The Perils of Bath Rugs

So, this might come as a shock to y'all, but it turns out we have old plumbing.

The Mr. and I got back from a trip, started some laundry, and sat down for a we-just-spent-six-hours-in-the-car meal of pb&js. At some point we became aware of the (not-so-tranquil) sound of falling water coming from the guest bath.  There, we find:

Awesome.  We realize (with relief) that instead of all the nasty things it could be... (I shall allow you time to imagine) .. it appeared, instead, to be "gray water" from the washing machine. It smelled great, actually. "Spring Meadow" Gain, I believe.

Our fears of spilling sewage were then replaced with fears of exploding washing machines, so we went skidding into the laundry room, sure that there was going to be a mess.  Nope again, but the utility sink appeared to be burping suds:

We just stood there for awhile, watching it gurgle. Though the suds eventually disappeared, the contents of the tub did not.  Turns out the pipe that leads away from the washing machine is a smidge too small/not vented well enough for the giant capacity of our washing machine, so if something starts to accumulate (the culprit: a shaggy bath rug was losing pounds of lint, apparently) things in our house start spewing drain water.

Ah, the things you learn.  Also, we had to pay somebody $150 for the 10 minutes it took to stick what looked like a GIANT roto-rooter down the tub drain.

So... what do you do?

• Pay somebody $150 every time this happens
• Widen the drain and add a vent
• Throw out the bath rug

The Guest Bedroom: Before & After

Alright! So after a slight hiatus (more on that later), I've got a whole mess-o-updates to make. As promised, here are some before and after pictures of the Guest Bedroom: Before The Mr. and I taped and primed it, it was a light purple-y gray:

...and it had a cream-colored berber carpet:

Mom and I then painted it a very light green (Valspar, "Sweet Kasha"):

... and then The Mr. and I ripped out the carpet. The Mr.'s mom and dad helped us remove the old carpet padding staples, tack strips and some strips of double-sided tape goo. The final result (pre-move-in):

I think it's quite the improvement! I'm really happy with the color, and the hardwood floors are beautiful. We waffled about ripping up the carpet--even though our preference is hardwood, we really don't mind carpet in bedrooms and despite being slightly dingy the berber wasn't in terrible shape. It is, actually, still with us:

NB. Find out where the nearest dump or recycling center is prior to tossing large amounts of refuse on your porch. Anyway, we took the gamble and the hardwood is in pretty great shape. We'll have to figure out something to do with the threshold between the room and the closet; there's an area there that either didn't get stained with the rest of the floor or was stripped at some point. What do you think? Miss the purple?

Wallpaper, or: "Sometimes it's there for a reason."

The previous owners of our new house had pretty great taste. The wall colors are nice, neutral and understated (not to mention well-painted). The trim is a nice creamy white, even the window treatments I'd have probably picked out. In the kitchen, though, below a piece of trim about four feet up the wall, was a faux-tile wallpaper (...that I rather famously thought was real tile--yes, until I actually touched it. Score one for the wallpaper). I'm not a huge fan of wallpaper, so first item on the agenda: down she comes. We highly recommend 'WP CHOMP!' brand wallpaper stripper, which not only works well, but is fun to say when particularly large parts of paper fall off with little effort. ("Narghnarghnargh-wp!-CHOMP.") It also smells like Bacardi O, but I don't recommend drinking it. So.. the problems arose the more paper we got down. It turned out that the backsplash, the wall next to the refrigerator, and the wall behind the stove used to be tiled. How could we tell? There was still a good bit of grooved adhesive on the wall. I have no idea how old it is, but it's pretty petrified and chemicals haven't seemed to make any difference. You'd be able to see the texture under the paint we'd picked out. We thought briefly about sanding it--as messy as that might be--but in the end, decided that the slim chance that the stuff contained asbestos was worth pursuing other options. 'Other options' turned out to be 1) removing the wallboard and replacing it, or 2) recovering the areas. Since we'd like to retile at some point, but can't afford it immediately, we opted to 'recover.' Beadboard, likewise, is a little expensive for our needs--so we decided to go with a paintable wallpaper. Yes, wallpaper comes down, and more goes up. That might seem inefficient, but I'm telling myself that this stuff is 1) made to be painted over, and 2) mostly vinyl, which sounds good from a kitchen-cleaning perspective. It's available in a lot of goofy textured patterns, but we took a chance and went with one that's supposed to look like pressed tin. I was surprised by how well it went up, actually; I've never hung wallpaper before and I think we managed to do it pretty well. (The true test will be when we go back this evening to see how it's dried.) Here are some pictures of a wall, still wet; once it's painted, the contrast between the raised vinyl parts and the backing won't be visible, but for now it looks kind of interesting. A closeup: From the other side of the room: Next steps are painting, and a good washing-down of the floor and baseboards (wallpaper goo gets EVERYWHERE). Oh, and don't underestimate the the dangers of wallpaper: I managed to sustain my first home-improvement related injury from the stupid trim guard. Post-painting pictures to come.