I'll Be Finished by Friday

We love our home. It isn't big. It isn't fancy. But it suits us. (Although sometimes I wish there was a way to make the dining room bigger.) Within the last dozen or so years, almost every room has been redecorated. With one little exception - the laundry room.

A couple years ago I started trolling Pinterest for laundry room makeover ideas. I found lots of great ideas. I merged the ideas I liked into a master plan for a "new" laundry room.

Cabinets - "This house has too much storage space" said no one, ever. The revamped laundry room would have cabinets - two corner cabinets, one on both ends of the corners (the side walls) and one in between the corners - over the washer and dryer. It will be a great place to store cleaners and such that are better off not stored under the kitchen sink.
Tile - The vinyl tile would be replaced with ceramic.
Walls and Ceiling - The walls would be a combination of bead board (painted white like the cabinets) and wallpaper (a black and white toile pattern was the original choice but when I started looking I chose a toile pattern that is more yellow and gray than black and white.) But most importantly, those DirectTV wires and cables that were left hanging between the wall and the ceiling would now be located behind the drywall. We also planned to remove a shelf unit in the living room that was built into the wall and protruded into the laundry room space.
Lighting - The room would have a chandelier - because well, why not?
Drying Rack - A drying rack should be installed on the wall because the floor models take up too much room and because it seems impossible to buy clothing of a quality that can withstand a tumble in the dryer without turning into a crop top making line drying a necessity.

The next step was to find someone to do the work. We have the skills but we don't have the time. We settled on someone from Mark's networking group. His price was reasonable and his timeline for the project was acceptable. (We were looking at about eight days.) He met with me and I showed him the different Pinterest pins so he would have a better idea of what I was after. He was ready to start the demolition within a matter of days.

This project was started before we went to Ohio and South Dakota in June. I wanted the demolition done before we left. I've seen too many redos on HGTV where they tore down a wall and then it was "Oh My! I wasn't expecting THAT!". I just wanted to make sure that we were home for moments like that. This house was built in 1950 - there are plenty of things that weren't necessarily done to today's standards - and things that will make a contractor say "I've never seen that before." As an inspector, Mark is able to determine what needs to be changed. But once we got past the demolition phase, I was happy to have the work completed while I was away.

But this is where it started to go wrong. The cabinets had been ordered from Home Depot. When they came in, I had been sick in bed for two days. The room was being demolished and not ready for them anyway. Then I got a text message from Home Depot telling me that said one of them was damaged and that I could call Customer Service or wait for them to call me (within 48 hours). Long story short - I was sick (like on my death bed) until the day before we were slated to leave for Ohio and didn't call them. They called me a week later (not 48 hours) so a replacement cabinet for the damaged unit wasn't ordered for a week. When it came in a week later, they had ordered the wrong cabinet and had to reorder it again. In the end, the cabinets weren't ready for pickup until the day before we got home from our three week trip.

I had asked the contractor to send me pictures of the progress. I hadn't received any pictures and was a bit concerned but otherwise busy and assumed he was, too. The only communication I had from him was to let me know that he'd have to charge me extra for the wasted trips to pick Home Depot to pick up cabinets that weren't actually ready for pick up. I wasn't especially happy, but that's something I'll take up with Home Depot.

I got home to find the laundry room as I'd left it. Another job he'd been charged with was to reframe the front door. He had cut out part of the framing and left it. He also let me know that he'd be able to pick up the cabinets on Wednesday. It was Saturday and they were available for pick up on Friday.

I was confused. Why hadn't he completed the work on the front door? Why wasn't the room painted? Why hadn't the wall where the laundry room door is been redone? Why wasn't the ceiling painted? Why wasn't the bead board installed? And don't think I didn't ask.

He told me he'd been waiting on the cabinets. Okay. Why? The only jobs contingent on the cabinets were 1. hanging the cabinets 2. fitting the shelf under the cabinets 3. laying the tile and 4. installing the light fixture.

The other jobs - reframing the front door, painting the ceiling, painting the walls, putting up and painting the bead board, redoing the wall with the door, redoing the living room wall - all of these could have been done without the cabinets. Then he told me that he wanted to be sure to have a full day's work since it was so far. ("So far" is about a twenty minutes.) And those jobs looked to me like they'd take a full day - probably more than one - especially when your day starts around 10 am and ends around 4:30 pm.

Aside from there being no reason not to do those jobs, it make sense to do all the painting before any cabinets or flooring was installed. (And there was absolutely no reason to cut half the framing off the front door and leave it exposed to the elements.) Plus if he'd done those things, he'd be finished now. But he didn't and he isn't.

He picked up the cabinets on Wednesday and installed them the same day. I was a bit surprised by that. I would have painted the ceiling and walls first. But he put up the cabinets. He has yet to level the doors. One door hasn't been put on yet and some of the shelves haven't been put in. The fill for the gaps hasn't been done yet, either.

I had asked for a time line. I wanted to know what would be done and when. Instead I got a message that informed me of the days and hours he would be working. But then in typical contractor fashion, on one third of the days indicated he was a no-show and the other days he was an hour late. When he didn't show up as scheduled last Saturday and then indicated that he would be coming Monday afternoon instead of Monday morning, Mark let him know that he needed to show up for a discussion of the project. That was this week. It was made clear that this project would NOT be lasting throughout the summer.

That day he worked until 7 pm. But here's the surprise. He laid the tile. Still no paint. Still no repair of the door, Still no bead board. He said he would be back on Wednesday and that he would be finished by Friday.

I truly didn't see how he would be done by Friday. Especially when he didn't actually show up on Wednesday. And now it's Friday. He left at 2:30 this afternoon and said he'd be back at 4 pm. And here we are - 5:00 pm on Friday. Where is he? He still needs to paint the bead board, he still needs to finish the living room wall, and reframe the front door, and frame the door to the laundry room, and paint the shelf, and trim out the cabinets and level the doors, and hang the new light fixture, and grout the tile, and seal the tile (which can't be done for a few days after the tile is grouted). Have I missed anything? Probably. I think it's going to look fabulous when it's done but I think that any future redo's will NOT be contracted out.

Here's where we started and where we are now.