It's Christmas

Well, maybe I can get away with, "It's the Christmas Season!"

Photo taken upon our return from the Blaze of Lights 2011.

Christmas trees in both turrets ... we are ready!

Getting Some Closure

Get comfortable, folks, this is going to be a long one! :)

So, as far as we are aware, the stairwell between the 2nd and 3rd floors of the house has been "sealed off" with some black garbage bags for the last 20 years.

Regrettably, we do not have a good photo of these while they were still hanging. Sorry.

Anyway, a few weeks ago my parents came to help with some house projects and we decided to tackle this one first so come winter we were not heating all of Bluffton. There was a nice draft coming up the spiral staircase and out through the 3rd floor.

You see, while there is a good bit of insulation up there, not everything is properly insulated and sealed.

Needless to say, we have been paying for our heat to go right out through the roof.

We had a plan. Kevin even drew it out for us. And as my dad and I stood there looking at the opening we decided to change the plan. (That's why it's important to be home instead of at work if you want your plans executed correctly.) Hee hee.

Mom came up while Dad and I were deliberating and tossing about some different ideas. All of a sudden she says, "Oh! I just thought you were going to put a door there, a door there and then frame some kind of wall to put another door there."

I know you can't see where she was pointing, but it was genius!

I tried calling Kevin to run the new plan past him, but had to leave a voicemail, and we left for lunch. Kevin called while we were at lunch and decided the plan was good.

The problem at this point? Friends had agreed to give us one of their old doors (they have a collection in their barn), but now we needed three. Another voicemail. We drove out to the farm (just in case) to see if there were three doors we would choose.

I love old doors. They have so much character! Three doors chosen ... now, weeks later, the doors are washed up and now they need hung.

Now, let me share something here. I'm not a do-it-yourselfer. So all of this is a learning experience for me. Try Googling "hanging an old door". There is not much that's helpful out on the ol' internet. See, most people are normal and just go get a new pre-hung door and install that. Much easier. But not me. Nope. I am the one who convinced Kevin that we should use old doors with character so it was my deal to figure out how to hang them.

Jambs. Yep, we needed jambs. So, went to Vetter Lumber and ordered me 3 sets of door jambs. Waited three days and got my phone call that they were in. Stopped in a few hours later to pick them up and what do you know? Some one sold most of them, but just the tops. Go figure. So, they cut me a couple of replacement headers and I was on my way home.

Now comes the fun part. Ethan came up to take some photos of the action.

Kevin had to chisel out the grooves for the hinges on the jamb.

Reading directions. :)

Hanging the jamb.

Checking if it's level.

Ethan ready for work. (Don't worry we didn't let him use any power tools yet.)

Yay! It's hung!

After a little trim it fit perfectly!

Long story, short? It's much easier to get pre-hung doors. But, these look much cooler. Stay tuned for the other two to go in yet. It should go much faster from now on.

Look what I found behind these bushes

There's a garage!! Did you know there was one back there? Look closely. ☺

As you can see, between our house and the garage is another obnoxious row of overgrown bushes. Immediately after our traditional Saturday breakfast of pancakes and sausage (Yum!), Kevin headed out to begin the day's work.


He started by trimming back the first clump and, from previous experience pulling out landscaping, was hoping that we would be able to wrap the chain around each one and pull them out with the truck.

Here he is hitching it up.

I got to document.

Attempt #1

Attempt #3

I missed the second attempt. Well, after three, Kevin had enough of the chain sliding up and off without pulling the bush out that we decided to just dig them out.

Yeah, what do you get when you combine frustrated husband with a stubborn shrub? A broken shovel handle. Yep. So, I made a quick trip to Family True Value and returned with a new shovel to continue with.

Mid way through the morning, Ethan was helping Kevin and our neighbor boy, N., again came over to help with the yard work. (Remember him from the last trimming? He's such a helpful kid.)

Sorry about the shadows. N is on the left and Ellie and Ethan are on the right. Notice they all have shovels to help dig out the roots.

