Category Archives: Reno

Two-Month Roundup

Categories: Reno

Saturday marked the two-month anniversary of starting work on the house.  Half of me feels like it was just yesterday that we started…the other half feels like we’ve been doing this for years!!  Anyway, here’s the list of things we have checked off so far (keep in mind that these are broad items, and each number contains about a gazillion little things that we’ve done):

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  1. Stabilized back porches with jacks and brackets
  2. Scraped entire exterior to remove remaining paint
  3. Repaired sump pump in basement to prevent more flooding
  4. Primed entire exterior, including all trim
  5. Rescreened 3 exterior screen doors
  6. Opened up 2 boarded fireplaces
  7. Repaired all interior plaster
  8. Installed motion lights outside (after this happened)
  9. Updated and activated alarm system
  10. Repaired and repainted existing shutters
  11. Updated plumbing in the laundry room for washer and dryer
  12. Removed shower from the upstairs hall bathroom
  13. Removed interior wall in upstairs back bathroom
  14. Closed in exterior door in upstairs back bathroom
  15. Removed shower tile covering window in downstairs bathroom
  16. Painted exterior of house (only the front is finished, so I’m counting it at about 20%)
  17. Removed 3 trees, cut back all bushes near the house, and removed dead/unwanted foliage
  18. Removed rotten eaves and soffits (this is only about 10% right now, but at least we’ve started!)

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I’d say that’s a lot of progress, especially considering that it rained the entire month of June!!  But we still have a LOOOOOONNGG way to go.  Here’s a (very condensed) list of the major items we still hope to complete in “this round.”

  1. Scrape and prep interior walls, trim, and ceilings (starting this week!)
  2. Prime and paint interior walls, trim, and ceilings
  3. Remove all interior carpet
  4. Finish electrical, including adding several outlets and wiring each room for ceiling fans
  5. Repair all porches
  6. Patch and paint the metal roof
  7. Rework hidden metal gutter system and repair/replace exterior woodwork
  8. Install new heating and air system
  9. Repair mortar in the basement, and repoint front-of-house mortar
  10. Finish upstairs back bathroom (tile floor, plumbing for a shower, new sink)
  11. Update downstairs bathroom (paint cabinets, new mirror, new light fixture)
  12. Repair garage (it is currently sturdy, but leaning)
  13. More landscaping

Who wants to start making bets on our move-in date?!

We’re Taking This Party Outside

Categories: Reno

It looks like the sun has decided to hang out for a few days.  (I’m knocking on wood as I’m typing this!!)  And you know what that means….time for major exterior work to commence!  You know you’re the homeowner of a really old house in need of a lot of repairs when you start jumping up and down with excitement over this sight:

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It’s a boom.  For reaching things really high up.  Like rotten eaves and gutters.  And a roof.  Yipeeeee!!!!  Okay, so there hasn’t been a ton of work just yet, but there has been some serious investigating going on in order to determine what materials will be needed.  Hey, I’ll take it!

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Inside, things are starting to get cleaned up so that we can start with the primer.  There’s only one room remaining that needs plaster repair–the laundry room.  Luckily that job should be quick and dirty.

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On the question of whether to paint the front door black or white…thanks for all the feedback, both on the blog and on Facebook!  I love interacting with all of you and reading your opinions.  But I have to say, with all the love in my heart, Y’ALL ARE NO HELP!!  You were hopelessly deadlocked straight down the middle.  Hahahaha!  Now you see my problem, right?  It’s such a tough decision!  I’ll keep thinking and let you know what we decide.

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Excitement in the Bathroom

Categories: Reno

No, not that kind of excitement.  Get your mind out of the gutter!

Let me first say that the pictures in this post are absolutely awful.  Hopefully one of these days it will stop raining (I feel like it has rained every single day for a month…and I don’t think that’s much of an exaggeration.)  When it does, I will take the good camera over and get a whole bunch of good ones!  For now, please forgive the very poor lighting and picture quality.

Ok, back to the story.  Yesterday was a fun day–I had to work (ok, that part wasn’t all that fun), but I got off a little early and came home to meet my brother and his girlfriend.  They haven’t seen the house yet, so I was super excited to show them and spend some time giving a “tour.”  When we got to the house, I got even more excited when I saw that all three bathrooms had major changes.

1.  Downstairs bathroom- This is the bathroom with the green tub and sink, and the window covered by the tile shower.  Well, at least the last one isn’t true anymore.  Here’s the before and after.

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We will finish it off with some privacy glass and subway tile.  It’s a huge difference!  But I definitely had to let the green tub know that his days are still numbered.

2.  Upstairs hall bathroom-  Remember this “after thought” bathroom?  The one with the 2′ x 2′ shower that pretty much blocked all access to the attic?  Yeah…it’s gone!  We decided to leave the toilet and sink so that we have an extra half bath for our guests (until we do our master bathroom…then it’s got to go!).  But I hated that shower even more than the green tub, so it is outta there.

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3.  Upstairs back bathroom- this was the biggie!  This is the bathroom that will eventually be a guest bathroom, but will serve as our master bathroom until we convert the old kitchenette into our master bathroom.  This one was even more cramped than the hall bathroom!  And it had an exterior door.  Why you need an exterior door in the bathroom I will never understand.  Here it is before:

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And here it is now:

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Who knew that that room could be so much bigger?!  We can work with this.  Here’s the view of that door from the outside now:

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And if having major changes in all three bathrooms wasn’t enough for the day, they also opened up our two covered fireplaces!  Here they are before (in the office and master bedroom, respectively):

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And here they are now:

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Certainly not pretty, but with some paint and simple tile, they’ll spiff right up!  So all in all, yesterday was a day of good news (with the exception of the weather forecast).  And today is FRIDAY!!  Have a good weekend! :)

The Painted Porch

Categories: Reno

I hope everyone had a great weekend!  I was excited to finally not be traveling this weekend (for the first weekend in months!).  So on Saturday, a couple of friends and I enjoyed antiquing and pool time, and then drinks and pizza!  It was the perfect Saturday.

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I also got to approve the final paint color for the house!  Our painter painted half of the front porch, along with the trim around the front door.  He even painted the shutters so I could really see everything put together.  And let me tell you…it is perfect!!  It’s exactly what I’ve been imagining.  The color will look great year round, especially when our yard begins to bloom.

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And like I said, he only painted half of the front porch, so the house is looking a little mismatched right now.  Luckily the primer color is very similar to the final paint color, so you can’t really tell from the street.  But the actual paint color is just saturated enough to not look “minty.”  Here you can kind of see the difference.  It’s subtle, but it is definitely different.

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I can’t wait to see the finished product!!  Also, this is what our stair case looks like right now.  It’s like an obstacle course trying to get upstairs!

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I met with our contractor on Friday for about an hour and a half and we went over every little detail in the house.  Lots of big changes are coming up…I can’t wait to share them with you!

Next up:  choosing interior paint colors!

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