A woman's guide to home improvement

After nearly eight years of remodeling houses, I've come to consider myself quite the expert on how couples can survive a remodeling project.

My trek into the whole marriage-remodeling journey started about the time Brad and I met. Instead of going on dates, we'd get together and help a friend with his remodeling projects. When we finally decided to cohabitate, times were tough and we knew a guy who knew a guy that would let us live in his house if we "fixed it up" for him.

Little did we know that "fixing it up" would involve tearing out the entire bathroom floor -- including the floor joists.

We lived without a bathroom for two weeks.

Rule No. 1: Make sure you have a toilet and a shower before moving into your new home.

We then move on to the floors. We were relatively sure that at one time, they were wood, but with the paint and carpet backing left behind by the previous inhabitants, it was hard to tell.

I went to work on the floors. I sanded the main part of the floor down using a big floor sander we were able to rent from a local hardware store -- six times. Then it was time to take care of the edges. For that I needed a belt sander. I plugged it in and started working. The sander went dead.

I pushed the "on" button. Nothing happened. I followed the sander's cord to where it was supposed to be plugged into the extension cord. The extension cord was gone. Suddenly I heard the sound of the rip saw tearing through a piece of wood. I followed the sound. I found my extension cord.

After a few choice words and a lecture on how he should find his own extension cord and quit stealing mine, I went back to work. I grabbed the cord from the sander and plugged it in. I heard the sound of yelping as the little belt sander chased my mutt Chewey across three rooms of the house

Rule No. 2: Never work on a construction project when your husband is home from work.

At about the same time we finished working on that house, we decided to move to our current residence.

We had our work cut out for us. Nearly every pipe in the house was split. Most of the insulation on the wiring was bare, the cement basement was crumbling in places and 75 percent of the basement had been used for a garage, complete with a mechanic's pit.

Walls were falling down, and the ones that weren't falling down should have been.

On the outside of the house, there were three sheds in varying degrees of decay and weeds that reached well over my head.

Our first goal was actually finding the house. We removed the buildings and got burn permits to dispose of the remains. Then I started chopping weeds. Brad wanted to get a machete and pretend he was in the Amazon Jungle on his way to hidden treasure. I decided it would be faster to rent gas powered hedge clippers.

Rule No. 3: Never put your hand in front of the blade of gas powered hedgeclippers.

The next step was tearing out walls. There was one wall in particular in the basement that I was itching to get at. Brad was standing around talking with someone about the best way to approach the wall removal. I knew how to get it out. The mortar was crumbling. A sledgehammer was sitting by my side. I picked up the sledgehammer. Brad and his friend stepped away from the other side of the wall. I took a swing. A three foot chunk of bricks fell. I took another swing at the wall, slightly above the first hole. I missed the wall. My arm, slightly less solid than a sledge hammer, made contact with the wall. I dropped the sledge hammer and grabbed my arm to stop the bleeding.

Brad started laughing.

Rule No. 4: Resist the temptation to release the pressure on a bleeding wound to pick up a sledgehammer and throw it at your husband's head.

We finally got through the first stage of our home renovations about a year ago. Both of us miraculously survived.

I vowed I'd never do it again.

We started our most recent project in June. It included new windows throughout the house, a new roof, exterior and interior painting, a new patio, and refinishing the old tongue-and-groove flooring we found in the attic and installing it in our living room. We still have to finish trimming out the windows inside and out, painting the exterior trim and eaves and moving our air conditioner so we can put in the patio so we can use our new door.

Rule No. 5: Limit yourself to one remodeling project per marriage.