Category: Home Renovations

Well this weekend Ryan had to work all weekend so I was left to my own devices.   Unfortunately it rained ALL day saturday so that meant indoor projects and I got a few things done including building this little bookcase to store tools on the porch:I made it out of some old shelves we had removed from the tv room closet and some scrap pieces of 2×4.  It’s quite sturdy and has now organized the porch to my satisfaction.
Sunday the weather was much more to my liking so I got started on the soffit.  It needed to be stripped with the heat gun, then sanded, then primed.  Luckily we had bought a new 20′ ladder that i could move around more easily than our other ladder so at least I could do this on my own.  However it was a difficult project for my wrist and I was aching by the time the stripping was done and in real pain once the sanding was done but it was getting dark so I pushed on and finished – just after dark 🙂

Here is the soffit BEFORE:

And here it is while I was working on it (notice that it’s getting kind of dark on this side of the house):

And here is the final primed soffit:

It has officially been one full year since we got married – and we celebrated by working on our house! We also made a trip down to NYC for a few days to see PJ and get away from JUST working on the house.

Our big project was installing the new windows we ordered and then putting up the siding we had removed around those windows.

Dad came out to help install the windows – when he left we had the windows installed (aren’t they beautiful), the siding started, and window caps almost completed (minus the moulding on most of them). We were mightily impressed and compared to our progress the rest of the week this was impressive.

Here are the new windows and siding when Mom and Dad left:

And here they are after working on siding Thur, Fri, Sat and Sunday (around the rain and heat/humidity):


A closeup of the window cap Dad made for us:

And here we our on our Anniversary:

Ryan spent saturday installing the bathroom window, this involved moving the window lower from it’s original position.

Here’s the original window we started with. Notice how the window goes right up to the soffit.

Here it is after the hole was moved down and the wall is now ready for the new window.

And here is the finished window – outside:

Inside:

That’s what we did this weekend! We went to my work summer outing on Saturday but Saturday evening and Sunday evening we accomplished this:


And we got it all cleaned up and moved inside just before it started to rain on sunday! Unfortunately as I was denailing the siding inside I was dripping sweat so we called it quits for the day earlier than planned. I blame the humidity! I’m very happy with the progress though, I really didn’t think we could get all the siding off in one weekend, especially since we had to go slow and try to save as much as we could (did a decent job of it too!).

Our brother-in-law was out this weekend (with my sister) to do the plumbing for the downstairs bathroom. We now have hot and cold water Pex lines running to the sink/shower/toilet and the drain lines almost done (they are in but not connected) as well as the vent lines.

We also pulled out what we could of the old phone and doorbell lines, effectively cleaning more of the wiring mess up in the basement.

Hopefully this weekend we’ll get a little more relaxing time but also some work done. The weather has got me really discouraged because my second rose bush is blooming and I’m missing it!

This is what we enjoy now that we have a house – weekends full of getting projects done around the house! I know I enjoy them more than Ryan does because I can just go go go all weekend and feel satisfied going to work Monday, Ryan likes a little bit of a break in there somewhere.

This weekend Mom and Dad came out to help around the house. We started before they got there though, removing aluminum siding from the outside of the house (porch) to reveal the original wood details had been removed but can hopefully be restored with some patience.

I also worked on making sure there was a big garden ready for all the plants my mom was bringing me – lots of baby perennials which hopefully survived the trip okay. She planted them all for me and made me a map while I worked with my dad on various projects – the largest of which was updating some of the electrical in the basement. We got a good deal cleaned up down there and I have a better understanding of most of the circuits the house is running on now.

All in all I think this month will be a very productive month – but we do have some new plans involving replacing the windows which is a bit more expensive than originally planned so things may go a bit slower than originally planned as well 🙂

With the very much appreciated help of my father-in-law, my husband and he finished all the demo of the first three rooms we are tackling. The “Red room” and bathroom are now down to studs. Wednesday they demo’d the “red room”, then thursday we did the bathroom, revealing some pretty bad conditions in the floor and the wall studs. So Friday we put down a new subfloor and started re-framing the bathroom walls. This project is not yet complete but it’s close.

With the weather being just so amazing last week we needed to do a little outdoor work so we started a garden to plant my birthday rose bushes in. I really hope I can keep them alive! This weekend all work was suspended (except for cleaning) due to other plans and with my sister’s wedding fast approaching (this coming weekend) work will probably not resume until next week.

Next on the house to do list is to finish the framing and support beams. Then the electrical. We also have to replace the bathroom window. Then we’ll just get ready for the insulation people to come and do the spray foam. Once that’s complete we get to do the really fun part – drywall???

I’ve added pages in the side bar to show progress on the home renovation projects we are doing. We bought our house in Feb, 2009 and started work almost immediately with lots of help from our families!

The goal is to slowly renovate the whole house, mostly because we need to insulate. We’ll be trying to keep most of the original details (windows and trim) but all the plaster has to come down so we can insulate. No major structural changes in the downstairs although upstairs we plan to add a hallway and a master bathroom someday.

The first project we tackled was what we call the “Blue Room” which will be made into a home gym. It’s a small room in the back of the downstairs. The demo is done, some new supports were added and the wiring. The next project is continuing the demo through to the “red room” which will become our tv room, the bathroom and the front hall. Once these rooms are all demo’d and new wiring put in we’ll insulate and start putting back together.

Our plan is to half of the downstairs, then do the other half of the downstairs, then do the entire upstairs at once? It’s going to be a few years of living in a state of renovation but hopefully it will all be worth it in the end!