On a Roll!

With so much to do it's sometimes hard to decide where to start.

Obviously we now need a nursery, and the deadline is quickly approaching! So of course Andy is hard at work tearing the room apart. First thing to be demolished was the ceiling in the closet. Okay, that was my dad's doing. He has been working on the closet, which, when we moved in had all the hookups for a washer and dryer. Andy then took down the rest of the ceiling. Why? Well why not when you're on a tight deadline  At least this is giving me plenty of time to think about the theme of the nursery.

 At this rate I won't have to worry about picking out wall paper or furniture until the end of January.

 And why not start another project as well?? Our side deck is in dire need of some TLC; the railings are falling down and the posts are rotted. Now's the perfect time to demolish the deck!

We Didn't Give Up, We're Just Slow as Molasses

Wow it's been a long time since I did an updated blog post, then again, it's been a long time since anything significant has been finished (at least in my eyes). We (or more aptly, Andy) were busy all spring & summer doing lots of little things inside and outside. I would guess Andy's favorite improvement, as it was likely the most fun for him, is the backyard. He finally got to get his lumberjack on and buy a chainsaw. He took down about five "scrub" trees that had just been left to grow. And luckily he did so with none of them landing on our house or garage. There may have been a few close calls though, some of those trees were taller than they seemed! 

Before

               

After

Then of course he had to cut up all the trees and lug them to the dump. I don't think he enjoyed that part as much.

 The biggest thing we have finally accomplished is our den. We started tearing down the wallpaper in the den on the day we closed on the house, July 20, 2012. Now, over a year later, it's painted, re-wallpapered and ready to be used! This was our first foray into wallpapering. Luckily for us my dad has pretty much wall papered their entire house so at least there was someone who knew what they were doing. Hopefully Andy learned enough so that he can do it on his own next time. Nevertheless, we are really happy with the way the room turned out. It will be a great cozy space this winter. Now if only we can get someone over here to check our chimneys one of these days, then we can actually enjoy our fireplace. One thing at a time though...

Before pictures...

 And after...

Now we just need to decorate and get the rest of the furniture in!

I'll admit, I haven't done a lot to help out Andy these last few months, so really he deserves all the credit for this room.

On the next project though, I definitely plan to be more involved.

Next Up: The Nursery!

DIY Would be Much Easier if we were Professionals

Well our winter Den project has quickly become our spring project and about to become our summer project. I've said it before and I'll say it again, everything takes longer than we expect and plan.

Not a whole lot of progress has been made on our den.  Most recently Andy and my dad have been installing the crown molding and it was like the blind leading the blind.  Even though my dad has installed molding before and has done it a number of times in the house I grew up in (and it looks just fine I might add), it has been over a decade since he last did it and therefore he clearly has forgotten most of what he learned.  But nonetheless, they pushed forward and began to hang our crown molding.  Each piece that they worked on took them an average of two hours to cut and hang.  And after each piece was hung?  Well, let's just say they looked less than perfect. My dad, however, told us not to worry and once it was pained and filled in with wood-fill it would look just fine. 

No molding yet.

Then a miracle happened.  One night after going out to dinner with some friends we had them all back to our house for drinks.  Lucky for us, one is a professional contractor.  Andy brought him upstairs to show him the "progress" on our crown molding and perhaps ask some advice on how to do the more complicated corners that were left.  He was then able to cut and hang a piece that looked better than anything we had done so far, all it less than 10 minutes and after a night of drinks!  He certainly put us to shame, but shared some great tricks of the trade to make going forward easier, such as don't use a hammer, get a nail gun.

Well, I got Andy a nail gun and compressor not too much later after that night for his birthday and he took down and rehung all the molding that he had already completed.  Thank god, it looks one thousand times better.   And THANK YOU MIKE, for all your advice!

Lucky for Andy, I didn't get any pictures of the "before" molding.  Looks pretty good huh?

Meanwhile, downstairs...

On the first floor we have what I affectionately like to call our "water closet."  It's literally a coat closet with a toilet stuck in there.  While it certainly isn't the ideal half-bath, it gets the job done for now since it's the only "bathroom" on the first floor.  Oh and don't worry, there is a sink, it's just out in the hall.

Anyways, a little while ago we started to notice that the plaster on the ceiling was coming loose from the lath.  Obviously I didn't want it to fall on my head or anyone else's head so I asked Andy to see if he could fix it.  No problem he said.  It was going to be a Sunday morning project. 

Andy figured he just needed to buckle it up by drilling a few holes and filling them in with some construction adhesive to make the plaster stick to the lath. 

Unfortunately I didn't get a before picture, so here is an artist's (my) rendering of the ceiling.

Hard at work.

Hmmm....

Ummm....

WHAT?!?!

So much for that.  And it's still like this today and probably will stay like this until we turn our "water closet" back into a coat closet.

                      

Progress...

I feel like we have bee very slow going with our projects so far this year, but now we are finally making some progress on our den. This room requires essentially the same work as our bedroom, however one wall was really beyond repair so we took it down to the lath. This weekend Andy and my dad put up the blue board and now it's back to plastering.

Andy has taken the lead on the plastering role because I find the room too dusty to be in. Perhaps Andy leaves it that way to keep me out of his way.

Now that work is getting done in the den it was time for Andy and I to make a crucial decision, paint or wallpaper??? When we first moved into the house we imagined ripping down all the wallpaper and painting everything. Now, however, we have both really fallen in love with the black and gold paper in our living room and hate the thought of getting rid of it. And even though we did paint our bedroom and I am happy with the way it turned out, I think Andy and I agree the painted look is a little too modern for the house. Therefore, from here on out, I think most rooms will be wallpapered. Now we just need to agree on a paper...

On a side note...

While I haven't been much of a help to Andy in the den, I did help him build his new work bench in the basement.  Andy tried to teach me the difference between a drill, a driver, and a drill-driver.  I'm still not sure what it is, but I did get a chance to to drill some holes and drive some screws. However, when it was time to try the miter saw I found it was too loud and freaked out and ran upstairs. Maybe next time I'll do better.

New Year New Projects

Now that the Holidays are finally over and things have settled down, it's time to get on to our next project, our Den.  So far, the only place in our house to relax and watch TV is our bedroom, which means once I lay down to watch a show, I'm likely to fall asleep soon after.  Therefore, we need a room with a couch and TV.

Andy started on the Den a couple weeks ago.  Here's what it looked like when we had our home inspection:

And here it is now:

There's a lot that has to be done to this room, but at least Andy has gotten quite experienced with plastering.  Unfortunately there was one wall that could not be fixed.

When we took the wood paneling down the wall behind it was a huge mess, so we decided it would be easier just to take it down.   Now we just have to rebuild this wall, fix the others, fix the ceiling, prime, paint the trim and either paint or wallpaper the walls.  I'm hoping to be done in less than 5 months this time. We'll see...

Squirrel Update

A few weeks ago we had the tree we believed the squirrels were using to get onto our roof trimmed back, and since then there have been no more squirrels in our attic.  With this close to zero degree weather, if we don't catch anymore, I believe the problem will have been taken care of.  We only had to relocate five furry friends.