Steady as She Goes

Another weekend of progress. We had a long weekend due to Veterans' Day off so we spend three straight days working on the house. Starting to feel like a real homeowner. Spend every extra dime on the house and my vacation days working on it. We also got our first property tax bill last week. After the initial shock of it being around double what we thought it would be, I took it upon myself to take a closer look. Fortunately, we discovered that our homeowners exemption had not been applied. After a few trips to the County Assessor's Office we got it all sorted out and got it back down to where it should be.

So with that behind us we moved on to inspections. Kelly had lined up three for Friday morning. Plumbing, electrical, and framing inspectors all made their way through our construction site with approving eyes. It was a very stressful time that we are thankful is behind us until we are finished. OR SO WE THOUGHT. We were told that we need an insulation inspection. What the crap?! Four inspections just to be able to put up drywall. Oh, and a tip on remodeling an old house: don't shake anything too much. A few weeks ago, while working on the electrical we needed to saw around some of our plumbing. Apparently, that shook away the corrosion that was preventing the drain pipe from the tub to the waste stack from leaking. That was ok, because the plumber was scheduled to start the next day and it was really just a drip. The plumber was great and got everything new in before turning to the leaky pipe. He fixed the leak only to find that the force he had to exert on the pipe to get it lose from the tub caused another section to leak. This section was right next to the stairs so he had some choice words for it prior to fixing it. He did a great job. We are really happy with how everything looks.

Hummm, new pipe

My brother and soon to be a dad, Tim, made his return appearance to our place. He helped us move in so this was his first visit since we started to destroy the place. He and Ron came down to help us keep on keepin' on. Since we were told we couldn't put up walls until after the insulation inspection we managed to find other tasks for them to help us out with. Ron put trim up around the windows so that our stucco guy can hopefully come soon and finish that up. He also built and put up the soffit that goes over the cabinets. Timbro pulled down the final pieces of plaster - a section over and behind the radiator in the new kitchen that Kelly and I had refused to touch for the past month. Tim and I then put insulation in the ceiling to help with the noise that comes with old wood floors. Then came the drywall. Tim, a veteran of the drywall circuit, showed me some of the ropes before we called in Ron for the hard piece. We managed to get four pieces on the ceiling.

For those of you wondering who the extra set of hands is, it's Neil Couch ladies and gentleman. Now a resident of Naperville, he came over to see Tim and stuck around to pitch in. Thanks.

I used Sunday and Monday to put all the insulation in the walls and Kelly began pulling up some of the subfloor that is in the new half bath. No pictures of this stuff, maybe next week. We also had a guy over to give us an estimate on refinishing the floors. Not as bad as I thought it would be but still something that will be further down the road. And just to bring everything full circle homeowner, I raked the leaves this afternoon.

The dogs provided their usual assistance.

Lots of Progress

You can see from the pics Matt posted last night that we made a lot of progress this weekend. On top of all of our house work, I actually got up and ran a 5k this morning-I have no idea where I got the energy!! But it felt good to finish and I'm very glad I got up and went. The race, which was along Lake Michigan, benefited a local childrens hospital. The great fall day along with the beautiful scenery made it a very enjoyable run. We worked so hard pulling the floor up this weekend that I didn't think Matt gave it justice on his posting yesterday. The picture to the left shows the first layer of linoleum. It took me about 30 minutes or so to pull it up while Matt and Ron worked on the windows. I thought "Oh, this is a breeze. It won't take long." I was wrong!The layer under this one was the first of two layers of subfloor, one of which use to have lovely green carpet on top of it. Thankfully we didn't have to pull it up but they left us a small remnant so we could see just how fabulous it once was. The subfloors were so tough. Big nails and staples EVERYWHERE. Even a little glue on some of them. Bonnie thankfully arrived early afternoon to give me a hand. She also brought us a second round of her great food to get us by while we are without a kitchen. This has been such a big help for Matt and me. Its very nice to have something home cooked to toss in the microwave when we get home. We appreciate it so much. Matt pitched in with the floor once the windows were in while Ron finished up the electrical work. It took us Friday afternoon and all day Saturday to get it torn up. In the picture below you can see a little of the subfloors, the very old 2nd layer of linoleum, and the original wood floors underneath it all. The bottom linoleum was so old it pretty much crumbled. I thought it was neat in a way that something so old was still in the house but I'm glad it's gone. Ron and Bonnie left late Saturday evening after much help and hardwork.




















Today Matt and I finished tearing out the ceiling which had a layer of drywall and then a layer of plaster underneath. No, "do it right" was definitely not in the vocabulary of our poor little house's former owners. Cheap and easy certainly were. We are now laying in bed, sore muscles and bruises from head to toe, and very happy about the progress we made this weekend. Our task for the week is to work on pulling out the zillion nails and staples still remaining in the floor. We're planning on putting laminate down throughout the downstairs, likely the most durable option with two crazy dogs : )

Gatsby's mug shot!

