How we spent New Years Eve.

      We spent the another full day at the Project House. Michelle spent the day putting a second coat of paint on the dining room and the Kitchen. She also put the first coat of paint on the bathroom. I spent the day putting up baseboard and trim around doorways. We seemed to stay out of each others way in such a small house and got a lot accomplished!

Christmas is done, back to the project!

     We have had two good work days at the project house. We painted ceilings yesterday, Michelle didn't like how the bathroom and kitchen ceilings looked, as some of the seams weren't exactly perfect. . She ended up mixing the ceiling paint and with joint compound and used a texture roller on the ceiling. We now have textured ceilings that look great and now all the ceilings are textured. We were also able to get a coat of paint on the living room walls.
     While were at Lowe's yesterday getting more ceiling paint we were looking at the unfinished  cabinets  and the clerk informed us that all the cabinets were 20 percent off right now, so we ended up buying all the kitchen cabinets today. It took three trips  to Lowe's to get them all to the house. The first picture shows the base cabinets. The middle cabinet sticks out as we  were not able to put it all the way back against the wall as the plumbing is coming up through floor there. We ended moving all these cabinets into the spare room  with the upper cabinets. We got the first coat of paint in the kitchen and dining room and a second coat of paint on the living room.
      Tonight we ended up going back over to the house as we forgot to bring home a couple of paint brushes that needed to be cleaned. I ended up getting the car stuck in the snow in the driveway. We ended going over to the neighbors and asking him if he could pull us out with his truck. He got us out, so luckily didn't have to spend the night in Leavittsburg. It has been a long day, we are not going over there tomorrow. We will go back at it on Monday!
   

Todays surprise.

     This morning I went over to the project house to do a little painting. I was going to go in the afternoon as we were supposed to get a lot snow in the morning, but I woke to just a trace of snow on the ground, so thought I better go before it really started snowing. When I pulled into the driveway I noticed a set of tire tracks in the snow in the driveway. That got me wondering who had been there. I also noticed a lot of branches and pieces of bark around the yard and on the roof. I walked around the house and discovered that one of neighbors trees had broken off at about the level of our roof, I also noticed the neighbors truck was full of tree limbs and branches. Well might not be the sharpest tool in the shed, but I figured out who was in the driveway.

       Michelle and I have been discussing these trees since the first day we started the project. The first concern was how close they were to the house, the second concern is that all the trees are dying, the third concern was that the neighbor would claim that they were are trees. The one other problem we had was these neighbors are not the most friendly people I have ever come across. We have been working there for nine months and we have been pretty much ignored. We knew the trees would have to be discussed we just didn't want to start a war over them. Well that all changed when we discovered that the tree had landed on the roof. With the neighbor over cleaning up everything pretty much let us know he owned the trees.
       I went ahead with my painting and kept Michelle updated on what was going on through text messages and pictures on my phone. She was getting pretty worried and madder by the minute and ended up coming home from work early. She held the ladder as I ended up going on the roof to check for damage. There was no real damage to the roof, one gutter was dented a bit and there was a gash in one of the posts on the front deck. We can fix the gutter and the post,  the problem is the 4 other trees. We went over to the neighbors house and knocked on the door, no one was home. Left a note with our names and phone numbers and that we needed to talk about the trees. To make a pretty long story shorter he has agreed to have someone come out and top out the trees. It looks like it is going to turn out fine.
    
     

Todays work.

It has been a couple of weeks since I have posted on here, it isn't that we haven't done a lot of work, it just doesn't  look like we have done much if you take a picture of it. Today the plan was to hang both bedroom doors, finish the trim in the bedrooms and finish up the last bit of sub-floor in the kitchen. We ended up getting two of the three done, didn't get all the trim done. Everything takes longer than you plan. Here are a few pictures, they are pretty much self explanatory.

We are glad that the furnace is working!

We had a little bit of snow after having a Thanksgiving day in the 60 degree range. The bottom two pictures are of the drywall that we have been working on in the kitchen and bottom picture is of kitchen window which we have trimmed out now.

a couple Thanksgiving pictures

Here are a few pictures from yesterday. The first 3 are kind of group shots. The last one is Gracie and Me relaxing watching sponge Bob waiting for our food to settle so we can have some pie!

Here is a little bit more from today

Here is the window frame that we stained today. The bottom two pictures are of the wall we built today to inclose the closet in the master bedroom. Things are coming along.

This weeks work

Kathy I took your suggestion and gave you a before picture. Here is the new tub and the picture below that, the toilet will go underneath that window.

Back to the grind

   Today we got back to the project. Michelle went back to putting the finishing coat of joint compound in the drywall in the two bedrooms. I started out the day cleaning the furnace with the vacuum cleaner. It has been having trouble staying lit. It worked fine all day after the cleaning, so keep your fingers crossed. We do have Larry the plumber if it acts up again. We set the thermostat at 62 degrees when we went home, it is starting to get cold here.

    The rest of the day I spent putting drywall around the sliding glass door in the dining room. I then put the sub-floor in the dining room. It was exciting to actually to start putting things back in that when we started the project we were tearing out! We will probably be painting the bedrooms by next weekend.

Michelle's painting of Snickers

Here is the picture Michelle painted of Snick. She worked on him a for a couple of months at her art class. The bottom picture is her reference photo which I took a few years ago. His eyes would always close when you took his picture with the flash. It came out real well, she did a  great job!

Change of plans for today

We started today thinking we were going to do some work inside the house, but the weather was so nice outside we thought we better take advantage of it. We put the second coat of stain on both front and back decks, and we put a second coat of paint on the front door and front door trim. There is also a coat of paint on the sliding door trim. We did get inside long enough to put a new thermostat in for the furnace. The reason back deck looks wet is that it is, Michelle rolled out the stain while I was mowing up the leaves in the yard, just before we headed for home. We just about have all the outside work done as winter is on the way.

This weeks work.

Today as you can see we got the rear patio door put in. It really cleaned up the look of the back of the house. We need to put trim on the outside and inside of the door. This is what the bathroom looks like now. The tub is in and all hooked up. The water heater is also installed with all the connections ready to go. Today Michelle and I put up insulation up in the ceiling of the bathroom.We also had a new gas lines put in throughout the house to the meter. The last picture is what the water shed looks like now with the new tank and all new plumbing. Michelle and I put up the insulation in the shed yesterday. I will call tomorrow to get the gas scheduled to be turned on. All the plumbing is done. We do have one problem as the well pump keeps throwing the breaker in the electric panel. Larry the plumber is going to pull the pump out of the well tomorrow, He thinks the pump is probably frozen  from not running for 3 years so we should be up and running with water soon. We bought a vanity for the bathroom this week. It was a display model from Lowe's, it is a bit" high end" for this house, but got it for half price {$144}. It even included a granite top. We are pretty close to turning a corner here!

A little cement work and insulation work for today

We worked at getting the pump house cleaned up today. The first picture is of the old tank that goes in that little building, we bought a new tank this morning. It has a baffle inside that keeps the water pressure at an even pressure.  We also replaced the insulation  inside with reflective Styrofoam. The second picture is of the pump house and the tank. The third picture is of the outside of the pump house after we put a layer of cement over the gravel that was in there. On the right side you see that little pipe we have in the cement, that is for drainage in case  water gets inside. The last two pictures are on the insulation in the bathroom and kitchen. That's about it for today