Brian's Visit - Done

Brian left a week ago.  It's taken me a while to catch up - what with all of this free wheeling I've been doing without my arm sling!  That's right folks, the broken arm is a thing of the past (mostly, I still can't lift heavy things for another 2 weeks).  

Brian left last Friday, Caleb and I spent the weekend in Virginia Beach for our 6th wedding anniversary, and then on Monday I got my sling off.  Since Monday, I've been overcome with productivity.  Running errands like a boss.  Paying bills like a boss.  Cooking dinner like a boss.  Sweeping floors like a boss.  Going to play group like a boss.  I'm queen of the world.

Anyway, back to the point of this blog - the house.  Here were our goals for before Brian came, with what we accomplished last week struck through:

- Put a ceiling in the basement (the flammable insulation is exposed)- Remove carpet from screened-in porch, put in a different (more weather proof) flooring
- Rebuild the stairs, railing, and screen door going up to the screened-in porch

- Remove classic 1970s intercom systems and plaster over space

- New double door from outside to basement

- Replace painted over and non-functioning electrical outlets

- Extend and/or rerouting some downspouts to prevent water leaking into the basement

- Replace most of the doors (particularly the ones that lead outdoors and are leaking air)

- Install a handrail on the stairs going to the family room- Securely fasten the toilet in Lucy's bathroom in a way that prevents movement

- Set up a working smoke alarm system

- Remove linoleum in laundry room (2 layers) and replace with new linoleum
- Remove wall paper in laundry room
- Paint laundry room

You can see we got quite a bit done, but we still have some left to do.  The biggest differences are in our porch and basement.  Below is the progression of photos through out Friday and Monday (while I was getting my sling off, Caleb and my parents were putting up screen).

Friday morning
Half painted, no stairs, no door, no screen

Friday evening

Painted, stairs, door, no screen

Monday evening

Painted, stairs, door, screen

We still have to stain the floors and put up wood stripping to hide the screen seams, but all of our work has really transformed the space.  When it's completely done I'll be sure to post before and after photos.

The painters also arrived this week to start painting all of our brown trim white.  Caleb was joking today that pretty much all we've done at the house is turned brown things white - trim, electrical face plates, the porch.  I think it has made everything look so much more modern.  Although, I don't think I would say, "all we've done is turn brown things white" without context.  Yes, that's right, we're  gentrifying our house.  No, we're not racists.

Brian's Visit - Day 4

Remember when summer vacation used to be relaxing and you could spend your money on fun souvenirs, like a piggy bank in the shape of the the Empire State Building?  Now in adulthood, we get to spend our summer vacation painting, sanding, and removing wall paper and our money is all spent at Lowe's.  (BTW, Is Rob Lowe of the 1980s Brat Pack of any relation?  If so they should totally put him in their commercials.  I know I'd buy more thinking of that dreamy face.)

Today - day 4 of our "summer vacation" - we have accomplished a few things.  Our wrought iron railing is finally done!  We used the directions from here, or rather, I printed the directions from there and handed them to my parents (I could get used to this broken arm thing).  One thing I do not recommend is sanding all of the old paint and rust off and "getting some shut eye" before painting the enamel on.  It stormed that night.  And guess what happens to unprotected iron after a storm?  It rusts.  So we had to begin all over again.  But the final product is decent.  I hope it stays that way for a long time.

Before

After

Otherwise, the rest of today was dedicated to one thing - painting the deck.  It took us a full 8 hours, even with two people working all day.  The heat index today was 106 degrees, and the humidity was so high that most of my pictures were fuzzy from the condensation on my camera lens.  Everyone is exhausted, except Lucy. 

Tomorrow is our last day with Brian here, and we're planning on using his expertise in every possible way.  He's going to build our deck stairs, install a new screen door, and teach us how to sand and stain the deck.  In his "down time" (a.k.a. time in the air conditioning) he's going to teach me how to remove wall paper and linoleum from the laundry room.  We can get this all done in the 5 hours he has before he has to go to the airport, right?

Brian's Visit - Days 2 & 3

We are now three days through our summer "vacation" and though I feel like we've accomplished a lot, you can't really tell by just looking at the house right now.  Like most improvements, it has gotten worse before it gets better.

The basement is now 90% done.  The sheetrock is all up and "mudded" and Brian is working on building us a drop ceiling to access our plumbing pipes and HVAC system.

The rest of the last two days have turned out to be the saga of the deck. I have begun to refer to the house as "the parfait house" after the Shrek quote about layers.

Astroturf (circa 1977), beige carpet (circa 1990), and
future deck tiles glimmering in the distance.

