Calling in the Troops

I took a week (almost) off work to make some headway on some of the house projects that had been nipping at my heels. These are the projects that every time I walk by, I can hear a little voice is saying, "paint me", "trim me", "cut me down". Ok, I made up the last one - like any tree/shrub would actually volunteer to be cut down.


Is this the way life will be from now on? Taking 'vacation' to work on the house?  Little voices coming from all nooks and crannies? Oh dear....


My parents came up for a few days to help me get some 'labour intensive' projects done.  The list included:

• removing the big dead vine/bush in the backyard corner
• trimming low-hanging/dead tree branches
• taking out the cherry tree (diseased and unsightly)
• power-washing the front porch
• painting as many rooms as possible

It was a productive few days, that's for sure. Instead of describing it via text, I'll use photos to do the talking.


Outside work.....

Cutting down the cherry tree in the front yard. You can tell who the 'site supervisor' is.

Finnegan saying good bye to the Cherry Tree. 

                  

And now for inside the house....

Above and below: Prep and painting the living room.

Getting the bedroom ready.... Good bye beige!

When everything is done, I'll do some before and afters.... after all, that's the most exciting part, and as HGTV has mastered, the only reason people stick around to watch 30 minutes of renovation.

Green Dreams - Part I

My favourite thing about living in a house (as I believe I have mentioned earlier) is having a frontyard AND a backyard.  This is a significant improvement from the apartment I spent the last 6 years in.


For years, I've been cutting out pictures of yards and gardens that I love.  Now it's time to make that dream a reality.  First things first though, need some garden tools. It was such an exciting day when Grant and I went to the garden store to buy garden tools - 31 years old and never owned a rake!  It was a dreamy day!!  


We had made a list, but that list flew out the window once I was allowed to go into Lee Valley. (Prior, I did not allow myself to go in there - I heard I would love it too much, which would cause serious storage problems for an apartment girl).   The rumours were correct - Lee Valley was made for me. My new favourite place.  Bought some hand clippers,  hand saw and a manual push lawnmower - had to seriously restrain myself. Everything else we got at RONA, thanks to a lovely giftcard from E & B.


Up to that point, our yard looked like a total jungle - grass was long, trees were overgrown and things were of a general un-tidiness. So, Grant was eager to get our new lawnmower into action. Here he is posing for me (isn't there some kind of right-of-passage for a man with a lawnmower? I had to document this).


From the picture on the left, it doesn't really look like we need a lawnmower (at least  on that half of the front yard - note the lack of grass).  But the other half of the yard needed a haircut.


Here are a few shots of the virgin backyard - untouched by anyone up to this point (except for that pile of twigs and leaves that I made with my NEW RAKE). A good reference point for things to come....

Making Messes

So, we purchased an old house - just over 100 years old. We wanted something with character, something we could fix up and put our own stamp on. We also wanted to live in the city, which means 'completely renovated' + 'character' + 'nice neighbourhood' wasn't in the financial cards.


The first renovation came early.  Our house was largely (despite the home inspection report) knob and tube wiring. We needed to bring the electrical to code so we could be insured.  Some of the wiring on the main floor was borderline fine (ie. grounded but not wired correctly), but almost all of the second floor was not.  It's easy to see why - you actually need to open up the walls to re-wire the second floor. Minor reno, right?

Some of the 'apparently fine' wiring

in the kitchen. You can see the knob

and tube (black wiring) that was capped

and cut out.

If anyone has ever dealt with plaster walls, they'll know what a total mess cutting through plaster is.  Not one room in our house was unscathed (no worries - Montauk was safely hiding under its plastic sheet).  In addition, we had little bits of plaster rubbing on the previously buffed wooden floors - made some nice scratches for which I gave Grant a lot of heck for.


It took Grant about 3-4 weeks of 'after work' work to get things all straightened out and properly installed. In the meantime, all my plans for indoor beautification was basically put on hold. I was relegated to outdoor work, which is not really a bad thing. (More on that to come...)

Above: Tools everywhere!!


Left: Cutting holes in the curve of the ceiling
(yikes! How will we patch that up!!). Note the
few 'tester' holes to find the wires.  It's was bit
of a guessing game to find where the wires
were running.  No rhyme or reason.

Holes where Grant was cutting above - filled 
and sanded!

Once the wiring was complete and to code, Grant had to patch up all the holes. Not an easy job considering no wall in this house is straight, and he'd never done this before. The holes in the curve of the ceiling were the most difficult (right). However, the sanding of the plaster patches was the worst!! Dust everywhere!! (As an aside, we had a 3 month old baby coming to stay for the weekend with his parents two days after the photos below were taken. I was freaking out a little bit - too dusty for newborn babies!!!!).

We tried to minimize the spread of dust in rooms with small holes by taping Grant into a confined space while sanding (kind of looks like an alien in a pod). Although you can't tell from the photo, he IS wearing a safety mask and googles (Grant is very into safety). It worked fairly well, as you can tell from the cleanliness of the floors.


It took a good 2 days afterwords to clean all the plaster dust that had spread to every crevice.  Some good relationship building moments there. Made it clean in time for Henry (baby).


Overall, rewiring a house is not the most fun project a new homeowner can undertake.  I was so glad this 'minor project' was over.  It now means that our house is more electrically safe than before, and more importantly, that I can start painting, and start making this place look fabulous.