Pond in Southern Illinois

[sissy]

sheetmetal man there is never any light at the end of the tunnel LOL .You always are tweeking it no matter what or getting a new idea .Remember that when those words come back to bite you ,I know I said that at least 20 times (I'm done ) sure (I 'm done )never done

 

[addy1]

Thanks everybody. We looked at a lot of different flooring Addy, and FINALLY, me and Anne agreed on the prefinished Gunstock Oak from Lumber Liguidators (if we had took our teenagers looking with us, we probably would still be cussing & Discussing--theres just so many varieties and styles out there) I would have liked the 5 inch boards with the handscraped look--she wanted the 2 inch boards in the traditional smooth look and we comprised on 3 1/4 inch smooth. Now I need to find a great flooring website like I did when I found this great Pond website and research all the ends and outs of laying Hardwood Floors.

Rent a floor nailer (home depot, we rented a air one), if you can lay it out so the flooring is perpendicular to the main light source i.e. windows then every little imperfection does not show as well. Lay out your pattern, long and shorts, you also want the ends to be at least 8-10 inches from the next end, makes a nice random pattern.
Use the cut end of one board for the start of the next row. less waste that way.
Make sure the floor you are laying it on is screwed down well (if wood sub floor) ow it squeaks.
If on concrete use the flooring glue, ($100 for 5 gallons) have mineral spirits to wipe it up when it gets everywhere.

 

[CountryEscape]

Tim, I LOVE the sidewalk you did, and thanks so much for sharing it! I hope you don't mind, but I think I will use your idea for my pathway from sidewalk to far side of my pond which I hope to someday be a patio area as well, complete with fire pit! I am so glad that others have the idea of using different styles of stone like you did, as it is the first time I've seen "different" all together to see how great it looks! I have done the same thing here. Using mainly the red/black stones, but different types and shapes of stone for the pathways and walls.
Anne is one lucky lady to have you to love doing all the projects that you do around your place! I'm sure she helps as well, but the fact you research so much like you do, it's obvious you do the best job possible, and you compromise! What a great marriage you must have. Good luck on your flooring.

 

[Sheetmetalman]

Your right Sissy--if its something you like and enjoy, then your never done-always tweaking something here and there. Thanks for the flooring advise Addy--I see what you are saying about the windows. By all means Patti, use any Idea of mine you want--thats what were all here for-- to share ideas and make our projects work out better. Working 10 hour days still so I probably wont be responding to comments till the weekend--have a good week everybody.

 

[CountryEscape]

Wow, Addy, next time I'm thinking of removing carpet and replacing with wood floors, I'm going to contact YOU for advice! I think you have probably done everything in your life. I'm VERY impressed!

 

[addy1]

Wow, Addy, next time I'm thinking of removing carpet and replacing with wood floors, I'm going to contact YOU for advice! I think you have probably done everything in your life. I'm VERY impressed!

I hate carpet country! so to get rid of carpet you have to put something down..........laughing. My arizona home was totally carpeted, within a year or so all stone, tile, wood floors, the carpet was put under my pond there............

My dad raised me with tools in hand, never played with dolls, then owning a home (no hubby at the time) you learn even more. Then married but hubby became disabled keep on learning and doing.......I love tools and use the net, people, observation and learn how to do almost everything. (not always successful, but called the learning curve!) Will not mess with electricity though, unless it is simple things.

 

[CountryEscape]

I agree, Addy, learn by doing, and go to the internet to learn if you don't know how! I never did anything when married, ex did all the repairs, carpentry, etc. He was carpenter! He also did all automotive maintenance stuff. Well, once I got out on my own, I taught myself to do thing, and when people came to do things I didn't know how, I made sure I was there to learn, so I could do it next time! I've had lots of great teachers over the last 6 years. It's very liberating to know that I've done things that 7 years ago I would never have tried (or if I had, I would have been told I did it wrong LOL). I'm super impressed with your wealth of knowledge! Just goes to show when we need to get things done, and don't want to spend the money to have someone else do it, we CAN and DO learn to do things ourselves. I got a bid for power washing, priming and painting my barns. I thought the price was very high, and when I got prices on doing it myself, learned my nephew, of all people, was going to make about $4,000 in labor on ME! Nay nay!!! I did the job for about 1/3 his quote. Now, if the neighbor will just get over here and get the big barn roof (it's an 8/12 so no way am I going to even think about trying to help, somewhat scared of heights as it is!) and old wood siding covered with the new metal I bought and paid for 3 months ago, my place will really look super! I am scared to death of electricity, too! Plumbing I can do, I found out, but never will try electricity. Add that to my list of things that scare me - snapping turtles, bugs that sting/bite, and electricity that shocks you! LOL

 

[HARO]

Learn by doing! Something we should be telling the younger generation. I've always been a quick learner, and have helped out on many a project. When we decided we needed our own home, and not a rental, my sweety and I figured out what we needed, then I drew up the blueprints, and with minimal outside help we built the entire thing from the ground up. I did all the plumbing, wiring, whatever needed to be done, and saved a bundle. Our grandkids, on the other hand, will be able to do anything--- as long as it can be done with two thumbs on a keyboard! John

