Entry and Stairway – nicole.groudasfamily.com

Floors!

Ryan and Dad have had a busy couple days already and the upstairs floors are looking amazing (from pictures anyway, they probably look even better in person). Dad is home and Ryan is still doing poly as I type evidently but the first coat they did was Shellac so this is already the second coat, last coat to go on tomorrow. Hopefully it dries fast.

Stairs sanded and scraped by hand — Ryan’s project while Dad did the sanding of the hallway and bedrooms upstairs

Poly on the stairs – i love the colors – old wood!

Late night for Ryan, hopefully he can sleep in a bit tomorrow since he has to wait for the poly to dry anyhow. This is a big ticket item getting checked off the list – the list is getting pretty small now thank goodness!

Oh and Ryan sent me a picture of the Diningroom – including the built-ins put back together and the new section of wainscoting/shadow boxes!

Finished ceiling with crown is impressive!

New wainscoting – just one small section of wall to paint there by the kitchen (I think that’s done by now actually).

Everything is really coming along, I wish I could be there to help but this weekend was my nephew’s birthday party and I can’t be by the poly fumes anyhow 🙁

Wrapping Things Up

This weekend was the last weekend I plan to go out to the house to work! We’re busy the month of may and with the baby coming I won’t travel out there in June. Ryan and Dad will go out next weekend to do the floors upstairs and Ryan will stay and finish a few more things. We have our contractor back working on some things this week and next if we need him. The house goes on the market on Monday next week!

Let’s try to recap the weekend a bit.

Friday night Ryan got the drawers installed in the built-ins so the tv-room built-ins are finally completely finished!

Since the doors are all painted I put the hardware back on all the downstairs doors and they look great. Ryan hung the tv-room closet door too that I had finished painting last week.

Saturday we got an early start, the first thing I did was clean and mom the diningroom which was scuffed up from the painter, then I covered the floor with paper and a new drop cloth knowing we’d have people working in there still but wanting to minimize damage. Our contractor came out (he’s back from Arizona!) and he did the crown molding in the ceiling over the weekend – it looks awesome!

Diningroom ceiling crown is done (just needs paint!)

His wife is actually going to do the painting for us, she painted the front closet on Sunday. She’s also going to do some cleaning downstairs for us this week to get the house show ready (wash windows and such).

I got the built-ins stripped (just the front face) and sanded. Ryan put up the last bit of trim on the built-ins and they are ready for caulking/prime/paint!

My project at home here this week is to strip/prime/paint the drawers and doors so ryan can put those back in next weekend.

Maribeth and Dan worked on outside projects mostly for us. First Maribeth painted the outside of the little upstairs porch!

Then she and Dan scraped the old paint off the back porch and got it primed (the 2 sides). Our contractor will do the siding on the back side of the porch this week and get the final paint on everything back there I think.

A big project Ryan did with Dan’s help is getting the ceiling of the front porches done (the wrap around and upstairs porch). They finished putting up the last pieces of paneling, then quarter round around the edges, then lattice, flat trim on the seams.

Once that was done I could put up the ceiling fan on the porch!

Speaking of fans, I got the back bedroom fan and closet light installed. I also go the master bedroom fan installed and fixed the master bedroom closet light wiring which was flaky/not working for some reason.

Ryan also got the hand rail on the front staircase installed (the second one) and finished the small railing by the side door which Maribeth then painted. The one last back railing he got the hand rail and bottom piece installed, but has to do some sort of railing still, it won’t match exactly but it never did anyhow before.

Maribeth got the final coat of yellow paint on the little porch off the master bedroom.

Little porch all cleaned up and finished

With a ton of help Ryan got the vanity upstairs, he had to cut the side of the vanity that sticks out further than the granite in order to fit it properly in the bathroom – (that was unplanned work) but it came out great!

Vanity installed! And he could put in the last piece of baseboard on the right there.

The bathroom list remaining is just : Paint touch ups (Last baseboard), hanging mirrors and bars, plumbing and glass. Then it’s done! That was definitely fast for a bathroom renovation!

Ryan and Dan also moved the washer and dryer upstairs on Saturday and I tested them out. They are awesome! Not too loud at all like everyone said, I ran a full heavy load through and you could barely hear it during the spin cycle. The dryer noise was actually louder (and not too loud). Man I wish we had done this particular project sooner so I could have enjoyed it!