Carpenter, We Don't Need No Stink'in Carpenter

Well after being told three times by the carpenter that our windows would get put in the end of next week we decided to take things into our own hands. Well the capable hands of Ron anyway. Over a beautiful fall weekend we managed to tear out the old windows, frame in and hang the new ones, tear up the kitchen floor, and tear down the remaining plaster in the kitchen. Daisy enjoyed the day in the sun.

Kelly and I were busy over the past couple weeks destroying more of our house. The really fun part of the remodel is the fun we get to have living out of the family room. As the pictures show, before we tore out the kitchen walls we moved everything we had into the family room. The tv stand is now the counter, holding the microwave, coffee maker, and other things. We took down the roof of the soon to be kitchen and the wall that seperates the two rooms.

Doesn't the new refridgerator look great. Thanks John.

I forgot, Gatsby's cage is also in the kitchen/living room/storage room. Despite all of this we have still found time for the finer things. Like Garrett's Cheese Popcorn (on top of the refridgerator)

The view from current living room to the current kitchen. The stove is now on the back porch

The view from the other side.

After finally getting in touch with the carpenter and him saying for the third time that he wouldn't be able to get to our windows till the end of next week we decided to move on without him. We asked if Ron was interested in giving it a go. He was so excited he jumped on a bus in Kzoo and took a 4 plus hour odyssey through the back roads of Michigan and Indiana to Chicago's Union Station. I picked him up around 1 am on Friday morning. Good times. Friday, we awoke to a wonderful fall day and got started. We managed to pull out both old windows, take down some stucco, and frame and hang the new ones.

The large windows that were on the south wall of the dinning room. GONE.

The smaller windows in the back wall. GONE

The new casement windows that replaced the large window on the south wall. Soon, the sink will be centered under this window.

Level yet!!!

I held the window over my head while Ron decided if we were level yet. Actully, I didn't. Instead, we got it level on the first try.

The new windows in the back of the house. Soon a table will be under these so we can look out and watch the dogs in the backyard.

Things were going so well that we decided to take up the floor in the kitchen as well. For those of you counting at home, there was a layer of linoleum, a subfloor, a plywood subfloor, a layer of linoleum, then the original hardwood. The long scrapper tool was pretty handy but a lot of this was done with a hammer and a chisel. The picture shows the second layer of linoeum and the original floor.










So tomorrow, if I manage to crawl out of bed, the ceiling in the current kitchen will come down and the destruction part of the job will be complete. Our cabinets are scheduled to be delivered on Thursday and hopefully we will be able to get our plumber over to do that work. Let's keep our fingers crossed.

Let there be light, well some of it anyway

Where are the dogs? Not outside, not in the living room, not on the porch. Kelly found them. This is how Kelly found the dogs at one point on Saturday afternoon while everyone was downstairs working.

BIG HELP GUYS, Appreciate it!!!!

Progress continued this past weekend. Bonnie and Ron made the trip around the lake to help bring light to the new kitchen. Although the selection of lighting was a bit more difficult and involved a few more trips to home depot and lowes then planned, we found what we wanted. After that, Ron made quick work of the place and we had some nice light before we knew it.

During one of our trips to home depot we purchased some lumber for some shelves we desperately needed in our linen closet. A few measurements and cuts later we had four nice shelves. We painted them green because we had some green tinted primer laying around and felt that was a good use of it. I got to use Ron's mitre saw and my new skill saw. Almost 30 years old and I make my first cuts with either type of saw. Not sure what that says about me. The shelves have been put to use and as of now we haven't heard them crash to the ground.

On the delivery front. We received our new windows and hope to have them installed next week. They look great. We are really excited about them and can't wait for them to go in. We also received our new appliances. Our refrigerator is already in use and the dishwasher looks great. The stove was damaged and the replacement didn't show up so we continue to wait for those. Thanks to John for the help with the purchase of the appliances.

Tear It Down

First and most important, Congratulations to Tim and Brooke on their pregnancy. I know we are late on this one, sorry about that. Also Happy Birthday to brother and soon to be a dad, Tim

I know how you feel brother, I had the same face when I found out you were going to be a dad:) Just kidding, you guys are going to be great parents.

We haven't posted in a while so there is lots to talk about. Again, thanks again to everyone who has helped us over the past couple months. For starters some dog humor.

Its kind of fun to stand on the sleeping porch and call the dogs while they are in the back. Here Gatsby displays his best "where the heck are they" face.

