The Header!

Yesterday afternoon I got to work on my master bedroom door frame and trim project.  I puttered around for hours working at my own putzy pace... and had fun.  My personal victory for the day?  I got the header in!

I know -- it doesn't look like much, does it?  But it's in, it's solid and hey-hey, its level.  Three lovely characteristics we like to see in a header.  You may recall that when I took the door frame off it was revealed that there wasn't a header there at all.  The space was open for a few feet, right up to the attic!  Yeah, um...

My challenges with installing it?

1)  On one end, there wasn't anything to affix it to.  There was one vertical 2"x4" at one end of the door opening, so I installed one at the opposite end.  The vertical ends of those are what the horizontal ends of the header could but affixed to -- the header being under the vertical ends.  (Those red bars represent the vertical 2"x4"s.)

2)  I installed the second support the same length as the existing one so they would match.  Problem with that was, they weren't long enough to have the header extend past the jagged edge of the door opening above the door.  Yes, theoretically I could have cut that off evenly... but I'm not that comfortable with the saw that I have for that type of cutting, and I was worried that the stress of the saw blade on the wood might do more damage than good.  Maybe I should have tried it.  Maybe I'll try it on the next door... if I get comfortable with it I could also use it on the sides of the door...

2)  To remedy that I added some wood pieces to the ends of the 2"x4"s to drop the header a couple of inches lower. 

3)  Then I realized the wall opening (the thickness of the wall) wasn't wide enough to accept a full 2"x4" so I had to rip the 2"x4" to be  a 2"x3". 

4)  Even with that it still wouldn't fit up into the wall because obstructing the opening were old nails sticking inside the wall from the sheetrock!  Ugh!  To remedy that I had to cut away some of the sheetrock above the door inside the room, and then backed the nails out.  Finally the header would slide into place!

5)  I really needed another set of hands at this point -- I needed just a hair of a shim on the header ends, and I was drilling in the screws over my head -- never fun -- but I managed to get it in. 

Through all of this my dog was in a corner of the house as far away from me as she could get... she doesn't like the noise.  And since it was oh, 110 here yesterday it's not as though she could hang around outdoors for very long...

So -- header?  Check.  Next I needed to build out the door frame so that I would have enough width on the outside of the bedroom door (the hallway side of the door) to install trim.  The way it currently is, the space along side the door frame is wide enough for trim that is about 1/2 wide.  The reasons that the old frame was built out in such a crazy fashion is becoming clear to me...

See how there is no room for trim?

Here's what it used to look like:

My plan is to put in some spacer blocks to which I'll attach a 2"x6" and then that is what I'll attach my final door trim lumber to.  Here I have the blocks in place:

I could have used a solid piece of lumber floor to ceiling there, instead of blocks, but it isn't going to show so I figured I'd save myself some lumber.  (I have to do both sides.) 

Complicating matters (if you are even still reading I give you major snaps --) is the right hand side shown in this photo -- is immediately adjacent to the hall closet door/door frame.  To build that side out far enough to have room for a full piece of trim would make my previously much oversized door opening smaller than a standard 32" door.  Here's a view of that corner with the bedroom door trim removed:

Cozy, isn't it?  Before I build out this side of the door opening, I will need to decide if I would rather have a smaller opening (smaller than the opening for a standard 32" door) with full width trim, or a larger opening with narrower trim. 

I'm not sure that accomodating a standard door size is a priority.  My current plan of a sliding barn door gives me a lot of flexibility, as does my Plan B of building my own doors -- in which case I can make them any size I want.  Now if I am considering another owner down the road who may want to replace the door, then I probably want the door frame to accomodate a standard sized door....

Do you see now how this has been a slow project? Each little piece of it is met with an issue to resolve, it seems.  Thankfully I don't have a deadline -- no big parties at my house on the horizon, no house guests scheduled until late October... so I am free to mess around with it and problem solve at my own pace.  As long as I can tolerate living in a construction zone, that is...  And won't it be grand when it's done and I have that great sence of accomplishment?  I'll know exactly what is inside the walls (there's a novel concept) and be pleased to know that it was done right.

