but there is no way she could have done it on her own. As my kids get older, they need less help from me. But in the learning years, the "training wheels" come in the form of daddy's hand on the back of the screwdriver keeping it going straight.

4. People are more important than things - This is the one thing that I need regular reminders of. At the end of the video Big E drives a screw so deep that the wood splits. "Uh oh... That's okay" was probably forced at the time. Actually, I was so sleep deprived a the time from having two little ones that I was probably in a vegetative state. But remembering that kids are more important than that piece of lumber or that tool will help keep the focus on the important things.

5. Know that we all make mistakes - I don't always have the most patient attitude towards my kids, especially when I'm in the middle of a project. But remembering that these are the memories that they are building helps. I want them to have fond memories of doing projects with me. When I mess that up (read about one such instance here), I need to fix it.

Now that I've spent the past several minutes reminiscing, I think it's time for a current project to work on with my kids. Any suggestions?

Interior Doors: A Small Change with a Big Impact

It's funny how small things sometimes tend to bother us for a long time. For the past 19 years, my wife and I have lived in 6 different homes (two of them were very short term), and with the exception

Inexpensive DIY Appliance Repair: Cheaper Than the Alternative

In the past three months we have had four major appliances break. Our refrigerator ice maker, then dishwasher, followed by our microwave, followed by our dryer. I have never considered myself any kind of appliance repair guy. I also tend to have little faith that appliances last very long these days. So with each breakage, my inclination was that it was time to replace each one. However, with a little internet searching, some connecting with great how-to videos, and some inexpensive parts, I was able to save quite a bit of time.

By no means is this meant to be an instructional tutorial. I have already found those for my particular models of appliances. Instead, this is meant to be encouragement that if you have an appliance that breaks down, instead of jumping to the conclusion that I initially made, you might want to troubleshoot a little bit.

Frigidaire Refrigerator Ice Maker

Problem - when our ice maker is turned on, the ice bin fills with water and we get a solid lump of ice.

Hidden Hairdryer Storage

I have been slowly but surely working on our bathroom remodel for so long that I no longer know when I exactly began. The last post I wrote about our bathroom remodel outlined the first several steps, which were completed exactly one year ago. Since then I have chipped away little by little at the bathroom. Lately, I have added two cabinets that I bought at the Rosie on the House auction site, removed our mirrored closet door, and added a pocket door. While those projects have all had their challenges and moved us slightly closer to being done with the bathroom, I am most proud of this project--hidden hairdryer storage--because it brings me daily joy.

The previous owner of our house hardwired a power strip into an electrical box and attached it to the side of our bathroom cabinet (essentially he cut off the plug, stripped the wires, and gave the strip permanent power - not exactly up to building code). This power strip was used by my wife for her hairdryer, but because of the placement of the power strip the hairdryer either lived on the counter or between the vanity and the closet door. The removal of the closet doors and installation of the pocket door forced me to remove the power strip and add an actual electrical outlet in the wall. But the "storage space" for the hairdryer was gone.

Pocket door and wall cabinet

DIY Flooring Project

When we first moved into our house, my wife and I knew that our floors were not long for this world. Last summer, after going through the process of deciding what flooring to use, we settled on a floating laminate floor from Costco. While it was one of the lesser expensive floors that we tested, it was surprisingly also one of the more durable. And when I went to purchase it, it was on sale: score! It took two truckloads to load 90 cases of flooring in my garage (in 116 degree weather), but I was ready to go.

And with that first hammer swing to remove the first tile, my project was on. I told my wife, "I don't see why I couldn't be done with this by Fall Break." She lovingly accepted my confidence, but after 19 years of marriage, she knew to mentally add six months to my optimistic estimate. I chipped tile, pulled out carpet, hauled the wreckage to the dumpster, begged my friend Stan to help, cut my leg with broken tile, filled the house with tile dust, and sweated like there was no tomorrow. The first hour of the project was complete!

Remodeling Stairs with Decorative Risers

When my family and I decided to redo our floors, I knew that our stairway would be a challenge. Do you remember the scene in Pee Wee's Big Adventure, when Pee Wee Herman came across the pet store that was on fire? Pee Wee ran in and opened the puppy cages. Then he ran by the snake terrariums, gave a look of disgust, and continued to save the kittens. On and on he went, passing the snakes, making a face, and saving other animals. Finally, he knew that he could no longer pass the snakes, so he grabbed two fistfulls of them, ran outside, and passed out.

That was how I felt about the stairs. I would walk by them, shake my head, and move on to some other part of the flooring project. I worked in the kitchen, looked at the stairs, and moved on to caulking. Then I looked at the stairs, and moved on to the living room. Then the laundry room, bathroom, dog, and ceiling fan. I floored things that should never be floored. And then I had to face the stairs.

