. . . Gonna Eat a Lot of Peaches

I'm in love with a stripper

2011-06-30T22:17:00.000-05:00

And not the Chippendale kind. Or the kind T-Pain sings about. Nope, I'm talking about the kind who made our linen closet door look like this:

We've literally been elbow-deep in bathroom painting this week, trying to finish the bathroom remodel we started several months ago (see Involuntary Bathroom Remodeling Part I and Part II and stay tuned for Part III). Last night, as I was painting around the linen closet, I asked Joe if he thought it would be easier to just take off the closet door so I could paint around it. He agreed that would work best, took the door off, and took it out to the garage to get it out of the way. I thought that was the end of it. Next thing I knew, in Joe's typical let's-take-this-to-the-next-level fashion, he was back inside explaining to me that the door really needed to be stripped, primed, and re-painted and telling me that he'd already scraped all the paint off the perimeter of the door. OK then. I guess we're stripping and re-painting the linen closet door. This is similar to the way he had to take off a little bathroom trim to put in the tiled shower, then decided that needed to be stripped, then decided that the rest of the trim also needed to be removed and stripped, and now has decided that the trim around the doors needs to be removed and stripped...you get the idea. Now, a huge part of this bathroom project involves removing, stripping, priming, reattaching, and repainting trim *insert huge sigh and "will this ever end?" facial expression here*.

So I'm officially in love with a stripper. And, no, he's not the Chippendale kind. But I think he's pretty cute, don't you?

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Home Improvement FAIL

2011-06-20T21:24:00.000-05:00

After a bit of downtime on our home improvement, I figured tonight was a good time to continue work on our bathroom project. In particular, we need to paint the ceiling. I prepped the area, then went to the garage to get the big bucket o' paint. I picked it up, and realized that there was a leak and that goopy white paint was now on my concrete garage floor. Thanks a lot, Home Depot.

Undeterred, I figured that, instead of painting, I would continue removing the trim from the baseboard. I went to go pry off a small piece in the corner, and in all the pulling, twisting, and bending, my 3" putty knife--probably my second-favorite home improvement tool behind my 1.5" putty knife--snapped in half.*

*Yes, not only do I have a favorite home improvement tool, but a top 5 list regarding same. The order: 5. Lineman's pliers, 4. Rotary sander, 3. Circular saw, 2. See above, 1. Ditto. I love me a good putty knife. I can't believe I'm actually saying (writing?) this out loud.

To top it all off, as I write this Kendra is outside trying to fix a leaking hose in our hand-pump sprayer-thingy to spray the weeds in our gravel driveway and patio. This is one of those days when I think I should rename the blog, "F*ck This Old House." Cocktail, anyone?

Follow-up to yesterday's post: our first tomato of the season

2011-06-02T20:25:00.001-05:00

I discovered this little guy today.

Our first tomato of the year. A Cherokee Purple heirloom.

It's official. Summer is here.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

How does your garden grow?

2011-06-01T21:00:00.002-05:00

This is my garden.

If you would have told Kendra from 4 years ago that she would have a garden, she would have laughed in your face. As I've mentioned before, Kendra from 4 years ago couldn't even keep a house plant alive and had never so much as dug a hole in the ground. Now she has a garden. With green things growing in it. I'll be damned.

It's not much - probably just about 6 by 12 feet or so - but it's enough for 3 tomato plants, 3 cherry tomato plants, 4 heads of lettuce, 4 heads of broccoli, 5 various pepper plants, and some spring onions this year. More than enough for our little family of four.

This is the third summer I've had a garden, and I've learned a little bit every year. The first year, I learned you can love your garden a little too much. I watered my tomato plants every 1-2 days, and ended up with huge, green, vine-y plants but very little fruit. Last year, I learned that little cages (and some putrid spray called "liquid fence") are necessary to keep rabbits and raccoons from snacking on young plants. The plants were salvageable, but I ended up with some plants that didn't produce any peppers until very late in the season.

This year is off to a great start. I've watered (but not too much), applied the liquid fence, and protected most of the plants with cages. The spring onions are almost ready, everything is growing, and we even have a tiny pepper growing on one of our jalapeño plants.

No it's not much, but I've grown pretty proud of this little sliver of our yard. And one of the best parts is that Max enjoys helping in the garden, so it's something we can do together. I hope Charlie will be able to start getting his tiny hands dirty next summer. It's perfect, really, because I've found that gardening is a lot like parenting: full of hope & frustration, surprise & disappointment, exhaustion & reward. You sow the seeds not knowing what you're gonna get, but you tend those little plants the best you can. When you mess up, you hope the damage is reversible. And you learn as you go.

Kendra from 4 years ago would be amazed at what it's all become.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

There's A Hole in the Ceiling Because I'm Fixing It...

2011-05-25T21:27:00.000-05:00

...thanks for asking, Kendra. I did start out this project as simply covering an air return between the bathroom and the playroom. One I got on the ladder and started checking things out, though, I realized we had some old water damage to the bathroom ceiling. I got to removing the damaged plaster, and soon my 12"x10" hole was now about 3'x2'. So, in all, your typical old house project that starts out small and gets bigger and bigger.

In any event, the hole has been patched with drywall, taped, and has a coat of joint compound on it. By the weekend, it should be ready to paint, which is the whole reason I was up on the ladder in the first place.

With the ceiling painted, we can move to the walls, then the trim. Except I'm pretty sure I'm going to pop all that trim off the wall, strip it, and repaint it. Stay tuned.

Why is there a hole in my bathroom ceiling?

2011-05-24T21:14:00.001-05:00

So sometime in the last 24 hours, Joe decided he needs to close up the unnecessary vent between the play room floor and the downstairs bathroom ceiling. Perhaps he is tired of Max peeking down at him and saying, "DAAAAAAAAAAADDDDDDDDDDY! I SEEEEE YOOOOOU!" while he's getting into the shower. Perhaps he is worried that same thing may happen to an unsuspecting guest. Or perhaps he is truly hell-bent on NEVER finishing this bathroom project Did I mention he's also taken off about half of the bathroom trim to try his hand at paint stripping? That's a post for another day...

Anyway, now there's a large hole in the bathroom ceiling where the vent used to be, pieces of plaster all over the floor, and some sort of horrible power tool screaming from behind the bathroom door. I'm hoping it doesn't wake the boys. I'm hoping he has enough drywall and/or whatever else he needs to get it patched tonight. And I'm hoping Joe is documenting this to blog about later.

Good night, Peaches readers.

What we've been doing instead of working on the house (and blogging)

2011-05-13T22:38:00.105-05:00

Life is moving fast. Max wrapped up soccer last night and his last day of preschool (for this year) was yesterday morning. All of the sudden, Charlie is seeming less like a baby and more like a little boy - eating table food with his 4 (almost 5) teeth, trying to crawl, and even pulling himself up to standing at the coffee table a couple of times. I decide it's time to update the blog, and realize we haven't been on for almost a month. Wait a minute - didn't I just post that bit about landscaping, like, yesterday?!? Slow down, time! Honestly, there's not been much to post as far as the house goes. Our lives have been too busy for home improvement and blogging. So here's all the non-house related stuff we've been up to (in no particular order):

1. Baseball-ing

The boys in blue are off to a good start.
Is this the Royals' year?

The now annual Gagnon-Bryant-Meyer
Easter backyard baseball game.

Max perfects his home run swing.

2. Easter-ing

Max carefully dyes his eggs.

The Easter bunny was generous this year. The boys must
have been good!

All dressed up and ready for church.

Charlie "hunts" Easter eggs.

3. Swinging

A new back yard swing = hours of fun!

Max loves to push his little brother at the park.

4. Bike riding

Max with his new set of wheels.

5. Golfing

Charlie's first trip to the course. I did not let him drive.

Is the next Tiger Woods in this picture?
Not if they take after their parents.

6. Camping

Max's first camping trip. I've never seen him so excited.

Joe and his boys by the campfire.

7. Marching (for Babies)

With the help of our family and friends, we raised
over $1500 for the March of Dimes in memory of Lucy.

Me and my "angel Mom" friends.

8. Soccer-ing

Ready to take the field.

Goal!

9. Spending lots and lots of time with family.

Max and Charlie with their three cousins.

They love their Nanni!

Charlie and Paw-Paw share a smile.

Time may be flying by, but we wouldn't have it any other way. Our lives are so full, and these boys just keep getting bigger and better every day.

Lucky them.

Lucky us.

Landscaping for dummies

2011-04-14T16:17:00.001-05:00

Before we moved into this house, we never had a yard and I'd never tried to plant anything. Ever. I'd been given several houseplants over the years, and could never keep them alive. I figured I was hopeless. A brown thumb. The first year we lived here, our "landscaping" pretty much consisted of digging (ugly) stuff up and cutting (dead) stuff down. I wanted to plant something but didn't know where to start. So I hired a landscape designer to come up with a very simple beginning landscaping plan. The thought of planting something myself was overwhelming and intimidating. Then the local Garden Club had a sale and I bought a few hostas, dug some holes around the patio, put the plants in the holes, and waited. And guess what? They didn't die. So then I dug a few holes outside the back porch, put in some tomato and pepper plants, and waited. And they didn't die either. Those experiences gave me a bit of confidence, so I decided I'd try to at least get started with the landscape designer's plans. And so, for the past two years, I've slowly been adding simple elements to our landscape. With the exception of some mums and roses I planted in 2009 that didn't come back for 2010, everything is alive and - dare I say - thriving. And so, here I am, Kendra the Gardener. Who'd have thunk it? And the funniest thing about it is, I've found I actually like fooling with the green stuff.

Today, it's 75 degrees today in Northwest Missouri. The birds are singing, the trees are budding, and the grass is turning green. It's been a long, cold winter folks, and I'm itching to get my hands in some dirt and pretty up the exterior of this old house with a bit of landscaping. I'm ready to get more brave. Add a little excitement to the yard. Kick it up a notch. So, Peaches readers, I'm posting today to ask for your suggestions on how to make our landscape shine. Remember, we are a young family with a small business so we're definitely on a budget. Suggested plants should be native to our area and hard to kill. I'd prefer perennials, but would consider planting some annuals in spots. I've included some pictures and descriptions of the current landscaping for you to view and ponder. Don't hold back.

The front of the house, facing east. We have 2 globe blue spruces (one on each side of the steps) and eight holly bushes out front. On the northeast corner (the right side of the picture) we have a young red dogwood tree and three hydrangea bushes. I'd really like to add some color and line the front walk.

This is the side of the house, facing north, from the street. We absolutely hate this side of the house and have no idea what to do with it. It is hard to see in this pictures, but we have 3 summer wine ninebark and 3 viburnum planted on this side of the house. I also have some creeping phlox around the AC unit. As you can see on the right side of the picture, we have a gravel rainbow drive and a fence line on this side of the house. We also have a lot of yard to work with on this side of the house. I'm thinking more shrubs, color, maybe some bushes or trees that will be pretty in the fall???

This is the south side of the house taken from the southeast corner of the front yard. This side of the house isn't very visible from the street, so we'll probably keep it simple here. There are some daffodils and some sort of lilies that I keep trying to dig up but just won't die. The brown things are mums I planted last fall. This is my second shot at planting mums. Hoping they'll come back this time, but it isn't looking good. You can't see them here, but there are 3 hydrangea bushes planted along the lattice on the south side of the porch.

Secret Window Repair?

2011-04-07T19:35:00.002-05:00

Kendra is out of town at a conference for a couple days, leaving me home with the kids. Now that the kids are in bed, I have a bit of free time. Since Kendra's not around to say "no," I have an overwhelming urge to start a home improvement project that will sit, unfinished, for several months. In particular, I think I should pull out this window's sashes and trim to refinish/repair it:

See the cracked window in the upper sash that the previos owner scotch-taped(!)? The broken sash cords? Missing putty? Peeling paint? Okay, you probably can't see that because it's a pretty crappy picture, but trust me that this window is a mess--and in a prominent location in our living room, to boot. This thing's got to be fixed, but it's likely to take a few months to find the time to do everything that needs to be done. So I'll put it to a vote; should I tear into the window while Kendra's gone?

Should I tear out this window?

Rub A Dub Dub!

2011-03-31T22:13:00.000-05:00

The new tub is finished:

A mere 5 weeks after announcing we were almost finished, we finally got around to tiling the new tub surround. This was my first tile project; I figured that I could figure it out on my own, but I had a better plan in mind. I was able to convince good friend Steve Schaefer, owner of Steve Schaefer Flooring in Jefferson City, to make the drive to Lathrop to give me a hand.

Yeah, this was a pretty simple job for Steve.

With Steve's help, "we" were able to get all the tile onto the wall in a few hours, including fixing the major hump that was in one of the walls. Steve did most of the work, while I was the designated tile cutter.

The next evening, I grouted the joints and applied a sealant recommended by Steve. Next up was caulking the inside corners and the tile perimeter. Once that was done, I did my best to texture the new, unfinished part of the wall to match the old. Kendra and I are very pleased with the final* product:

*Ok, it's not quite final yet, since we need to paint the wall. But it's close enough.

I think our end result looks good, and also blends well with the character of the house. I think the color of the tile (dubbed "lemon chiffon" by American Olean, the tile manufacturer) has an arts and crafts touch, and the radius tile we used on the built-out wall (on the right side of the picture) adds to the traditional feel of the tile.

Overall, we are very pleased at how the new tub turned out. It wasn't fast--and it wasn't cheap, even though we did most of the work ourselves--but the "before" and "after" difference is enormous. The only problem? With the new tub/shower in place, it makes us want to continue with the remodel of the bathroom, including a new vanity, countertop, and custom-built linen closet.

You know you live in the country when...

2011-03-17T12:47:00.000-05:00

...the only short-sleeved green shirts you can find for your little boys are sporting John Deere logos.

Happy St. Patrick's Day from two of the sweetest little Leprechauns in the Midwest!

Restoring Window Trim

2011-03-13T21:51:00.000-05:00

With Kendra's cloth diaper post pulling in 300+ visitors, as opposed to our usual 50 visitors, I have a tough act to follow here. I get it-- people are more interested in parenting than they are in two DYI-challenged folks futzing around with a (nearly) 100-year-old house. So consider this my effort to simultaneously yank this blog back on-topic and lose hundreds of viewers who might otherwise become regular readers.

After my last update, I was working to get the bathroom in finished shape. Now that our bathroom is completely rebuilt and retiled, it's time that we start . . . wait, hold on. My mistake, the bathroom is NOT done yet. The walls are built and the joints are all taped and mortared, but there is still no tile. The projected completion date is end of month, but, of course, I said that last month.

Let's forget about the bathroom for now. With spring approaching, Kendra and I are contemplating what exterior work should be accomplished this year. We've done quite a bit to the east (front) and west (back) sides of the house, but relatively little to the north and south sides. Here's a view of the north side of the Peaches estate:

This side of the house really annoys us. This picture actually looks more appealing than the house looks in real life, I think. This side faces a street (I'm standing near the street in taking this picture), and we've struggled coming up with something to enhance the curb appeal. So far, we've done a few small things -- you can see the stone wall around the AC unit. There are also three nine bark bushes and three vibernums we planted last year (they are just sticks right now, but hopefully will be nice and bushy once spring arrives). Otherwise, this side is just a large expanse of grungy vinyl. Long-term the plan is to reside the entire house with new wood clapboards, but our empty piggy bank prevents us from moving on that right now. Another part of the plan is to plant some trees on this side and let them grow, but that does nothing to help in the short term.

Given the lack of curb appeal on this side coupled with its prominence to the street, Kendra and I discussed what small touches we could do to dress it up a bit. We had settled on a modest plan: repaint the windows to the basement, perhaps paint the stone foundation, and paint the vinyl window trim. That's when I got to really looking at the windows:

We often lament the vinyl siding that's on the house. But look at that window--to me, it sure looks like we have some pretty ornate wood window trim lurking underneath that damn plastic. You can even see that the bottom sill is not cut flush with the side trim, which makes me think that the original trim is fully intact under the vinyl. After all, if they wanted to make the vinyl job easier, they would have squared off the windows, wouldn't they?

Taking all this into account, I think the new plan is to remove the vinyl from the windows and repaint/restore the exterior wood window trim. This is, no doubt, a much larger project than just slapping some vinyl-friendly paint on there, but I think the finished product--if we can pull it off--will be more impressive. Plus, I have already undertaken to restore our original wood windows, one at a time, and this will dovetail nicely with that project (more details on the window restoration in a later post).

So what do you think, Peaches readers? Does this have a shot of working? Have any of you done this type of thing before and have any tips for us? One of my biggest worries is flashing/waterproofing, but I think the siding and some caulk should take care of that for us. Or is there something I'm overlooking?

Cloth Love

2011-03-10T22:27:00.000-06:00

First off, Peaches readers, I know this is supposed to be a "house blog." But it is also the closest thing to we have to a family blog, and every once in a while I dream about being a professional Mommy blogger when I grow up. So I hope you will indulge me today, as I Mommy-blog my reflections on 6 months of cloth-diapering little Charlie (and my apologies in advance if you clicked over from Houseblogs.net, but please read on if one of your upcoming DIY projects is to install a diaper sprayer on your toilet).

Charlie's first cloth diaper: an unbleached Chinese prefold with an extra-small Thirsties cover.