Then the party grew. Two more neighbor boys came to join in the fun. Welcome, neighbor A. and his friend J. They thought this looked like so much fun they scrambled to find shovels of their own too.

Five children working at the roots of this line of shrubbery.

It was great! They were having so much fun and Kevin just let them "work" while he trimmed out the rest of the bushes and pulled out the back two.

Finally, just before noon all of the bushes were pulled out of the ground and the last of them where hauled away after our lunch break.

Since Kevin thought that project might take most of the day, we were pleasantly surprised to have enough time this afternoon to move around to the alley side of the house and trim up some of those trees and overgrowth too.

We were very busy and productive outside today. So much so that I forgot to get "after" shots before dusk set in. Here's what I have for now. We'll take new ones tomorrow so you can see what it really looks like.

Look whose vehicles are parked in the garage!

View at the back steps of the wrap-around porch underneath the kitchen windows.

All in all, we are making progress. Man, does that feel good! (Unless you are my shoulders, Kevin's back ... )

Plumbing Leak

Yep.

Wednesday night Kevin and I were working in the kitchen and he discovered this:

It's definitely difficult to see on our lovely cobalt blue countertops, but that, my friends, is a puddle of water of our counter.

How does that happen?

We had no idea, so we looked up....












And saw this:

If you ask me, not too threatening. Until...Kevin got out the stool and felt around by that teensy, weensy little brown dot in the ceiling.

Spongy.

Not good.

One guess as to what is directly above this spot in the kitchen.

Yep. The bathroom. The tub to be specific.



So, Thursday morning I called our good friend, R.P., who graciously offered to come over before noon and check it out with me.

He started by putting two small holes in the spongey area (with a bucket underneath) to release any water that might be standing there. Just a note: we will need to replace the entire ceiling when we remodel the kitchen anyway, so that's just fine.

Good news! No standing water.

So, then we moved upstairs to the bathroom. R.P. removed the tile panel on the half wall and we got a great look at the plumbing...and all of the wet floor and subfloor.

After initially thinking there might be a problem with the drain, we determined that the problem lies with the plumbing for the hand-held shower attachment. The plumbing wiggles, a LOT, and probably cracked in the very recent past.

Final determination: no using the hand shower attachment, but we are good to go with the tub.

Now, we need to detach the bad plumbing, buy new and reattach. That should be interesting. :)

Blood, sweat and tears

If you take a look at the house in the upper right, you just may notice the overgrown foliage all along the left side of the house.

It's ridiculous. Eventually, we'll be taking all of it out and redoing all of the landscaping around the house. But, for now. we just wanted to trim it back so it still protects the house through the winter but isn't so obnoxious.

All last Saturday afternoon, Kevin worked really hard to trim them back to get things looking a little cleaner. He started with the electric trimmer, but the bushes were so thick and overgrown, that he needed to switch to the hand trimmer. It's a good thing he's so tall!

We thought for sure, this was one solid row of bushes, but as it turned out there were just a few planted that had just spread out like crazy. So, after Kevin finished trimming one up, I would go underneath and trim up the stragglers and random stuff growing out of ground. After Ethan woke from his nap he come out to help too, and then our neighbor's son, N., came over to help too.

They were so great! N. went and got two little rakes that they used to clean out the underbrush and they had a ton of fun using the small hand trimmer too.

I was a complete slacker and didn't take any pictures during the process. Clearly, that's something I need to work on.

For now, just the "after" will have to suffice.

Ah! Now doesn't that look better? Not great, but definitely better. :)

Total bust

Well, after I was so excited to go to the auction on Saturday, we came home with nothing.

Okay, not nothing. There was another auction at the fairgrounds at the same time and I got a cake plate. :)

But, no toilet, no shower, no sink or vanity, no flooring. Total bummer. Now, it's not that they didn't have any of those things. There were several options, but we are just looking for something particular.

They had a number of really tricked out shower units, but this is what they looked like.