 

[CountryEscape]

John, I hear you! In Illinois, they have a campaign to "get kids outside at least one hour a day"! Can you believe that?! Of course, we all know that kids these days would prefer to be on their computers, Ipods, Play Stations (I'm not even sure how many updates there are to these!) and so forth. They do not get out and "play" like we used to. My own children are 26 and 27, grew up in the country, we did NOT have cable TV or any computer games to speak of until they were almost graduated from high school. Therefore, they are the exception to the rule. They learned to ride their bikes to friend's houses, or walk. And, that might have been a mile or more, not next door. They went fishing and hunting for fun. They had animals to take care of, and did a fine job of it. Oh, I'd better get off my soap box! This is a thread about Tim's super patio and pond! Yes, we all need to show our kids how to do things so they will learn and do them alone as well!

 

[Sheetmetalman]

Hi everybody, its been close to a month since the last time I posted here. Its been a busy month, we bought the hardwood floor, then started researching how to lay it--glad we did our homework because we found out you shouldnt lay hardwood over particle board, and you guessed it, my home's subfloor is da#%d particle board, lol. We had to buy plywood then rip up the particle board and lay that over the existing 5/8 plywood that is my primary (lower) subfloor. Anne wanted to risk it and lay over the particle board because we found several websites where people had posted that they had done that successfully but I didnt want sqeaky loose boards if the nails didnt hold good in the particle board. Also our hardwood floors 25 year warranty wood be voided if it was layed over particle board so I told Anne we just couldnt risk it.

 

[Sheetmetalman]

With tearing out the particle board and replacing it, a big project turned into a huge labor intensive project but we both agreed we didnt want to go back to carpet and so I went with an old saying from a buddy of mine, Sid always says "that Project may be big but so is an elephant and you can still eat him one bite at a time". So we started eating our elephant and although weve made a few minor mistakes were happy with the results so far, although we both wish it was done. We knew it would take some time and so we eliminated as much furniture from the room as we could then moved the rest to one half of the living room and tore up the other half and got started. Its worked pretty well, we lived in that half and worked on the other half then once it was done we moved over onto the hardwood and tore out the second half and the hallway. Thats were we stand right now, hopefully we will be done by next weekend and I can get back on my pond and patio that Ive neglected somewhat with all this going on. With cooler weather arriving here the leaves have been overwhelming my skimmer system so I turned it and the waterfall off to protect my pump and started my new air pump bubbler system in its place.

 

[Sheetmetalman]

I followed your advice Addy and put the flooring perpandicular to the windows and I see what you mean--it throws the cracks (and any minor mistakes) into shadow instead of shineing straight dawn the seams. When we pulled up the old subfloor it was held down with ringshank nails and some had loosened so we had some squeaks but we went back with heavy duty deck screws which took care of that problem--overall were both very happy with the floor so far and I hope we can finish it without many problems, then we will concentrate on the oak stairs down to the basement family room and bedrooms.

 

[addy1]

That is looking great! I know what you mean about wishing it was done, been there many times with many projects, but it is so nice when it is done.

 

[sissy]

looks great and better to pull up the particle board in my house it was odd the sub floors when the house was built I requested plywood and all the rooms were plywood except for my master suite he put osb which is different than particle board .My wood floors were laid before I moved from NJ to VA and the master suite after a year I noticed something was wrong ,the floors were shifting and you could see gaps .I called the wood floor company they came an inspected and said they would replace the floor as there installer put them in and should have said something about the osb and not installed the floor over that either .I gave them an empty house to install the flooring and now I have massive bedroom furniture in there so they had to hire a mover to move everything to the great room and then they manage in that to break one of 2 ceiling fans .The bedroom is 19 by 32 ft and the flooring company was not happy .They replaced the fan and had to replace the shoe molding also ,so motto is you can not even thrust the pro's to do it right .Particle board is worse and just falls apart as I can tell by your pics and found the reason is that it does not hold well in either application is that the staples they use loosen up more in those products .What I understand from reading on the internet some do work but over time you may see a change in the flooring and that comes because all wood flooring these days is not from older growth trees .I'm glad it was only one room

 

[Sheetmetalman]

Thanks Addy & Sissy, and Sissy your master bedroom situation was exactly the nightmare senario I wanted to avoid since the installer is me, lol. Well heres some Pics of the pond and patio since thats what were here for -not hardwood floors. This was in the morning before Anne blew the leaves out where I could mulch them with my mower--it looks a lot better now but it will only last 2 or 3 days before all the leaves will be back. I bought a big swimming pool skimmer net today since my little one just wasnt cutting it. I have been so busy with 10 hour work days and 4 hour flooring nights that I hav'nt got the leaves skimmed off in time, so with the skimmer overwhelmed by the leaves, a lot of them sank the 5 & 1/2 feet to the bottom of the pond. I plan on fishing them back out tommorow evening.