Finishing Details

Another batch of photos from Mom! She said that everything is ready to go now. A little cleaning here and there and a couple last projects. She painted the inside of the storm door, painted and hung the wood storm windows on the porch, painted the porch floor, and touched up some of the stain on the banister. The staircase is far from perfect, but the new owners need to experience some of the joy of old house ownership, right? Photo time!

The green-ified storm door:Paint for the porch floor and re-hung, painted wood storm windows:
For the staircase lets do a little retrospective. Lets start with the beginnings. Faux-wood paneling as far as the eye can see, a closet blocking the view from the living room, drop ceilings, worn-out rust-colored carpet. Behold the grossness:
DEMO!!! By far the easiest and most satisfying house project:Wall gone, paint stripped, carpet removed, walls repaired and painted. Lookin' good!Lastly, I'd like to wish a very happy 1st anniversary to my very, very good friends Eric and Lindi! I doubt they read the blog, but congrats to you two anyway! This is a photo from one of our Fraternity formals. Cute couple, no? They are seriously the most laid-back, easy going couple I've ever met. In the four or five years they've been together I don't think I've ever heard them fight... and I lived with Eric for a couple of those years. They're a perfect match.

Here's one of my favorite photos of the wedding party. We were in the limo midway between the church and the reception. As we passed a park we had a spontaneous photo session. I'm on the slide on the left, second guy in (look how short my hair was! What was I thinking!). Eric and Lindi should be obvious. He's the guy holding the girl in the white dress. Yup, that's her. Really, you should have already figured that one out by yourself. Fun factoid: The guy to the left of me and the girl standing to the right of Eric are my friends Tony and Laura who are getting married September 6th. That's right in the middle of Fashion Week so unfortunately I can't make it. Eric and Tony were best friends growing up and Lindi and Laura were best friends growing up. How did they meet? Lindi and Laura were my friends from high school. Eric was my roommate in the dorms and when we moved out Tony, Eric and I got an apartment together. Basically, they met through me. Cool, huh?

NYC in 10: Trim, Trim, Trim.

First, before the trim talk, last night I started working on the kitchen tile. Ugh.

It was a pretty straightforward job: peel off old tiles, lay down new tiles. Not too hard, right? No, not utill Nate decides to start doing things the right way. I already had a good part of the kitchen re-tiled but then, behind the fridge, I realized that the sheet vinyl underneath was coming up from the floor. "I should really peel that up first" I thought. Big mistake. I spent the next two hours redoing the work I had already done. Peel off the new tile, chip away at old sheet vinyl, replace tile. After about a third of the kitchen the sheet vinyl stopped coming off, so I had to use my scraper to kind of taper the edge off to the wood floor. Then I could transition from vinyl tile over wood to vinyl tile over sheet vinyl. Here's a photo of that transition.

By the way, check out how amazing that sheet vinyl was. I want to meet the person who decided that was the best option for their kitchen. Seriously.
Here's a photo of the part of the floor that is done. The rest has to wait until the subfloor dries out from the leaky shower. Yeah, that's on my to-do list too. Just imagine white cabinets and window trim. The hardware we picked up today was the wrong size, so we'll have to exchange that. Yeah, I forgot to measure it and just took a guess. Of course I was wrong.But, back to the main topic of the post: TRIM!!!

Yesterday Mom and Dad came up and helped me get started with the trim replacement. After a trip to the Depot to get lumber, Dad and I started cutting trim while Mom primed the boards. We replaced all of the missing baseboards and quarter-round trim on the first floor. Photos:

Today they came up again with my brother and sisters. After another trip to the Depot, we started with the crown moulding. After about a hundred bad cuts, we finally got it up. We've got some filling to do at the corners and seams, but it's good enough. Yeah, I don't think we have a future as a father & son crown moulding company. Next came the cap moulding over the window and door trim. Check it out!

After we finished, we moved upstairs and Mom primed all of the wood. We need a little paint yet, but we're on the home stretch.

Upstairs, Dad and I hung the trim around the North West bedroom door (inside and outside trim) Next we hung up the door to the linen closet. It went up really easily, much to our surprise. It only took, like, 20 minuets to hang an 80 year old door in a new frame in an 80 year old house. Everything just lined up level on the first try. After we put the trim up around that door, the family took off for home. It feels so good to have this much progress happen in two days. I'm feeling a little less stressed out. Next step? Finishing the baseboards and quarter round trim on the second floor, priming, then a couple coats of paint. Then big old before and after pictures. I love nothing more than some good before and afters!

NYC in 20: Today's Theme is Curb Appeal

In probably every real estate book I've read, they all say that you should change up something on the exterior right before you sell your house. That way people who pass the house on a daily basis notice that there are changes taking place.

Well, I did that today. At least started that. I painted the porch door & door trim, front door & trim, screen door, upstairs front windows, and shutters. The upstairs windows and shutters need another coat, but I can square that away tomorrow.

The color I used was kind of an earthy green that I thought would compliment the white well. Hmm... it's growing on me, but I'm still not sure. I wanted something that was reminiscent of 1920's arts and crafts design, so I thought the green would work well. People will either think of arts and crafts when they see it or of a baby's dirty diaper. I'm hoping people will think of the first reference, not 'lets not buy the house with the diarrhea trim'. It was dark out by the time I finished, so I haven't had an opportunity to get a good look at the place. It was also too dark for pictures. Sorry, I'll get 'em tomorrow.

Tomorrow will mark my last day at the Hotel Donaldson, leaving me unemployed and ready to kick the house repairs into overdrive. With each little thing that gets done I can take a little bit of a deeper breath and my shoulders relax slightly further from my earlobes. I'm just kicking myself for being such a lazy putz this winter. I could have had so much more of this done!

Pictures, Pictures, Pictures!

I figured out how to use my camera, even though the LCD screen is broken. That one was a little alcohol+game involving movement+pavement+camera issue... I learned my lesson.

The good news is that I took pictures of everything I've written about but been unable to show you. I'll start off with the salvaged basement window I cleaned up, put new glazing compound on, and painted green.

I'll have to go the house and prop it up on the porch so you can see what the color looks like in it's proper application. Taking pictures from the middle of the street I guess; just more weird behavior in front of the neighbors. They'll have to start expecting it at some point.

Here's a photo of the one of the doorknobs I got from my 'parts house' (Rest In Pieces!). Check it out, 3 bags full! They've just been riding around in my trunk with me for the last couple weeks.

I read that if you put hardware like this in a crock pot full of water overnight, the paint comes right off. I'll try it sometime before we start working on the house, just in case these get called into play

I worked for three more hours on the first salvaged door, removing all of the paint with the heat gun. I'll probably use a chemical stripper to remove the stubborn paint from from the cracks and crevaces. That should take care of the rest of the varnish too. I'm a little concerned about the stripper because I've never tried anything like it before. I should be able to manage if everyone else can. Anyone have any suggestions on which one to use?

Before I get to that I need to attack the second door. Oh, picture provided! Yes! We have door #1 on the left and door #2 on the right. We also have about five hours of heat gun and scraper on the right. Boo!

Did I fail to mention that Fargo hit 100 degrees today and is really humid? Just the perfect temperature to spend a few hours with a gun blasting out 950 degree air. Fantastic idea. Ranks right up there with wearing shorts and flip-flops with searing-hot sticky paint chips dropping to the ground. I felt the heat on that one a couple times! I also inadvertantly bumped the hot tip of the gun with my thimb. Ouch! It was quick enough though that I didn't burn it really. No blister at least! It's still my favorite tool.

That's about it for now.