At Home In The Woods

[Obed]

Yesterday we got the gas meter hooked up to the house and turned on. Today the H&A guy fired up the gas water heater and gas furnace. The HVAC thermostat has a neat feature; you can configure the max temp to which the heat can be set and the min temp to which the AC can be set.

 

[Obed]

Cat Door

We needed to install a cat door between the kitchen and garage in order to be able to move into the house. We plan on putting the litter box in the garage. We waited until we got our certificate of occupancy before installing the cat door because it appears the county can get very particular about what you install in a garage.

My impression is that most people install cat doors in doors but we wanted to install our cat door in the wall. I had to install some blocking inside the drywall to form a "tunnel" through the 2x6 framed wall. Some cat doors can be ordered with an optional "wall kit" but they are expensive. Of course if I consider how long it took me to install the cat door tunnel framing after the drywall was already hung, it would probably have been worth it to order the expensive kits. However, it was mostly a case of wanting to get the job done immedately without waiting for a special order kit.

I used a Dremmel to modify the cat door so I could install it in a wall instead of in a door. I used the existing stud in the wall to form one side of the tunnel. I sanded the stud to prepare it for painting. I cut 1x6 boards to form the other 3 sides of the tunnel, these boards did not require sanding. I screwed two 2x6 vertical boards to the bottom plate to support the bottom horizontal 1x6. I screwwd the other two 1x6 boards to the drywall. I put 2 temporary screws in the top 1x6 to give me a handle so I could position the tightly fitting board.

The cat door is now ready for screwing to the wall. My wife will spackle and sand the screw holes then paint. After painting I will screw the cat door to the wall and be finished. I hope we won't have problems training our old cat to use the cat door.

 

[medicshawn]

Just make sure you have a smoke detector close by inside the house, and if there are gas appliances in the garage a carbon monoxide detector. You've just made it much easier for fire and dangerous gasses to enter your house. That's why the county is probably a little funny about breaching that barrier. I understand you're an adult but just wanted to point that out to you.

 

[eepete]

The phrase "training a cat" seems so unnatural... :laughing:

We taped the door open for a while, this let the cats figure out that a passage was good. Cat treats on the other side of the door are good icebreakers. We kept lowering the door so the cats got used to it rubbing on the spine when they used it, and to having the door move.

Then there is the day of reckoning when you close it and let the cat go up and push on it, see that it moves and figure it out.

One cat was very stubborn and would just bang on the door so we would come and hold it open. For a while, she was more successful at training us than we were with training her :confused2:.

Good luck....

Pete

 

[Obed]

Congrats Obed..

I would guess you now have some furniture and appliances to buy? That can get expensive but its fun kinda

walleyed,
Yes we have some purchases to make. We have furniture for the bedrooms in our storage trailer. We need living room furniture. We will start looking for used furniture on craig's list.

We have bought a new dishwasher. We have the other appliances from our last house in the storage trailer. We have a hand-me-down electric stove we got from our parents. Eventually we will replace the stove with a gas unit.

In general we like to buy used big ticket items (cars, furniture, etc) and pay cash. The markup for new items can be very high. When we can, we try to avoid paying for things that we can't sell for the same price one day later. You typically lose thousands of dollars the instant you drive a new car off the lot. Quality furniture at a fraction of the new price becomes available as people remodel or move. I hope we can be patient as we look for LR furniture.

 

[walleyed]

walleyed,
Yes we have some purchases to make. We have furniture for the bedrooms in our storage trailer. We need living room furniture. We will start looking for used furniture on craig's list.

We have bought a new dishwasher. We have the other appliances from our last house in the storage trailer. We have a hand-me-down electric stove we got from our parents. Eventually we will replace the stove with a gas unit.

In general we like to buy used big ticket items (cars, furniture, etc) and pay cash. The markup for new items can be very high. When we can, we try to avoid paying for things that we can't sell for the same price one day later. You typically lose thousands of dollars the instant you drive a new car off the lot. Quality furniture at a fraction of the new price becomes available as people remodel or move. I hope we can be patient as we look for LR furniture.

I had totally forgot about your storage trailer. Good you have a nice start on furnishing the house.

My wife wouldn't let me buy used funiture. Appliances are no problem but anything with fabric she is afraid of bugs. We got a couch many years ago when we were first married that had flees. Ended up having to get the house sprayed for them.

Moving in this week? I'm so happy for you guys. Enjoy it.

 

[Obed]

Obed, I have a suggestion for you on the fridge, get one with the freezer on the bottom. These are much more common now days. I had never seen one until I met my wife (30 some odd years ago). We have always had one since. You open the fridge part 10 to 20 times more often than the freezer part. It is much more convenient.

Russ

Russ,
When we bought a fridge for our last house, we looked at the bottom freezer models and really liked them. However, we ended up with a top freezer model because the one we bought was half the price of the lowest pricked bottom freezer models.
Obed

 

[Obed]

Obed, I too give you my congratulations!!! Now to keep this thread going you need to start on a big outbuilding!! Will you keep the rv or end up selling it?

We will sell the camper as quickly as possible. We don't have to get top price; we want to free up the camper space for parking and no longer have to maintain it.

Obed

 

[Obed]

The phrase "training a cat" seems so unnatural... :laughing:

We taped the door open for a while, this let the cats figure out that a passage was good. Cat treats on the other side of the door are good icebreakers. We kept lowering the door so the cats got used to it rubbing on the spine when they used it, and to having the door move.

Pete,
Great suggestions. Thanks.

Do you have cat doors in walls? Did you install them during the house construction or afterwards? Do you have any cat doors in exterior walls/doors? How well insulated are they? My general impression is that most of the pet doors are not insulated very well; you might as well just have an open hole in your wall.

Obed

 

[Obed]

Thanks all for the congrats. This house building project has been one of the biggest tasks that either my wife or I have undertaken. I consider it to be similar to getting my college engineering degree with respect to difficulty and stress. In some respects it's been more stressful than college. This project just didn't take as long as the degree did.

A general contractor friend of mine from my home town has asked me several times how my marriage was doing during the house build. He said that building a house can be tough on a marriage; I would agree. My wife and I have had our share of difficult conversations during this period. We are fine, only because my wife has been wiiling to forgive my contankerousness. Unless your marriage is rock solid, I would not recommend building a house, especially if you act as the GC.