Finally one of the projects that was just waiting to be done.. the banister! Everyone pitched in Saturday night and got the banister sanded. Maribeth and I stained it and she waxed it on sunday as I was packing to leave. It looks awesome! We’ll have it covered with plastic next weekend while the floors will be done so it won’t need to be dusted and it will certainly be a showcase feature!

What an exhausting weekend, everyone worked so hard and we were all sore after but so much is done. My list of what’s left to do finally fits on a single page! That’s amazing! After this week I can focus on getting ready for the pig roast and then baby coming. As we move more and more stuff out of the house (mostly attic and basement/tools left to move) we’ll have to find a place to store more stuff (another storage unit!?) like tools but it’s a good problem to have as it means we’re getting close to not paying a mortgage on a house we don’t live in (after 8 months already of doing so!), i’m hoping we can keep it to 1 year total.

Goodbye Nashua – hopefully I’ll see the house finished when we sell it if baby arrival works out well with that! (She has to come a couple weeks before we close in order for me to deal with the drive out!). I think that’s very likely.

Another busy/long weekend

Not really long as in longer than 2 days but long as in it felt very long. We got an early start Friday, hitting the road at 5pm and getting to the house by 8! I put the munchkin to bed and Ryan got started grouting the master bathroom! I cleaned paint off the master bedroom windows while he started and then by the time he was onto the floor I could help (not much help in the shower). We were up until 1am but got the entire bathroom grouted!

Floor view (next day when Ryan was doing trim)

On Saturday we couldn’t walk in the bathroom until after about 3pm so Ryan worked on various other projects throughout the house. He put up some trim in the tvroom closet (door and a piece of baseboard) and he put the trim up around the top of our columns in the livingroom – they look great!

Now that the master bathroom is done we had our neighbor hang the last piece of sheetrock and start taping/mudding the last section of the house!

Our painter had worked a bit during the week and worked all weekend again, trim is almost done, he’s coming again once this week and a bit next weekend and it should be done (what’s up already) – and if he has time we’ll add a bit more to his load after this weekend.

The stairway has paint now – looks great

I was pretty distracted with a toddler most of the weekend and never took pictures after this point (some time saturday afternoon) so the rest is choppy.

During naptime and kid free time I got the build-in drawers (tvroom) sanded and shellac’d so those can be installed (this is the 5 that weren’t in out of 10 total). I worked on the doorbell finally but may need a new button on the front to get it working. I got the back porch light installed and the back bedroom closet light wired up (needs a fixture but works as a light now).

Ryan worked on installing trim on the back porch using what scraps we have left once he finished all the trim in the master bathroom (3 windows, 1 door and baseboards) between Saturday and Sunday. Aside from one piece of cap molding in the master bathroom the upstairs trim is finished. The only trim really missing is the front hallway closet (inside) and some small baseboard in the back porch which Ryan will finish up next weekend. Ryan also got the little porch off the master ready for a new ceiling (added some strapping) and cleaned it up – it looks really nice. Once the ceiling is in and everything gets a coat of paint that porch will look great.

We stayed until 5:30 on Sunday, I got the last of the fragile kitchen stuff packed up while Ryan did a final cleaning of the bathroom tile with cheese cloth and we headed out with a truck load of stuff. Next weekend is the last weekend I’ll go out, the plan is to go kid free if we can and make the most of it. Then the following weekend Ryan will take a 3 day weekend and hopefully my dad can go out and they can do the upstairs floors – then the house is on the market. So close it’s unbelievable really.

April Staycation… in NH

Well this was our last stay-cation at our NH house where we take a week off of work to work on the house, definitely not as much fun when it’s finishing a house that will get sold 🙁 Add to that my back has been killing me (sciatic) with this part of pregnancy (so much fun) but we got a ton done and we are on track to get the house listed in mid-may i think. Let’s see if I can recap the vacation a bit…

We drove out Friday night (Alex’s birthday). Saturday Ryan worked on getting trim installed, the painter was starting on monday so he wanted all but the master bathroom trim done if possible. He got the back bedroom windows and doors trimmed, then the window by the washer/dryer…

Baseboards done … the old baseboard tops had to be stripped of paint and cleaned up a bit then the caps put on, plus a small piece had to be pieced in.

When i had time I focused on electrical. These lights were done the last weekend we were out but I didn’t take pics so here are the lights i installed in the stairway and top of stairs.

I got the back bedroom outlets all wired up at some point during the week (a naptime – there weren’t many naptimes). So master bedroom and bathroom are really the last outlets left.