This is Charlie in his very first cloth diaper. He was just 3 days old and weighed in at 7 pounds, 8 ounces. Why did we decide to cloth diaper him? I don't really know. We talked about cloth diapering Max, but never took the plunge. It just seemed so overwhelming at the time. But, over the 2 1/2 years or so that Max wore disposable diapers, I grew to dislike them. First of all, they were expensive. Like all babies, Max went through diapers like crazy, and seemed like we were always out of diapers, running to the store to buy more for home or daycare. We always had a diaper pail full of stinky diapers, waiting to be taken to the trash. I couldn't even think about the cubic feet of landfill space we were filling up with Max's Pampers. And all those chemicals up against his skin 24 hours a day? Ick! The chemical-y smell of a fresh disposable diaper wasn't much better than the smell of a dirty one if you asked me. So, when we were expecting Charlie, I knew I wanted to give cloth diapering a try and I convinced Joe - who was understandably skeptical - to join me in my cloth diaper experiment. Once I started researching and reading, I quickly realized that - while cloth diapering is certainly cheaper than disposable diapering - there is quite an up-front investment (especially if you want to use some of the new-fangled fancy-pants diapers). So we committed to trying cloth diapers for at least 6 months, both to make sure we recouped our initial costs but also to make sure we gave it a fair shot. And today, Peaches readers, I will share our cloth diaper experience with you.

So what did it take to cloth diaper for 6 months?

This is our entire cloth diaper "stash," including almost everything we've used to diaper Charlie for the last 6 months. It includes items we've used almost every day from the beginning of cloth diapering, items we used at different stages, and things we haven't used at all.

The primary cloth diaper "system" we decided to use with Charlie was GroVia (more on that later). But their one-size diapers were just too bulky to use during those first few weeks, when Charlie was still so very tiny. Luckily, we also had 22 unbleached Chinese prefold diapers (infant size) and found those worked best for about the first month of cloth diapering. These old-school prefolds are what usually come to mind when you hear "cloth diaper." But don't worry, folks - these aren't your Momma's cloth diapers. Plastic pants have been replaced by breathable waterproof covers and there are lots of styles and cute patterns to choose from. During the newborn phase, we adored our 3 extra-small Thirsties covers. Not only did they fit Charlie's tiny body, but the double-gusseted design contained all the wetness - including runny newborn poo. I don't think we ever had a single leak using prefolds and Thirsties covers! We also had 2 small Bummis covers, but because they were more bulky and plastic-y than the Thirsties covers, we really only used them when the Thirsties covers were dirty. Using prefold diapers and covers is easy. Most of the time, we just lay the diaper in the cover, like so...

Regular (premium) infant prefold with one-size Blueberry Coverall.

...then secure the diaper and cover around Charlie, like so.

It will be just as easy for you to use a prefold and cover, but - unfortunately - your baby won't be as cute. Sorry.

If we ever want to fasten the diaper before securing the cover (which I like to do but Joe doesn't), we use one of our 4 Snappis.

Diaper pins are a thing of the past! I just fold the diaper into thirds (see picture above), give it a twist to reduce bulkiness between the legs, and fasten it in front with a Snappi.

The covers were wipeable and reusable (unless they got poo on them, of course), so we usually just alternated between two covers every day.

Once Charlie was back up to his birth weight of 8 pounds (about 2-3 weeks old), we were able to start using our one-size GroVia all-in-two diapers. These GroVia diapers are a two-piece system consisting of an outer shell (we have 9 of them) and snap-in insert (we have 15).

The inside of a GroVia shell

GroVia shell with snap-in organic cotton insert.

Like the Thirsties covers, the GroVia shells can be reused throughout the day (until they get dirty). We typically use 2-3 shells per day. Early on, we struggled with occasional leaks with our GroVia diapers, but I discovered that they need to be washed and dried REPEATEDLY before reaching full absorbency. I also discovered that the tags would occasionally slip out of the shell and wick out the moisture, so I cut out all the tags. Since then, we rarely have leaks and we LOVE our GroVia diapers! They are trim, made of organic cotton, and the 3 rows of snaps make the shell "one-size" so they have grown with Charlie from 8 to almost 20 pounds now.

One week old, about 7 pounds. The GroVia diaper was still a bit too big.

2 weeks old, 8 pounds. The GroVia diaper was a bit bulky, was was workable.

2 1/2 months old and about 14-15 pounds. He is pictured wearing a GroVia snap shell here.

6 months old, just shy of 20 pounds, and happy as a clam in his GroVia diaper! Compare to the newborn shots and note that we are now on the second row of snaps. There are 3 rows of snaps to grow the diaper covers from newborn to infant to toddler sizes. Genius!

One thing I really appreciate about the GroVia system is the versatility. We can use the shell and insert together, or can use the shell as a cover for a prefold diaper (which we did quite often early on, when prefolds seemed to do a better job containing the runny breastfed baby poo). They also sell BioSoakers, which are biodegradable, disposable inserts you can use to make GroVia a "hybrid" diapering system. We have a 50-pack of BioSoakers, but haven't really used them. I imagine they would be great for traveling, sitters who are uncomfortable dealing with cloth, or if you were someone who wasn't ready to totally take the cloth diaper plunge.

2 months old. Wearing a GroVia cover over an infant prefold fastened with a Snappi (take my word for it).

In addition to our GroVia diapers, we also have 9 regular (premium)-size prefold diapers in our current rotation with 2 Blueberry one-size covers. The prefold/cover combo isn't as trim as GroVia, but they work very well and we probably use them every 2-3 days, when all the GroVia diapers are in the wash.

5 months old and about 17-18 pounds, wearing a regular size prefold with a one-size Blueberry Coverall.

Although GroVia and prefolds with covers have been our "go-to" cloth diapers, we also dabbled in a variety of pocket diapers. Pocket diapers are just as they sound - they are cloth diapers with a pocket that you stuff with inserts. They allow you to customize your absorbancy by stuffing as much or little as you want, and cut down drying time because the inserts are separate from the rest of the diaper. Charlie has always been a very heavy wetter, and the problem I had with pocket diapers, across the board, was that they seemed to leak after about an hour, no matter how much I stuffed them. So none of them worked well for us. Luckily, Joe's cousin Tamera (who I refer to as the cloth diaper fairy) gave us a lot of hand-me-down pocket diapers the she used with her daughter, so we were able to try most of these risk-free. I'm glad we did, because I would have been very disappointed if we would have purchased a bunch of these right off the bat. Of the pocket diapers we tried, my favorite were Swaddlebees.

Small Swaddlebees stuffed with two inserts. 2 months old, approximately 14-15 pounds.

They were trim, soft, and usually didn't leak as long as I stuffed them with at least two inserts and made sure to change them every 2 hours or so.

Also included in our "stash" of pocket diapers were 5 extra small Fuzzibunz.

Wearing an x-small Fuzzibunz at 3 weeks old, approximately 9-10 pounds.

The Fuzzibunz were cute and very trim, but leaked every time. Didn't matter how much I stuffed them (and I stuffed them as much as I could), Charlie would wear them an hour and then be covered in pee (but they did contain the poo).

We also had 6 Happy Heiny's (4 size small, 2 size x-small). We absolutely hated these. The legs weren't gusseted and did not contain runny newborn poo. And it seemed like my breastfed baby was pooing about every 10 minutes, so that's exactly how long one of these diapers would last. Maybe they would've worked better for an older baby. We never used our two Very Baby pocket diapers, but they looked almost exactly like the Happy Heiny's so I imagine I would have hated them too.

In addition to the diapers themselves, there are several cloth diapering accessories that have made cloth diapering possible (and, dare I say, easy). Here are all the extras we've used along the way:

Three rolls of liners. We've used Imse Vimse and Kushies. These flushable, biodegradable liners lay right on top of the cloth diaper and are great for catching poo so you don't have to dunk, scrape, or spray it off in the toilet.

GroVia shell and insert with a Kushies liner on top.

Incidentally, breastfed baby poo is totally water soluble, so you can just toss poopy breastfed diapers in the washing machine without any rinsing. So these liners are only necessary when you have to start getting rid of the poo before you wash. Since Charlie is an exclusively breastfed baby, we didn't start using liners until he started solid food at about 4 1/2 months. And we don't use the liners all the time since we installed a diaper sprayer on our toilet, which is an easy and pretty clean way to wash the poo off the diapers and into the toilet. Sure beats the old dunk-flush-repeat method our mothers used.

Our Bumgenius diaper sprayer mounts right to our toilet.

One diaper pail. A cheapie Safety First model from Babies R Us. It is the same one we used with Max's disposable diapers, and is basically just a glorified trash can. You certainly don't need any special diaper pail for cloth diapers. You do, however, need...

Two Planet Wise diaper pail liners. Gone are the days of the "wet pail," where you throw dirty diapers in a solution of water and cleaners to soak until laundry day. We use the "dry pail" method, and just throw our dirty diapers in the pail lined with these washable liners. They make diaper laundry (which we do every other day) oh-so-easy - just throw the bag in the washer with the diapers and wash away! Which brings me to...

Front-loader washing machine and Rockin Green laundry soap. Cloth diapers and front-loader washing machines are both environmentally friendly, so you'd think they'd work well together. The irony, however, is that a front-loader washer generally does a pretty crappy (no pun intended) job of washing cloth diapers. You see, cloth diapers need water - lots and lots of water - to get really clean, and front-loader washers use less water. This can lead to unclean, stinky diapers. There is no "best" wash routine for cloth diapers. It really depends on your washing machine and water quality. It has taken a little bit of experimentation and problem-solving, but we seem to have figured out the best routine for washing our diapers ( cold short cycle with no soap & extra rinse + hot long cycle with soap & extra rinse). Occasionally, if the diapers start to get that not-so-fresh smell, I run another cold short cycle with no soap & extra rinse and that takes care of it. We've also experimented with soap. I've had the best luck with Rockin' Green, regular Tide, and Charlie's Soap (in that order). But the Rockin' Green is far and away my favorite.

Two medium-sized zip-top wet bags. We have one made by Planet Wise and one made by Wahmies. These waterproof bags are essential for keeping dirty diapers and all their wetness and smells contained while you're out-and-about or on days when baby is with Grandma or the sitter. Wet bags are handy even if you don't cloth diaper - I've used them to keep wet/dirty clothes and bibs from floating around the diaper bag.

A few packages of Pampers. Charlie is a heavy wetter and gets really upset when he's wearing a wet cloth diaper. We just haven't quite figured out how to keep him cloth-diapered at night without leaks or fussiness. There are special overnight cloth diapers out there, but I haven't explored them. So he wears one disposable diaper overnight every night, and I think we've purchased about one package a month since his birth. I'm only human.

So there you have it. Am I glad we took the cloth diaper plunge? Yep. Do I plan to continue? Absolutely. My plan is to keep little Charlie in cloth diapers until he potty trains (which may not be long since research shows that cloth-diapered babies potty train earlier). If (and that's a BIG IF) we have another child, they'll be cloth-diapered, too. Cloth diapers are cheap. All told, I think we've spent just under $300 on cloth diapers that will carry us through potty training, so they've been a very good economical choice. They're good for the environment and - after I got over the initial shock of all the options and accessories - it has been surprisingly easy to cloth diaper, even as a working Mom (thanks to our sitter, Pam, for being open-minded and trying cloth diapers with us).

And, besides, what's cuter than a chubby baby in a cloth diaper?

Nothing!

It's always something...

2011-02-27T14:12:00.004-06:00

...and here are our 3 somethings this week.

1) The lower spray arm on our dishwasher. Somehow, it came in contact with the heating element and melted. This has left us without a dishwasher until the new part comes in (2-5 business days, we're told) It was only a $25 part, so not a major head ache. Just annoying and time-consuming to have to wash dishes by hand. And since our New Year's Resolution was to cut our extra spending, especially in regards to groceries and eating out, a week of take-out isn't an option. How did people ever live this way???

2) The upstairs shower is leaking. This picture is of the downstairs hall ceiling, directly underneath the shower in the upstairs bathroom. Joe thinks some caulk with fix this problem. I am less optimistic. Nothing is ever that easy.

3) Our refrigerator ice maker. Hasn't made any ice for the last 24+ hours. We realized this after breakfast this morning, so we haven't investigated very thoroughly. Hopefully more ice will just appear and we won't have to worry about it.

Here's hoping those are all the "somethings" we'll have to deal with for awhile. Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to clean up lunch dishes, take a shower, and make myself an ice cold drink. Damn.

Involuntary Bathroom Remodeling Part II

2011-02-21T16:17:00.002-06:00

In my last post, I discussed the suddenly urgent need to completely redo our downstairs bathtub/shower, and the accompanying demolition. With everything demo'd to dry wood, I had to contemplate rebuilding everything to support the new tub and shower enclosure.

The first order of business was figuring out what tub to put in the space. The old tub was a 60" jetted "drop-in" that, you will recall, (1) didn't have working jets, (2) wasn't properly supported by the framing, and (3) didn't fit into the 57" space--the tub protruded three inches into the closet in the adjoining room. Kendra and I decided we would buy a 54" tub instead, which is harder to find than a standard 60" tub. We finally settled on a 54" tub at Menard's, primarily because it was available without special ordering.

This still left us with a size problem -- a 54" tub to go in a 57" space. The best solution I could think of was to build a three-inch shelf out at the top of the tub. This meant more carpentry (ugh)* but seemed very doable. Since 2x lumber is actually 1.5", that means I just needed to nail a couple 2x8 to the framing to create the shelf. It all seemed very easy, until Kendra mentioned that she'd like to install shower doors in the finished space, instead of a shower curtain. Now, my simple shelf project turned into a new wall projecting three inches out from the old wall. Ugh, more carpentry.

*The reason I say "ugh" is not because I hate carpentry, it's just that I'm really bad at it. Driving a nail usually is a two- or three-take process for me. Which makes me hate carpentry.

I set to work reconstructing the space so that we could set the tub. First, I needed to reinforce the floor joists, which had significant (although not catastrophic) water rot, so I sistered some 2x8s to the existing joists. Underneath the bathroom is crawlspace, which made the work more difficult in that I was flat on my back the whole time, yet also easier in that I didn't need to reach straight over my head to work. Due to the bathroom being located on an exterior wall, I was able to rest one end of the 2x8s on the sill plate, which should make them hold better (I think). After reinforcing the joists, I cut a piece of OSB board to fit the opening in the floor and screwed it to the joists.

After a little bit of framing to correct the hole in the wall the old tub was shoved into, and then installing two 2x8s to create the proper width for the tub alcove, it was time to install the tub. I cut and fastened a 2x4 ledger board on the back wall to support the tub. Then I enlisted Kendra's help to lift the tub into place. It took quite a bit of coaxing, shoving, and pushing, but we finally got the tub set on the floor. I doubt we had a quarter-inch of space to spare. I used some shims to level the tub, and then we were set.

The tub snugly in place. You can see the new framing at both the right and left-hand sides of the tub.

After getting the tub in, I turned my attention to the new, 3" deep wall I would need to build out to accommodate our future shower doors. I decided I would attach horizontal 2x4s to the existing studs, then attach vertical 2x4s on top of that to run the length of the new "wall." This successfully narrowed the tub alcove from 57" to 54", and resulted in a plumb-enough new structure for installing the cement board.

The cement board was surprisingly easy to work with, although there was some drama along the way. First, I needed to clean up some of the wiring by removing the switch and wires that worked the nonfunctioning jetted tub. In the switch's place, I installed a GFCI outlet, located in the same electrical box as the switch for running the exhaust fan. It doesn't really makes sense to have an outlet in that particular spot, but I didn't know what else to put in the box. I guess this will leave a power source in case we want to put in a 42" TV right across from the toilet.

After the wiring, I called and had Cooter's Plumbing come over and replace some of the old PVC pipe that ran to the tub and shower with PEX pipe. They also installed the new shower valve and made the drain connections. With the wiring and plumbing done, it was time to cover the walls.

I attached 4 mil plastic sheeting on top of the lathe board to act as a waterproof barrier to the framing underneath. I decided to install the cement board on the long wall first, because it would require the least cutting and let me practice my technique before moving on to the more delicate pieces.

One wall down, two to go!

I found the board easy to cut and work with, but my efforts were not without problems. After hanging the first piece--the one on the top in the picture above--I realized I had forgotten to cut out the opening for the exhaust fan. Luckily I was able to punch out an opening with the use of a utility knife and cold chisel. It added some work, but not an ungodly amount.

Yesterday, after a couple weeks of no progress, I was finally able to hang the rest of the cement board. Here are a couple shots; this picture shows a straight-ahead view:

And here is a photo showing the new 3" wall:

As of today, we are almost ready to start tiling. I still need to mortar the cement board joints, and finish the perimeter with joint compound. And we still don't have the tile yet, although it's supposed to come in this week. After two months of no downstairs tub, and I'm guessing 40 hours of labor, we are getting close to finishing this project.

Snowpocalypse, Snowmageddon, Snotorious BIG, Snoprah Winfrey, Snow joke, SnOMG...

2011-02-07T21:09:00.000-06:00

Whatever you call it, we survived. Here are a few pics of our winter wonderland.

Our old house and about a foot of snow (before drifts). Also a nice shot of our new roof.

Riding the snow drift wave!

Wading through the snow.

Joe had a whole lot of shovelin' to do.

The freshly shoveled path between our garage and the back porch.

The dog, the boy, and a big pile of snow.

Snow angels!

Just relaxin' in the snow.

Max and Charlie wore nothing but pajamas for four days.
I DID make them wear a different pair every day in case you were wondering.

Watching movies and snuggling. Not a bad way to spend a few snowy days.

