Lila's DIY Page

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We have done many do-it-yourself and/or home improvement projects around the house.  Here is some information I have about projects we've done.

Concrete Staining our floors

When we moved in our house there was carpet in all rooms except the bathroom and the kitchen.  We wanted something different, but couldn't afford much.  We ripped out the cheap/ugly carpet that was in the house. 

We found the bedrooms had some sort of old tile (like the kind that was in your school years ago) in them and we wanted carpet in the bedrooms anyway so we decided to just cover it.  Now we just needed to figure out what kind of carpet we wanted.  We kept the existing padding since the realtor told us they had just had the carpet and padding put in so theoretically it should be practically brand new.

We went down to a commercial carpet installer's warehouse here in the San Diego area called Resource Flooring and looked at the extra carpet they had available.  This is carpet that was ordered for a building somewhere and is left over after the job.  Designers typically order extra (especially for custom orders) just in case there is some sort of uh-oh.

We found a carpet that I was very hesitant about, but Jeff (who is an architect) talked me into it.  It had a distinct pattern which I thought might overpower the house, but of course, in the end, he was right.  Hey, I guess he does this for a living so I should've known to trust him.

We had installers install the carpet in the three bedrooms and then had a piece cut for the living room which was about 18" short all the way around and then paid them to bind it.

Now Jeff spent countless hours stripping and preparing the concrete floor for a chemical acid stain.  Let me tell you that there must've been 4 or 5 layers of vinyl in the kitchen and at least 2 in the bathroom.  It was a ton of work.  In the livingroom, dining room and hall this is what the process involved.

1. Pull up carpet and tack strips
2. Strip glue from floor that was holding carpet padding down
3. Patch holes in concrete left by nails in tack strip
4. Grind down the concrete patches
5. Clean all floors
6. Stain all floor with a chemical acid stain from Lithochrome (which comes in a plastic jug, not a paint can).  We used the Dark Walnut color and applied it with rags.
7. Stain a second time
8. ...at this point the floor looks really chaulky and not at all like you want it to
9. Seal with a special seal that we bought with the stain of the same brand... Lithochrome (which came in a paint can, not in a plastic jug).  This made it the deep rich olor that it is now. I think this was applied with a roller.  Check the instructions for more appropriate suggestions.
10. Wax with a product from Waxie called that says "Floor Star Finish" in big letters and then "Maximum Gloss" in small letters.  It is in a white plastic jug and I think it was installed with a roller. Check the instructions for more appropriate suggestions.

Insulating the walls in an existing house

We used J&L Insulation. 619-561-8632 They will come to your house, measure your walls and subtract the windows and doors and give you an estimate based on the sf. Then you can check SDG&E's website for the rebate. Currently it says the rebate is 15c sqft.
http://www.sdge.com/residential/single_family_rebates.shtml

Ours ended up being $680, but we didn't do the kitchen because we didn't want to drill holes in the wood siding and it was too hard to get to from the inside because of the cabinets. We also didn't do the wall that is shared with the garage or any of the garage walls (I don't think the rebate applies for these walls anyway, but I could be wrong).