“Basic Home Repair”

This was the last week of my “Basic Home Repair & Preventative Maintenance” class at Whittier Tech [the local Voc Tech high school].  It was a 10 week class, each class was 3 hours long.  I learned so much!  Here’s my diploma:

We started with 3 weeks of electrical where we learned how to fix a loose outlet, replace an outlet, ground an outlet, map our basement electrical box, and add a switch to a wall [like in a room that only has pull cords].  As you saw in a previous post, I successfully wired an outlet to a switch and then to a bulb, which went on on the first try – woohoo!

We then did a 3 week plumbing segment, where I learned to repair a toilet when it won’t flush or stop running, and how to cut and replace PVC piping.  But I missed the last 2 segments due to illness.  Major bummer.

The last 3 weeks of class dealt with drywall, including how to hang it, tape and mud it [to prepare it for primer and paint], how to repair it if something small like a doorknob goes through it, or if something larger like someone’s foot goes through it.  It was really fun!  The school built us an L-shaped interior wall [prior to our first drywall class, the walls were bare studs] which we used to hone our drywall skillz:

First we nailed electrical boxes to the studs and strung wire through them.  If more people had shown up for the last 2 classes, our teacher would have had us wire them to switches and light bulbs.  But only 3 of us showed up 2 weeks ago, and only my friend/co-worker Joanne and I showed up this week.  So we only had time to measure, cut, hang, tape, mud, damage & repair the drywall.

Here’s some campy pics we took the last night of class – our teacher posed with us which was great!  He was a super nice guy and a great teacher.  We learned so much!

This post is dedicated to Clover – we will never forget you, sweetie!!!  You were the best rat anyone could ever ask for.