Involuntary Bathroom Remodeling

2011-02-02T15:21:00.000-06:00

"What's THIS?!" we heard Max bellow from the bathtub. We had a suspicion something was wrong, but we had no idea what was ahead of us.

It was about two months ago that Kendra and I rushed into the bathroom to see what Max had found during bath time. In his hand was a small plastic sliver--which, unfortunately, had chipped off the bottom of the bath tub. As we inspected the tub, it became obvious that the tub's useful life had ended quite some time ago. We always knew the tub would need replacing soon, but it wasn't really a project that was on the front burner. But with the cracked bottom the tub was now unusable. It was decided--we'd install a new tub, with a new tile surround.

The first order of business was demo. Since I didn't take any "before" pictures, I'll have to describe the old setup. Our bathroom walls are textured plaster. We had a tub/shower combo, with the tub being a non-functional whirlpool tub. There was vinyl paneling on the shower walls for waterproofing. Demo started with removing the vinyl paneling. Unfortunately, this involved just peeling the panels off the walls, as they were stuck directly to the plaster with some type of adhesive. That was the extent of the wall waterproofing, and it showed. When I removed the panels, I was greeted by soggy plaster and drywall, which just crumbled off the wall in places. It made demo easier, but it was more than a little concerning how much water was passing through to the structural elements of the house. With the help of my craftsman multitool, I was able to cut out plaster from the area to be tiled. The multitool gave me a nice, straight cut, which should make the cement board installation that much easier:

After cutting/demoing down to the wood lathe, it was time to remove the tub. As I started to take a closer look at things, I noticed that the old tub actually penetrated one of the walls. I guess I always knew this, but before now I never paid much attention. You see, the wall-to-wall measurement is 57 inches, 3 inches too short for your standard 60 inch tub. That didn't stop one of the previous homeowners from "installing" a 60 inch, drop-in style jetted tub, though -- just shove it three inches into the wall and call it good. This would not do for our replacement, so this was one area we'd need to address during the new install.

After getting the tub out, I was able to assess the floor. It was awful. The tub was resting on a piece of plywood, which was so rotted I was able to fold it in half like a piece of cardboard. Tongue-in-groove hardwood flooring was laid underneath the plywood. It also appeared a little wet, so I poked at it with my finger--and a chunk of the flooring crumbled and fell into the basement below. On the optimistic side, the rotted wood made for an easier demolition, and soon I had removed the existing subfloor. I could peer into the basement (which is a crawlspace under that particular part of the house) and see the floor joists. Unfortunately, what I could see was that the top 1" or so of several joists was also rotted. When the demo was finished, here's how things looked:

The amount of water damage wasn't really surprising, but it was disappointing. With substantial rebuilding required before I could even start replacing the tub, the "new tub" project was taking on much more of a carpentry feel than I would prefer. But that's probably enough for now. You'll have to wait for the next blog post to see how the carpentry went.

Oh snow you didn't!

2011-02-01T14:29:00.001-06:00

A peek outside our back door during the now-infamous Midwest Snowpocalypse 2011.

I'm dreaming of the landscaping and patio expansion projects we're planning once the grass turns green.

2010 Year in Review

2011-01-29T08:24:00.002-06:00

Our year* in less than 5 minutes

After multiple technology failures and a whole lotta drama, I finally got this posted. It's bugging the heck out of me that you have to click on it again after you get to Web Albums to view it, but I really think this is the best I can do. Seriously, I could write a blog post about how this simple little movie was such a pain to get posted. But I won't. Just enjoy the movie.

*note: I know this is supposed to be a house blog, but I didn't really find any of our home improvements this year (landscaping, furnace repair, insulating, new toilets, pipe repair, new roof, bathroom remodel in progress) interesting enough for our YIR. Stay tuned for updates on our DIY projects.

Let's do this!

2011-01-18T13:06:00.003-06:00

Joe's right. I long ago declared the blog dead. As many of you may painfully remember, my last post was October 23, 2009. The day our daughter, Lucy, was due. I was overwhelmed by the support and feedback I got from that post, and I truly planned to continue posting to our little blog about our house and our lives. But every time I thought about opening up the blog and making a new post, I just couldn't do it. Somehow, it just felt wrong to me to follow-up the post about our dead daughter with something about installing new toilets... So one day recently, Joe brought up the blog (again) and I finally told him why I haven't posted for over a year. I may be biased, but I'm pretty sure my husband has the most beautiful soul I've ever known. I'm not sure if he understood my feelings at all, but he acted as though he did. And he made a simple offer that actually meant quite a lot to me. He asked me, if he redesigned the blog and made the first post-Lucy entry, if I thought I could keep going. I said yes. So he did. And I will. And I just read Lucy's Garden for the first time since posting it almost 15 months ago. I have to say, I'm pretty damn proud of the words I wrote and the clarity in which I was able to express myself in such a time of grief. And reading the post allowed me to reflect on how far we - me, Joe, our family, and the house - have come since then. This house and - more importantly - our family have stories to tell, and I think this is a great place to do it.

So I say to you, Joe, resurrector of the blog, let's do this! Let's bring the blog back. For real. None of this wash, rinse, repeat stuff. As I type, I am brainstorming a pictoral Peaches "year in review" post...

And let me be the first to introduce you to the newest member of our family, Charlie, who entered our lives quickly, a bit unexpectedly, and absolutely perfectly last September.

GMaCP (gratuitous Max and Charlie picture)

Redesign, and a (Possible) Return to Posting

2011-01-07T15:54:00.000-06:00

It all sounds familiar, doesn't it? A blog falls out of use, and then the author comes after 6 months and says he or she will resume posting, and then stops blogging for 6 months, then says he or she will resume posting . . . wash, rinse, repeat.

I spent a bit of time redesigning the site (and by redesigning, I mean changing the default Blogger template) in the hopes that it will jumpstart me on providing regular updates. The last year has soon a lot of work done to the house, and a new addition to the family--our four-month-old son, Charlie. Right now we are in the middle of a tub/shower overhaul that is consuming a lot of time, and we recently put on a new roof, which consumed a lot of money. Stay tuned for some substantive posts; if nothing else, I need to post just to prove Kendra wrong, who has long proclaimed this blog as dead.

So what type of posts are on tap? Here is a short list of improvements in the works or that have been completed since we last updated:

*Refurbishing the first of 12 old windows

*New roof

*Extensive landscaping

*Minor exterior repairs

*Insulation of pipes (because they burst!)

*New tub/shower/tile job in downstairs bathroom

*Removing four loads of tree trimmings from our beautiful maple trees

*Construction of outdoor play set (not an improvement to the home, but a major construction project nevertheless)

I'm guessing that we can also get some pretty serious "before" and "after" shots done. But in any case, I feel like I owe it to someone (who, I don't know; the house maybe?) to keep this blog going.

Lucy's Garden

2009-10-23T09:29:00.019-05:00

Our daughter died. She was stillborn.

I've said those words to myself over and over again. Sometimes to convince myself that this really happened, sometimes to break the news to others. Surprisingly, they're not that hard to say. We lost our Lucy before she was born. I was 8 months pregnant, in labor and delivery, hooked up to monitors, watching her heart beat. Then it stopped. Seven minutes and an emergency c-section later, she was born--not breathing with no pulse. And now she is gone. It is that simple.

Yesterday, she would have been one month old. Today is her due date. And so, we have begun our year of "firsts" without Lucy and a lifetime of "what ifs," "should haves," and "might have beens." Today's post, Peaches readers, is the first since our Lucy died and is dedicated to her. I wish more than anything that I was posting about bringing home our baby, but I am instead posting about planting a tree in her honor.

Since Lucy died, the kindness and generosity of friends, family, and our community have been overwhelming. We haven't had to cook supper, not even once, since we returned home from the hospital almost one month ago. We've received over 100 cards, 30+ flower deliveries, and countless emails and phone calls. People are so good, and I've never been more convinced of that since this happened to our family.

It is surprising, when you lose a child, what you learn about yourself and about others in your life. You find you are stronger than you thought...and weaker. The same is true for your relationships. Many people open up and share their losses with you--some you never even knew had experienced such losses. You feel bad that you never knew, that you didn't even ask. If you did know, you feel bad you didn't do more or that you didn't understand. People you barely know--or don't know at all--come running with food and a shoulder to cry on. And yes, unfortunately, some of the people you are closest to, the kind of people who call every day when you bring home a live baby, are painfully silent. It is impossible to reach out when you are in this situation, to tell those people that you need them. So you instead focus on those that are there, who have reached out to you. And you hope the others will eventually find the words.

When we returned from the hospital, the feeling of helplessness was overwhelming, and Lucy's due date loomed large even when it was weeks away. We couldn't save her, but we wanted to do SOMETHING for her. We knew this day would be a tough one for us, so--almost a month ago--we decided we would celebrate by planting a tree in her honor. We received several beautiful potted plants and flowers and several generous gift certificates to local nurseries from friends. So what began as just a tree turned into much more.

We began last weekend by planting eight holly bushes in the front of our house. Beautiful little shrubs with pretty red berries and glossy leaves that will stay green all year long. We received three yellow mums in the week after Lucy died, so we planted those along the south side of the front porch. Although one has already gone dormant, I am hopeful they will all three come back next year. And when they bloom, in the fall, they will remind us of our sweet autumn baby. The rose bush that was sent to her funeral was planted out back. It also has gone dormant, but we will see what spring brings.

Joe and Max begin digging for the holly bushes.

Max finds a new friend--a HUGE earthworm!

Then we set out to find a tree for our Lucy. We wanted something beautiful, and decided a dogwood would be perfect. We looked for a pink one, but quickly found out that most nurseries only carry pink dogwoods in the spring. Many places had white, but for some reason that didn't seem right. Then we found it--a beautiful red dogwood at Family Tree Nursery in Liberty. Already over 6 feet tall with gorgeous buds just begging to bloom this spring. After we purchased it and got back into the car, I said to Joe, "The red dogwood is the right one. I think our Lucy would have been more of a red kind of girl than pink anyway." He smiled and nodded.

We have spent this week debating where the tree should go. The "perfect" spot, in my opinion, was on an incline right under a power line that runs about 15 feet above the ground. Both of these things (the incline and the power line) made Joe nervous, so we settled on a compromise--still on the incline but just to the side of the power line. We've never planted a tree before, but the very nice gentleman at the nursery assured us we couldn't go wrong if we followed his instructions:

just dig a wide hole (but not too deep)

put the tree in (after covering the root ball with some stuff called "Myke's")

backfill with compost and soil

and top with mulch.

So that's what we did. Fingers crossed that the tree takes root and in the spring and summer--when our little girl would have been sitting up, learning to crawl, and even starting to babble ma-ma and da-da--we'll be reminded of her beauty with green leaves and big purplish-red dogwood blooms. To watch over the tree, we placed a statue of an angel, another gift from very kind friends.

We also purchased two globe blue spruce shrubs and planted them on either side of the front steps. And a very kind friend brought another gorgeous rose bush to us this week to add to Lucy's garden, so we planted that on the south side of the house today, too.

Now that it is all said and done, here is an updated "after" shot of our house from the front and northeast corner (note that, since our last post, Joe got lattice put up around our front porch...he did a great job).

The shrubs and trees looked so big at the nursery,

but look so tiny against the house. It will be fun

to watch them grow.

Although we will never be able to take care of our little girl or watch her grow up, we will be able to care for these plants and watch them grow and change. It may seem small, but planting this garden has allowed us to DO something for our daughter. And there is great comfort in that.

I want to close this post with the assurance that our blog isn't going to turn into a sad one about our lost daughter. Future posts will continue to highlight our adventures restoring and repairing this house. Occasionally, wistfully, we may mention Lucy and--if we do--we hope you aren't uncomfortable or scared. Or that you think we're not coping well because we are talking about her or because we feel sad or angry that she is gone. She is a part of us and our family and our story now. She has changed us, and this experience is now part of the very fabric of who we are. But it does not define us, and we will forge ahead. It is what she would have wanted.

For those who have experienced a loss or who know someone who has, or are just trying to understand what we are going through, I recently ran across this beautiful and brutally honest letter written by a mother who lost a child during pregnancy. It is posted many places and describes "what we wish you knew about pregnancy loss." Unfortunately, I cannot find out who is the original author so that she can be given credit. Although much of it is specific to losing a child during a pregnancy (specifically miscarriage), I think much of it speaks to the feelings of loss in general, and I thought it was worth sharing.

Our daughter died.

Surprisingly, those words aren't that hard to say. I need to say them, in fact. I need to talk about her, to talk about what happened. To be reminded of her every day. It means she existed, that others know she existed. That she mattered and continues to matter. Thank you, Peaches readers, for letting us share Lucy's story. Or for at least reading to the end of this very long post.

And to our angel--we miss you. Always will.

Out with the old!

2009-08-04T14:10:00.002-05:00

Last weekend, we had a garage sale. Above is the "before" photo of Max's clothes, shoes, hats, socks, etc. that he wore during the first two years of his life. It was SHOCKING for me to see it all. How could one little person possibly have needed all that? Two boxes of shoes??? He has tiny feet that don't grow! And we have two more big bags of gender-neutral clothes (not pictured here) that we put away for baby Lucy...

There was a part of me that was afraid to go through it all, thinking I'd probably get all sentimental and teary-eyed as I remembered the pajamas he puked on at my sister's or the outfit he wore when he threw his very first temper-tantrum. But sorting through it all reminded me that I am not a pack-rat and I just don't get sentimental about "things," so there were few tears. In fact, it was a lot of fun looking at his little outfits, thinking about how far he's come, and knowing that we should be so proud of the person he's becoming. And it was somewhat therapeutic to begin to clear out some space in our home--and our family--for our little girl. Just the first step in getting ready for the changes to come...

Porch Painting Progress

2009-07-12T21:40:00.001-05:00

Lately, we've had a renewed zeal for home improvement (ha!) and some cooperative weather, so we've been tackling some of those outdoor projects we've otherwise put off for too long. In particular, we've paid a lot of attention to our porches. If you'll recall, we reconstructed both our back porch and our front porch last year. Our contractor used treated lumber for all of our new framing, so we had to wait a bit for the wood to cure before painting. After staring at raw, unfinished wood for a year, we decided* enough was enough and it was time to pretty things up a bit.

*Okay, by "we" I mean "Kendra." She seriously kicked me in my butt to get back aboard the home improvement bandwagon. I have spent the last year content with the current state of the Country Estate, which I would describe as thoroughly adequate. She, on the other hand, is always planning the next move--which is not a bad thing--and has no contentment with "thoroughly adequate." I've had my come-to-Jesus moment, though, and am back to work and fired up to get things done around the house. Until Mizzou football season starts, anyway.

While we haven't quite finished the painting on the porches, we are making solid progress. Some of the painting on the back porch will have to wait to accommodate our new garden, but we should knock out the bulk of it by next weekend. Here is a shot of the stairs and decking leading down to the patio:

Everything in white is newly painted. Okay, I know that doesn't look like much, but it is a pain to paint those damn spindles, and I'm glad that job is done. We will be painting the steps and floor a red color to match our front porch, which, by the way, now looks like this:

I just realized we didn't get a good "before" shot of the front porch, but let me tell you--there is a huge difference between now and then. Most of the stone columns you see in the picture above were buckling out, causing major structural issues. Due to this issue--or perhaps causing it--there was a giant hole in the ground under the porch, which I'm sure just pooled water, causing more movement, and further destabilizing the area. I'm no structural engineer, but that's my theory and it makes sense to me. To remedy the situation, our contractor propped up the porch roof with lumber, and then tore out the rest of the porch structure. He cleaned and re-laid the stones, rebuilt the frame under the floor (which was pretty well rotted and bounced when you tried to walk on it), and replaced/reused the old floorboards. He also filled in the hole under the porch to get water away from the house. The result is a porch that is structurally sound, safe to walk on, and pleasing (we think) to look at. Last week, after the powerwashing, we were able to finish painting the raw wood. Now, all that's left is to put on some lattice around the bottom and plant a few shrubs. We're crossing our fingers to get that finished by the end of July.

Powerwashing Momma

2009-07-02T15:16:00.007-05:00

Just because I'm nearly 6 months pregnant doesn't mean I'm not willing to get my hands a little dirty (or wet).

I spent the better part of last Sunday afternoon powerwashing the front and back porches and some of our window trim in preparation for painting (hopefully this weekend if it stays dry). The fella from Sherwin Williams SWORE to me that the paint I bought was "self-priming" (in fact, he refused to sell me primer), so two coats should do it. Then we can put up the lattice on the front porch and FINALLY start landscaping. I also washed the back patio so we can re-level some of the stones and sweep some new sand into the spaces between the pavers.

And, of course, I also took time out to play with my favorite little guy!

Happy Fourth of July.

Joe Dirt

2009-06-19T21:15:00.007-05:00

Hello? Is anyone still there? Anyone still reading? If you are, I salute you, and apologize for not posting for MONTHS. I'll spare you another "we're going to resurrect the blog" speech for now. That's the intention, but that was also my intention when I last posted in January. For now, I'll just bring you up to speed on the latest activity with the house.

As you can see from the opening pic, we're spreading some dirt. Correction, Joe's spreading some dirt while I sit on the patio and blog. He doesn't want a 5 1/2 months pregnant lady hauling around a shovel and wheelbarrow, despite my protests. So I guess that brings us to the first update--we're expecting another baby in October. And it's a GIRL! Maybe my nesting instinct is kicking in already, but I've got a lot of plans for this house over the summer...

