OS Singlies - We Do It Our Way!

greenbee

CC - I'm having the cupboard removed from under the stairs as I'd rather have the open space. Do you want to swap?!

calicocat

greenbee wrote: »

CC - I'm having the cupboard removed from under the stairs as I'd rather have the open space. Do you want to swap?!

Fab idea....is yours the whole width of the room?....mine is a garage that has been converted to a room, my stairs are in the middle of the house (which I do love, but means all heat flies upstairs) .....so I have a huge 8 ft by 4 ft kind of under gap in the room, if that makes any sense??, when I can afford to do it, it will be fab storage space..at the moment I have a curtain across (which I don't think looks bad) , but ideally the whole thing would be a cupboard.

greenbee

It's in the middle of the house, but with a half landing, so the space under it is very low. I know I won't use it as a cupboard, so might as well open it (I'm thinking of putting wine rack all round the wall...). Heat goes up the stairs here too, but I work on the basis that having the heating on downstairs keeps upstairs at an OK temperature while the rads there are on low. One day I'll get a new front door (have to do the windows first) and then the hall will be a LOT warmer. Then again having some kind of flooring over the concrete would probably be a help!

Mrs_Bones

Hi everyone, seems ages since I've been on the thread, but it's only a few days, going to have a read back in a bit to see what you've all been chattering about.

My dad's partner had to go in hospital for an op this week so I've had him over for lunch every day and sent him home with sandwiches at night. Also been doing a lot of batch cooking so they've got things in the freezer to just reheat now she's back home. It doesn't sound much but I'm feeling shattered both in body and mind. When I think back to all I use to do at work and outside of work I think I must be getting ready for the knackers yard. :rotfl:

I took up a special offer last week on Ancestry site so going to try and pick up my family history again.

boddy

Hi everyone.

Been a busy day. I've had workmen in putting a wet wall on over the tiles in the shower. I'm so pleased with it. It looks much better. The workmen were really good and cleaned up after themselves so there was not much for me to do when they had finished. They arrived on time and were lovely.

Byatt

Winter_Phoenix wrote: »

I love this expression, it's brilliant! Please may I borrow it to use in future?

And I've just caught up with all the postings about doing up houses. I've renovated three old houses, and I well remember the endless mess, the frustrations, the managing without absolute essentials (like floorboards, or heating, or a kitchen). Finally you get to the end, and everything's absolutely perfect, and you love it. Then six months later you're looking at houses in estate agents' windows, desperate to put your perfect, finished house on the market and buy another complete wreck! :rotfl:

I think my house-renovating days are over. This one didn't need much doing to it, and I've lived here for a few years without doing much more than moving an internal wall and a cloakroom, and upgrading/updating it with en suites, and putting in new steps, and having a new roof, and - oh, hang on, I said I hadn't done much to it, didn't I?

Yes, of course.

I've never renovated a house but have had builders in when doing improvements/converting garage etc. Hated every minute of it. The worst was when we had new windows, it was a friday, men were keen to finish early, tried ripping out old windows and seemed never to have done it before as they spent some time phoning head office asking what to do. They left, and there were huge gaps between frames and walls, this was winter so not good at all. I had been at work and ex was supposed to be supervising and never said a thing! :eek: So having a man around is no guarantee things will go smoothly or that they command more respect.

I do flat packs, always use a cordeless screwdriver, makes the job so much easier. The first flat pack I did, was a bathroom cabinet, I made a small mistake, hinges put on the outside instead of inside, but I was so chuffed with myself. :T I repaired my bed recently, it's a heavy mahogony French wooden bed, and I thought I would have to get a man in, although explaining why was worrying me, :rotfl:, but then decided to have one last go repairing it, and a couple of hours later, several bruises (needed 2 people really to hold the frame, but I used my legs) and a lot of swearing but it's now solid as a rock!

singlestep

I'm having a day off.

There's plenty of work that's followed me home but I just can't do it. Went out for a brisk walk in between spells of rain and do feel a bit better but I'm doing nothing more demanding than finishing the laundry, cooking beef and broccoli stirfry and planning the next few days' meals.