When your house is built in the 1900s, this isn't exactly the look you go for. It would have been totally cool, but it doesn't go with the rest of the house at all.

Ditto on the toilets. Although, if you were looking for a black or gray one, they had those. And the ones with a dual flush system.

But, alas, none that fit our needs. And the vanities and pedestal sinks were too big or the wrong style too.

So, we came home with a cake plate, and our bathroom remains as is for now.

So, it's been a little quiet...

Admittedly, it's been quiet on this here blog.

Why?

Um, did you forget that we just moved?

So, we've been unpacking and trying to arrange some furniture, rugs, and other random stuff that we seem to have accumulated. Oh, and plan. This house requires some planning.

That being said, I have my sights set on the bathroom on the main level. It used to be a full bath, and we have plans to make it that way again. We are headed to the Allen County Fairgrounds tomorrow for a big "home stuff" auction. I hear it is loved by contractors who are able to score some sweet, brand new stuff for super cheap.

Check out the auctioneers' website.

People come from all over for these auctions. I mean, seriously, they have a list of hotels and truck rental companies on the page. That's CRAZY!

I'm totally pumped. I CAN NOT wait!! I'm hoping to score some serious bath products: sink, toilet, shower and surround, flooring, etc. We'll see. We want to keep our remodels period-appropriate for the house so it really depends on what they have.

Wish us luck! And, I will be updating after the auction to let you know where we came out.

In other news, I've been setting up appointments with various companies to come in and do some quotes. Fun stuff. More about that later.

Chandelier

Oh, my goodness! Can you see this? The one on the right has been Windexed and the one on the left has not. Amazing!

Confession

I don't think it's a secret to anyone here so I'll just say it. I get distracted. All. The. Time...

What was I saying?

I found this picture on the internet, but it is the exact same
chandelier as the one in our dining room. Gotta' love
the ol' internet.

Oh, yeah. Well, I was dropping off a van load of our stuff this morning when I realized how dirty the chandeliers in the house are. I grabbed the Windex and a rag and started on the living room chandelier.

FYI, we have four chandeliers. :) One in the living room, one in the dining room, one in the entry way and a sconce in the stairwell.

Anyway, the glass is amazing! I forget to get before and after pictures, but I still have the one left in the main entry, so I'll get photos of that one.

I do love my sparkly things. And, these light fixtures are amazing. Pics to come tomorrow...

Unless I get distracted. :)

Cleaning Inside

There really was a lot accomplished inside too, so here's a glimpse into that part.

This is the caked on deteriorated carpet padding that Mom was scraping off the floor in Ethan's room.

Here I am hard at work in the full bath. The carpet is off and I was busy trying to get up the tacked down underlayment and padding.

Remember when I mentioned other people's dirt? Yeah, this is what come off of ONE of the window blinds after it was scrubbed in the tub.

This is the front living room. The large wooden box is one of the radiator covers and the window coverings are down for washing. So, we are looking out the front of the house toward Main Street.

Mom hard at work using the carpet cleaner in the Fireplace Room.

Tracey still hard at work now cleaning the inside entry door.

Garage pictures

To help document the project, here are some pics taken. Note: these are cell phone pics so the quality may not be phenomenal.

You might be able to notice the torn and ratty shingles along the bottom half of the roof. Those shingles are the reason why we took on this project.

This first picture was taken when all the old felt and shingles were removed from the garage roof. I think Dad and Kevin would agree that this was the most difficult part of the process.

Dad and Kevin installing the shingles.

 So, I have to comment here. By now, surely, you have noticed the massively overgrown shrubbery. You should know, this pretty much surrounds the house.

See? Documentation! I really did help!

We agreed to pay Ellie and Ethan 2 cents for every nail they found and picked up in and around the garage. So far, Ellie has raked in $2.22.

First Round

It is amazing how different a house looks when the former owner leaves a house empty! The good news? We love it even more!

