Hurricane Damage

Two days before Hurricane Irene's arrival, we were directly in the path of the storm (as in, on a map, the eye of the storm was shown directly going over us). Ugh. Luckily, the night before the storm, it got pushed west, so while we'd still get impacted, it wouldn't be as bad as initially thought.

We woke up this morning to a loud noise outside our windows. Turns out the huge tree directly across the street from us fell (luckily, into their yard, not onto our mailbox or the road).

As I was looking out the window at this, R went to all of the other windows. While looking out the Twilight Room back window, he saw this fall on our shed/coop!

Luckily, these two trees were the main problems of the day. We were two of the only people in the state with power. It flickered out for about 2 minutes around 8:30 AM and was fine for the rest of the day. We did lose internet/cable/phone around 3:30 PM, which wasn't cool... internet and cable were all that were keeping us busy! So much for our Game of Thrones marathon..

Around 6:00, we joined all of our neighbors outside to assess the damage. It appeared that our yard was hit the worst. No one had any damage to their houses, and the only trees to come down were across the street from us and in our backyard (we had a couple fall down in the woods, in addition to the one on the shed).

Our next door neighbor had some huge branches fall down and into the road (the town came during the storm and moved them out of the road for her). We cannot figure out how they didn't hit the power lines because they were over the lines, but some how managed to fall under them and into the street..

I lost three tomato plants.. and a couple tomatoes which fell on the ground.

Tomato-killing branch..

Shed killer..

Here, Irene did some good. She was kind enough to knock down most of the dead branches off of the huge trees by the well. We were going to have to have someone come to cut them off (they were up really high), but now all we had to do was drag them into the woods.

While I was walking around taking pictures and picking up sticks and branches, Ryan was trying to figure out how to get the tree off the shed. Our neighbor from across the street was helping out our next door neighbor and saw Ryan and the tree. He offered to help out, and showed up a couple minutes later with his chainsaw, another neighbor and his chainsaw!

They didn't take the tree completely off, but got a lot done. We offered the wood to them and one neighbor offered to turn a bowl out of it for us :)

No Chimney Cap?

Starting this spring, we've had some major fireplace problems, especially in the Kitchen. With the amount of snow we had this winter, it was only expected that we'd have a very wet spring when it all melted. Every time it has rained since then, we've had to put buckets in the kitchen fireplace to catch all of the water (and once, a mouse, but that's another story..).

The water that comes dripping down our massive chimney is not pretty... By the time it makes it to the kitchen, it is covered in 240 years of grime and soot. The water in the buckets is black and nasty. Oh, and doesn't smell so good either. Just what you want in your kitchen while you're trying to eat.. Days after a rainstorm, the kitchen still smells because now all of the bricks are saturated. A couple weeks ago, we've started to notice leakage in all of the other fireplaces as well.. and no, really strong plug-in air fresheners PLUS all the windows open don't completely get rid of the smell, in case you were wondering.

About a month ago R realized that we had a HUGE hole in our chimney cap, and that's why the water has just been rushing into our kitchen's indoor water feature. His guess was that with all of the snow piled up on there this winter, the cap just gave out. Last weekend he was in the attic putting some boxes away and realized that all of the water had washed away some of the mortar in the chimney and we can now see straight through it. We knew that eventually the chimney would have to be rebuilt at least in the attic, but it was something we were hoping could wait until we were ready to finish off the attic.

With the impending Hurricane Irene, R had had enough. He called a local chimney company, A to Z Chimney Sweep, and Jim came out the next day. He said that he had been to our house a couple years ago to look at the cap (great... so it's something that has been in bad shape for a long time.. not a good sign). The previous owner decided not to spend the money to fix it, seeing as he'd be selling the house soon. So, now it's up to us. Jim went up on the roof and took a look around. Turns out that hole in the cap was a lot bigger than I had imagined (I was thinking like 1'x2'). Turns out it's 5'x5'. No wonder we have so much water! I'm surprised we haven't been flooded out of the house! Jim also thought that the fact that we have oil heat aided in the demise of our cap. He said that so many years of oil heat coming up through there have just eaten away at the metal.. then the heavy snow was the last straw and it just collapsed. Because of the size of the chimney, we have to get a new cap custom made. We've decided to go with stainless steel, which comes with a lifetime warranty (will it still be there in another 240 years?), with screens around the sides to keep out birds and other animals. Our bedroom fireplace has evidence of mud nests built by swallows. This takes time though, so it wouldn't be ready before the hurricane, so Jim put up a temporary piece of sheet metal, to get us through the storm.

He tied it on with strapping and it did a great job! It survived the 70+mph winds and 24 hours of heavy rain. It did keep us entertained, flapping around up there, making noises that sounded like thunder (we had neighbors asking us if we heard the strange noises during the storm, which we had to admit was us...). But most importantly, it kept us mainly dry. We did get a couple drips in the kitchen toward the end of the storm, but it definitely performed beyond our expectations!

Operation Tomato: A Success

We did it! We grew tomatoes!! We've been trying for 3 years to grow tomatoes. Granted, 2 of those years were on a deck with tomato plants that were too big for a pot, and last year, when we actually had "deck" tomato plants, we moved them halfway through the summer and they died.

