The Goings-On Part II

OK so this is going to be a long one. A LOT has happened in the past week and a half. Since so much happened I'm going to keep a chronological order.

Last Weekend:

Nate's dad came to visit and while I went to the Bates track meet on Saturday (I have to give a shout out to the girls team who've had 2 first place finishes and the thrower girsls who are kicking butt this season!) he and Nate worked on puttying the upstairs bedrooms and getting rid of the bulk head on the stairs. The bulk head was there for no appernt reason but was really good for hitting your head on as you went up the stairs. I don't have a picture of this but I guarantee you it looks awesome. Now even the tallest person we know can go up the stairs without knocking themselves out and we can get a bed bigger than a twin up!

On Sunday my task was in the upstairs. Since the upstairs was finished later than the downstairs, there is some funky things in the upstairs. One of those things was the trim. It was inconsistent and weird. Below is a picture of the trim before i fixed it (on the right) and after I fixed it (on the left)

This was not an especially difficult task, however it took all day long to take all the trim down, take out the nails, cut the trim and put it back up but it looks a lot better. While I was working on trim, Nate and his dad were rebuilding the island. We were going to use is the dresser down in the basement but we ended up just using the drawers.

Shortly after this picture was taken Nate encountered the classic struggle of thumb versus table saw. I think it goes without saying who one the battle and so we had our first experience with the Sturdy emergancy room. Luckily it was just a flesh wound and all important parts of the thumb are still intact but Nate now has a very large bandaged thumb for the next couple of months. By the time we got back to the house it was about 9:30 but work was not done. In order to be able to move our furniture in on time we had to have the last coat of poly down before we left on Sunday. While I slathered it on the floor, Nate and his dad finished odd projects around the house. After a very long day we were finally able to go back to Lexington.

This weekend:

So this coming week is when everything gets delivered so that meant that this weekend we had to get everything ready for the deliveries. We are also trying to get the upstairs bedrooms ready as well so that we can move all the furniture into the appropriate rooms right away. In order to get to that point I spent the day working in the larger of the bedrooms. We got a nice surprise when we pulled up the carpet. The beautiful hardwood floor had paint and putty all over it.

This was very irratating. I first tried sanding it off, when that took forever we took a trip to Lowes and was told to use Goof Off. Well that did a great job getting the poly off the floor (which I didn't actually want to do) but left the paint securly on the floor. At that point I had paint on a splotchy floor. Our solution? strip it. This worked great but was a pain in the butt.after about two days of work they now look like this:

Once this dries and I paint the floor trim this room will be move in ready. You don't want to see the other bedroom though... that is a project for this week.

In the kitchen we needed to repair a cabinet, build a cabinet and build a bookself. A couple of Nate's friends came over and they pumped out everything and threw in the trim for the office bookshelves to top it off! We also installed the cabinets and I replaced the hardware, cleaned the stove (Which was so incredibly gross I don't even want to discribe it) and revamped a buffet table we have.

New built in bookshelf around chimney

Revamped buffet

Trimmed out bookcases

Pantry and above Refridgerator cabinet

Kitchen coming together

How I kept Madeline from getting in the way when we

brought the washer and dryer down.

As I mentioned, we brought the washer and dryer down and so the laundry room is also coming together. As you can see, they barely fit. Or you can say that they fit like a glove which was the statement of the week around our house. Next week the house should start looking a little more homey. and we get countertops!

The Goings-on

You know how I said we were going to take a break for a bit? Well that wasn't completly true. While we have cut back a lot due to the floors (which the first coat took forever to dry due to the massive amount of rain we got) we can't seem to stay away from doing other things around the house. This is what we've been doing during our "time off".

Buying living room furniture: This was one of the more exciting events for me. It also helped that we went shopping and found our furniture on one of the rainiest days (of the what seemed like hundreds we've had recently) which made it seem a little less dreary.

 This is our new chair and ottomen. We actually bought two of both and two of the couch shown below. We will now have plenty of seating in our new living room!

