Walls! Fancy that. Walls!

 The summer before Pat left (2009) he gave the grandkids each hammers and let them do their darnedest demolishing the plaster in the utility room. Two months later he was gone and I was not in a position to do anything about the roof leak or the bare lathe showing on the walls. I have lived with that for three years. (After a while you cease to see it, but you never like it.)

Times have changed. The roof is going to be repaired soon. It's time to finish the walls and reclaim the utility room. My friend Brian offered to help with the sheet rocking  That was good because Joe was still an over-the-road truck driver and he wasn't going to be home long enough to do much with the project. He did help Brian get the first two pieces up.

With Brian's expertise and my thumb-fingered assistance, we got the walls up in a couple of days during the first of October. It looks so nice! The entire room is brighter.


Joe and his wife Lisa changed jobs after Halloween. They have been staying with me while they look for a place to live. This has given Joe a chance to do some of my Honey-Dos. Replacing the front porch was one major project and plumbing the utility room was another. I wanted to get rid of the side by side washer/dryer and put in a stacking unit on the other side of the room. This would free a wall to create a pantry.

Joe built a partial wall to protect the stacking unit from the back door. He mounted the new faucet and drain hookups in the wall. There was even room for a trash compactor beside the stacking unit. Hey, I'm getting uptown high class!

The finishing touch has been the pantry. I purchased a base unit for a bathroom sink at the Habitat for Humanities Restore in Topeka. We butted a 3-drawer unit that came from the kitchen against it and Joe built the cupboards above. I have the doors to the base unit in the garage. They will get their last coats of paint when the weather is warmer. (Tape, bed, texture, then painting, will happen then as well.)

Now we are talking about putting a single metal sink in the pantry unit. It will give mechanics a place to scrub that ISN'T my kitchen sink. I'm liking that idea. I can use it as a spot to scrub vegetables coming in from the garden, too. Of course, Joe is going, "I just pulled out the plumbing there..."