I don’t claim to be an engineer, an architect, or even a contractor. To be honest, I don’t entirely know what I’m doing when it comes to construction. My skills can be described as so-so at best. And my body (the saw marks on my arm, the nail blackened by a hammer blow, various cuts, scrapes and bruises from statistically unlikely mishaps, of which I am the queen) attests to this. But, what what I lack in talent I make up for with enthusiasm and ingenuity. And cheap (mostly free) materials. 
The body of the bar is made of free wood pallets. The frame for the roof and the wood for the bar top came from the wood pile at the transfer station (or dump, as it’s called in the south). To spruce it up, I bought one $25 6 foot by 8 foot roll of bamboo fencing from the hardware store (FYI – it’s not quite 8 ft long). I cut it using garden clippers into two halves, one 3.5 feet, the other 2.5 feet. I wrapped the taller section around the bottom, cut the shorter section into two halves and used it for the roof, attaching with a staple gun.
I bought the cheapest laminate floor tiles (12 at 88 cents each) for the bar top. To attach the roof, I built boxes for the upright wood pieces, screwed them to the bar top, and screwed up from under the bar top into the wood rod. I cut notches into the top of the rod for the frame of the roof to fit into so that I could lift the roof off and store it when the snow comes. I spent less than $10 on new wood, buying only two 2 x 2 x 8 which I sawed in half and used at the upright rods holding the roof up, for a total investment of under $50. Which leaves money for the most important part of any tiki bar:
(FYI – these awesome plastic tiki cups came from the $ store!)
And this: 
This was something that I saw on 
Most couples (I think) do something special for their anniversary. An evening out, a romantic getaway, something relaxing. For our anniversary, my husband and I built a fence.
The fence was something that I really wanted, and had wanted
jerked around by a care bear schnauzer turned raging hellhound, the mere step over the threshold triggering a Jekyll-Hyde change. I would be free!!!!!!
Now the dogs have a great yard to run free and play in and I have the luxury of reading while they get their fresh air and sunshine (they still have to be supervised). It was a fantastic anniversary present, and best of all, we spent quality time working together to achieve our end goal. Next year, I’m thinking we’ll build a garage.
So, Step 1: Demo – Demolition is the first step for several reason, all of which make perfect sense to me. For one, starting a project by having some fun gets things started right. For two, once you demo, you can’t change your mind. There’s no going back. Once there’s a hole in your wall, something has to be done about it. So with my husband’s help, we pulled the old unit out, which meant pulling the stone strips that framed the old fireplace off the wall. FYI – the stone had been stuck to the wall using some extraterrestrial glue which was crazy strong and tore chunks out of the drywall. I’d love to get my hands on a tube of that stuff, so Alf, if you’re listening . . . 
wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be. It was actually pretty easy until I got to the grouting part. For some
room like I was a monkey with a pitcher’s arm. This being a bedroom and not a shower, I really wanted to keep the clean-up to a minimum, so I used my hand to apply it. Maybe not the best idea, but it kept the fling radius to a minimum. My last remark about tiling is that scrubbing the grout off of the tops of stone tiles, with all their porous little clefts and crevices, was not the most enjoyable hour of my life. I imagine that it’s much easier to clean porcelain or ceramic tiles. 
It would be wonderful to move into a new house and buy all new things. To hand pick each piece of furniture for the exact spot and purpose in your new abode. Maybe that’s the way it works for some people – but not this one.
Maybe if my husband and I weren’t both such practical people, we could give it a try. Live on the wildside. Spend unnecessary money despite having just bought a new house that needs work. Go into debt for decoration’s sake. Honestly, though, that seems kind of silly to me. There’s always a feasible solution if you try.
Chalk paint covers just about everything, and made even my most hideous and abused furniture looked shabby chic, which, apparently, is in style. There’s plenty of DIY tutorials out there if you want instructions on how to give it a try. I looked at a few and spent a couple of hours giving it a go. Now my old furniture looks like the new furniture made to look old that’s in so many stores right now. Hmmm.
I find that I’m having an incredibly hard time allowing myself time to relax when there’s so much work to be done. I grab a book, curl up on the couch with the dogs, but it’s hard to concentrate on the words when your eyes keeping wandering. How can I read when there’s caulking that needs to be done? Tile that I want to regrout? And painting? So much painting, every square inch of the house because I’m picky and because I want to – because I finally can! Only I can’t, because it’s too cold to paint outside and too cold to open the windows for air ventilation to paint inside, but there’s so much painting that I’ve got to get started on it somehow, somewhere.
Which left only one option. The worst one.
The issue is that the siding wasn’t cleaned before the porch was added, and now that it’s part of a glass enclosed porch, you can’t exactly use a hose to wash it off. The task was actually near the top of my list because I’m planning on sitting on that porch, with a book, as soon as it warms up a bit more. Only I couldn’t possibly enjoy a book with a dirty wall at my back. So I grabbed a stack of rags and my watering can and went to work. After scrubbing, sanding flaking paint, and scrubbing again, I finally found myself painting. Now that the painting is done (and the color has dried several shades lighter than it went on) I find that I’ve finally earned the right to relax. For at least the rest of the week. I hope.
If you give a girl a hammer, she’s going to want a wrench, too. And a drill, some screwdrivers, pliers, and whatever else she needs to reign terror on the household repairs that plague her. Bob Villa ain’t got nothing on me. (Except saws. I really need an electric saw. Then I really need to learn how to use it.) 
So as I prepared to call the two professional’s whose expertise I required, I looked at my list. I needed to arrange a hot water heater to be installed, something I know some people DIY, but it’s heavy work and requires time spent in the basement, so it’s not really a new skill I feel the need to acquire. But no hot water in the upstairs shower? Hot water instead of cold in the washing machine? Those sounded like mysteries that I could safely investigate without adding too much to the cost or repair (I hoped). 
The hardest part was pulling out the built-in shelf around the unit and the washing machine itself. Swapping the hoses really couldn’t have been easier. Now my washing machine has cold water, my shower has hot, and I have over an hour’s worth of payment for labor still in my pocket, ready to buy the supplies for my next DIY project. Today plumbing, tomorrow a garage from the bottom up. (Ok, so maybe not a garage built from scratch tomorrow, but it will happen. Wait and see.)
Shannon Hollinger 