Next week's soup lunch is going to be green as I have leftover celery, leeks, kale, broccoli, courgette and sprouts to use up and, if necessary, a solitary baking potato and frozen spinach and peas. Hope it tastes ok, but I really cba with shops today. I make soup on a Sunday morning, portion it up once cooled - usually end up with four for the week, two for my mum and one or two for the freezer.

moneyistooshorttomention

Re the doing work on the house...that physical strength restriction from having this weaker female body is a bit of a problem. Right now...my back is feeling very much the worse for wear from thinking "Surely I can manage to do so-and-so myself". Errrm...I got that wrong then didn't I?:(

I think that's the two things women face when doing DIY type stuff...one is there simply aint any arguing with the fact we have a lower level of physical strength than men. The other is getting our confidence up to think "Maybe it's worth me having a try...".

Am currently trying to remind myself that we must have an advantage over men, in that we admit we don't know what the heck we are doing on this front and need to learn (but it's not the done thing for a man to admit DIY uselessness). We DO need an counterbalancing factor...as there's no point in not admitting that most of us just don't have the physical strength factor. I can say because I think I rate at "lowest end of that spectrum" even by female standards.:cool: I simply haven't GOT any physical strength and that's that...

It's certainly one of the things that strikes me forcibly whenever I look at DIY tools that there are a few items that have been re-designed to meet womens usual lower physical strength and then there's the others (ie the ones that are rather heavy for us). I tend to just think "Dear firm...get with it and update to 21st century and make lighter-weight versions of whatever item of machinery it is or go out of business" but it does take some doing for that message to get through to some companies imo.

I'd say that for those of us on the cusp of the "both sexes do things like that equally era" then it's obvious to me that dead simple step-by-step how-to explanations are needed for everything, because we didn't imbibe it at birth. In my more "mellow" moods I try and remind myself that many men would quail at the equivalent in reverse and, if someone said to me "Make a white sauce" or somesuch cookery equivalent I'd say "Yep...no problem" because I've taught myself how to. Hence I guess that the "male" equivalent is how to get an unwanted nail or screw out of something and I will be standing there puzzled, but yer traditional male wouldn't understand why I was concerned, as to them it would be Easy Peasy Territory.

So..yep...I personally think maybe I have got a couple of "Hopeful Males" lurking in the vicinity...but I want to feel I can get these tasks done without having to think "So and so maybe has some sort of 'interest' in me and maybe....". It would be so easy to bat my eyelashes, but then I don't want to give any stray males in the vicinity any "hopeful thoughts" when they aren't warranted...because I'm quite okay on my own thanks very much..

Byatt

I know my physical strength has weakened as I've got older, and although not having the same strength as some men, I think I overcome those problems through sheer strength of will and thinking outside the box. I have always had a go, and hauled various things about that whilst taking me probably a lot longer than some men would, I do usually succeed.

Combined with my DD, who is surprisingly strong, (she's 5ft nothing), we have managed moving house, once completely by myself. :eek:

I think a lot of men are useless at DIY, my ex certainly is...my father was brilliant at all those sort of things, so I wrongly assumed all men were!

Both brothers are useless too (in more ways than one, I have to add:rotfl:) although good at other things (music/art/buLLsh!t).

OTOH, a female cousin completely renovated a house, building work, as well as the more decorative aspects.

I think if I had had the choices/was taught by father/was interested when I was younger I could do DIY with the best of them. It's a learning curve, unless you try, you don't learn.

I must admit at my age of 60, it's the last thing I'd want to do as a project now, I'd rather learn Italian! :rotfl:

edit, I don't do batting of eyelashes, I'm very independent, too much probably.:eek:

moneyistooshorttomention

Byatt

My father was a polymath and didn't make any assumptions that his daughter "couldn't" just because of me being female, so I guess that's one positive thing in a way. Negative in another way...because I know most people aren't in his league and I personally often get stopped at the Start Gate by the fact that I'm not either. I don't get ridiculed/belittled by my male parent for wanting to do "whatever", as he thinks I should be doing so much more.

I'll admit to the "not actually interested as such" about things like that, whereas I can see that a good cooking session will produce something very tangible quickly (like a nice meal).

I haven't yet convinced myself that I have the confidence and that, combined with a lot of firms are still not making tools okay for us, can/does easily throw me off track personally and I get cooking instead...:o

Think it depends a bit on how our mind functions, in that I personally can easily follow the basic "step by step" thing in some ways IF instructions are couched at Idiots Level...but they usually aren't and then there are those 20th/early 21st century tools and I take to my equivalent of you and think "Better learn some Welsh instead then....and I'll get a concrete response...as in someone smiling at me (or killing themselves laughing) for me trying".