I finally finished my 4 week project of getting the garage door opener installed. We purchased the garage door opener before we closed on the house with the intent to get it installed before we started painting. I thought installing the opener would be a fairly simple project, it turned out to be a nightmare. I first installed it too far back while trying to keep it away from having the door hit the rail as it opened. Then I reinstalled it against the wall but then the door would not open because of the rail. After that I got tired of messing with it so I tried to call Sears to have them come and finish the job. The lady I talked to there told me they wouldn’t work on it since I had already opened it, it was too much of a liability for whatever reason. So I decided just to finish it and bought a couple of quick-turn brackets to install at the top of the door to help it open lower. Everything went well with those and after I got them installed I mounted the garage door opener on the ceiling and hooked it up to the door. Everything actually went fairly smoothly with it for once! After I finished that I got the garage all cleaned out and we put Jodi’s car in it.

Yesterday we also bought a new grill. We had a 10% off coupon for Home Depot and thought we would use it for that. We went to Home Depot and looked at what they had, and they didn’t have very many grills put together and on display so it was difficult to see what they had available. We decided to leave Home Depot and went to Costco to see what they had, they only had two grills and they were both more money than we wanted to spend. After that we went over to Lowe’s and checked out their selection. We liked what they had and decided to buy one there, it is a BBQ Grillware brand, 3 burners, electric igniter, and a side burner. They also had a deal going where they provided free assembly, which meant we ended up getting of one the grills outside on display, and a free exchange for a full bottle of propane, which meant we had to buy a new empty bottle to exchange for a used, full bottle. It was a pretty good deal, saved us time from putting the grill together and about $20 on the propane costs.

Now we are in the house and mostly settled. The past few days have been busy still, but we are getting some things done. We decided to buy a new stove since the one we have is pretty cheap and rather dirty. Monday evening we went to Sears and Lowes and looked around. We also did some looking around on Consumer Reports. We decided to get a Kenmore Elite stove, but didn’t want to purchase it on the spot since it is kind of a big purchase. Last night we went back and bought it, it will be delivered on Saturday. It is an all electric convection range with a smooth-top and all buttons covered in glass on the panel. It will be much easier to clean. When we got home we pulled the old stove out and cleaned behind it, we are planning to paint back there before the new one goes in. We also pulled the fridge out and cleaned behind it so that we can paint back there as well.

I also pulled out the dryer and cleaned under and behind it, it was really really dirty in that room. I decided to change out the dryer hose as well, but I hate the metal ring things that hold the hose on, so I am going to try and find something else that will hopefully work better. Maybe I just don’t know the secret with them, but I did try! I also cleaned out some of the faucet things so that the water comes out more smoothly.

Jodi and I finally got possession of our townhouse yesterday. We closed on the place on March 25th and the tenant moved out yesterday. She was suppose to be out by noon yesterday, but when we should up at 1pm the door was unlocked and there were a few small things in the house including cleaning supplies and a fish tank. We assumed that she wasn’t done yet and must have just been at her new place, or else we had just inherited a fish. We left and went to Home Depot and bought some painting tools as well as some other misc stuff. While at Home Depot I called my dad to get some painting advice, he was very helpful and gave me some good tips and suggestions on things that we would need and how to use them. We then went to Sonic to get some lunch. After these errands we went back to our new home and this time the door was open and a truck was in front, so she must have been inside finishing up. We left again and drove around a little to check out what places were around our new house. When we got back the third time around 3pm she was gone so the place was finally ours!

For our first day I had planned to install the garage door opener that we purchased a couple of weeks ago. We bought a Craftsman 1/2 hp Garage Door Opener, Belt Drive and decided that I could just do the install myself instead of paying the $99 to have it installed. I pulled everything out of the box and began going through the instructions, we made sure we had all the parts we were suppose to have and then I discovered that since our garage is finished, we needed to purchase a couple of support pieces to mount the garage door opener on the ceiling. We also needed to purchase a support for the garage door. We drove over the Sears in Jordan Landing and looked around. We tried to explain our problem to an employee there since we were not seeing the parts that we needed and he was not much help, told us to go over to the Parts and Service department, they were just as helpful. So then we went over to Lowes across the street and the guy there at least knew how garage door openers worked, but they don’t sell the brand of opener or the brand of door that we have, so he was not able to get us the parts. So we drove back over to Sears and found the ceiling mount, then we went looking for the bolts that we would need. We could not find them so we found another employee and she was not helpful at all. I was very frustrated and decided maybe it would be better to just pay someone to install it for us, maybe then they would have all the extra parts. The employee we were talking to wasn’t sure if they would have the parts or if we would need to furnish them, so I wasn’t sure what to do. Luckily Jodi noticed that the screws and bolts that we had been looking for were actually packaged with the ceiling mount that we had found. So I decided to go back and see what I could do.

We went back home and I got the garage door opener assembled and mounted to the ceiling. There wasn’t much clearance above the door so I had to mount the header bracket and everything to the ceiling, hopefully it will work like it is suppose to! I still haven’t found the support mount for the garage door, hopefully tomorrow I can track that down so that I can actually attach the opener to the door.

We also discovered that the previous person who had been in our house was not very clean. The carpets are disgusting, which we knew and is why we are having new carpets put in next week, as well as some of the walls and the kitchen. The kitchen was filthy, I think she swept, but that was about it. Jodi spent all afternoon cleaning all the appliances, counter tops and the sink. I think she is mostly finished. Tomorrow we hope to finish getting the garage door opener put together and clean some more. We are also planning to fill in some small cracks with some spackle and start painting Wednesday (we have other plans Tuesday so we won’t be working on the place that evening).