Next up? 

I need to go buy a couple 2"x6"s... and frame out the door opening. 

Then I'll patch the sheetrock around the door opening, and texture/paint. 

While that is drying I'll stain my lumber for the door frame and trim, and then install.

Meanwhile I need to choose barn door hardware and make sure there isn't anything crazy involved in that installation!

Wanna place a bet on how many additional steps will be added into that list before it's all done?  Stay tuned.

My House - the 1950's

My last post about the history of my house was here http://my1929tudor.blogspot.com/2011/07/my-house-1940s.html where I gave you the ups and downs of the 1940's.  Onward, now to the 1950's.

1950:  Nettie is now the school cafeteria manager at Travis Elementary.

1951:  This year, when the City Directory was published, Nettie is listed as a widow.  Also notably her employment is not listed.  I don't know if she was in between jobs at the time, or if its just a printing error, because in

1952:  Nettie is listed as working as a dietician.  I don't know if she was doing that work for the school, or for someone else.

1953-54:  Nettie continues to live in the house.  Nopw she's working as the lunch room manager for Crockett School.

May 31, 1953:  I found a newspaper article this date, that gave news of an upcoming Sunday tea, where a bridal engagement will be announced.  The bride-elect, Doris, is listed as living in my house.  I don't know who she is... but she's marrying Ed.  It seems a bit anti-climatic to announce the upcoming tea, during which an engagement is going to be annnouced... er, so, now we already know, right?  I'm confused!  The article says that Miss Glenys (the sister of Doris the bride-elect) will be "registering" the tea party guests.  And it says an "old fashioned bridal bouquet of pink and yellow carnations will center the tea table, and the table will be covered with an aqua table cloth."  The wedding date is set for August 15th.  Here is a photo of Doris:

1955-56:  Netie must love the schools, because she's changed jobs again, but she's still doing school food.  She's the Lunch Room Engineer for the Board of Education! 

1957-1964:  She's back at Crocket, working in the lunch room.  Maybe back then all the school cafeteria positions were on some type of rotation...  I'll bet her feet are tired.

1965:  Par-tay!  Nettie retired this year.

1966-1975:  Not much news listed anymore; the newspaper formats were changing.  But in 1975 the City Directory became a telephone book -- Nettie got a phone!  Her number was 321-3219.  I'd like to ring her up...

Pocket Door - Out

My office internet has been down, so I haven't been posting... (far too busy at home to blog - must blog at work - ha!)

I talked through the pocket door idea with Red and reluctantly concluded that a pocket door is a bigger project than I want to take on.  The type of construction of my walls, combined with having to relocate electrical, and topped off -- so to speak -- with the need to install a header was just too much.

So now I am back to either an oversized traditional hinged door, or a barn door style.  Here are a couple of photographs of the barn door styles:

Photos courtesy of www.BarnDoorHardware.com

I could still make my own door -- in a traditional style that matches the other doors in the house but wider -- or I could do a rustic barn door style.  I could have one large door, or I could have two narrower doors where one slides left and one slides to the right...

Because I have a light switch and an outlet just 4-5 inches away from the door frame, I would need enough track to allow the door to go all the way past those to have access to them; but that doesn't seem like a huge deal.  It would also bump into my row of 5 clothes hooks, but I think I could put 2 of the hooks on the door itself, and/or move the hooks closer to one another.  A less attractive option would be to reduce the number of hooks from 5 to 3, but if you could see what heavy use they get you'd agree: not optimal.

I found http://www.barndoorhardware.com/ which has a mind-blowing selection of styles and types and lots of fun photos of doors in place to help you dream. 

Right now I am leaning towards the barn door style over the traditional hinged door style.  What do you think?  Which do you like?

Barrel in Place

Here's the newly painted barrel in place...

Blends in nicely!  Maybe I'll paint the concrete pad and cement blocks too...

Interior Door Trim and Door Frames

SATURDAY

This weekend the interior door trim and door frame project got underway in earnest.  I was so excited to begin that I could hardly relax and have morning coffee with Red. I traded vehicles with him for the day, and headed out to Home Depot.  To those of you who gave me Home Depot gift cards for my birthday -- thank you!  This is what they purchased....