A few weeks ago, we had some old concrete removed from the yard and a couple of new walkways poured--one in front and one in back. That's where the dirt work comes in...filling in the holes and around the new concrete.

They look great and were MUCH needed. And after never planting ANYTHING in my life, I have even tried my hand at a tiny bit of landscaping and planted a very small garden outside the back door (more on my adventures in gardening in a future post). It is finally getting to the point where we can sit back in our new patio furniture and enjoy our yard!

So, what else is on tap this summer? Painting the front and back porches, installing lattice around the front porch, new trim in the downstairs bathroom, a bit more landscaping and a LOT more dirt. Oh yeah--and Joe has taken out one of our downstairs windows to begin his ambitious project of restoring all the original windows in the house. I'll let him tell you about that later...

Max is 2!

2009-01-21T09:14:00.001-06:00

This post is a little late, but our little Max turned 2 on the 11th! We had a FUN celebration with almost 20 family members. Lots of food, cake, toys for Max, AND an American Idol Karaoke tournament for the grown-ups after Max went down for his nap.

Hard to believe that this time last year, Max was still crawling and saying probably only 10 words or so, and we were packing up our loft to start our new life here in Lathrop.

Seems so long ago, yet just like yesterday. What a difference a year makes...

Falling back...

2008-11-03T21:58:00.004-06:00

So, Peaches readers (if there are any left). I'm going to pretend it hasn't been three months since we've posted on this blog. We had a TON of work done on the house over the summer, but did little ourselves. Joe started his business in July, and--in August--I added a day to my workweek to start providing PT services for Lathrop School District (in part to cover the cash flow deficit from the extensive house restoration and business start-up costs). Frankly, we're short on time--both to work on the house and keep up with the blog--and we've run out of money. So there won't be any major restoration projects on the table until the piggy bank fills back up (hopefully this spring, although Joe is less optimistic). In the meantime, I hope to keep up with the blog, but I will warn you in advance that it may be less about working on the house and more about living our life here in a small town and surviving our first full winter in our old home.

Which brings me to the real purpose of this post. The changing seasons. This afternoon, I walked outside and realized I couldn't see our yard anymore (see above pic). Before this place, I've never had a yard, let alone a tree. Who knew they dropped this many leaves in the fall? I feel like there's no purpose to raking leaves--just let nature take its course and let them decompose in the yard. Joe says it is what good neighbors do to keep leaves from blowing around in other people's yards. I don't know if Joe's right or not, but I do know that we don't own a rake. And I haven't noticed him rushing off to the hardware store to buy one. Do I really need to rake these leaves? Maybe it's another one of those jobs best hired out to a neighborhood kid. He'll just have to bring his own rake.

A tiny do-it-yourselfer

2008-08-04T15:11:00.000-05:00

Before and After

2008-08-02T10:28:00.010-05:00

Last Thursday, we hosted a house party for Kay Barnes at our home (yes, Joe and I are raging Democrats, but you can be assured that this is a bipartisan blog and we won't hold anything against our Republican readers). The nice thing about it--other than raising over $1000 to get dirty-dog Sam Graves out of office--was the compliments we got on the house, many from people who were familiar with the house and the shape it was in before we bought it. As I was telling Mayor Barnes that we used to live in a new loft in downtown Kansas City (which is where, incidentally, we saw firsthand what an excellent leader she is--now I promise I'm done with the political rants), one of our friends laughed about how funny it was that we decided to move from a 1000 square foot loft that required basically no DIY skills (or home maintenance for that matter) to a 2500 square foot DIY challenge. It made me laugh, too, but also made me think about how far we've come since we somewhat naively purchased this place. I think it's easy to get so wrapped up in the to-do lists that we forget how much we've done and how much we've grown and learned here. And since July 31 was our six-month anniversary of living in the house--and because I haven't posted for so long (sorry!) that I am backed up with pictures to share--I thought it would be fitting to create a sort of before and after "gallery" of what we've done so far! And as tempting as it might be to pepper the photos with captions about what still needs to be done, I won't. Let's just enjoy...

Our Home: A Before and After Web Album

New Job, or, Why We Didn't Post for Two Months

2008-07-16T22:02:00.006-05:00

I figure I owe the loyal Peaches readers out there an explanation as to why the site went dormant for the better part of two months. On June 30, I quit my job as a fancy-pants lawyer for a large Kansas City law firm, and on July 7 opened my own law practice in Lathrop. So from about May 1 until July 1, pretty much all of our free time was spent getting all the ducks in a row to have the practice ready for business when the doors opened.

I am definitely excited about this new chapter in our lives. Working in the community in which I live is an important thing to me, and I hope that my new business can contribute to the Lathrop community. If any of you in Metro KC or Northwest Missouri have legal needs, well...you know what to do.

Return of Peaches

2008-07-16T21:11:00.005-05:00

And we're back! It's been a while since we've posted, so we'll try to break up the progress into digestible "chunks" so the blog posts don't get too overwhelming.

The last update concerned the back room, which had just been returned to its former glory as a porch from its previous existence as a laundry room. Here is the porch, now that it has been painted and furnished:

Note the fresh coat of white paint, the painted gray floor, and the gray trim. We also found quite a score with the furniture -- $200 for the set at World Market. Needless to say, we absolutely love the back porch, especially Kendra. She would hang out there 24/7 if we put a bed out there.

While the progress on the back porch has been pretty cool, by far the most work has been on the back yard. The plan was to have a new patio poured, and we were leaning towards a stenciled concrete to make it look like a cobblestone patio. But before the patio could be poured, there would have to be a significant amount of old concrete to be broken up. There was also a large concrete block capping something, likely either a well or a cistern, and that would have to be addressed, too.

Well, nothing is ever easy when it comes to home improvement, and it took us f-o-r-e-v-e-r to coordinate with the concrete guy. Towards the end, we were getting the distinct impression that he was jerking us around. We didn't really appreciate that, so we cut him loose. While this threatened to throw us off our arbitrary schedule, we were prepared with a plan B -- we had a quote for a paver patio from our handyman extraordinaire, Art.

The first step was to break up the old concrete, and use the debris to fill the well/cistern/whatever. There is not, unfortunately, a clear photo of the back yard "before," but this photo gives you a flavor of what we (and by "we" I mean "Art") were dealing with.

In the picture, you can see the edge of the concrete cap on the right. When our contractor cut into it, it turned out that it was an old well lying underneath that concrete. It was one of those old stone wells (still spring-fed) that looked like it belonged in Buffalo Bill's basement:

It rubs the lotion on its skin or else it gets the hose again.

With the well filled, the patio was laid in no time. We used a basic 6"x9" concrete "stone" paver laid in a sand base. This shot from our back stairs shows off the patio fairly well.

And for the parting shot, a quick contrast of the "before" and "after" on the back elevation on our home. First, the "before:"
And then the "after:"

I Stand Corrected...

2008-05-19T15:55:00.003-05:00

Joe did post pictures of our old porch in "Let's Take it Outside" on 4/29. Sorry for the redundancy, faithful Peaches readers.

Back Porch Transformation

2008-05-17T11:57:00.022-05:00

We got a new camera and the back porch is done! Well, make that almost-done--we still need to paint, but our screened porch is fully enjoyable. In fact, I'm sitting on the porch listening to the birds sing and indulging in a cool beverage right now...

A couple of weeks ago, Joe posted about our porch demolition, but he really didn't show you where we started, so here it goes:

Pretty crap-tacular, huh?

The room pictured above was originally a back porch. We know that because of the original exterior wood siding and diamond-shaped exterior window (see top picture). Our neighbor tells us that the owners before the owners before us (in other words, two owners ago) decided to enclose the porch to make it a laundry room. They put in some old cabinets, put up some cheap paneling, and created the room pictured above. When we first looked at the house, the previous owners were using it as a laundry room/mud room. They actually kept it very clean and decent-looking. Then we moved in. We knew we wanted to ditch the laundry room idea and make it a porch again, so we created a laundry room upstairs. Then the back porch became DIY-central--a dumping ground for tools, drop cloths, half-used paint cans, old blinds, and any other junk we managed to accumulate. Because our front porch isn't really usable (stay tuned for updates on MAJOR front porch construction later this summer) and because the driveway is in the back of the house, this "room" was the main entrance for us and our guests. It was dirty, smelly, dingy, and ugly. To tell you the truth, it really killed the "first impression" factor when we showed the house to our family and friends. I became disgusted with this space and--with the improving weather--was hell-bent on creating an outdoor space for our family to relax (that's why I moved to the country, right?) So I nagged Joe until he cleaned off the porch and I called our ever-so-handy-man Art. The transformation was underway.

First, Art tore off the old, rickety stairs, removed the exterior window, and ripped off the exterior siding and interior paneling.

Good-bye crappy paneling and ugly window...

Then he built us a much-needed new set of set of stairs.

Momma was so happy!

Next, he got busy replacing all the rotten floor boards (which was nearly all of them), cutting and capping the old washer/dryer fixtures, boxing in the exposed pipes and wires, and patching/repairing holes and imperfections. During the process, he uncovered some old Kansas City and St. Louis newspapers, dated around 1905 (!) that had been used to insulate our home when it was built.

If you click on the pic above you can tell the brown spot is actually a 100-year-old piece of newspaper.

Once all the tear-down and repair was done, it was time to build. Art built a low wall and inserted recessed panels made out of the cedar siding he we found on the exterior of the house, under the vinyl. He made sure the wall was just low enough so Max could see outside.

Finally, he removed the old window and door that led from the house to the porch and installed French doors. The last step was to insert the screens, leaving our porch sunny and breezy, yet blissfully inaccessible to bugs, birds, and UV rays.

And here, my friends, is the finished* product...

Ooh! Aah!

...and some before and after shots.

The next step in our outdoor living makeover is to have a patio poured by the northwest corner of the house (to the left of the stairs in the exterior house pic above). We're going with decorative, stenciled concrete that is supposed to look like cobblestone. Check back for updates and please feel free to leave any comments you may have on the pros and cons of decorative concrete. We don't know anyone else who has a stenciled concrete patio, so we'd love to hear from someone who has something similar.

*We're playing it a little fast and loose with the word "finished." Art still needs to come back and install a ceiling fan and paint the whole thing. But we've pretty much spent the whole weekend enjoying the space (working, playing, enjoying a variety of beverages), so it's finished enough.

If I Had a Camera...

2008-05-06T21:03:00.003-05:00

So Joe managed to get a few pics of our porch "before" and "shortly after" construction began. Over the weekend, I took a few more recent pics with big plans for posts. But now, I can't find the camera. It's just as well since our camera is on its last leg anyway and a new one is on order. So now, in the absence of the pics I took, I give you a list of pictures I would post on the blog if I had the camera...

A picture of me driving my father-in-law's Ford F-3 million. Okay, I don't think Ford actually makes a F-3 million model, but the point is that it is a big, BIG truck. I could barely see over the steering wheel. And there was something funny about seeing my Kate Spade bag laying on the dusty floor, right next to his gun (very city-meets-country). But it was city clean-up day in Lathrop, which means there was a free drop-off for all of our construction waste. So I (literally) jumped up in the cab and drove a load uptown.
A picture of the progress on Max's room. As you may remember, Max's room was our project for April. Somehow, April passed us by and we didn't get it finished. We did, however, get it cleaned up and painted. Now, all we have to do is move the furniture in and put on the finishing touches. But because Max is pretty comfortable in his room as it is, this just honestly isn't high on our priority list.
A picture of the entry. No, we haven't tackled the green trim problem, but we did finally get it painted.
A picture of some of the treasures left in the garage by the previous homeowners: the home-made muscle-man collage, the old cans of protein powder, the cow skull, and the collection of energy drink cans. Sadly, we parted with all these priceless artifacts on the aforementioned Lathrop clean-up day.
A picture of our newly installed French doors (they are beautiful) and our back porch (which is less than beautiful right now). We have new back steps, which are nice. The porch walls are pretty much completely ripped out and half of the floor is missing, which is not so nice. But we're told that this project will be done (or at least mostly done) by the end of the week. I'm skeptical. We'll see.
A gratuitous Max pic (GMP). As he grows, parenting is getting more and more challenging. But he is happy and spunky and smart and I'm proud to be his Momma. And he reminds us every day (by demanding to go "outside" and play with his "ball bat" or pointing across the street and asking for "Emma," his new friend and neighbor) why this is such a good place for our family.

Porch Demolition

2008-05-04T21:40:00.004-05:00

In the last post here at Peaches, we discussed the upcoming work on the back porch. Well, work is underway, and things are coming along nicely. Here are some pics of the demo work that was done earlier this week. First, the exterior:

I don't know what you can see from the photo, but underneath the vinyl siding is a vertical wood paneling-type of siding. It's isn't terribly unattractive, but that doesn't really matter, because it's coming off anyway. Also note that the rickety old steps are completely destroyed.

Now, pictures of the inside:

Not a whole lot to look at here; everything is just about what we expected. After we removed flimsy wood paneling (or, rather, after our contractor removed the flimsy wood paneling) the remnants of the original porch were revealed. you can see one of the old porch posts, painted white, in the photo above. Unfortunately, there aren't enough of the old posts left, so we are going to have to replace all of them for the "new" porch.

Quite a bit of time has elapsed since we took these photos, so I must confess that this is NOT what the porch currently looks like (sorry, it takes too much effort to try to update this blog daily!). So, faithful readers, you will have to remain patient while we get the newer photos uploaded. Work continues this week, so hopefully we can do a better job of updating the blog as the porch progresses.

Let's Take It Outside

2008-04-29T14:39:00.008-05:00

So far, all the work to the house has been on the interior. Now that winter finally seems to be over, we decided it was way past time to address the exterior of the house.

We've got a lot of problems. We've documented the problems with the front porch, and it is near the top of the exterior to-do list. We have been assured that it isn't a structural threat to the house, but it is unusable in its current condition. Next, there is no outdoor entertaining space. We've decided to put in a patio instead of a deck, as it fits in better with the home's historical context. And, between the dog and Max, we really need to fence in the back yard. Add in the need for a complete landscaping overhaul and our (eventual) desire to remove the vinyl siding and restore the original clapboard siding, and out exterior to-do list is a bit overwhelming.

First up, however, is to address the back porch. Right now, it is enclosed and has been turned into a laundry room. When we moved in, we moved the washing machine and dryer upstairs, so the back porch doesn't serve much of a purpose. We've decided we want to turn it back into a screened-in porch, so that it serves a bit of an outdoor/entertaining purpose. We are very excited to get this going, as we think it will change the entire complexion of the homes exterior from the back elevation.

Here are the "before" pictures. First up, this is the back of the house:

The lower portion of the house on the right is what used to be (and what will once again be) the back porch. The taller portion on the right is an addition to the kitchen. As you can see, the entire exterior is covered in vinyl siding. We have no idea what we will find underneath that siding, especially on the enclosed porch. And, obviously, those rickety old steps must be replaced.

Next up, here's a picture from the inside of the house:

This door leads to the enclosed back porch. Right now, it is not an exterior-grade door. As part of the porch work, we are going to remove the door and window, and put in a french door. Our contractor says he can re-use the old trim for the french door, so it should retain its "original" look.

And here are pictures of the inside of the back porch:

As you can tell, it's not very attractive in there. You can see the old wood siding (what we hope we will find under the vinyl siding) and the remnants of the washer and dryer hook-ups. The exterior wall is covered in flimsy wood-paneling, with some kind of backer board underneath it. Hopefully the old porch posts will still be underneath there, and in salvageable condition. There is also (in the top picture) exposed plumbing and wiring that goes up to the second floor. Obviously, that stuff will have to be enclosed.

And that's the back porch in a nutshell. I will post updates as construction progresses.

The Silence Is Broken

2008-04-13T21:41:00.003-05:00

Hello, faithful Peaches readers. Looking back, the blog has been awfully quiet lately. Last time you heard from me, I was in a door-induced stupor. I wish I could say that Kendra and I have been working hard on some big project, but we've actually just been enjoying the house and--you know--living in it!

I feel like we are getting to the point where it's starting to feel real comfortable in the house. Not that we haven't been working on the house at all; just this last weekend, in fact, I installed a new ceiling fan in the kitchen (my fifth ceiling fan install so far!) and put the finishing touches on the bifold door in the kitchen while Kendra primed some drywall in Max's room. These were all little projects. The good news is that we got to "check" things off our to-do list, but the bad part is that these aren't the type of projects that make for good pictures--or blog posts.

In addition to the small projects we have been finishing, we are also planning for some major contractor work in the next couple months. This is the subject of a future post, but in short we are looking to rebuild our front porch, turn our mud room back into a back porch, install a patio, and run HVAC to all the upstairs bedrooms. And we've also engaged a landscaper to draw up some plans for the exterior. Right now we are still in the bidding stage, but as we learn more, faithful readers, we will pass any news along.

That's it for now. I believe Kendra is planning to post about our April "room of the month." That post should be a little meatier with actual home improvement information. And since I haven't had any pictures in this post, I will leave you with a GMP (gratuitous Max pic):

A Brand New Guest Bedroom!

2008-03-28T13:45:00.010-05:00

Remember when Joe told you about our one-room-at-a-time plan? Well, we've almost completed the month of March and I'd say it's been a success. Sure, we've had a little door drama, but what fun would it be to fix up an old house if there wasn't a little excitement every now and then?

