Garage Revamp

Our little garage was built in 1910 for the cost of $40.00, according to the building permit. When we got here, the original shingles still covered the roof, although sunshine and rain came in through more than one hole, and it was tilting slightly to the right. We had it straightened and shored up, reroofed, painted to match the house. Although these are not our favorite colors they will certainly do for now. We spent this weekend tidying up the backyard, but it still has a long way to go. At this point, work on the backyard entails moving the dirt around, spraying Round-Up on the crab grass, and pruning the orange and meyer lemon (we think) trees.

Bathroom - Almost done!!!

All we need now in the bathroom is a shower curtain, a towel bar, a shelf, etc. and a mop that will clean the dirty, filthy floor. We are also planning on putting an accordion mirror on the window frame above the sink so we can have a mirror near the sink area/window. The medicine cabinet hangs on the wall that is next to the toilet, to the right as you come into the room. This seems to be the original medicine cabinet, but we weren't sure where it originally hung, as it was already down when we moved in. I'll be searching for a nice little antique table or cabinet to place under the medicine cabinet.

We aren't using this bathroom until the entire upstairs is complete, and we move up there. At this point, it doesn't feel like that day will ever come. For now, this is a Model Bathroom.

Maybe I'll treat myself to a bubble bath on June 30.....the last day of school!

Some neighborhood shots

Here are a few of our neighbors homes that we love. This is where we'd like to be in a few years, but it may take more like ten.... The house with the ladder out front is our neighbor to the north. She's getting ready for exterior paint, which should add a lot to the ambiance of the middle of the block.








As for progress on our place, I spent the past two weekends trying to diagnose a pesky electrical problem with the new bathroom sconces. They would work while hanging by the wires, but once screwed into the wall, the upstairs circuit breaker would blow. Long story short (No pun intended!), there was a short in one of our new lighting fixtures. Hopefully, the problem will be rectified when the new fixture arrives. Also, we decided to give up on stripping the old picture molding. We went this weekend to order new molding, which will have to be custom cut, but it should save many hours in trying to work with shorter lengths of old, damaged molding. We had Brent in to hang two doors, but as for us, we didn't do a lick of work! Still waiting to post our beautiful bathroom photos, as soon as it is done.

One Room Finished!

After being on vacation for about six weeks, I've had a lot of time to devote to the house. The smallest of our four bedrooms is now finished (with the exception of refinishing the floors, which we will do last when the whole upstairs is complete). The wood moulding, baseboard, and windows were stained in a dark mahogany (and three coats of polyurethane, which I am learning to apply without bubbles). The walls are a golden color called chestertown buff (which complements the color of the light fixture). The color is actually darker and richer than how it appears in the flash photo. We changed the electric outlets from white to brown and installed a period style push-button switch (with a dimmer-definately NOT period). It feels great to have one room done.



Meanwhile, progress continues on the bathroom...the subway tile wainscot and 1" white hexagon floor tiles are in! The walls were done perfectly, but the floor tile had to be ripped out and redone by the tile contractor because it just wasn't laid out in an even and level way. Luckily, our tile guy was very professional about the situation. And although he was not happy about having to redo it, he was very concerned that the job be done right and that we were happy. And ultimately, it came out beautifully! Next step--fix the gaping holes in the walls. The question is, drywall, or replaster???

Upstairs Wood

Another ongoing project is the upstairs wood. All of the wood upstairs is "paint grade" which means that it was originally painted, probably white, and always was painted...that is until we came along. For better or worse, I decided it would be nice to have the upstairs wood stained. (Actually, the previous owner, Tina, began stripping some of the wood in the master bedroom. This is probably what got me started down this slippery slope.) This has turned into a MAJOR piece of work.
We began doing some of the paint stripping ourselves when we first moved in, and realized we needed some help. We hired two guys to help us--they worked full time for about 8 weeks last summer and got most of the paint removed and did some sanding, but the wood still was not ready for stain. There's lots of paint left in nooks and crannies, as well as finish sanding left to do. Since summer, we stained (on the exterior) and rehung ten double hung windows just to get all the windows back on the house for the colder weather. We took a major hiatus, but have been back to work over this winter break from school. Our friends the wood strippers took ten doors off of their hinges, unlabeled, and we took a day to figure out the puzzle of which doors hang where. Today was an exciting day because we finally finished staining the wood in the smallest of the four bedrooms. This wood still needs three coats of polyurethane, so the work is not quite done yet, but it is nice to see something that resembles a finished product. We like the lighting fixture that Tina put in this room, and are planning to paint this room in a shade of rich yellow/gold to compliment the fixture. This room will probably be used as Raphael's "playroom" where he can set up his bass guitar, and other toys.

Upstairs Bathroom

One of our areas of focus is our upstairs bathroom, which was gutted when we bought it. In trying to get the bathroom toward a more finished state, it seems we have to make a bigger mess first. We have stained the window and door frame, and bought subway tile for the walls, a pedestal sink and toilet by St. Thomas Creations, and some lovely lighting fixtures from Schoolhouse Electric. The previous owner also left us a clawfoot bathtub, which we found sitting in the living room the day we first saw the house. (Several of our friends, were brave enough to help us get the very heavy tub up the stairs on the day we moved in. Phil thought of a way to hoist the tub up the stairs using rope and a lot of brute force.) We bought a shower riser which will convert the tub into one of those cute showers with the curtain that goes all the way around the tub.
When we called in the plumber to check if all of the pipes were lined up correctly, he discovered that the toilet waste pipe was not to code, and would have left our new toilet sitting uncomfortable close to the side wall. Also, we opted to tear our part of the wall in order to convert a 4" ventilation pipe into a more current 2" pipe. This allowed us to remove a weird little section of wall which jutted out to accomodate the larger pipe. The electrician also came in and made some nasty holes in the lath and plaster walls and ceiling while putting in our new ventilation fan and wall mounted lights. We are a bit worried about how these walls will get repaired, and how much of the lath and plaster will have to be torn out and replaced with drywall. Our next step in the bathroom is to install the subway tile on the walls, and the white hexagon floor tile.