As an aside, Home Depot only had half of their overhead lights on -- I presume to conserve energy since it's so hot and the electric grid is continually threatened -- but it lent itself to a very different shopping atmosphere... sort of nice...

I finished removing the door trim off the outside of the bedroom door, and was left with the door frame -- entirely freestanding.  All that had been holding it in place and plumb was the trim!  I cannot conceive how it was still plumb, but it was. I guess that is a testament to the sturdiness of my house despite many boards appearing to have been cut with a hatchet...

I carefully removed the door frame intact and stabilized the corners and legs for transport.  At this point I hoped to use it as a pattern for my new frame; size, height, door hardware placement, etc.

Here is the "before" photo of the outside of the bedroom door.  I know -- and I agree -- it doesn't look bad enough here that replacement is required.  But what the photo doesn't show is the just ghastly amount of crusty old paint and painted caulk that is making the whole structure a lumpy, formless goo. 

And here is what it looks like now:

The doorway is positively huge!  It's larger than the door I took down by a good 6 inches in width.  Red and I spent quite a bit of time Saturday afternoon discussing building the opening up to fit the smaller door.  Eventually the obvious occured to him (it never did to me...) and he asked,

"When are you going to build the new door?" 

Me:  Um, sometime when it isn't 110 degrees outside when I'm teaching myself a new project?

Red:  Why don't you just build a larger door, to fit this opening, rather than make the opening smaller?

Me:  Silent stare.  Oh.  Yes, why don't I?

We had both remarked earlier how nice the larger door frame looks -- how spacious it feels.  So why would I enclose that again?  Hmmm.  I'll have to think about that.  And with that, we were off to dinner.

SUNDAY

Sunday morning over coffee I thought about what Red said about making a custom door to fit. I also thought about how spacious the room feels without a door. And then the lightbulb came on: a pocket door! My walls are certainly thick enough (hollow enough) accomodate the hardware and door.  I turned this idea over in my mind during most of the day while I worked...

Immediately adjacent to the door (but not visible in the photograph above) is a little* closet that I use for my vacuum and cleaning supplies.  The trim from both of the doors was compromised in the corner...

It became readily apparent that in working on the bedroom door, I'd need to remove the trim (and about 3 tubes of caulk) from the adjoining cleaning closet door.

Closet door trim removed

That helped me see things more clearly, but I continued and took the door off in anticipation of removing the frame.  This door frame, like the first one, also was not secured by anything other than the door trim.  It did however have a couple of "shims" wedged in.  Not actually attached, mind you, but in place.

Again, utter amazement that the door frame is still plumb.

Where I removed the frame from the bedroom door, there was some goopy white paint on the flooring as well as quite a build up of floor wax and polyeurathane, forming a pretty high ridge. I got my sander and gave it an initial clean up -- it will need more...

"Before"

Right side "after"

Left side "after"

 

Sunday evening I did some online research on pocket doors -- pros and cons and what quality issues to watch for, and watched a couple of installation videos.  I'm fairly certain it's the route I want to go.  Installation would require me to remove a few feet of sheetrock, but I am okay with that.  I looked at pocket doors at Home Depot, but am going to look elsewhere; I wasn't pleased with what they offered.  I was going to do some online searches today (Monday) but since I neglected to take measurements this morning it will have to wait.

The bummer is, until I think this part through, I'm sort of at a standstill on this project unless I want to demo more door frames before this one is resolved... and I do not.  I am already sleeping with a compressor in my bedroom (who else do you know who does that?), and lots of construction tools etc. are in my guest room.  Probably best not to not go completely crazy before I finish the first one...

More updates to come!

*Mostly it's "little" because there is an old furnace chimney coming up from the crawlspace that hogs most of the closet space.  Word on the street is that every house in the area has one, and it has asbestos in it.  Consequently they have been left alone for the most part.  Mine is wallpapered!  Makes me laugh.  It also makes me want to rip it out.