This month was dedicated to our downstairs bedroom, which is a guest bedroom/office. When we purchased the house, this is what the room looked like:

We didn't care for the midnight blue walls, strange shiny paint in the closets, dated ceiling fan, or boring carpet. The trim also needed some touching-up (we'd love to strip and stain that trim someday, but that kind of project is way out of our league right now).

We started last fall by pulling up the carpet and painting the walls, trim, and inside of the closets. In January--just before we moved in--we had the hardwood floors refinished. So at the beginning of March, when we decided to focus on this room, it was really just about finishing everything off. Joe stripped the hardware from the doors and windows, and I painted the closet doors and the main entry door to the room. We replaced the ceiling fan with something a little newer and replaced the beige plastic outlet and switchplate covers with brushed nickel ones. As for decorative touches, we got our curtain panels at JC Penney, the bedding at Linens N Things, and the lamp, wall hanging, and rug from Urban Outfitters. Here is the finished product:

Is the room completely finished? No, but it's as finished as we expected it to be by the end of March... Although we have a leaning bookcase/desk for our laptops, we'd like to get a larger desk to add space to really sit down and work. The workspace isn't really needed right now, but should be this fall when I am (hopefully) writing my dissertation. None of the doors shut--the old hardware just needs to be repaired which shouldn't be too big of a job. We need a decent bedside table and definitely need to hang a few things on the wall to warm up the room a little.

Overall, we are happy with the results and this is now one of my favorite rooms in the house (I think I say that after we finish every room!). We're ready for our first overnight visitors to come check it out...any takers?

So what's on tap for April? I think we're going to tackle Max's bedroom--you know, the unheated dumping ground for all of our unpacked boxes? It's time to transform that space into a functional room. Stay tuned.

Hanging a Door in 3 Easy Steps!

2008-03-23T20:42:00.008-05:00

It seems like I've been posting exclusively about doors for about 2 months now. Well, loyal readers, I can proudly say that we have a new door on the upstairs bathroom! On Saturday, Max stayed all day at his Nanni's, so Kendra and I took that opportunity to knock out a bunch of home improvement projects, including the new bathroom door. Here's a step-by-step in case any of you are contemplating a similar project.

Step 1: After realizing that there is a 3-inch-gap between the existing bathroom door and the floor (no joke), and realizing that the existing bathroom door is originally from the hall closet, remove the existing bathroom door and hang it on the hall closet (now a laundry room).

Step 1(a): Okay, then you need to find a door to put on the upstairs bathroom. There are a ton of old doors hanging around, surely one of those will fit, right?

Step 1(a)(i): Nope, none of the other doors seem to fit. They are either too short or too long.

Step 1(a)(ii): After measuring every "spare" door in the house twice, locate a door that seems to be the proper dimensions. Since it is from an old closet, you can probably just live without the door on the closet until you buy a new door many years in the future. Pause and admire your resourcefulness.

Step 1(b): Haul replacement door upstairs to the bathroom. realize that you don't have the proper hinges to install on the frame, so steal hinges from another closet door that is rarely used.

Step 1(c): Hang replacement door in bathroom door frame. Swing door closed, and realize that the replacement door is about 1/4" too wide for the frame, so the door will not close.

Step 1(c)(i): Argue with your wife, since she is the primary user of the upstairs bathroom, and now doesn't have the ability to close the door. Blame it on someone/thing else. Do not admit fault under any circumstances.

Step 1(c)(ii): Proclaim that you will fix the problem as soon as possible. Consider nominating yourself for husband of the year.

Step 2: Two weeks later, measure door frame for trip to Lowe's to buy new door. Rather than take the written measurements with you to Lowe's, just remember that you need a 32" door.

Step 2(a): Once you get to Lowe's, remember that your door frame is an odd measurement and that your door will accordingly need to be cut. Realize that Lowe's will cut the door for you and save you the trouble. Remember that you left the precise measurements at home.

Step 2(a)(i): Call your wife and have her measure the doorway. Make sure, though, that you have the good tape measure with you, so that your wife has to use a seamstress's tape measure. Tell her to measure inside the frame, and let you know the smallest measurement.

Step 2(a)(ii): When you call your wife, make sure you call her when she already has her hands full dealing with your 14-month-old son. This will make her very happy.

Step 2(b): Have Lowe's cut your door according to the measurements relayed from your wife.

Step 2(b)(i): Prime and paint the door (or, talk your wife into doing it).

Step 2(c): Carry the door upstairs to place it in the door way and make sure it fits.

Step 2(c)(i): The f***ing door doesn't fit.

Step 2(c)(ii): Argue with your wife over whose fault it is that the door doesn't fit. Do not admit fault under any circumstances.

Step 2(c)(iii): Realize that when you told your wife to let you know the smallest measurement, she did exactly as you asked and measured between the stops on the inside of the frame, making the door 1/2" too narrow.

Step 2(d): For probably the 10th time, MEASURE THE INSIDE OF THE DOOR FRAME. For probably the 11th time, MEASURE THE INSIDE OF THE DOOR FRAME. Go to Lowe's with the measurements, have them cut a new door, and bring it home.

Step 2(d)(i): Prime and paint the new door.

Step 3: Block out the whole day to plan for the install of the door.

Step 3(a): Place the new door in the frame; it appears to fit. Measure the location of the hinge mortises on the frame, and mark the corresponding locations on the door.

Step 3(a)(i): Chisel the mortises into the door.

Step 3(a)(ii): Realize that you chiseled on the inside of the door, but the hinges attach on the outside. Go ahead and chisel mortises all the way across the side of the door.

Step 3(b): Attach hinges, and hang the door. Hold your breath as you close the door. Exhale in relief when the door fits perfectly.

Step 3(c): Install an old rim lock and doorknob on the door.

Step 3(c)(i): Mark the location on the frame where the catch for the rim lock will need to be installed. Cut out the notch in the frame, and attach the catch with screws.

Step 3(c)(i)(A): Close the door, and realize that the catch sticks out JUST enough so that the door won't close properly. Consider arson as a viable home improvement option.

Step 3(c)(i)(B): Remove the catch, and shave off a bit more of the frame so that the catch and lock work properly.

Step 3(c)(ii): Use wood filler in the old screw holes used for attaching the catch.

Step 3(c)(iii): Wait for two hours for the wood filler to dry.

Step 3(c)(iv): Install catch with two screws.

Step 3(d): Swing door closed, and listen with relief when you hear that beautiful "click." Consider yourself a poor man's Bob Vila.

And that's it! Remember, with just three potential replacement doors, one month's time, the purchase of several new tools, no fewer than two domestic disputes, and about a dozen man-hours, you too can install a new door into an existing frame. It really is as easy as it sounds!

Door Drama

2008-03-20T21:39:00.004-05:00

It's been over two weeks since I posted last, yet I feel like we haven't done anything. Well, that's not entirely true. We have installed new wireless doorbells, but that barely counts as home improvement. Kendra laid out the latest in doors, lights, and closets, but most of that post concerned work that was done by others. I did manage to run new wire and install a light in the hall coat closet; that's got to count for something, I suppose.

So what has actually been keeping us busy lately? Those stinkin' doors. Here's the situation--there are no doors on the kitchen pantry, upstairs bathroom (well, there used to be a door there until I got it in my head that I needed to switch it out with another door, and then it turned out the replacement door didn't fit), Max's closet, or the master closet. The big priority is the bathroom door, of course. That one has Kendra a little steamed at me because that is the bathroom she uses the most. The second priority is the pantry door, because (1) our dog likes to drag things out of the pantry that we leave on the lower shelves, and (2) Max flips out when he looks in the pantry and sees good things to eat (he says, "Naa! Naa!", which roughly translates into "Snack! Snack!" in 14-month-old-speak).

As I've said before, we purchased and painted a new bi-fold door for the pantry but, since we live in an old home, the doorways aren't "standard" sized. So we had to cut the door down a bit, but I didn't get it right and we have to shave a little bit more off the side. Not a big deal, except that I don't own a saw. That was frustrating enough, but that is nothing compared to the ordeal that has become our door situation.

A couple weeks ago, I finally went to Lowe's to buy a door for the upstairs bathroom. As you might suspect, that doorway is not "standard" either, so as I was picking out a new door, the thought occurred to me that I could have Lowe's cut it so I wouldn't have to borrow the saw from my brother again. I pulled out my phone, called Kendra, and asked her to measure the opening. Apparently, though, there was a miscommunication, and I ended up bringing home a door that was about 1/2" too narrow for the bathroom. We both blamed each other for the door screw-up, natch. This did not enhance our marital harmony that week.

Fortunately, the too-small door will fit the master closet if we just trim it down a bit more, so buying it wasn't a complete waste. But that still left us without a door for the upstairs bath. So off to Lowe's I went (again), with my twice-measured door dimensions handy, to get a new door for the bathroom. I got the door home and Kendra primed and painted it.

So after all that, here's where we stand: we have a bi-fold pantry door that is primed and painted, but still is a tad too wide for the opening. It will need to be trimmed about a 1/4" and then installed. We have a primed and painted door for our upstairs bathroom. It may need to be trimmed slightly, but should be the proper dimensions. We will need to chisel mortises for the hinges and attach one of the extra rim locks we have to the door. And we also have a primed and painted door for the master closet. Installing that door is very, very far down our priority list, and will involve installing stops inside the frame, mortising hinges, and installing a knob.

Doors and lights and closets...Oh my!

2008-03-06T13:58:00.010-06:00

Let's start with the doors.

My friend, Misty, brought her little girl over today for lunch, playtime, and a tour of our new digs. When she entered the kitchen, she said the same thing almost every blog reader has said:

"The kitchen looks a lot better in person than it does on the blog."

She quickly started to backtrack and apologize (c'mon, Mist, we've been friends since kindergarten...no apology is ever necessary), but she's right. For some reason, in the pics we've posted, the cabinet color looks at least 3 shades lighter than it actually is. I think the pic below is a little more true to the actual cabinet color.

It really isn't country blue...

So where do the doors come in? Well, for the last two days, I've been priming and painting bifold doors to the pantry (on the right in the pic above). I'm happy to say that the pantry and all its multi-colored glory should be doored (is that a word?) by the end of the weekend.

Now for the lights.
Notice that we actually have them. This is a shot of our downstairs and upstairs hallways taken from the base of the stairs. When we agreed to buy the house, we asked the previous owners to disable all of the old knob and tube wiring for safety and insurance purposes. That left us without lights in our hallways, which made it more than a little precarious to walk up and down the stairs, especially while holding Max. Clearly, putting in all new wiring (including a 3-way switch for the light at the top of the stairs) was not a DIY project for us. We asked our friend and insurance agent, Aaron Greer, to recommend a good electrician in town and he came through with Ray Sellers. Besides being a heck of a nice guy, Ray did a great job bringing our lights up to code without doing too much damage to the walls or our pocketbook...

Now for the grand finale: The CLOSET!

Today, Kansas City Closet Company installed our long-awaited custom closet system into our newly-built master closet.

Woohoo!

There's really no good way to photograph it, but let me tell you that KC Closets came through again! We've got six sections of hanging, three built-in laundry baskets, two belt racks, a tie rack, and lots and lots of shelves. Once we get everything in there, we will be totally done living out of boxes. I never thought I'd be so excited about a closet...

So, while Joe is a little down in the dumps, I'm feeling positive and re-energized this week. Sure we have a few unfinished projects, but there are some really good things going on here, too.

And, by the way, Max took his first "real" steps here this week. How can it not feel like home?

Finish What You Start

2008-03-05T22:02:00.005-06:00

There are ups and downs to living in the house while there is still substantial work to be done. On the plus side, we no longer have to plan our weekends around 40-mile trips to a house without furniture or any means of cooking food (and typically in a snow/ice storm). On the down side, however, I keep finding myself with, say, an hour of free time to tackle a project on a whim that takes three hours to complete. This haphazard approach to home remodeling has left us with the following:

A new wooden, bi-fold door my brother and I cut to fit the kitchen pantry, yet remains unpainted and uninstalled.
Power ran to the non-functioning (and previously powerless) doorbell, which still doesn't work for some unknown reason.
All the materials purchased and assembled to install a new light in the coat closet, but the install itself is on hold because I don't have any tool right now that will cut the lathe board.
And my favorite: a door on the upstairs bathroom that doesn't fit the doorway because I took the old door off to fit onto the previously door-less laundry room, and I didn't thoroughly measure the "new" bathroom door before hanging it in the bathroom, and now it is about 1/4" too wide.

I've definitely lost my focus, and it's showing in my recent remodeling efforts. Remember just a few weeks ago, when I was espousing our One Room A Month Plan? I wish I could consistently bring that type of focus to the table, but right now I feel like I'm just hopping around from task to task as the mood strikes me. And the maddening part is that I don't even care! I like living in the house, and I think that's causing me to overlook all the little imperfections that should be driving me crazy, but are not. But things can't go on like this forever. Some of these projects need to be finished before starting others. In fact, right now Kendra is priming that pantry door, so maybe we can start checking off some of these items off the "to-do" list. I even hear there are rumors of a trip to Lowe's and Home Depot this weekend . . .

Bedroom before and after...

2008-02-22T09:26:00.005-06:00

The color scheme in our bedroom was shocking when we moved in.

Master bedroom "before"

Why didn't we show you this before? We really felt we needed you to fall in love (or at least like) with the house before showing you this room. When our family and friends came to see the house initially, this room--without fail--always brought a funny fake smile to everyone's faces with comments like "Oh, this is nice." Once we explained that we hadn't painted the room, people--without fail--always said something to the effect of "Thank goodness. I was hoping that you didn't pick the colors."

In fairness to the previous owners, we think this was a child's room. While the color scheme may have been fun and bright for a kid, it wasn't very restful for two grown adults. We have big plans for this room--it will eventually be a master suite. And, so far, we've done quite a bit of work to that end.

First, we borrowed some space from the adjacent bedroom (what will eventually be Max's bedroom) and created a walk-in closet. When you walk in the front door of the room, the closet is located just to your right. It's hard to tell in the pic below, but it is L-shaped, about 5' x 7' in the main area with another 2' x 4' section. Kansas City Closet Co. will install a custom closet system (complete with hanging racks, shelves, and laundry bins) in about two weeks.

New master closet

Next, we had the floors refinished, and painted the closet and trim. We actually lived in that pink and orange room for a couple of weeks until, last weekend, we couldn't take it anymore. We chose chocolate brown bedding and window treatments and painted the bedroom a pale blue. Sherwin Williams calls it Honest Blue, which--as Joe pointed out--makes it a good choice for a married couple's bedroom. The old ceiling fan didn't work (and wasn't too attractive), so we got a new model with a remote control that has become Max's new favorite toy.

Master bedroom "after"

We still need to hang things on the wall and I'd like to get a big, fluffy rug, but we are SO happy with the end result. I think it is exactly what we imagined and it really is quite relaxing.

The old closet, however, is not so relaxing. In fact, it makes me tense almost every time I open it. Right now, because we can't use our new closet yet, it is just chock full of junk.

Old master closet--future bathroom.

Eventually, this closet (and the attic space behind that door), will become a full master bathroom. But, for now, the mess behind the old closet door will just be our little secret.

I Love My (Crazy) Husband

2008-02-18T13:50:00.019-06:00

When you last heard from me--on January 30--it was moving day. I know it sounds cliche, but it seems like years have passed. We've been working around the clock to make this house our home (and, incidentally, have been compiling loads of "before" and "after" pics for upcoming posts). We've made lots of mistakes, wasted lots of time, and shared more than a few cross words with each other. We're older and wiser and maybe just a bit more cynical. And, frankly, I expected that to happen. But even though Joe and I have been married almost 8(!) years, living in this house has revealed a new, unexpected side of him. For better or worse, I think yesterday is the perfect example of my new, slightly crazy, husband.

Yesterday, it snowed. Hard.

Gratuitous picture of Max

Sure, Max looks happy and care-free playing in the snow, but that was after-the-fact. Yesterday morning and afternoon, it was windy, cold, snowy, and wet. Max was visiting his Nanni, so Joe and I decided--on such an awful day--that painting (inside) would be a good project to tackle. So imagine my surprise when, after I finished rolling some paint in our room, I couldn't find Joe. I searched the house and finally went outside. Here is what I found:

The conversation went something like this:
Me: "Joe, what are you doing?!?!"
Joe: "I'm putting these extenders on the gutters."
Me: "Do you really need to do that now?!? It is snowing and the wind is blowing 40 miles per hour!!!"
Joe: "Yes. Can you hand me that white bracket on the back porch?"
Me: "This white bracket? Here you go. It is entirely too cold to be doing this right now. You are psychotic!"
Joe (dead serious): "Kendra, there's nothing psychotic about keeping water away from your house."

What do you say to that? I threatened to take his picture and quote him on the blog. He was undeterred.

He told me he would be done in a second and asked if I wanted to get lunch at the local restaurant, the Hungry Mule. I told him I needed to go grab my scarf. Two minutes later, I opened the back door and this is what I saw.

I honestly have no idea why he was shoveling the walk while it was still snowing or how he had managed to shovel all that in the short time I had been inside. All I can tell you is that he was shoveling as furiously as I have ever seen anyone shovel.

Don't get me wrong--I appreciate that these things needed to be done. I just question whether they needed to be done in the blowing snow, especially when there were plenty of indoor projects he could have been working on.

Is there a twelve-step program for obsessive older-home owners? Or perhaps a support group for their confused, concerned partners?