Carpeted stairs - they look happy in spite of the old carpet.

The first thing I had to do was pull off the carpeting, the tack strips, and the 3.7 million staples that were used to attach the carpeting to the stairs. Next, I had to cut the bullnose off of each stair (this is the overhang that would have interfered with the flooring on the deck [the horizontal surface]). Finally, in preparation for covering the stairs, I had to cover the risers (vertical surface) with pieces of plywood, just to give some evenness to the stairs for our covering.

Here is where I had a wonderful conversation with my five-year-old. My son was working with me and helping in the fantastic way that five-year-olds can help. He would take staples and put them in a bucket. He would use the pliers and try to pull staples out. And then, when we pulled off some carpeting, he discovered a knothole.

I wonder what's going on in there.

That boy sat there staring at the knothole for minutes. He looked at it from so many different angles. He poked his finger into it. And then he said, "Daddy, please don't cover that hole. I think it's a knothole like Ralph (from The Mouse and the Motorcycle) lived in." We then had an entire conversation about what the mice that lived in that knothole might do. Did they ride around on his motorcycles? Play with his Legos? What did they eat? How many were there? He was so fascinated, and I loved watching him and listening to his imagination spinning and thinking and creating. It was great! I almost forgot that I had stairs to work on.

Back to work... After the risers were covered with plywood, I laid the new floor on the deck. Because they are stairs, the pad had to be removed and the flooring had to be glued down with a construction adhesive. Finally, a few nails with the nail gun to keep everything in place, and we had new stairs.

The finished product!

For the risers, we didn't want to install more of the flooring. I thought this would be too dark, and between the flooring and our furniture, we have plenty of wood around. After spending irretrievable hours on Pinterest, we decided that it would be really cool to wallpaper the risers. We found a wallpaper store (yes, they still exist), and after getting several samples, settled on two different colors of the same wallpaper, alternating them in a 1-2 pattern. Installing the wallpaper was a breeze.

The result is a wonderfully light and classy stairway, which really highlights the banister that need to be replaced and the walls that need to be painted. But at least the snakes are safe! And the mice have their hole underneath the wallpaper.

Now on to the next project.

What Type of Flooring is Best? A Stress Test of Bamboo, Laminate, and Engineered Floors

We love our current house, but we are still in the process of making it our home. As you may have read in one of my previous posts, the addition of kids really slows down the home project process. However, one of the biggest advantages of taking projects more slowly is the amount of time I can spend researching products before deciding what I want. This is my gift. This is my curse... All of that to say this: I hate my floors. Our carpets are so old and worn that we have stopped cleaning the stains. The tile is standard builder's grade beige with hints of beigeness, with beige grout. We have been fine with this for the past four years, but I say to these floors, "No more!"

But back to the process part of the project.

So before we tackled this project, we had to decide what to replace it with. We knew that we wanted something that was wood or wood-look, and we needed something relatively inexpensive (Remember, I'm an educator. We're famously underpaid.). So we had four contenders.

Inexpensive Home Comfort Fix: So Easy a Six-Year-Old Can Do It

This past week, we had a whole house energy audit. If you haven't heard of these, they are pretty cool. We had ours done through a Rosie-certified contractor (all Arizona homeowners should know who Rosie is). The purpose of a home energy audit is to find out how energy efficient your home is. Here's the process.

First, a big fan is hooked up to the front door. All ducts are tested with a pressure sensor, the AC unit is tested, windows and doors are

DIY Stained Glass

Three years ago I wrote an article about being a real life long learner. The two skills that I had recently learned at that point were milking cows and making stained glass. At that point, I had only made a turtle after one session of stained glass work, but I really enjoyed it. My mom had supplies, a friend had several boxes of glass, and I had a table in the garage that just needed a future project to sit on it. And sit on it the supplies did, for three years.

Then, this past spring, my wife and I were looking at this ugly curtain that covered a south facing window above our sliding glass door. The curtain came with the house, I think it had once been white but was so covered in dust that its color was indescribably filthy, and the window was just screaming for some class. We had talked about doing something with stained glass for that space, but the window is about five feet by two feet, and the turtle that I had previously made was about four inches by three inches. I didn't know if I was ready to

DIY Bathroom Remodel: Whirlwind-Speed or Slow-and-Steady?

In my life BK (Before Kids), I loved doing whirlwind weekend projects, especially when my wife was out of town. One time, when she was gone for three days, I drywalled in a doorway to the family room, cut out an opening between the living room and the family room, and installed french doors connecting the two rooms. During another trip, I gutted our bathroom, refinished the walls (pulling down salmon colored wall tile and drywalling significant portions of the walls), painted, and installed all new fixtures and a new vanity. It got to the point where I had set myself up for some amazing project completion when she was gone, so that I had to find something to do with each trip.