Seal It Up, Baby!

Well, it only took 3 months, but we are FINALLY finishing sealing that envelope! That's right folks, the new windows are FINALLY here and getting put in, little at a time! No more worrying about birds and bats and God-knows-what-else flying around inside the joint! So without further ado – extremely bad quality, relatively boring photos!

So this is a taste of what we've been dealing with on the second floor... one's a mess, two are boarded up... this is what we've looked at in the back of the house, where we park our cars, for the last year... 

I got home yesterday and I was greeted with..... 

(Hey I know the pics suck, but you can't complain about sun in Buffalo... let's just imagine it's the clouds parting, and a ray of sunshine is shining down on us, with choirs of angels singing and playing harps!)

So I ran in like a kid on Christmas, stole the hubs' iphone (for slightly less sucky photos – I LEFT MY CAMERA AT WORK!), and ran upstairs to see from the inside. 

Check out how dark this room was... 

That crazy solar flare above the board is where the sun rises every morning... but even in the evening, this is what the room looks like now!

Aw, so sad to see this go... (no, not really...)

We also got one of the windows in the front in!

Before:

After:

Ok, it doesn't look that exciting, but the other one was cracked, and rotted, and all sorts of wrong!

Reading corner:

(what you can't really see is that is plexiglass covering that broken window frame... BROKEN plexiglass at that...)

nooooow:

Okay, I AM painfully aware that these photos are completely anti-climactic, but please trust me, this is a huge deal... and I'm jumping-up-and-down-hand-flappin' giddy about it! More and more and more to come... FINALLY!!! 

So Much For Being Ignored...

So remember when I said I didn't want to be FEATURED on the Garden Walk, I just wanted my house to be "ignorable"... Well...

Siiiigh. How can I say no to something this hilarious? Well, maybe this was the best cover for the front yard AC unit!

Anyway, as per usual, the to-do list expectations exceeded the ability to actually do them, BUT, I'm happy with the progress made. First up, the walk way:

Before:

After:

(this was a sh!t-ton of work, surprisingly... that's annoying...)

The porch; 

New moulding, primed, full update coming soon...

The driveway;

Still a hot mess (shock me shock me shock me!)

Back door;

Likewise

Back of house;

Trip to "the dump" planned... for reals...

And the crown jewel of our new "curb appeal"... the garden!

Let's see what took so long... as we discussed, there was rototilling...

then plant transplanting

and then topsoil

then more tilling...

then plant planning...

with Brick supervising...

then mulching and finallyyyyyyy...

Let's remember before, shall we? (because that's the only thing that makes this impressive, haha!)

Before:

Afterrrrr:

(will be replacing sucky sun-flarey photo tomorrow...) SO we still need to redo the flagstone pathway, and line the garden with the bricks we found on the side of the house, AND cover that massive eyesore of an AC unit... BUT... le sigh, it's ignorable. :)

So our garden was definitely not the star of the Garden Walk... but I don't think anyone noticed... 

We're stars for better reasons... with neighbors like these, who cares about the effing garden anyway? :)

Sacrilege, or Daringly Awesome?

I have recounted... on more than one occasion... my outrage – nay, disgust – with people who cover original hardwood floors... Alas, here I stand before you, asking the question – to paint, or not to paint...[GASP] the wood floor in the family room! 

Here is where the thought process is... Flooring in the reno is an issue. It's an issue because when we bought the house there were piles and piles of flooring (tile and hardwood) in the rooms upstairs, waiting to be installed. So we did not factor flooring into the budget. Fast forward a year later, and I've changed my mind on the tile for the bathroom, and after measuring out how much hardwood was there, we realized it was not enough to do the hallway AND the family room (which already has an existing, albeit a bit beat up, hardwood floor). Leaving our choices to be a.) buy flooring out of pocket (which we are already doing for the bathroom, leaving the metaphoric "pocket" looking like a cartoon with a moth fluttering out of it....) to do ALL of the family room plus hallway, or b.) keep the existing floor in the family room and have it not match the new wood flooring going down in the hallway. 

As you can see in the sketchup, it's a pretty large expanse where the floors meet. Which leads me to today's question, and possibly choice c.) [wincing] paint?

I was a little unsure on the idea, until I saw these photos from Sunny's Goodtime Paint (don't you just love the name?) via Young House Love...

Admit it, are you smitten? Outraged? Banging your head against the wall, wondering if I've truly, finally lost it? I dunno, I might be convinced... especially that first one; I kinda love... 

Love is a Husband Who Will Garbage Pick For You.

Purchase price: $0
Shipping price: $0
Getting an original Jamestown, NY antique from a landlord yelling and screaming about the former tenant that skipped town without paying rent and now he's gotta go through all their crap and empty out the place: Priceless.

Tis Better To Give Than To Receive...

That must be the mantra of the good grandparent, yes? Because every time we are visiting my grandparents, or Nick's grandparents, we come home with some goody. This week's may be bell ringers. This came from Nick's grandfather... he had it in his basement, never opened, and thought we could use it. He got it "a few years ago"... 