Sunday Ryan worked on the master bedroom trim (baseboards again) and also patched up the floor where the radiator had done damage. The floors are officially ready to be refinished now (well when we have time!).

Over the weekend our neighbor finished spackling the bathroom and then sanded it on sunday so I could prime it and Mark could paint it Mon-Tue, we went with a light grey paint.

Monday started the master bathroom project in earnest, Ryan had to get the shower pan installed which took some work and included putting the drain in, then the foam floor insert (Kerdi system). Ryan’s dad came out to help Monday afternoon-Wednesday which was a huge help. The kerdi system involved putting down the underlayment then letting it dry so working on something else until they could tile again. It slowed down the project but hopefully is worth it.

The project they chose as extra was putting up most of the front porch (wrap-around) ceiling! They put upstrapping to nail the new ceiling to and then put up bead board panels. We’ll need to put up some trim on the seams and around the edges to make it look really finished but it’s a huge improvement and looks great. Over the 3 days they got all but 2 panels installed.

In the bathroom on Tuesday they got the floor to the shower done AND the floor to the whole bathroom tiled! All day on hands/knees as this is a large bathroom! Oh and Mark also painted the entire bathroom

Starting the floor tile, simple subway layout of 12×12 on the floor.

Unfortunately they needed to give the tile 24 hours to dry so the shower project had to wait until Wed night before starting. So that’s when they worked on the porch ceiling the most.

I got some lights in the master bathroom wired up so Ryan would have light in there at night if he tiled the shower. I also worked a little on the banister project I have planned. I’m sanding it lightly with 300 grit, cleaning it well, staining it dark so it hides any knicks then i’ll give it a wax. Here is a section I did with just stain, no wax yet…

It darkens a bit but really hides the old knicks well and looks awesome in person! This section only took about an hour so won’t take too long to do the rest!

The painter started on Monday with prepping (filling holes and sanding) the trim we had installed. Then he got to priming – he’s doing all the trim upstairs, some downstairs and all the doors we’ve had dipped. I actually drove the last 3 doors down to Worcester on Tuesday to be dipped and they’ll be brought back this week when I make another trip out!

Painter got the trim all primed in the back bedroom

Some great progress this week… Alex, Mark and I headed back late Wednesday night so I could clean the house and prep for the birthday party Thur and Fri. Ryan stayed through Thursday, tiling the shower!

The glass guys came and measured on Thursday once the shower was tiled and Ryan also met with the realtor … about 4 more weeks and we’ll be listing hopefully!

We have a few big projects left and lots of little things. We need to fit in finishing the floors, the painting is being handled so that’s not a concern. The bathroom has to be grouted – this weekend! And then the glass can be installed in the shower. We have to get the vanity upstairs and put in – that is crazy heavy and will be tough but hopefully soon.

Last Kid free weekend

Well this past weekend was most likely the last weekend we’ll go out kid free – the next weekend we go out is for our ‘vacation’ so of course we’ll bring Alex (plus it’s her birthday weekend!). After that we’re getting close to the end of what I can do anyhow as I get further along so we’ll bring her along.

We drove out Thursday night and both worked from the house on Friday so we could get the new vanity delivered. Then we worked friday night from 6-11 with a break to go to Lowe’s for our tile!.

Friday night was mostly making a new door frame for the master bedroom door and getting that installed. Ryan also worked on some chair rail in the hallway and I got some outlets installed in the master bedroom.

Saturday we started with another hard project and got the master bathroom fan vented out through the attic frieze board. Ryan had to hang out of the half moon window to cut the hole for it, it was quite the ordeal but the fan is vented!

Fan vented! I didn’t take a pic outside because it was snowing – ugg in spring!

Other than installing lights (I got the front hallway lights all installed up the stairs and top of stairs!), I also took up the carpet on the stairs finally. We can finally see these beautiful stairs that will look great refinished!

Stairs! the lower part of the wall just needs to be painted and this will look great!

Ryan got trim around the rest of the upstairs hallway (chair rail and door trim around the master bedroom door). Then he did the other doors in the master bedroom (outside door and closet door). The bathroom door is our last one in there that needs to be installed and trimmed out!

Trim around doors and some baseboards done too

I got the vanity light boxes installed (we were waiting on the vanity so i could make sure the lights were centered above the sinks properly and I think we are good here).

Our neighbor finished spackling the back porch and got that sanded. It’s ready for primer/paint and trim! Then he built the knee wall in the bathroom for the shower and put in some blocking for the glass door to hang on when we get that.