I just think that yesterday, Joe could have benefited from a safe, warm place where he could have gone and said, "Hello. My name is Joe and I own an old home..."

Joe's Home Improvement Week: 1 Win, 1 Loss

2008-02-15T11:08:00.009-06:00

I'm sure everyone out there on the Internets can't wait to hear the conclusion of my gripping tale that is the plasma tv saga. Well Peaches fans, wait no more. I present to you, the finished product:

I'm not the one watching Rachael Ray, I swear.

Also, note the old-school NES. That's how I roll.

Victory! The TV is up with the cords deliciously hidden behind the wall. In fact, it's been on the wall for five days now, and it still hasn't come crashing down. I think I'm in the clear.

While most of you are likely unimpressed with my "ability" to accomplish a very simple home improvement task, there are probably two or three folks wondering how I got this done. First, I purchased electrical boxes better suited to my needs -- the new ones secured themselves to the existing wall pretty well. Then, I attached the switchplates directly to the plaster with self-drilling screws to give the electrical boxes a more finished look. With the help of the future brother-in-law, I was able to lift the TV onto the bracket.

At that point, the job was finished, except for one thing. There was no functioning power outlet near the TV. There used to be an outlet there, but it was on a knob-and-tube circuit that was removed before we moved in. It was my mission to run a new outlet to that spot. First, I had to enlarge the existing hole in the baseboard to make way for a new, code-approved electrical box. This was easy with my pocket saw--until the saw handle broke. Ugh. I was determined to finish the job without another trip to the hardware store, so I just put on some work gloves, grabbed the saw blade sans handle, and hacked at the baseboard until the hole was big enough. Surprisingly, I accomplished this without hurting myself or any bystanders.

Then, I tapped into a functioning circuit in the basement, ran the wire up to the electrical box, and connected the outlet to the wires. This was the first significant electrical work I had done to the house (there will be a future poston all the electrical work I have done so far--oh, I am such a tease). I flipped the breaker back on, and everything is working perfectly.

You'll notice the title of this post -- 1 Win, 1 Loss. The high of getting the TV up was quickly diminished by the low of my experience with the thermostat. Last Saturday, I purchased a programmable thermostat to replace the old one. I figured it was the right thing to do in that we would save some money, and also do our part to reduce our impact on the planet, being the conservationist that I am.

Installation was a snap (just a matter of connecting wires to screws) . By Saturday afternoon, everything was great--it was all programmed and running. We were saving money. We were saving the planet. I figured a congratulatory phone call from Al Gore would come at any minute.

Then, on Wednesday morning, the temperature in the house was 65 degrees. I fiddled with the thermostat for probably an hour that morning, but couldn't get any heat to come out of the registers. Not wanting to take any chances (with it being the dead of a Missouri winter and all), I called a heating and cooling guy to come take a look. He diagnosed the problem as a faulty thermostat--that fancy programmable one just wasn't sending the proper signals to the furnace. He put a basic, non-programmable one back on for us, and by the time I got home on Wednesday evening, the house was nice and warm.

Final tally for my thermostat misadventure, including the service call and the price of the (now useless) programmable thermostat: $190. Ouch. It's not like we'll go hungry or anything, but I would have preferred to just have kept the old thermostat and saved the time and money.

So, final score for the week: Joe 1, House 1.

One Room at a Time

2008-02-14T15:49:00.004-06:00

Being in the house now, we've already noticed that our home improvement patterns have changed. Obviously, projects aren't limited to the weekends anymore, and we've also developed a better understanding of which projects are a priority for us actually living in the house, and which ones are more superficial. For example, we do not have any functioning lights in our stairway/hallway. This is a little dangerous, and very annoying. Since this involves a level of electrical work that is well over my head, we've got an electrician coming to look at the situation next Thursday.

From here on out, Kendra has a developed a "one room a month" plan of attack. We pic out one room that is going to be fixed in a month's time, and all the home improvement efforts are concentrated on that room. For February, that room will be our master bedroom. So far, we've already refinished the hardwood floors and changed the window treatments. I don't have pictures right now, but the master bedroom still needs some serious help. We will be changing the ceiling fan, re-painting the walls, and pimping out the closet.

This seems like a very modest to-do list, but I think this is the approach we have to take for now, or otherwise I think we risk spending all of our time doing home improvement and suffering some major burn out.

Plasma

2008-02-08T23:15:00.000-06:00

We are still going through all the fun that you encounter when you move -- forwarding mail, changing addresses, and setting up utilities. Yesterday, the satellite TV guy came, and hooked up our service. This is the first time we have had cable in about 4-5 years, so it's a bit of a change for us. The good part is that we will finally take full advantage of our HD plasma tv. We've had the tv for 3 years now, but--without cable--we were only pulling 5-7 of the local HD channels over-the-air. Now, thanks to DirecTv, we have 20+ channels in full HD goodness.

Since we have cable now, I thought it would be a good idea to try to mount our plasma to the wall. I had done this before in the urban highrise, but with the plaster walls at the country estate it was going to be a little more complex. Here is my step-by-step guide on how to mount a plasma tv, Joe-style.

Kendra and I already decided the TV was going in the corner of the living room by the pocket doors. There's a cable jack on that wall, so we are covered there. I even flexed my home improvement muscles and ran a new telephone wire up from the basement for the DirecTv service. There's no outlet there, but I am planning to add one into an existing cut-out. So far, so good.

Next, I used my new stud finder to find two studs. I'm attaching the wall mount directly to the studs with lag bolts, so I drilled four pilot holes, then attached the mount. Thankfully, it came out level.
Next, I took a utility knife and cut through the plaster to make two holes: one for the cords to go into the wall behind the tv, and one for the cords to come out of the wall and into our various components.

Then, I took a pocket saw and cut through the lath:

With my cable holes finished, I took two electrical boxes and cut out the backs using tin snips. I could have just ran the cables through the open holes, but I want to finish the holes out a bit, which ultimately proved to be my undoing. Here's one of the electrical boxes I used.

Mounting the box was tricky. One of my holes was cut perfectly -- I just slid the box in and it fit very snugly. It's not secured, but I don't think that's necessary right now. For the other one, though, the plaster crumbled a bit as I was cutting, so it didn't fit quite so snug. I had to rig it up using a toggle bolt I found in my toolbox. That keeps it in place, but it's got some play in it.

Next, I ran the cords through holes and electrical boxes:

And this, loyal readers, is where things went to hell. I went to install the switch plates I purchased at Menard's. I purchased oversized plates, thinking they would allow more room for the cords. But, come to find out, oversized plates do not fit standard electrical boxes. Shit. Now I'm stuck with a bunch of cords dangling from the walls, and my plasma tv sitting pathetically on its stand. There's no way I'm mounting this thing, only to have to take it down again to put regular-sized switch plates on.

Back to Menard's, I guess. I suppose I'll keep my TV on an entertainment stand for now, like some kind of barbarian.

Moving Day!

2008-01-29T10:31:00.001-06:00

I'm sitting here right now while the packers are boxing up our stuff. The movers come tomorrow, so in 30 hours or so we'll be official Lathropians. Everything seems to be falling into place now... The workers got our closets built, the floors refinished, and the water line ran to our fridge. Today they put the last coat of finish on the floors and install our new cooktop. By some miracle, we actually found someone to clean the house for us tomorrow morning and the movers should arrive at the house with our stuff in the afternoon. The schedule is tight, but I think it's all going to work out.

We've got some pictures of the new closets and floors, but unfortunately they are on the desktop computer, which is already packed. Once we get the computer up and running (and internet up and running) at the country estate, we'll have tons of pics to share.

All About the Details

2008-01-21T20:00:00.000-06:00

Joe's right--the reality of moving (and moving on) is hitting us now. In just 10 days, we'll be moved out of the urban high rise and into the country estate. And that's when things will really get interesting. So far, working on the country estate has felt like more of a hobby than anything else. We drive up on the weekends, get some work done, laugh about the quirks of the old house, and then drive back to our new loft in the city where we don't have to worry about knob and tube wiring and rooms without heat. Very soon, we'll be living with the little things every single day.

In that spirit, Joe and I had a lot of little things on our list to get accomplished over the weekend. First, I wanted to get some closets painted. Doing this before the floor refinishing begins this week allowed me to sling a little paint without worry. Unfortunately--like every other project we undertake--it took longer than anticipated. For some reason, the 3 closets I painted had all been previously painted with a super-glossy beige paint, which you can see in the "before" picture of the guest bedroom:

Bedroom closet "before"

In hindsight, I probably should have primed the bedroom closets first, but I didn't. Fortunately, they turned out okay, but the new paint didn't really want to stick to the old, so it took a couple of heavy coats.

Bedroom closet "after"

In the bathroom, I painted the linen closet. I learned my lesson with the bedroom closets, so I primed this one first. The paint went on pretty smoothly and it looks a LOT better.

Linen closet, downstairs bathroom

While I was painting, Joe was working on some electrical issues. He installed a light--from scratch--in our newly painted kitchen. Notice it right over the sink. Even though the light isn't on in the pic, rest assured that it works.

Kitchen "after"

(You'll also notice that we finished touching up the kitchen cabinets and installed new knobs on almost all of the doors and drawers--the other 5 knobs are on order at Lowe's. We are happy with the finished kitchen for now but will both be even happier when the budget allows for a complete kitchen renovation in a couple of years.)

Joe continued honing his electrical skills by installing new outlets in the guest bedroom and installing a new dimmer switch in the parlor.

Finally, Joe painted the cabinets in the downstairs bathroom and installed new hardware and hinges. I don't know if you can appreciate it in the pic below, but we painted the cabinets a pale sea green and installed chrome hardware. That bathroom is also in 5-year complete renovation plan, but we think it will look pretty good once the floors get refinished this week.

Downstairs bathroom cabinets "after"

I know it may not seem that exciting to you, dear readers, but checking all of these little things off our lists gave us a nice boost this weekend. This week, construction begins on an upstairs closet, and the floors will be refinished by early next week. The packers come the 29th and the movers will be here on the 30th. Things are moving fast now, so we should have some great "after" pictures and at least one or two stories about our moving adventures over the next couple of weeks. Wish us luck!

Don't Know What You Got, 'Till Its Gone...

2008-01-17T22:09:00.000-06:00

No, I'm not much of a Cinderella fan, but it is definitely a day of mourning. Today, we found out that we have a signed contract to sell the urban highrise. Good news, right? Well yeah, it is good news. I mean, we don't particularly like to pay two mortgages, and we are very excited about moving into the country estate and all. We are really glad to be able to give Max the kind of childhood that we think will be perfect for him. And we definitely like the idea of living a slower-paced lifestyle. But...

We love it in the city.

This wasn't our first home. In fact, Kendra and I had lived in three other places since getting married. We even liked one or two of them. The first was a crappy, 600-square foot apartment in Columbia, MO. It was fine, but given the construction of the place I'd be surprised if it's still standing. Then, we moved to North Carolina, in a decent little townhouse. It was quiet, out of the way, but it never meshed. After that, we lived in a cool little loft in downtown Durham, NC. It was an old tobacco warehouse converted into apartments. It was convenient, trendy, and fun.

But this home in KC was ours. We bought it. We picked out the tile and countertops. It is located in one of the hippest parts of KC, in one of the city's iconic buildings. Above all, this is where we brought Max home for the first time:

He spent the first year of his life here. He learned to crawl here, smiled his first smile here, and laughed for the first time here. And he will remember none of it.

The reality of what we are doing is really hitting us now. There is much that we will miss about the urban highrise, probably too much to name. I'll give it a try anyway.

We will miss the intimacy of living somewhere that truly requires you to interact, almost 24/7, with those you love the most. Even if we wanted to, we cannot get away from each other. Having 3 people (and a dog) live in 1085 square foot will do that. And that creates something special, I think. With over 2400 square feet at the country estate, we will lose this intimacy, to an extent.

We will miss our neighborhood. For those of you not familiar with the Crossroads in KC, it is the center of the city's art scene (and increasingly its dining and nightlife scene). Our waistlines--but not our palettes--will thank us for moving on. But man, it was never hard to figure out what to do for fun on a Friday or Saturday (or Tuesday!) evening.

We will miss our door person, Dei Dei. She is friendly, enthusiastic, and warm.

We will miss our condo. As I said before, this was ours. We customized it. We forged a lot of memories here. We held three holiday parties here, each one going later than the last (thanks, usually, to my brother Chris, or Mike C., hanging around too long after everyone went home).

This is the only place that we have raised our family, and that is changing now.

We are excited about moving, but the sadness of moving on is real, too.

Sometimes, You Just Can't Do It Yourself

2008-01-10T21:33:00.000-06:00

If there is anything Kendra and I know, it is that our home-improvement skills have limits. With the bulk of the painting done at the country estate, we are just about ready to enter phase 2 - the contractor phase. So Kendra met with our contractor at the house today to discuss the scope of our work. We will be starting the construction of our new master suite by borrowing some of the adjoining bedroom to create a new walk-in closet. In the long-term plans (but not necessarily to be done right away) is to turn the existing closet + some unfinished space into a master bath, and to add a laundry room off the upstairs hall.

We also have about 800 square feet of wood floors to refinish (remember all that carpet we pulled up?). This is going to make a huge difference and give us a very "finished" feel, as we will be refinishing the floors in the office, downstairs bath, stairs, upstairs hall, playroom f/k/a jayhawk room, and Max's room. Some of the trouble spots on the downstairs trim will also be touched up.

We are on a tight time frame, and I think Kendra may have freaked out our contractor a bit when she told him that we wanted it done by the end of the month. The good news is that we should be able to post some sweet before-and-after shots relatively soon.

Belated New Year's Resolutions

2008-01-07T16:53:00.000-06:00

Happy 2008!

Like most slacker bloggers, we let ourselves get all caught up in the holidays and holiday aftermath, and we've neglected the blog for almost two weeks now. I could rattle off a list of excuses a mile long, but that's not the spirit of this post. Nope, the purpose of this post is to look ahead to a 2008 full of home improvement possibilities.

I'm not one for New Year's resolutions. I don't really see the point of waiting until the New Year if you need to make a change. And I think that trying to force change just because you think you're supposed to is really just setting yourself up for failure. Despite that, I've been reflecting a bit on 2007. Particularly the last 2 1/2 months of 2007 as we dipped our toes in the do-it-yourself ocean. I have a feeling that by the end of 2008 we'll be in at least chest deep and hopefully completely over our heads at one time or another--that's part of the fun. So, as I look to the year ahead, I give you my home-improvement New Year's resolutions. I'm afraid the fact that I haven't even gotten around to making these resolutions until now--a week into 2008--isn't a good sign...

1. I will stop bugging Joe about the electrical work that needs to be done in the house. He knows my position on it (I want it fixed immediately) and I know his (it's not a priority). Guess who's winning on this? Not me.
2. I will learn how to strip and stain woodwork, specifically in the front entry.
3. I will learn how to mow a lawn. Yep--that's right--I've never mowed a lawn in my life.
4. I will relax about the heating and cooling work that needs to be done. I will realize that people survived for centuries without air conditioning and that many children have grown up in homes with baseboard heat and lived to tell about it.
5. I will make a point to learn something about all of our new neighbors besides their names and what their house looks like from the outside. This sort of assumes, of course, that we will sell the highrise and actually move to the country estate in 2008, but I digress...
6. I will hire a landscape architect to draw up plans for the outside of the house. As someone who's never even mowed a lawn nor has ever been able to even keep a houseplant alive, I should probably leave flowers, grass, trees, and shrubbery to the experts.
7. I will let Joe continue his quest to fix and restore all the windows in the house himself without questioning his sanity.
8. I will throw away the home-made body builder display and energy drink can collection that were left by the previous owners.

And finally...
9. I will know that Rome wasn't built in a day, and that it may take 5 years (or more) for our vision of this house to be fully realized. I will stop suggesting that we take out a huge loan to do everything in the spring and recognize the value of putting our own elbow grease--and hearts and souls--into this project. And I will remember to stop every once in a while and enjoy the house--and our DIY lifestyle--for what it is rather than what I want it to become.

We'll check back in December and see how I did.

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow...

2007-12-27T11:03:00.000-06:00

As I was reading the last few entries of our blog, I noticed a pattern...

It has snowed or iced at least 3 of the last 4 weekends. And guess what it is doing right now as I write this? It's snowing. And guess what it is supposed to do tomorrow morning? You guessed it! You would think from reading our blog that Missouri is covered in about 10 feet of snow right now, but the snow and ice is just coming in little bits at a time--enough to make for treacherous driving conditions for about a day or two--then it warms up for a couple of days and melts. Then it starts again, just in time for the weekend.

Last weekend, we knew another snowstorm was coming, but through sheer determination (we ARE going to get those cabinets painted) and a little bit of stupidity (it won't be THAT bad), we decided to "beat" the storm. So we got up early, loaded up the family, and headed to the house.

We got started painting the cabinets while Max played and, by some miracle, he decided to take a 3-hour nap. We took that once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to FINISH painting the kitchen cabinets (woohoo!). Joe finished painting the doors while I worked on the cabinets on the wall.

Yep, I'm sitting on the windowsill with my feet in the kitchen sink.

There will likely be a little touching-up to do and we need to re-attach the doors and install new knobs and pulls. But the picture below may give you a little taste of what it will look like when it is finished.
Those of you who have been following our blog know that--working at our pace--these finishing touches will probably take at least a month. But somehow it feels "done" and that feels really good. The kitchen was the last room to paint downstairs. All that's left is the small entry downstairs (which will, as you remember, require removing and stripping trim) and two bedrooms upstairs (which we won't paint until we have some construction done). So we can put down the paintbrushes...at least for a little while.

