Bedroom before and after...

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

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

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

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

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!

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

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...

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

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

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.