You've made many bad decisions.

First and foremost, any change if plane or material should not be grouted.

https://youtu.be/_DI4hfHM_Hg - watch this. This is the definitive guide that will set you right.

Encapsulated, sealed crawl spaces are absolutely better in every way compared to all alternatives.

It is a significant amount of work to encapsulate one that wasn't originally designed for that sort of treatment - but it's always absolutely worth the effort.

It is also the sort of thing that can be DIY'd. Contractors tend to run prices up for this sort of work, and rightfully so I'd say - it's uncomfortable, dirty, limited access work in most cases.

https://youtu.be/_DI4hfHM_Hg - watch this please.

This is the definitive guide. He's uploaded a couple of follow ups to this one, but start here.

This is the state of the art, nobody has done it better. Anyone still smearing their fingers, or using tape or soapy water ......simply put, is doing it wrong.

Don't know if it's applicable, but I've installed shims with a blob of glue to prevent them from going missing or moving.

These are kick ass, well done.

I've seen the company you're talking about. They sell the exact same thing. I've been tempted to make my own too!

This.

However these legs are attached to cheap particleboard, disassembling the thing, and liberal application of PL on all hardware and contacting surfaces - they will be rock solid. I would be tempted to even do a caulk style bead around each leg as a final step to really lock them in.

Don't over think a solve for a cheap piece of furniture folks. I'm all for fixing stuff and avoiding landfill, but the right fix here is PL. New legs? Adding cross braces? Absolutely not necessary.

https://www.leevalley.com/en-ca/shop/hardware/outdoor-hardware/gate-and-fence/latches/74567-ozco-gate-latch?item=01S1525

You've got the cheapest of the cheap latch set there, that's sort of sub optimal because the wee latch bar bears all of the slam when it closes.

Get something like this, a way better design that addresses all the wee one's shortcomings.

New dishwasher has a manual. Read it.

This information is in the manual.

Adding dirt is the easy answer ...but pay attention to your house.

You just can't fill dirt up against the house as high as you want. There should be some sort of concrete/cement/block foundation and then your house built on top of that. Generally speaking your foundation can be buried and the house shouldn't be.

Your asking for trouble if you bury any of your house's cladding, be it brick, stucco, or siding.

Dricore is very forgiving, and you can get shim kits for that system too. How bad is the concrete floor? Do you really need to pour leveling concrete for what is likely a small room? I'd rather shim where needed than pour based on my experience with both of these products.

YouTube 'Vancouver Carpenter' ....he's set the gold standard of YouTube drywall content.

Tips? V grove your seams. Apply a fill coat first, let that dry. Then do a really tight seam tape with fibafuze. Then start coating for aesthetics. Scrape between coats, only sand once. At the end.

Also. Take a tape measure and measure 12 inches from the left of the hole and make a pencil mark. The right. Top and bottom too. Now draw the biggest circle you can to connect all those dots. That's your finish line, when you're done your mud should be feathered out that far.

Edit: typo

Locks up, remove the screen, push the window out from the bottom.

The slim LED pan lights, are disposable. So you wouldn't be replacing any bulbs, you would just be replacing the entire fixture into the same 4" hole in the ceiling.

Personally, I absolutely can't stand ceiling cans. The E26 base is too big, it's so comically oversized given today's lighting options.

https://youtu.be/XRRYDEa-pDM - almost all of what you say is debunked here.

Not true.

I've never seen it last. This is a poor option in my opinion.

If you're curious, this is most often done by flippers. It cleans up an old bathroom quickly and looks great in listing pictures.

This.

Extension springs aren't really that dangerous. The way they load/unload is linear and predictable. Take precaution of course, and be careful, but these aren't a big deal to work on or maintain by an average DIYer.

Torsion springs are EXTREMELY dangerous. They fail in unpredictable ways and have a lot of potential energy wound up in them. Danger bay.

Risk of explosion based on what you describe is incredibly low.

Risk of your lantern ruining itself, causing a fire, and generally just being a frustrating not very useful dirty burning annoying thing? Very high.

I hear your accusation of insanity, and raise you on the fact that you dismantled it, removed and tossed all of the old hardware ......and don't have a plan for how to proceed.

And you don't have tools.

It's fine.

You should anchor the plywood, in fact it would have to be anchored to pass inspection if you ever chose to. ....you can't just have hard wired lights floating freely.

Add a screw or two to hold the wood in, and also anchor the controller/junction box and your good.

You've made a massive mistake, if you've applied wood stain on a painted drywall wall.

There is unlikely to be any sort of meaningful fix, short of ripping it out and putting up new drywall.

Have you ever hung a tv mount? These come with all kinds of hardware so that no matter the wall material you've got a hardware to hang it.

Those hardware packs also come with all kinds of standoffs. Usually black plastic disks that would be ideal for this use case.