Looks like it's been through quite a bit, but I can't wait to open it and try it out!! The box itself just tickles me!

And from my grandparents? This week it was a generator. That's right, a generator. For those that don't know, a few years ago a massive storm hit the area and almost everyone lost power for at least a day... some (like my parents) for as long as 10 days. 

Things got a little Mad Max for the folks without power or a generator, and since we live furthest away from everyone else, my grandfather wanted to make sure we had one. A.dor.able.

So moral of the story – grandparents are awesome – not because they give gifts, but because they find stuff and think "Hm, I know who could use this..." So sweet.

Blog Poll!

Ok all (both) of you readers out there! As the garden makeover continues, I need your opinion on what to do with possibly the BIGGEST lack-of-curb-appeal eyesore in the whole Money Pit... (now that we have a gorgeous window for the OTHER biggest eyesore...)

One of these things is not like the other... Do you see the problem?? All this time and energy and money spent a garden that, in the end, still has a GIANT A/C unit in it! Who puts that in the front yard ANYWAY? Well, since it's an environmental hazard to remove yourself, we have to hire pros to do it, and since that costs a pretty penny, it's going to have to wait until next year. SO, I ask you, should we:


a.) Turn it into a bird bath
b.) Paint it to blend in better
c.) Turn it into a planter
d.) Paint it black, put 8 sticks in it, and make it look like a giant spider for halloween

Rototill This...

Mary, Mary quite contrary, how does your garden grow?  Not well, I'm afraid, not well at all my dears. I should have been listening to Megan when she said, "Work smarter, not harder," and NOT when she said, "That rototiller won't handle all that grass, you're going to have to dig it up first..."

My tool (for the last two weekends or so...)

That's right, the old-fashioned Amish way, of digging the weeds up from the roots, turning them over, stabbing them with the shovel to break up the dirt, and pulling out the weeds... Until finally, while having beers and enjoying the nice [albeit too-hot-to-garden] weather, my neighbors just couldn't stand to see me toiling any longer, and they said, "Why don't you just rototill it??" To which I responded what I was told, about the grass wrapping around the blades and breaking the thing... To which THEY responded, "Why don't you just TRY it?"

Well, guess what folks... This thing:

Was a f*&%ing champ... And I got to tag off and take a break while Nick finished, in 15 minutes, what it had taken me several weekends to "start."

I'm looking at it this way - what a WONDERFUL learning experience, and just think of all the CALORIES I burned! Hooray!!

So, once again, a holiday weekend full of parties, friends, and cookouts got away from us, but, we did get it to this point:

 

(Lest we forget it WAS this:)

 

And we've got these all ready to go in...

So we're gettin' there... and we'll just have to keep taking advantage of these light-out-late evenings... After all, you can't work the whole summer away!!

Happy Anniversary?

Well... here we are... one whole year since first moving into the Money Pit. If you had asked me a year ago, I would have thought I'd have MUCH more to show for it than I do now... but let's take a moment to reflect on what we do have...

Things I Know Now:

The sense of pride you get from doing something yourself far outweighs the bruises and the muscle pains and the headaches and the "why the eff wouldn't you just pay someone to do this" questions you get from people who don't get it.

Whoever did the last renovation did it wrong. Ask a contractor. The other guy ALWAYS did it wrong.

Pigeon shit is the most vile substance on the face of the Earth. Mike Roe should dedicate an entire show to the superheroes that cleaned our attic for us.

Contractors don't want to talk to women. Good contractors WILL, but they all prefer dudes.

24 hours to finish your kitchen before a surprise inspection on the hottest day in August, a broken furnace in January, and two weeks to fill a 10 ton dumpster will instill a sense of panic and desperation in you like none you have ever known... and an indescribable gratitude for the people that come to your rescue.

Everything takes longer than you think it will. EVERYTHING. Got a deadline? Add a week. Already did? Add another one. Now you've got a chance. Maybe.

Measure twice cut once... usually... sometimes, you cut twice anyway...

Good family and best friends aren't always the same people, but sometimes they are.

You'll feel better if you stop asking yourself the question, "WHY would someone DO something like [fill in the asinine blank]?"

You CAN survive a Buffalo winter without a furnace. But I don't recommend it.

Beers make even the dirtiest job bearable.

Swinging a broom at a bat will only make it angry.

"Good fences make good neighbors," but GREAT neighbors are priceless.

A puppy would much rather chew on a piece of plaster than the organic rope toy you spent $16 on.

A year ago, I wouldn't leave the house in anything less than a 2" heel, had regular mani-pedis, couldn't hammer a nail, and didn't know the difference between a circular saw and a miter saw. Now, it's not unusual for me to be seen coming out of a hardware store in paint-splattered jeans, a pair of work gloves hanging out of my back pocket, with little to no makeup on, loading paint, power tools, and/or lumber into a pickup truck. Oh, and I drink beer now.

But I don't think I'd have it any other way.