This last weekend was a whirlwind of projects at the house. Big priority? Get it clean! Oy! Thanks to Kevin's mom, our friend Tracey was on hand to work her magic. Tracey was such a blessing. She loves to clean and see the fruits of her labor, and boy, those fruits were abundant! The dirt that came off the walls was ridiculous.

The carpets too. I think we all have no idea how much dirt and nastiness hides and thrives in our carpets and rugs. Thank goodness for my mom's carpet cleaner. Whew! Really, you should have seen the rinse water she was dumping. Totally gross.

I would be amiss if I did not stress that it was really the purpose of my parents' visit to have Dad help Kevin with reshingling the garage. The garage roof was showing significant wear and tear and it was estimated that it would not successfully weather another northwest Ohio winter. Thankfully, Dad was a roofer in a former life and was able to share his experience with us.

Kevin started early in the morning to tear off the old felt and shingles. The unexpected bump on that project was that it took until noon to clean off the roof. Originally, the plan was for them to return home early Sunday morning, but with this bump, they decided to stay longer and get a lot further on the roof. And, that's exactly what they did. When it was time for Mom and Dad to leave, there was just one side of the roof left and I could help enough for Kevin to finish it up. Well, except that we ran out of shingles. But, we fixed that Monday morning and Kevin officially finished the garage roof Monday night.

Roof? Done. Whew!

Oh, yeah. And, we also wanted to tear out carpet in two rooms: Ethan's bedroom and the full bathroom upstairs. Mom did most of Ethan's room. She and I pulled up the carpet, but the padding underneath had completely deteriorated and was giving my allergies major grief. So, Mom finished that room, scraping up the lingering padding with a putty knife. It really worked wonders.

I worked on the bathroom. Yuck! You know, I just want to take a little break here and say that we all deal with our own dirt. And it's gross, but it's your own so it's mostly okay. It's much less okay to work with someone else's dirt. Not cool.

So, the carpet in the bathroom was gross.

Anyway, I pulled it up after some major wrestling with an abundance of carpet tacks. Oy! Seriously, there was no need for so many tacking strips and nails. And underneath it? ... Are you ready for it?? ... Marble! No, I'm just kidding.

There is lovely vinyl tiles glued to a wood floor, which means if there really ever was marble under there it was torn out long ago. Bummer, dude.

That being said, it's vinyl which means it will do until we can renovate that bathroom. Mission: Accomplished.

All in all, a very successful weekend.

Schedule

Here's the plan.

Saturday AM: Kevin arrives super early in the morning to start scraping the old shingles off the garage. I arrive at a reasonable time in the morning to start on our inside projects. Our friend, Tracy, arrives and begins the overwhelming job of cleaning the house top to bottom. Our friend, Andrea arrives to help. My parents arrive by 9 am to start helping. Dad goes to the garage and Mom and I begin taking out the carpet in two rooms upstairs.

My dad estimated that the garage roof is not likely to make it through another winter and this weekend works for he and my husband to replace it.

Except for Tracy (sorry, my friend), the rest of us women will be taking out carpet in Ethan's bedroom and the full bath on the 2nd floor. Ethan's bedroom is the only one with carpet right now. The padding has all deteriorated and there are wood floors underneath. (I checked.) I just hope they are in excellent shape.

The bathroom. Ugh. It will eventually get remodeled, but for now the carpet is coming out. Who carpets the bathroom?? Gross. So, we're pulling that out too and planned on just throwing down some cheap remnant of laminate flooring to make due until said renovation. However, rumor has it there may be marble under that carpet. Marble! We shall see...

It's done

So, we bought the house. We are scheduled for our "walk through" with the most recent owner this coming Friday at 3:30 pm. He wants to share with us what he knows about the house.

I'm a little nervous.

We had the home inspected by an old house expert, but I'm worried about what he'll tell us. The plumbing is on its last leg and all needs replaced. Oh, the electrical nearly fried the house last week. The roof leaks everywhere and is about to cave in.

You know, things that could really happen. :)

I am trusting that what we know is all there is to know and he wants to fill us in on personal stories and experiences in the house.