Shrek: Ogres are like onions! 
Donkey: They stink?
Shrek: Yes... No!
Donkey: Oh, they make you cry?
Shrek: No!
Donkey: Oh, you leave 'em out in the sun, they get all brown, start sproutin' little white hairs...
Shrek: NO! Layers. Onions have layers. Ogres have layers. Onions have layers. You get it? We both have layers.
Donkey: Oh, you both have LAYERS. Oh. You know, not everybody like onions. What about cake? Everybody loves cake! Shrek:  I don't care what everyone else likes! Ogres are not like cakes.
Donkey: You know what ELSE everybody likes? Parfaits! Have you ever met a person, you say, "Let's get some parfait," they say, "Hell no, I don't like no parfait"? Parfaits are delicious!

Like parfait, this house has several layers.  In our screened in porch, as we began to peel off the carpet we realized - much to our horror - that there was a layer of astroturf underneath the carpet. 

This is not the first time we've found layers in the house. The laundry room has two layers of linoleum.  The roof has two layers of shingles.  The walls are several layers of paint over wall paper.  We should expect from now on to find remnants of previous owners in all of our house projects. But, it's still a shock.

But back to the screened-in porch.  Brian convinced us that rather than patching holes in the screen that we should just start from zero - take off all of the screens, paint the wood without the screens on and then re-screen the area.  So after we got all of the carpets off, we began power-washing. 

Powerwashing is my mother's favorite activity.  She enjoys it immensely.  And I'm not even being facetious.  Really.  She does.  So she did that while I went home and waited for the dishwasher repair man at our rental house (his wise words, "yep, it's broken."  Thanks dude.)

When I came back with Lucy around 4 p.m., the deck looked amazing and Caleb was busy installing new outlets and light switches in the bedrooms.  All of the face plates and units were a 1970s chocolate brown, and Caleb updated them to a modern white (with a little tutoring from Brian).  Lucy was very impressed, and tried to "help" daddy by poking scissors in there.  We might need some serious discussions about the dangers of electricity.

Turns out after all of that powerwashing, the floor boards underneath are actually quite beautiful.  I had bought some very expensive eco-friendly deck tiles to cover what I thought was going to be hideous wood.  The good news is, we can return the expensive deck tiles (which adds $2,000 back to our budget) and just seal or paint the wood.   By the time I left to go home and make dinner, the men were working on installing the ceiling!  I'm getting very excited for how this space will turn out!

Brian's Visit - Day 1

Blame it on sequestration or lame airlines - who knows why - but Brian's flight was delayed and he didn't get into Richmond until around 1 a.m., which didn't put him back home until 2:30 a.m.  Thus, we got a late start today.  Once we got to the house around 10:30, we took Brian on a tour around the house to give him an idea of all the things that need to be done.  Brian, ever the optimist, thinks we can accomplish all of the things on our "to do" list and then some.

The main thing "the men" (Brian, Caleb and my dad) accomplished today was getting sheet rock up in the basement.  When we bought the sheet rock at Lowe's this weekend Caleb was obsessed with asking me, "How are we going to get this on the ceiling?" as if I knew the answer.  Apparently the sheet rock is ridiculously heavy.  I wouldn't know because I was able to claim the broken arm to get out of the heavy lifting.  Low and behold, Brian arrives and says, "Oh shoot, I forgot to ask you to rent a sheet rock lift."  Aha!  So that's how you lift these heavy 4 foot by 8 foot pieces of gypsum on the ceiling!  So my dad and I headed to an equipment rental place and got the sheet rock lift.  By the time we got back it was 2 p.m.

But, with three men drilling, they were able to sheet rock most of the 575 square foot basement in the next 3 hours.  They couldn't finish it all because my mom insisted we were all home for dinner.  Thank you mom for feeding us!

The other thing we started was the process of getting rid of the intercoms!  The hated, ugly, 1970s intercoms.  Step one, remove screws and remove intercoms from wall.  Step two ... I have no idea what they did for step two because I was at the rental place picking up the sheet rock lift.  But when I come home, this is what I saw:

A wall in each bedroom that looked like this, and a pile of things pulled out of walls.  I've been told the holes will need several layers of this wall compound and lots of sanding, so it won't look like abstract art forever.

Looking forward to what tomorrow may hold!

Painting Party

After weeks of feeling unaccomplished, yesterday's painting party is just what the doctor ordered!  Ironically, one of the couples wasn't able to make it because the husband thought he had broken his arm that morning while trail running.  The last thing a painting party needs is two people with broken arms!