We headed back to NY Saturday night at 7 so we could have a family day with Alex on Sunday which was very a great idea and ended up being a blast.

I’m headed back to the house this week to get the master bathroom inspections done so that the next weekend we are out we can move forward on the bathroom (and our neighbor can start sheetrocking it). Exciting!

Lot’s left to do but the inside is coming along nicely and if we hire someone to paint we are getting closer for sure!

Kid-Free weekend again

We are on an every-other weekend schedule going out to work on the house and this weekend Alex stayed with her grandparents so we could go out by ourselves and make more progress! It was a productive day and a half for sure.

Saturday Ryan worked on trim all day – starting with the master bedroom, putting up window trim. We need to buy more window apron trim but he got what we had up and the windows look great!

3 without aprons (plus we need aprons for the back bedroom and master bath)

Next up he worked on baseboards. He couldn’t finish the uptairs hallway shadow boxes and chair rail because the door for the master bedroom needs to be installed, and before that it needs to be stripped, so we packed it up and brought it back and Ryan will strip it here and we’ll bring it back ready to install.

Had to cut the old baseboard down to match and then put in a new piece.

Notice the blue rug at the top of the stairs is gone! Floor looks great underneath. We didn’t take it off all the stairs just this section so far.

Baseboards continue around the linen closet and down the hallway on one side.

And partially around the washer/dryer stand

This is the door to the attic trimmed out (no pic before) and technically there’s baseboard on the right side of it too…

I focused on ceilings and electrical this weekend. First I hooked up smoke detectors so we now have all the smoke detectors hooked up and connected! I also put a light in at the top of the back stairs and a bunch of the covers for the HVAC in the ceilings (and recessed lights have covers now)..

Light at the top of the stairs in the back and smoke detector all hooked up 🙂

Covers on HVAC and another smoke detector (had to do upstairs and downstairs but didn’t bother taking pics of all of them!)

Washer and dryer outlets and put the trim piece on the drain/water thing.

The washer/dryer stand is just about ready – we have to put a piece of trim around it and water proof it, then we’ll bring up the washer/dryer and then we can put the last door in place at the top of the back stairs.

On Sunday we worked a few hours on the master bathroom. We had our neighbor clean up the ceiling in the bathroom and start sheetrocking a bit (just one section) on Saturday. Ryan put in the ceiling fan/light box Sunday morning and then we ran all the rough electrical in there (outlets and lights).

Fan installed, just need to hook up that wire.

We drew out the plans for the vanity and the shower so we’re ready to finish the rough-in plumbing hopefully this week. We’re going to order what we need for the bathroom this week too (need the vanity placement so we can plan the light boxes exactly).

So the master bathroom has been started, trim work continues nicely and electrical is going along. I replaced a bunch of the switches with the nice rockers we are using and started putting in outlets in the upstairs hallway.

The next trip out we’ll have Alex so probably getting more trim done and I’ll get a bit more electrical done during naps and such.

OH – and we got the built-in doors hung – they need a tiny bit of sanding down to close nicer and then touch up painting in place, then we’ll put knobs and magnet pieces on and they’ll be done…

Long weekend

Ryan and his Dad both had a 3 day weekend this weekend so they took advantage and went out to work on the house. Alex and I joined them Friday night to Sunday afternoon to provide entertainment in the form of a 2 year old and so I could do a tiny amount of work while Alex napped or watched tv.

While we were gone, our neighbor has made some progress, the back stairway is now sanded and primed. Also the ceiling over the front stairs was painted – ceilings done!

Sheetrock wise the only thing left is the back porch – Ryan’s dad installed the light box in there so that room is ready for sheetrock next!

Friday after getting some supplies, Ryan and his dad worked on the front entry trim. The panels in the front entry were finished up on Saturday and all holes are filled and trim is caulked. Ryan’s dad also painted the wall portion so all that is left is to paint the trim (considering hiring a painter to just paint all trim and doors when we are done).

This is with only 1 coat of paint but after we left Sunday Ryan’s dad finished all second coats of paint on the brown

Upstairs Ryan got the attic door installed, and trimmed out doors and windows wherever he could. He made up the sills for most of the rest of the windows and I hear got the master bedroom windows sills installed! Our neighbor stripped some rosettes for us too so we were able to trim out a few things completely and not do just the sides 🙂

Top of stairs – that’s the nursery and the archway – with trim finished!