And while we were triumphantly painting the cabinets, it started to rain. And then it got colder and started to ice. And then it got even colder and started to snow. By the time we left, this was the scene in downtown Lathrop
It was a slow drive home, but we made it safe and sound. We were supposed to go out to dinner that night with some friends, but our sitter couldn't make it with the nasty weather. So, we put the baby to bed, cracked open a bottle of wine, and watched the snow fall while we basked in the glory of completing the painting portion of our kitchen.

Home Improvement Pop Quiz

2007-12-23T10:13:00.000-06:00

Q: How can you tell when you've been logging too many hours in home-improvement mode?

A: You use a utility knife to cut your frozen pizza.

Merry Christmas everyone!

How to transform your kitchen for less than $100 (or, "Are we done painting yet?")

2007-12-19T23:05:00.000-06:00

As Joe already mentioned, we are in painting hell. Our recent efforts have focused on the kitchen. I was hoping I'd have the complete "after" pictures ready to post by now but, alas, mother nature hasn't cooperated with us the last couple of weekends. Ice and snow have limited our ability to travel to the country estate. So I am going to ruin the suspense and go ahead an post a few "almost after" pictures of our kitchen work. (*If you don't care about the kitchen and want to see gratuitous pictures of Max, skip to the end.)

First, the wall paint. Here's the cutting in shot:

I actually really like the green in the kitchen. But it just doesn't go with anything else. The counters and floor are ivory and the trim is true white. The combo just didn't work for us. So we decided to paint the walls to match the countertops and floor (the color is Sherwin Williams Toasted Pine Nut). That way, the walls, counters, trim, and floor have a sort of cream on white thing going on. It makes the cream/white combo seem deliberate instead of clashing.

"But that's so boring," you say. "Why would you want to paint your kitchen Johnson County Beige?" (Sorry JoCo readers, but you know it's true). In a bold (at least by our standards) move, we decided to put color where it counts--on the cabinets.

The decision on whether to paint the cabinets was quite a debate. Some people (my Mom) were adamantly against it. Others (my friends Sarah and Lindsey, who have or have had painted cabinets) told us to go for it. The fact is, those cabinets are dated. We hated the wood finish. We despised the carving in the doors. So we figured we couldn't make it much worse.

So now, I'm going to present to you the Gagnon method of painting cabinets. We guarantee that, by using our method, you too can get your kitchen cabinets painted in about a month (or two...hell, it may take you three months--we don't know since we're not done yet).

First, you learn to use a drill and take off all the cabinet doors, stripping a couple of screws in the process.

Next, you wash all the doors and stack them in a neat little pile on the kitchen floor. You foolishly believe you will be able to completely prime and paint them the following week.
When you get ready to start priming, your husband will tell you that the cabinets must be sanded before he will let you begin priming. You make him do that.

Then, you prime all the cabinets, drawers, and doors. During this process, you will lay on the floor, climb on the counters, and stand in the kitchen sink. When you are finished, you will have primer in your hair, on your bottom, all over your hands and shirt. Your husband will sigh and ask you how you can possibly get so much primer all over yourself in just one day.

Finally, after the primer dries, you notice that your hand and wrist are cramping from using a paintbrush to prime for 6 hours. Your husband will give you a rest and begin putting a coat of paint on the cabinets (Sherwin Williams Bunglehouse Blue).
You will be pretty encouraged by the results, but still nervous about how this is all going to look when you get done. You will realize that it may take you another month to put the cabinet doors back on since you did not mark them when you took them off.

OK, now it's gratuitous picture time...
*Here's a picture of Max when we took him to see Santa a couple of weeks ago. I'm pretty sure this was the worst moment of his life.
*And here is a much happier picture of Max wearing his own Santa hat.

Painting Pictures

2007-12-18T21:09:00.000-06:00

Kendra and I have been painting. And painting. And painting. For a long time now. But we have made progress; only two rooms remain to be painted. We've done the before/after thing with the playroom, office, and the living room, but I don't think we've shown off the parlor or dining room yet.

Here is a before picture of the parlor:

Note the white walls, and the dated ceiling fan. We like the wainscoting, and will keep it, but we couldn't live with the white walls. The parlor adjoins the living room through a set of pocket doors and--most of the time--each room is visible from the other. We had used a light green color to paint the living room, so we wanted something fairly neutral for the parlor. We settled on "Natural Tan" from Sherwin Williams:
The Natural Tan adds just a touch of color without clashing with the green in the living room, which is the effect that we were going for. As you can see, we also swapped out the ceiling fan to match the one in the living room.

We've covered the dining room before (in all its mirrored glory), so I won't re-post a "before" picture. The walls were a very rich red. We liked the red, but with the stain on the trim it just made it too dark in there. We lightened up the room with Inviting Ivory from Sherwin Williams (who names these colors?!). In addition to the nice contrast with the wood, it makes the room seem bigger. Here is an after picture of the dining room (the notorious mirrors are on the wall just left of the camera; the living room is to the right):

A gratuitous picture of Max, due to the
demands of "anonymous" commentators
(we know who you are, Willis).

I must say that painting is the least sexy of the home improvement jobs so far, and I certainly will not be sad when the last coat is rolled on the walls.

An Unexpected Christmas Gift

2007-12-17T20:13:00.000-06:00

I posted last week about the winter storm that hit Missouri. This past weekend, we were hit with another round of ice and snow. Undeterred, we managed to make the trek up to Lathrop and work on the kitchen. That, however, is the subject of another day; this post concerns the generosity of new friends.

Earlier in the week, I received an email from our new insurance agent, Aaron Greer. Aaron is about my age, and is one of the few people Kendra and I know in Lathrop (along with our neighbors to the north, Rachel and Emma, who introduced themselves a couple weeks ago--but now I'm getting sidetracked). Apart from getting us a good price on our auto and home policy, Aaron is someone I've grown to rely on for letting me know the ins and outs of the Lathrop community.

Anyway, Aaron sent me an email to let me know that the ice storm hadn't caused too much damage to the trees at the country estate. He did mention that one tree did have some broken limbs. I replied that I hoped it was the ugly, drooping tree by the porch; Kendra and I had planned to have that cut down anyway. I went about my merry way the rest of the week, and didn't think much of the conversation--other than to realize how fortunate it is to have someone keeping on eye on our place.

Then, when Kendra and I arrived at the house on Saturday, we saw a pickup truck in the yard, and a man with a chainsaw doing violent things to the hated tree blocking the front porch.

That's Aaron on the right, dressed appropriately for the weather and the work at hand; and that's me on the left, dressed like a damn city boy.

After a couple hours work in the freezing temperatures, Aaron got the tree down and graciously hauled off the remains. Kendra and I were thrilled to have one of our "problems" eliminated by the generosity of someone who has known us for less than three months. The kindness of those in small towns was one of the reasons prompting our move in the first place, and it was nice to have that decision validated, at least in a small way.

Here is a "before" shot; notice the tree on the left side of the frame:
The tree doesn't look terribly intrusive in the photo, but it looked 100x worse in real life. It was ugly, it blocked the view from the porch, and it did not frame the house well from the street. Here is the house after the removal of the offending tree:

Much better, at least in our opinions.

So Aaron, if you are reading this, thanks again. We owe you big time.

997, 998, 999...1,000!

2007-12-11T11:44:00.000-06:00

Last night at 8:59 pm, Gonna Eat a Lot of Peaches recorded its 1,000th visitor. While that is not a big deal for most websites, I am utterly shocked that this many people take time to read the (somewhat) regular updates on our little project. From traffic statistics, I would guess that there are about 15-20 regular readers of the blog, and we are grateful that y'all are reading. It certainly makes it easier to spew forth posts when you know that there is a dedicated--albeit small--audience for their consumption.

I know the suspense is killing everybody--the 1,000th visitor was from Little Rock, Arkansas, having been referred to our blog from Houseblogs.net. Come forward to claim your prize!

Weather-Shortened Weekend

2007-12-10T19:58:00.000-06:00

Mother nature did her best to make sure we didn't get any work done on the house, sending an ice storm across the state of Missouri this weekend. Not wanting to face a shut-out, we braved the elements and made the drive north to the country estate. Even if we couldn't put in two solid days of work, by God, we were going to get SOMETHING done.

Forecasts called for things to get nasty Saturday afternoon, so we figured we had a few good hours in the morning to knock out some projects. We made it to the house at 10:00 am, and made surprising progress in 2 1/2 hours. I managed to get the ceiling fans wired and spinning with the help of my new voltage tester from Home Depot. Satisfied that the house wasn't going to burn down, we turned our attention to the kitchen. Earlier in the week, Kendra had supervised the delivery of our new fridge and cooktop (as previewed in an earlier post), and I must say that the fridge sits astride our kitchen like a Colossus:

The thing seems huge, but I think that's just because we had gotten used to not having a fridge in there.

By the end of our workday, we were able to get the kitchen about 95% cut in, too. With some good weather, and some hard work, we should be able to get the remainder of the walls painted, and the cabinets primed and painted this weekend. That would make the kitchen pretty much "done," and just leave two bedrooms upstairs to be painted.

Double Your Pleasure, Double Your Fun...with Double Mortgage Payments!

2007-12-05T08:59:00.000-06:00

The moment of truth is here; our first mortgage payment on the country estate is due. I'm still holding on to the check, because I can't bring myself to pay it yet. We are a little disappointed, because we haven't sold our urban highrise yet, but, on the other hand, we are also very excited about the house. So we'll keep plugging away, working on the weekends, and hoping a buyer materializes for the urban highrise.

This should be a good week/weekend for us. Tomorrow our new refrigerator and cooktop will be delivered. We haven't planned out the weekend, but it would be cool to get work done in the kitchen to go along with the new appliances. As always, we'll keep you posted about what's going on, and this time we'll try to remember to bring our camera so we can post pictures.

An Almost Perfect Weekend

2007-12-03T20:08:00.000-06:00

Once again, I forgot the camera. Well, I actually forgot the battery. The bottom line is that there are no pictures to post right now, but there is some good news to report. Remember that big list I posted last week? We knocked most of it out this weekend. Paint the dining room? Check. Finish the window trim in the guest bedroom? Check. Touch-up the playroom, guest bedroom, living room, and parlor? Check. Fix the ductwork? Check!

We didn't get the ceiling fan installed, but it's close. When Joe took the old one down, all four wires were green. He marked them so he would know which was which, but somehow the markings rubbed off while he was working. Now we don't know which wire is which. So the fan is all but connected and Joe bought some gadget to test the wires to see which one is "hot" (I am so down with the home repair lingo).

We didn't start pulling off trim in the entry yet either. After much discussion with the guy at Sherwin Williams, I purchased two types of stripper. One is a paste meant for the stuff we'll strip on the wall (the windows). The other is a stronger liquid that we'll use for the stuff we'll take down (trim and doors). I am reasonably confident that these will lift off a fair amount of the stain and that we'll be able to use another stain--probably something reddish--to balance the green that is left and turn it brown. This is a job that will probably need to be done outside--or at least with all the windows and doors open for ventilation. It was cold and rainy over the weekend, so we decided not to start that project.

Finally, I took all the cabinet doors off the downstairs bathroom and the kitchen and Joe and I washed them. Those bad boys are getting primed and painted in the upcoming weekend. We also have plans to paint the kitchen walls AND the new appliances are arriving this week. So expect some "after" pictures of the kitchen soon.

We decided to take a vacation from the house on Sunday, so the three of us read the paper in our pajamas all morning, went out for lunch, and did some shopping. I think that recharged us a bit.

So all in all it was a VERY productive weekend at the country estate and a good weekend for the Gagnon family. The only downer? The Tigers loss to OU on Saturday. And the BCS bowl snub on Sunday night. But we wouldn't be Mizzou fans if we didn't have something to be disappointed about, right?

Hell Hath No Fury...

2007-11-29T21:15:00.000-06:00

In the last post, Joe described our low morale and Max's meltdown last weekend. He was kind to me, but should probably be ashamed of himself for blaming the meltdown on the baby. I'm the one who had the meltdown.

For those of you who haven't had the pleasure of painting trim (and I was among you just a few short weeks ago), let me tell you--it sucks. It's the kind of thing you should leave to the experts and exactly the kind of thing that I would like to have hired done but with two mortgages, my accountant (Joe) tells me there's no budget for an professional trim-painter. So I've learned to do it myself, I guess. Last weekend was my third straight painting trim, and I'm going to whine about it a little bit. At the end of each trim-painting day, my wrist (and sometimes shoulder) hurts and my back is sore from practically laying on the floor to paint baseboards. The first room (the playroom f/k/a/ Jayhawk room) was a challenge because I was painting white over BRIGHT red. The second room (the guest bedroom) was a challenge because the walls are highly textured and it was impossible to get a good line. I'm happy to report to you that, save for the windows in the guest bedroom, I think we have painted all the trim we're going to for while. And God bless Sherwin Williams paint because I think I'd still be painting the playroom trim if that paint didn't cover so well.

So I'm in an okay place with it now. But I wasn't last Friday. I was tired of painting trim and tired of it looking like crap. In the morning, Joe's brother Chris showed up while Joe finished up cutting in the living room. They decided they were going to tackle two "quick" projects--fixing the ductwork in the basement and installing the ceiling fan--before resuming painting. Even though Joe has been to the hardware store THREE TIMES for this project, he still didn't have the right stuff. So he and Chris went to the hardware store. In the meantime, Max refused to nap and I managed to get a tiny bit of trim painting done. About two hours later, Joe and Chris show up empty-handed. So they decide to put up the ceiling fan. Two hours after that, it is starting to get dark and there is still no fan. And I've been painting trim all day while giving Max two bottles, two snacks, one lunch, and attempting to put him down for at least three naps.

How many Mizzou fans does it take to install a ceiling fan?

They finally get the fan installed, but there are no lightbulbs to make sure it actually works. Max is screaming. I've had enough. So I pick up my child and threaten my poor husband and brother-in-law with their lives--I am taking the baby for a ride to put him to sleep and the ceiling fan better be working and the living room better be painted when I return. After a 30-minute ride to Plattsburg and back, Max was finally asleep and I returned to the house. All I can say is Joe and Chris must have done some speed-painting (hell hath no fury...), because the living room was painted when I returned. It looked great and the baby was asleep. I felt a little stupid about the fit I threw, but no one said anything so I didn't either. Everything worked out and my blood pressure finally went down.

Living Room "Before"

Living Room "After"

I think you'll agree , the new lighter green (Sherwin Williams, Lemongrass) makes the space seem much more open and brings out the woodwork nicely. And the ceiling fan is actually from this decade, which is a nice touch.

As you know, we didn't do any work on Saturday (go Tigers!) and we only had a few hours on Sunday, so we made them count. My Mom and Dad had Max for the morning, so I finished up the trim work (hooray!) and Joe cut in and rolled the first coat of paint on the dining room.
We still haven't figured out how to get those mirrors down, so they're staying put for now.

So here are our ambitious plans for this weekend:

Put another coat of paint on the dining room
Finish painting the window trim in the guest bedroom
Touch up the playroom, guest bedroom, living room, dining room
Fix the ducts
Install a second ceiling fan
Begin pulling trim off the wall in the entry OR try to strip and sand with the trim still on the walls
Maybe--if we're lucky--begin painting the kitchen

It's a pretty big list, I know. Especially for two novice do-it-yourselfers like us. Are we setting ourselves up for another disappointing weekend? Or will we rally and come up with the most productive weekend ever? Tune in next week and find out.

Morale Bottoms Out, and a Weekend Pick-Me-Up

2007-11-27T09:49:00.000-06:00

With the holiday weekend, we planned to spend two full days (Friday and Sunday) working on the house. With all that time, we figured to knock out most of the remaining painting, get a ceiling fan installed, and fix the broken duct in the basement.

Good plan, terrible execution. Painting has proved to be extremely tedious. On Friday, we managed to get the living room painted (pictures to come in a later post), and that was about it. Kendra also finished some touch-up trim painting. But we definitely hit a low point on Friday. I went with my brother to pick up the duct work to finish that job, and the local hardware store doesn't carry the pieces we needed. That burned a good 1 1/2 hours. On top of everything, Max decided that he didn't really care for the lack of attention he was receiving, and had a near-meltdown. By the end of the day on Friday, we were ready to burn the house down.

But then Saturday came, and we remembered that we had tickets to the Missouri football game of our lifetime.

Your 2007 Heisman Trophy Winner, Chase Daniel.

The game was a blast, with Mizzou winning 36-28 to grab the #1 ranking in the country.

Our spirits buoyed by the big win, we were able to bounce back a little bit on Sunday. We've knocked out a lot of painting, installed a ceiling fan, and have a good plan to devote some solid hours this Friday/Saturday. We'll post some pics later this week to show the before/after on the painting.

Watching Paint Dry

2007-11-20T22:48:00.000-06:00

As Joe already mentioned, the last two weekends have been a little slow. Two weekends ago we traveled out of town for Mizzou football game, and last weekend we had an extra helper.

Max and Maggie

Our 3-month-old neice, Maggie, was with us for the day on Saturday. And we had her baptism to attend on Sunday. So the house went on the back burner for a bit, which is OK since it doesn't look like we're going to sell the city highrise and actually move to our country estate any time soon.