ON TO THE HOUSE:

We painted the middle bedroom a very soft blue. So soft in fact, it barely shows up in the pictures. It does however, look very nice. In the room is a rug we found in the attic. We had it professionally cleaned due to the rather fragile state it was in. We think its kind of cool to have something in the house that one of the prior owners had. We found out we are only the third owners of this house, it was built in 1924!!

With permit in hand we started the destruction of our house. Well, just the present dining room (soon to be kitchen). Since there was a grand total of one electrical outlet we took the room down to the studs in order to wire for more outlets and lights. Sorry fans of the wicker ceiling fan, it is going away. It was a nasty process. FYI, plaster comes down in very small pieces and as dust. Which means lots of bags to carry to the back. The shop vac has been the MVP of this phase of the remodel. We also had to take the room down to the studs for the plumber and the carpenter. The slats from behind the plaster have provided us a nice pile of wood in the basement. It looks like the piles you see in the movies when they are burning someone at the stake. This combine with the general spooky nature of our black basement (yes, its painted black) assures that Kelly will never go into the basement past sunset. We hope to have the new windows delivered in mid-Oct and the new cabinets in late Oct. After much deliberation, we ordered the cabinets last week. Finally, we get to spend some real money.

The rear wall


The chimney and south wall

Some of the bags we dragged out back full of plaster. They are gone now. It was really cool, I called these guys, they showed up with a truck, and an hour later the bags all the molding we took down and all of our yard waste was gone.

We also took out the non-functioning fireplace. Came down pretty easily overall. The mortar that was stuck to the wall was probably the hardest thing to get rid of. I wouldn't know. Herb and I were in the back fixing the garage door. Kelly and Dottie tackled the fireplace wall cleanup and spackeling of the walls in the living room.

Sweat equity baby. We figured we got 15-20 of square feet by putting the fire place in the back yard. Ok, so my masonry could use some work.

GOOD, Its GONE. Getting the fireplace out made Kelly a very happy lady.

Kelly and I decided to strip the window trim. Unlike the fireplace this turned out to be more work than we thought. Pretty much a whole day due to, what at least I would call excessive, amount of paint on them. The first layer, seen in the pictures, was a joke. The next few layers gave the extra strength stripper a bit more of a run for its money. We managed to kill a fair number of brain cells with all the fumes but pretty much got it done. For those of you worried about the dogs, they stayed out back all day.


















Finally, last weekend Bonnie, Ron, and Uncle Butch (special shout outs to Butch, its been a while but the man looks almost exactly as I remember him) came down to run all the electrical for the new kitchen. The incredibly efficient (obviously I stayed out of the way) pair of Ron and Butch got the whole
thing done in around 5 hours. That includes lunch and a trip to Home Depot. So fast we didn't get any pictures of the two at work. Now it is up to Kelly and I to take down the ceiling so we can wire the new lighting next week.

Finally!!!

WE FINALLY GOT OUR BUILDING PERMIT!!!! I'm so excited but Matt says to save the celebrating for when permit is actually in our hands ; ) I'm going to pick it up tomorrow afternoon.

We made quite a bit of progress on small projects this weekend. With some much appreciated help from Herb and Dottie, we got the fireplace torn out, patched the walls, and fixed the garage door. I'll post more pics soon.

Our home is finally wallpaper free!! We finished stripping yesterday minus the very top corner of the stairs where we're going to need a ladder to finish. As for progress on the permit, we resubmitted on Friday. Keep your fingers crossed!! The requirements for our electrical plans were extremely detailed. Thankfully, we have knowledgeable friends and family who have helped get the plan ready. We especially appreciate all the help from Ron and Andy. We're planning on painting more of the upstairs today and will start on the fireplace demolition on Thursday night. As usual, I couldn't wait to start tearing it down so I pulled the top off and got an idea of what we're up against. Matt and I think the process will be more tedious and dirty than anything.


The fireplace is non-functioning and isn't original to the house. We decided right away to take it out since it's ugly and we need the space in the den. We lifted the top right off to find the gigantic pile mortar and brink in the center. I can't wait to get it out!!


Like everything else in the house, the doors were painted white. The previous owners used latex paint over oil based paint so when we clean things the paint goops up and peels - it's a mess!! We used a special primer and then painted our bedroom green, the doors a very dark blue, and the handles in copper. We're so pleased with the way it turned out and plan to do the rest of the doors in the house the same way. A big thanks to Mom and David for helping us paint and fix up the bedroom!!



Standing on the radiator is their favorite spot : )

We adopted Gatsby weekend before last. He's a horse! He outweighs Daisy by at least 20 lbs. They are getting along pretty well but she's been a bit pouty. Gatsby is a cutie but we've got some work to do. He's got a thing for shoes. Fortunately, he doesn't chew them but just carries them around and puts them in a big pile. This is his first experience as a house dog. As you can see, he's catching on quite well.