Several months ago, the print that was hanging on my living room wall took a dive of it's own volition, leaving a good sized hole in its place. I looked around for something to replace it. I was in LOVE with an Ansel Adams print, but the only size that fit the wall was a legit reproduction and out of my price range.

Enter: two empty frames and a bunch of watercolor supplies. I had fun mixing colors and making a couple of trees - one spring, the other fall. They fit well with my other pics of trees, go with my decor and didn't cost a thing! WOOT!

I hadn't wanted to put pictures up post-move in since I had people coming to visit for my sister's wedding (and I wanted it to be a surprise!). So I'll do more catch-up now...covering at least part of the downstairs.

There's plenty left to do, but I hit a wall at the end of May where I was just burnt out, so I moved my stuff in. I thought I'd be more inclined to mix working on the house into post-job time but having stacks of boxes around actually make it kind of difficult to work. The wedding and the prospect of overnight house guests was a major motivating factor. So, there has been progress.

I've officially painted every room in the house now!
Here's the layout, so you can get an idea of how it fits together.


When I moved in, just my Master BR, the downstairs bath, and kitchen were in decent shape.

Downstairs, I finished stripping and repainting the moldings in the Living Room. Got my pictures up & the room is fairly well decorated. This pic is taken from the entry hallway.

The entry hall is still the biggest mess - since all the trim molding is off, it doesn't look the greatest, plus I haven't touched the stairs. Each post on the banister needs to be stripped and repainted.

I'm so happy with how the downstairs kitchen turned out. Most of it is IKEA (Stat white cabinets), so I was able to keep my costs down. I love the double bowl apron sink! I ended up using travertine tile for the backsplash (left over from my parent's remodel) and really like having the natural stone against the wood - it tones down the bright white. The floor is Allure - fake cork. ;) I know the lights are a bit modern, but I'd seen some similar in historical Victorian kitchen pics, so I'm happy with the choice. Oh, and that big lower cabinet panel to the left of the sink is a dishwasher - isn't that swish?
A word to anyone designing an IKEA kitchen: the one thing I wish somebody had told me is that there's a "fridge" cover panel that's deeper and taller than the normal cover panels. (It's also a bit thicker). I'm pretty sure it didn't show up in any of the catalog/design software they had. I had to make an extra trip to get it, but really like that all the cabinets are the same height and that the fridge is completely enclosed. My contractor had to build a box out to get the correct depth, but it all worked out really well.
The downstairs bath is really pretty - it's much more feminine than most of the things I designed. I did all white, sticking to different textures for interest. This picture doesn't really do it justice ;)


The back laundry room. (Looking towards the kitchen) In here I swapped out the back door for a Dutch door that was in the garage.
Both the front & back doors are painted a pretty rose-red color on the outside called "Frosted Pomegranate".

I still owe pics of the dining and library, in addition to the upstairs, but those have been particularly hard to get a good photo from!

What I love about my house so far:

1. Abby can go romp in the yard to her heart's content
2. The floor in my bedroom is crooked, so one side of my dresser is at least 3 inches higher than the other.
3. The morning sun in the kitchen.
4. The sound of rain hitting the roof just outside my window when I'm falling asleep.
5. Admiring the wall of book shelves (ah, zenlike)
6. My wi-fi hasn't once needed to be reset (constant, often daily problem at the 'rents)
7. All my stuff is in ONE place!

Mom bought me some geraniums and helped me plant them in the window boxes around the house. They look really pretty and less like a troglodyte lives here. It also makes me feel like maybe I won't kill everything I plant. Regular rains have helped maintain this illusion.

Things left to do:

1. Strip/Sand/Paint Stairs
2. Paint trim and doors in upstairs hallway
3. Touch up walls that got dinged during move-in
   
4. Strip/Sand/Paint other trim pieces in garage (fall/winter project)
   

Were I a poet, I would write an ode to Drywall - beautiful, clean, even, drywall.

It makes such a difference to have the walls closed up again.Here are a couple of before and after pics...Taping and mudding the joints is a dirty job - one I'm leaving to the pros. Meanwhile, I've been spending most of my evenings assembling cabinets in the garage.

Once the drywallers are gone, I'll finish stripping the moldings that abut the wood floors that are soon to be finished & prep/paint the kitchen so we can put in the floors and cabinets.

Guess what I did yesterday and today? If you guessed "pull down plaster" you get a gold star!
Here's why I wear a respirator. Some of the stuff falling out of the walls is nasty.

You know that part of human nature where the thing you tell yourself NOT to think about is the only thing you can think about?
That's what happened today as I'm ripping down lathe & getting rained on with crap. "Hmmm...wonder what's in these walls." Mice, mouse droppings, bugs, bug droppings. Just try to not think about it. It's the grey/black clumps of hair that creep me out the most - I'm just hoping its the horse hair binder they used in the plaster and not something else. bleh.

These wall pics are from Sunday night. I finished pulling down lathe in the dining room exterior wall. The other walls will just have drywall over the lathe.
A bit of Sunday & all of today were devoted to the front hallway. The pic, taken Sunday, shows the plaster down in a section. I actually have this corner down to the studs with what I did after work. I left around quarter of 9 & it was too dark to take a good pic.

I'm about ready for another trip to the dump.
Pic 1: 1 day's breathing in left mask vs. new one.
Pic 2: Living room down to the studs
Pic 3: Starting the plaster/lathe removal in the hallway.
Pic 4: Trailer 'o junk

You know, it will be really nice when I stop pulling things down and can start putting them back together! I think Brad just shakes his head now at the messes I make over the weekend. We agreed that the living room walls were in rough shape, so we'll add that to the drywall list. This means the plaster currently on the walls needs to come down. Unskilled labor should do this kind of thing. That would be me.

So today I worked on pulling down the plaster. Some sections came down really easily - like they were just hanging out waiting for the wallpaper to come down. Others were a total PITA, completely stuck to the wall. Those sections required a lot of crowbar & hammer work. That part sucks.

But I finished the East wall and a good chunk of the north wall (this is helped by the fact that 50% of the north wall is the archway to the living room, so there wasn't all that much to do. Hopefully I can finsh doing the rest of it after work this week.
It's probably weird, but I think the lathe is really cool looking - I like the texture from across the room & up close it's cool to see the guts of the house. Like if I were into modern, I'd probably just put fiberglass sheating over the wall so you could still see the lathe...and then throw around words like postmodern, deconstruction, and "stimulating unpredictability"... But I'm not. So I'll cover it with drywall.

Brad got one of the windows in the kitchen changed out; I'll show pics when they're both done.

The only other interesting thing going on is that Jeff the electrician is supposed to start soon - hopefully tomorrow. Did I mention that my house the original, state of the art 1911 wiring? This knob & tube stuff would still be relatively safe, except that the insulators & casings become brittle over time & are favored by rodents, so it's generally seen as a fire hazard now. (It also lacks a grounding wire)
Since there's still live current running to at least part of the house through these wires, Jeff will be pulling & rewiring those sections. He'll also add electric in a couple spots for the remodel, including to kitchen cabinet lights & that sort of thing.

Pic 1: East wall - on the left is the front hallway, to the right is the kitchen. Through the window is the eat-in banquette.
Pic 2: North wall (stripped) & west window in the dining room
Pic 3: My stone foundation & light coming through the kitchen subfloor
Pic 4: Electricity by Edison