Here's what we got accomplished:
- painted the front door from white to a sunny yellow
- painted the front door hardware from a brassy metallic to black
- sanded down the wrought iron railing on the front porch
- put Drylok up on the basement walls to stop the mold and mildew
- painted 7 shutters (many more to go)

I mostly supervised and made lunch, since my broken arm rendered me useless.  The people who did the most work were Caleb and our pastors.  A husband-wife team are pastors of our church and they are amazing, hard-working, humble people.  What other pastor would strap on a vapor mask and help you Drylok your basement?

Or help you chose what shade of yellow you should paint your front door? (We chose the right-hand side, Benjamin Moore's Classical Yellow).

Another church member, a former carpenter, helped us power wash the shutters.

My parents showed up and pitched in too!  Even bringing their tools for us to use.

Lucy helped out by taping off the bushes.  After all, what would we do it we got shutter paint on a leaf?

At the end of the day we were exhausted.  We headed to my parents pool and relaxed with some cheeseburgers.  Tonight my cousin arrives from Minnesota to help us with more projects.  He's a contractor and has graciously volunteered to come out and teach us some of the basics of home repair, and some not so basics (like how to install a ceiling). 

This week is officially our summer "vacation."  Caleb has taken the week off of work and we hired a babysitter to watch Lucy.  We're hoping to get a lot done. 

Here's our list:

- Put a ceiling in the basement (the flammable insulation is exposed)
- Remove carpet from screened-in porch, put in a different (more weather proof) flooring
- Rebuild the stairs, railing, and screen door going up to the screened-in porch

- Remove classic 1970s intercom systems and plaster over space

- New double door from outside to basement

- Replace painted over and non-functioning electrical outlets

- Extend and/or rerouting some downspouts to prevent water leaking into the basement

- Replace most of the doors (particularly the ones that lead outdoors and are leaking air)

- Install a handrail on the stairs going to the family room
- Securely fasten the toilet in Lucy's bathroom in a way that prevents movement

- Set up a working smoke alarm system

- Remove linoleum in laundry room (2 layers) and replace with new linoleum
- Remove wall paper in laundry room
- Paint laundry room

At the end of the week we will be celebrating our 6th wedding anniversary with a weekend trip to Virginia Beach.   Here goes nothing!

You can die now

I have spent every free moment of the last 3 months checking out design blogs in anticipation of our new home.  Since I've broken my arm the obsession has only grown.  The NSA probably already knows exactly how I'm going to decorate Lucy's bedroom.

Knowing that background, here is a list of things I think need to stop trending NOW.

1. Chevron.  This is going to look dated faster than Hammer pants.

 

Mark my words.

2. Mustaches. Really?  Really?  When did this come back as a thing?  Mustaches were, are and will forever be creepy.

Do you see the similarities?

3. Pennants Banners, or "bunting."  Don't get me wrong, I love bunting for how it's an eco-friendly party decorating item.  You can use the same bunting for every party and no one will know.  What drives me crazy is the mass proliferation of bunting as a cutesy artistic statement.  I get that it's cheery.  I get that it's colorful.  I like cheery and colorful.  But it's become the new "bird" of design.  Cards, baby onesies, necklaces.  STOP. IT. NOW.

 

 Put a Bird on It

 

1 month in

So, we bought our house a month ago, and what have we accomplished?  TWO things on our "to do" list.  I believe that makes us 1% closer to our goal.  In my defense, we would have been able to cross off three things this month had I not fallen off a ladder while painting the basement and broken my arm a week ago.

 

House, 1.  Kristin, 0.  So far the house is winning, Charlie Sheen style.

At this point it is a miracle that I can type this blog post left handed with a minimal number of type-o's.  I don't see my contribution to DIY projects over the next 4 weeks to be significant seeing as how I can't drive, write, lift things or feed myself.

I want to state here, for the record, how crazy I feel when all I can do is sit on my butt.  Today Caleb and I got in a fight - our first in a while.  Partly because my feeling out of control has a direct correlation with my ability to lose it.  And partly because the financial pressure of paying for a mortgage and rent, while not making any progress on the house, became real as we discussed our budget for the next few months.  The words, "Buying this house was a mistake" were indeed uttered.  But it's too late now.

What's really amazing is how people have stepped up to help.  Next Saturday a group of friends and church members are coming to help us paint the outside of our house - shutters, trim and doors.  The day after that my cousin is flying in from Minnesota to help us repair the deck and get rid of the intercom system.  Hopefully by the end of July I will feel differently about our decision to purchase the house.