The window at the top of the stairs trimmed – and that’s the stairway all painted (even cut in) thanks to Ryan’s dad! (We’ll have chair rail and panels up here too)

The hallway – closet and bathroom doors trimmed out and hallway painted!

Back bedroom door trimmed out and attic door getting installed (and then trimmed).

My contributions were minor, I caulked the trim in the front hallway and played with the toddler. I can’t wait to go back and see the progress next weekend! Pretty soon Ryan and I will do another kid free weekend and I’m hoping to get a bunch of electrical done then. Progress everywhere. Pretty soon we’ll be starting on the master bathroom, we just need the rough-in plumbing finished so we can get inspections before we close up walls and start tiling!

Happy New Year

The new year started out about the same as last year – a weekend trip up to the NH house to work 🙂 We had Alex with us so I mostly just spent time with her and Ryan worked. He got the final coat of spackle on the upstairs hallway (above the staircase).

During ‘naptime’ – otherwise known as Alex screaming or talking in her bedroom time – we got the first coat of paint on the 2 bedrooms (the back room and master). We are playing around with color, we bought white paint and we’re tinting it with the leftover orange from the gym to give it just a bit of yellow. The back bedroom came out perfect, the master I think had a bit more orange so we’ll lighten the bucket a bit more before second coat time and then save the leftover for touchups.

At this point I think we’re still planning on finishing up 2 coats of paint before we install trim so we only have to cut in on the trim painting. The ceilings are done so we can install the heat vents and lights/smoke detectors when we have time. One big thing holding us up right now is getting rosettes stripped. We can’t install all the trim until we have rosettes and they need to be de-nailed and stripped – ugg.

We’re hoping to work the next 2 weekends – maybe even get a kid free weekend in there. We’ll see. Lot’s to do and goes faster if both of us can work!

Another work weekend

This weekend we brought along the peanut and she was a big help 🙂

I found her like this when I came downstairs from doing something – she’s ‘making lists’ and has her tools ready.

Don’t ever change alex – you are too perfect 🙂

We had a busy day Saturday. Alex and I ran to home depot while Ryan started with some spackling. We have this tough to reach spot at the top of the staircase (ceiling and walls) that is taped but not finished. Ryan got a good coat on that area.

We also managed to get 2 coats of paint on all of the ceilings that were ready – that’s the 2 bedrooms and the hallway (minus the stairway area). Next time we’re out I can do smoke detectors and lights now!

Our neighbor was over to work and he sheetrocked (which included some 2×4 installation) the attic stairwell – we are only doing the first section to the 2x4s they have up because the attic is unfinished but this way when you open the hopefully soon to be installed attic door, it opens to a seemingly finished stairwell. We will probably leave this untaped since the rest is unfinished but we’ll see.

Attic stairwell – calling it done for now

All in all we had a productive weekend when you consider 6 hours of that is driving 🙁 Sunday we ran errands then drove home after packing up. Attempted to drive during naptime (no nap). All well.

Now it’s time to enjoy Christmas and family. In the new year we’ll return to the home building 🙂

Front Hall trim

Well we had a bit of a break on the house work with Ryan needing back surgery and then getting it. His recovery is going great though and this past weekend we took a day to drive out and work on the house, leaving Alex in NY with grandparents. We drove out friday night in the horrible ice rain, then back saturday night in slightly better normal rain 🙁 That left us one full day to work on trim in the front hallway.

First Ryan installed the rosettes and top piece of trim on the doorway that was missing it. Then he firred out the front doorway so we could install the trim around that. We have to strip more rosettes so the tops of the doors (front door and closet door) are waiting for that to happen.

Plinth blocks, trim up the sides of the doors and baseboards installed

The chair rail and the trim up the side of the door – the baseboard is also done in this section.

We managed to get plinth blocks in, baseboard, baseboard cap and trim out the strange section at the bottom of the stairs. Then Ryan got some more chair rail in. We need to buy chair rail and the trim for making shadow boxes up the stair well so we’ll need to get that measured and bought for a next project.

Baseboard cap started up the stairs and the cap for the section at the bottom of stairs is done

The tricky section with some angles that took a little work – to get the baseboard cap to wrap around nicely.

I think we were both happy with how that little section came out at the bottom of the stairs, it looks nicer from the tile side than the stair side but there isn’t much we could do on the stair way side as it’s just a ‘cap’ of wood over there.

The front hallway is getting closer, shadow boxes are the main thing left in there, then it’s painting and upstairs trim next!