Putting up Cabinets: On Easter we went down to the house to do a little work. We decided to put up some cabinets. This proved to be considerably more time consuming than we anticipated (mostly because we also vented and put up  the hood for the stove). This is what we did in about 7 hours.

That's right we got a grand total of three cabinets up. Luckily these were the hardest ones to get up. We also got a second coat of stain on the floors so it turned into a pretty productive day.

Working in the upstairs: So I did not get any real before pictures of the upstairs so here are some pics in the current state.

Steep stairs up

Atrium at the top of the stairs which we're going to 

turn into a half bath hopefully by the end of this year.

Larger of the two bedrooms upstairs. The thing in the

middle is the built in dresser that we pulled out of the

wall to have access to the eaves.

Other bedroom. This one is actually close 

to being done. We need to paint and rip 

up the carpet and it'll be done.

Watching the flowers grow: Our flowers are coming up all over the place!

Dog days

This post is deticated to our dog Madeline. Many of you may wonder what Madeline has been up to while we have been busy working on her house. Well, let me take you through the jam packed days of Madeline. (And the progression of fabulous hairdos).


To Do List:

1. Play with "Squeakers"

I don't know about other dogs but Madeline is OBSESSED with these long kinda dog looking toys that have a high pitch squeak in the head and a low pitch squeak in the belly. She spends hours playing with them (she now has three and yes she is spoiled).

This one has now been deemed "the car squeakers" because it got so dirty down at the house that we threw it in the car to wash it and she found it and now plays with it whenever we go anywhere.

This next one is now the Attleboro house squeakers which we bought because she kept looking for the purple one at the house. You'll notice that this one is much larger than the other one and she doesn't like it as much because it's harder to whip around.

You'll also notice the crazy hair in this one. She likes to whip the toy around and basically smash her head into the ground to get it to squeak (she'll also do this to toys that don't have a squeaker in them) causing some crazy hair.

2. Protect the house

I've mentioned all the inspections that we need to have for our house. This means we have a lot of inspectors walking through the house as well as our plumber and framer and all these other new people. No matter the situation Madeline insists on announcing that someone is in the house and then sticking right with them to make sure that they do a good job. While we apprceiate this, not a lot of work gets done with a dog running around your ankles. This means that on many occasions Ms. Maddie must be barricaded into different areas of the house.This is here trying to get out of the dinning room barricade.

It's fun when people come to the door and can hear her barking but can't see her because they usually are really nervous to come in until they see her and then they get embarresed.

3. Explore the house

Everyday there is something new to find or look at in a renovation. One thing that intrigued Madeline until the day we covered it up was a hole in the kitchen floor. We had to run a lot of wires up the kitchen wall and so we would yell back and forth between the first floor and basement. Madeline thought that Nate had somehow been transported into the hole.

Where is he?

There he is! And he has a treat!

still not sure about that thing

When we brought our bed down and set it up Madeline was once again confused. Our bed has cubbies in it on one side that usually houses her bed however we didn't put her bed in for a few days.

This is her "it used to be here?!" look

4. Nap

This requires really no explanations but let me just tell you this takes up A LOT of time.

This is Madeline napping next to the fridge. She finds the weirdest places/positions to sleep.

5. Help out with the house

Now there are not a lot of things that Madeline can help with due to the lack of thumbs. However, She is really good at being a paper (or wall board) weight

6. Riding in the car

Madeline loves the car. She would prefer to be in the car than anywhere else most days. When she's sick the only thing we can do to make her feel better is go for a car ride. Needless to say she goes everywhere with us and with the nice weather we've been having she's been enjoying the wind in her hair.

Recently she has been putting her elbow up on the window. We need to get her a little steering wheel and she'll be cruising.

7. Having Fun!

Picking up around the house

Getting a bath after playing in the water soaked fields after 14" of rain!

Always has time to stop and smell the flowers

As you can see Madeline has a packed schedule. But don't worry she always has time to snuggle.