Feeling like home

Wow, time has been flying by. Lots of "normal" work to do, so we've only been working on the house a few hours each night.

We started the weekend by organizing the piles of tools and stuff. I took a hint from my dad and bought two small tool boxes, one for plumbing and one for electrical. I also bought a tool bag thing with lots of pockets. We're not 100% organized yet, but things are much tidier.

Before:





After:



We got tired of staring at a non-working kitchen faucet, so we spent some more time under the house running the supply lines. I'm a huge fan of the Shark Bite fittings and PEX pipe. Instead of completely drying the copper and using the torch in tight places, I can quickly tap into the main lines and use a minimum of fittings.

Here's how I tapped into the cold and hot water lines:





I had started by building some 2x4 supports for the three stub-outs that extend into the island sink cabinet. This shot shows the hot/cold lines for the sink, hot line for the dishwasher and shock arrestor on the hot water line:



Here's the three stub-outs going up through the floor...



... connecting to the shut-off valves under the sink:



After getting some drain plumbing advice on Terry Love's forum, I ended up redoing the drain. I replaced the 1-1/2" vertical pipe with 2", and used a Santee fitting instead of the supply tee I incorrectly used the first time. I wasn't quite as careful with the PVC primer this time.



After cleaning up the tools on Saturday, I started laying some more floor in the TV area. Jen came home about halfway through and helped me finish.



On Sunday, we headed up to Costco Home and picked up our dining set. Once again, the Jeep roof rack saved us a delivery charge. We had to unpack the chairs to get 'em in the back, though. We barely got everything to fit!





When we get back from California, we'll run the electrical to the island and undercabinet lighting, then install the dishwasher.