But I think Joe is too hard on us. We have gotten quite a bit of tedious painting (cutting in and trim work) done over the past couple of weekends. And one important task was complete when we left the house on Sunday. In fact, I would say this is THE most important task in light of the MU-KU showdown coming up on Saturday. The Jayhawk room is painted! Every trace of red and blue is gone! And from here on out we will refer that room as the playroom f/k/a the Jayhawk room. Unfortunately, the light was too low to get a good picture of the final paint job, but I took a picture of the room before I put on the last coat of trim paint. I think you'll get the idea, despite the bit of stubborn red that is still bleeding through in this pic.

Go Mizzou!

I also think Joe is too modest. He has failed to mention that, although it is slow work, he is the ultimate cut-in expert.
Exhibit A:
This is a picture of the top of the trim in the parlor, which Joe painted last weekend. Notice the perfect line and the complete lack of paint on the trim? That's the kind of craftsmanship you get when Joe's cutting in. Here, you can see him cutting in the living room WITHOUT EVEN USING ANY TAPE! CRAZY!
The moral of the story of the last two weeks is this:
Even though it can be slow and sometimes the work isn't very entertaining or sexy, we're learning every day and creating a beautiful house--our home--together with the help of our families and friends. So, dear readers, stick with us and watch the paint dry. We promise the pace will pick up soon.

Duct Details

2007-11-18T10:47:00.000-06:00

The last two weeks have seen very little work done to the house, as we've only been able to shake free a few hours each weekend. We're hoping to really get some work in over the holiday weekend, so the pace of posting should pick up a little bit.

This weekend, I went down into the basement to check the size of the air filter for the HVAC unit. When I got down there and starting looking around, however, I saw this:

The vent on the right is connected to the HVAC unit, and was blowing out warm air. The vent on the left was just sitting there, disconnected from anything. Just above the rear end of the vent on the left, I saw this:
See that fitting in the center of the picture? Yeah, that's the vent that goes straight into the parlor.

So what did we learn today, kids? Not only is there no active source of heating/cooling to the parlor, but we are also apparently heating the basement. Who knows how long these vents haven't been attached and how much money has been wasted over who-knows-how-many years to blow hot and cold air down there. Looks like I'll need to add one more project to the (growing) list, and run a new duct to the vent. I guess it's just another opportunity to expand my mad home-improvement skills.

The Big One

2007-11-14T21:25:00.000-06:00

The kitchen is not bad.

Sure the countertops and cabinets are a little dated, and I'm not necessarily in love with the green on white on cream color scheme. But it is a fairly large kitchen for an older home and it has a nice wall oven and huge pantry (don't worry, we'll be covering the multi-colored paint and replacing the door). The ceramic tile is OK, but--as you read in Joe's previous post--we plan to explore the possibility of ripping it up to expose the hardwood floors and restore them to their original glory. A complete kitchen overhaul is definitely in the longer-term plans for the house. But, for now, a little bit of paint and some new cabinet hardware will make it work. Except for two little problems: the cooktop doesn't work and there's no refrigerator.

So, honestly, the kitchen is almost completely non-workable as it stands. When we go to the house to work, we usually bring a cooler and fill it with ice to keep drinks and Max's food cold. Then we order pizza or go get Subway (and have nowhere to keep leftovers). We decided it would definitely be more convenient and probably better for our health if we had a place to keep food cool. So we needed to buy a refrigerator. And we can't really move in without a cook top, so we figured we needed to buy that, too. But what's a couple to do when they have two mortgages and one member of said couple makes a paltry salary as a grad student/teaching assistant? We opened up the Sunday paper, and it was like God had answered our prayers...
Nebraska Furniture Mart was having its biggest sale of the year! And better yet, they were offering no interest financing for 24 months AND free delivery on appliances! So we did what any young American couple would do and we went out and bought a bunch of stuff that we couldn't afford on credit.

We were automatically approved!

So, our lowest-price of the year, no interest until December 2009, free-delivery Jenn Air downdraft gas cooktop and Whirlpool stainless steel refrigerator should be arriving sometime December 6. In the meantime, we'll be running a gas line to the kitchen and praying that the new cooktop fits into the old cutout. Oh yeah--and we bought a couple of ceiling fans to replace the dated gold ones in the living room and parlor (why not, they're interest free until 2009!), so we'll be trying our hands at ceiling-fan installation, too.

No Pictures, No Problem

2007-11-11T21:42:00.000-06:00

Short post tonight -- an out-of-town trip on Saturday prevented us from working on the house until Sunday morning. Even though we just had a few hours, we managed to get the parlor painted. Here is a picture of the parlor, before painting. This shot is from the living room, past the pocket doors, and into the parlor:

We didn't bring the camera today, so there is no post-painting picture. The changes aren't too dramatic--the new color is a neutral tan color. The new color takes a little bit of the harshness out of the (previously) white walls.

While I painted in the parlor, Kendra was painting the trim in Max's playroom (the old "Jayhawk" room) white. She got one coat on, with one still to go to cover up the red that was on the trim before.

Hopefully we can shake some more time free next weekend and knock out a few more projects, and hopefully we'll remember our camera next time.

To be (one of those people who paint old woodwork) or not to be?

2007-11-09T09:22:00.001-06:00

Let me introduce you to our entry:
To get to the nitty gritty of this post, skip to the last paragraph. To read my musings about the space, read on.

The entry is a small space, so it is difficult to photograph, but hopefully you get the idea. On the left is the open front door to the home (leading to the infamous front porch) and on the right is the door to the sitting room. What you can't see is that, directly next to the door to the sitting room is a door to the living room. So, when you walk in the front door and into this little vestibule, there are two doors that lead you into different rooms of the house. I've never seen anything like this before, and it is one of those unique features of the house about which we love to speculate. At first, we thought maybe the house was a duplex at one point, but nothing else about the home seems to suggest that. Then, our structural engineer (who happens to be a family member and an old home buff) suggested that the home may have been built by a professional--maybe a doctor or lawyer--who used one of the doors (probably the one to the sitting room) as a professional entrance into his office. That makes a lot of sense, so that's what we're going with for now.

The first thing that probably jumps out at you is the bright color. I'm all for color, but this space is just to small for that kind of intensity. Our plan is to lighten it up with something pale and pretty neutral, saving color for other areas of the house. What you may not be able to appreciate is that, at some point, someone has put a GREEN stain on the beautiful woodwork/trim. I don't know why someone would do that, but I guess that's not the point. It's done now and we need to deal with it.

Obviously, green wood is not an option. So, as I see it, there are really two choices. We can paint the wood, which is probably the easiest way to go. But then we're just a couple of jerks who painted over beautiful, old, original woodwork. The other option is to strip the wood and restain it to match the rest of the house. According to everyone we've talked to, this would be a LOT of work. And probably expensive if we take the woodwork down and have it stripped by a professional. But here are our questions: Would it be worth it? Would we have to take the trim off the wall in order to strip it? If we do that, can we strip it ourselves? Is there a product out there we can use to strip the wood while leaving it on the wall? Is there anything else we can do short of a total strip and restain job?

Any ideas?

Hardware Spa Day, Revisited

2007-11-06T21:00:00.000-06:00

After the painted hardware enjoyed a relaxing 24-hour soak in the crockpot, I took a nylon brush and started scrubbing. I think the results speak for themselves.

Before the soak:

And after the soak:

Even though the "crockpot" method removed most of the paint, it took a little more elbow grease than I had hoped. It was pretty effective at removing newer latex paint, but older finishes were a bit more stubborn. Overall, I would recommend this as a good way to remove paint from metal without worrying about harsh chemicals. This Old House has step-by-step instructions for this procedure.

Spa Day (for Hardware)

2007-11-06T08:00:00.000-06:00

Many of the rooms in the house have painted trim and doors (ugh). What's more, most of the time the previous owners did not remove any of the door hardware before slathering it in paint. So even though we have all these beautiful antique doorknobs, escutcheon plates, and locks, they are covered in paint.

The thought of stripping these with some type of noxious, chemical solvent wasn't very appealing to me. I decided to surf the web to see what our options were and I found some advice from this Old House. According to them, I just need to plop the hardware in a crock pot with some water and laundry soap, let it simmer overnight, and the paint will come off with some gentle brushing. I'm a little skeptical, but these guys know what they are talking about, right? The hardware from the playroom--f/k/a the Jayhawk Room--is cooking right now. I'll update y'all tonight on whether this works or not.

The Post Wherein I Talk a Big Game, But Fail to Deliver

2007-11-05T10:37:00.000-06:00

Remember last week, when I posted about my ambitious plans to remove the ceramic tile in the kitchen and take down the mirrors attached to the dining room wall? Yeah, I didn't do either of those things. Discussions with others made me realize that the ceramic tile would be difficult to remove while preserving the integrity of the underlying hardwood floor. We can live with the tile until we update the kitchen at a later date ($$$). As for the mirrors, I chickened out. I'm a little nervous about trying to remove them and the carnage the removal would inflict on our plaster walls. The mirrors are staying for now, probably until we get someone that knows what he is doing (hint: not me) to assist.

As Kendra posted below, we did get some things accomplished over the weekend. Apart from moving two carloads of clutter from the "high rise" to the "country estate," we also painted two rooms that were absolutely garish.

My big project on Saturday, however, was removing the vinyl floor from the downstairs bathroom. Our thinking was that we could remove the flooring down to the original hardwood, and then refinish if it was salvageable. If we couldn't refinish, then we'd look into options for ceramic tile. We did not want to keep the rolled vinyl that was in there. Not only is the vinyl an affront to the historical accuracy of the house, but it had a terrible faux-wood appearance.

I started by removing the toe board around the trim. Then, I cut the vinyl sheet into 2-3' strips for easy removal. It peeled up fairly easily enough, revealing a 1/4" plywood sheet underneath. The plywood was nailed to the floor, with most of the nails still covered by the bottom layer of the vinyl sheet. Since I couldn't remove the nails first, I just had to start tearing the plywood off, chunk by chunk. After I got most pieces started, I was able to pop it out in bigger chunks, so it didn't take too long. Here's what it looked like after tearing off about 60% of the plywood.

As you can see, underneath the plywood was another layer of flooring, which I assume is linoleum. My guess is that it was probably original to the home, or at least very, very old. It was in awful condition and various leaks throughout the year had taken their toll on its integrity. As you can also see from the picture, there is an active leak around the toilet, which we are hoping can be addressed by a new wax ring.

After the plywood was up, the nails were either popped out or sticking 1/4" inch above the linoleum surface. I was able to remove the remaining nails and then pry up the linoleum, which was adhered directly to the old hardwood floors.

Now, most of the bathroom floor is covered in this black adhesive that's been on the floor for decades. I need to talk to our contractor to see if this stuff can be sanded off during refinishing. If not, looks like we will be scraping/stripping this stuff ourselves.

After I removed all the linoleum I was able to check out the integrity of the hardwoods. They are sound for the most part, with the exception of a couple boards near the bathtub that have rotted. There also may be some rot near the vanity. Our hope is that these boards can be replaced and the floor refinished.

Bye-Bye, Blue

2007-11-04T21:23:00.000-06:00

It was another productive weekend at the country estate. Joe spent a large portion of the day Saturday pulling up bathroom floor (he'll be posting on that later) and Max and I were in charge of paint.
OK. We didn't actually let the 9-month-old near the paint and we tried our best to keep his developing brain away from the paint fumes. Luckily, Max's Grandma (my Mom) and Nanni (Joe's Mom) were there to help.
Back to the house...
Three of the four bedrooms in the house were various shades of blue, none of which we were very fond. Those happen to be the same three rooms that need floor refinishing. So we began painting those rooms first--before refinishing--so that any stray paint blobs can be swept away by the sander. We started with the downstairs bedroom, which will be our guest bedroom/office. It was a dark, dark shade of blue (think midnight blue or navy). A little heavy for a bedroom, so we decided to go with a light terra cotta (Sherwin Williams calls it Rustic Adobe) to open it up. The walls in the room are highly textured, so the effect, I think, is pretty good--earthy and kind of clay-like (see before and after pics below). Once the trim is repainted and the floors are refinished, I think we'll be in business.
The other room on the painting agenda this weekend, of course, was the Jayhawk room. It will be a playroom for Max, so we picked Gleeful Green. The trim will be white, but for now it is still red. Maybe we'll keep it in through the holiday season.
I know this is a super-long post, but I have to end by giving a shout-out to Joe's brother, Chris, and my brother, Kevin, for taking on painting and general clean-up duties this weekend. Thanks, bros!

More Demo Work

2007-11-01T22:16:00.001-05:00

As we've already mentioned, we spent some time pulling up old carpet to reveal the original hardwoods. We've received a bid on refinishing the 3 rooms (plus a hallway and stairs) that were previously carpeted. It's a no-brainer as an old-house-preservationist, right? You gotta pull up the carpet.

Well, we are not just stopping at carpet. Last weekend, we decided that the kitchen--which features a nice-enough ceramic tile--just doesn't look right in the context of the rest of the house. Sure enough, there is hardwood located underneath the ceramic tile, which is enough to warrant a death sentence for the tile. It's all coming up this weekend, provided we can figure out how to get it done. Are we qualified to do this?

Same goes for the laminate flooring in the downstairs bathroom--it's coming up this weekend, too. After our weekend demolition, we should be down to hardwoods throughout the whole house, except for the back-porch-turned-laundry-room and the upstairs bathroom.

The good news is that last time we pulled up flooring, we found 12 cents, and this priceless artifact:
I can't be sure what this means, but I strongly suspect foul play. In the conservatory. By Professor Plum.

Mirrors, Mirrors, on the Wall

2007-11-01T07:45:00.000-05:00

The dining room in the house embodies several things we love about our place. Here's a picture:

Notice the beautiful, original woodwork. The floors look great, too. The vaulted ceiling is handsome. The door to the kitchen is a double-hinged swinging door, which is kind of cool. The walls are original plaster. The window is huge and original.

And then there are the huge double mirrors hung on the wall. Bleh. Some people have told us that they like the mirrors, and they certainly make the room appear bigger. But these things have to go; they definitely don't fit the original decor of the house.

Last weekend, I was set to take them off. I unscrewed the mirror clips, thinking that the glass would just come off. The mirrors, however, are stuck to the wall. It appears that there may be some kind of backing to which the mirrors are attached. As you can see, the mirrors are huge. I was thinking of taping up the front to prevent breaking shards of glass, and then trying to chisel them off the backing or the wall. I'm pretty sure this will result in some plaster damage, but I guess we'll see. Anyone have any ideas or suggestions?

Porch Problems

2007-10-30T12:13:00.000-05:00

One of the big issues with the house is the front porch--it looks like it could collpase at any minute. The condition of the porch was flagged during our inspection. We foregoed (forewent? What's the right word here?) having a structural engineer inspect before buying because...well, I can't remember why. Because we are cheap? Because it was a calculated risk? Because we wanted the house anyway, I guess.

After we closed, our biggest concern was that the front porch was a symptom of a bigger structural problem. If we just needed to rebuild the porch, we were prepared to handle that. But, if it turned out that the porch was falling off because the whole freakin' front of the house was falling, too, then we'd have some problems. Our worst-case scenario involved us driving up to the house and seeing something like this:

On Sunday, we had an engineer come to inspect the house. Thankfully, it looks like the porch itself is the only issue. It will be a complete rebuild, but that is something that we were planning on anyway. The rest of the house looks to be structurally sound, with only some minor repair needed to the foundation. And, since the inspection was done by a family member, the price was right (thanks Mike).

Pulling up Carpet

2007-10-26T23:08:00.000-05:00

There are hardwood floors throughout the house, most of which were refinished by the previous owners. However, there was still carpet left in 3 of the four bedrooms as well as the upstairs hall. So our first big job was pulling up carpet. I was ready for the carpet and carpet pad, but who knew there were so many accessories (and by accessories, I mean tackboard, nails, and staples). After a long day of work, the old hardwoods are now exposed, staple-free, and ready for refinishing--as soon as we come up with the cash to get it done.

One of the formerly carpeted rooms is painted a lovely shade of blue with bright red trim (see before and after pic below). We call that the Jayhawk room. Clearly the color scheme needs to be changed immediately. Black and gold, perhaps?

What were we thinking?

2007-10-25T23:14:00.000-05:00

It's the natural progression of things, I guess. You get married, get good jobs, buy a modern urban loft, do a little traveling, and enjoy a lot of happy hours and nice dinners out. Then, for some reason, you decide to turn your sweet life upside-down and have a baby. And that baby literally forces you to slow down and reflect on everything. You start to long for green space and good schools and the small-town upbringing you had. And amid the sleep-deprivation and chaos of having a newborn, you decide buy a house in the country. So that's what we did. And to get Max ready for this wonderful new life we plan to impose upon him, we've become quite fond of singing him the opening line of a song by the Presidents of the United States of America: Movin' to the country, gonna eat a lot of peaches. I'm movin' to the country, gonna eat me a lot of peaches. Hence the name of our blog.

We closed on our new home on October 19. It's a 1913 Craftsman-style home located in Lathrop, a small town in Northern Missouri. So now--thanks to the dismal real estate market--we still own our loft in the city (we'll call it our urban highrise) along with our new small-town abode (we'll call that the country estate). It's just as well for now, because although the house is in decent shape, there are several things we want to do to make it our home, many of which need to be done before we move in. As we complete the transition, we'll use this space to update friends and family--and the world, I suppose--on the progress we make. Welcome to our blog!