We've also been getting a lot of string beans and cherry tomatoes, both of which don't usually make it into the house very often.... oops :)

Bedroom Closet Before/After

Total Cost:

$0 - Everything we already had... paint, hooks, shelves, hangers, boxes... I like this kind of project :)

Bedroom Closet

Our Master Bedroom has two closets, which is two more than most houses the age of ours. One is original, one was added probably in the 50's. The original one is located between the chimney and stairs and is about 7' deep and 30" wide. Before we even moved in, I told R this would be his closet. The other closet is a more "normal" size, about 30" deep and 6' wide. I hang most of my clothes up, plus need a lot of storage, so that closet became mine. I painted/cleaned my closet in October of last year, because I couldn't stand living out of boxes (I'm one of those people who need to see all their clothes in order to choose one). R, however, was perfectly content with his clothes in boxes. Because he didn't care, cleaning and painting his closet kept moving farther and farther down on my list of things to-do. In July I had finally had enough. We were about to go on vacation and I hate leaving the house messy when we're away (it's one of those things my mom ingrained in my head when I was little... you never want to go away and come home to a messy house). I had finally had enough of the boxes of clothes piled up in our bedroom.

It ended up not being as bad as I originally though. Only 1 dead spider and no huge cracks in the walls that needed repairing. All in all, I finished in two days (and I didn't spend all day working.. basically just the afternoons). The first day I spent cleaning out everything we had accumulated in there (boxes, suitcases, misc. stuff we weren't using and didn't have another place for), patching holes in the walls, and painting some of the trim. The second day I painted the door, ceiling, shelves and walls.

Luckily it was a very dry day, so the paint dried incredibly fast and I was even able to organize all of R's stuff in the closet before he came home!

The closet has 2 shelves in the back (about 24" deep). One these I put some long-term storage, pillows, and some of Ryan's stuff that he rarely uses. Underneath the bottom shelf (which is about 3' off the floor) I put our large suitcase and filled it with all of our dufflebags, backpacks, etc., so now when we're packing to go somewhere everything is in one place. On top of that I put our big, thick winter comforter in it's bag. (That's another thing I'm very excited to have a place for... It's white and light blue, and when it's too hot we've just been kicking it onto the floor. It basically spent the whole summer on the floor which means it got dirty from the floor and from the dog that decided that it was a new big huge bed we bought for her). Along the walls are old hooks which I was originally going to replace, but then decided just to paint them. I hung R's belts and ties on them.

Because the closet is so incredibly deep, there are 2 hanging rods. This would not have worked for me because I need to see all of my clothes. For R though, perfection! On the back rod I hung all of his winter clothes and on the front rod, all of his summer clothes! So now when he's looking for something, they're organized so he's not looking through sweatshirts for a polo shirt, but also if we have a cold early fall day, he still has the option to grab a long sleeved shirt if he wants. It also means that season-changing will be easier because rather than spending a whole day unpacking and packing clothes (like I do for my clothes), all I have to do is switch which rod they're hanging on.

The floor in front is open for laundry baskets and other misc. items like our large bed pillows if we're not using them. And yes, every single item from that first picture (in the closet and surrounding it) is all in here... I fit it all :-D

The Finished Coop

 

We finally finished up the coop this weekend. Well, enough so that the chicks can move in. We still need to build the shelving for the other side of the shed and build the outdoor space. But my patience had run out on having indoor chickens.

The finished interior coop takes up half of the shed. Nugget and Gladys love it! They love being able to run back and forth and fly up (they actually fly up to the top of the wall and sit up there and we have to rescue them..). Their new space is more than 4 times as wide as the playpen. Plus they get to play in the hay, which they love!

Slight Electrical Problem

Last night when R was coming up to bed, he turned on the light at the bottom of the back staircase. Only it didn't turn on. He was a little concerned because the lightbulbs in the two fixtures attached to this switch were newish (less than a year old) CFL bulbs. They shouldn't even be close to the end of their life yet. So this morning he decided to check it out. And we're both glad he did.

The first thing he realized was that the light fixture wasn't attached to the ceiling very well. In fact, hardly at all. When he took it down, about 20 acorns and other miscellaneous "stuff" fell out of the ceiling. 

He ended up taking down the drywall in this part of the ceiling because he wanted to clean out all of the acorns and debris, and also get a better look at the wiring. This staircase is one of the areas we're planning on completely gutting so I had no problem with this.The drywall would have come down eventually anyways.

R went to Lowe's and bought a new electrical box and a simple $1 light bulb holder similar to this. We figured it would be fine as a temporary fixture until we could get to gutting and remodeling the whole staircase. However, just like everything in our house, it just wasn't that simple. After a couple hours of staring and testing, R decided he wasn't comfortable enough messing with the wiring. It appears that it wasn't done correctly (in fact, there's all black burn marks on the back of the drywall and wood showing that the wires/fixture got too hot) in the first place, and some of the wires were frayed, so we both decided it would be best to have a professional look at it. Until then, we don't have any electricity in the back half of the house (both upstairs and downstairs). The only room with power back there is the upstairs bathroom and the attic. So we've been using a lot of flashlights and extension cords :)

Coop Progress

This weekend we got a lot of work done on the coop. 

On Saturday R installed the insulation and plywood on the walls. For now we just insulated the walls that are inside the coop area. We were originally going to insulate all of the walls and ceiling, but now we're thinking we might just get some sheets of rigid foam insulation to put on top of the coop and to put on the interior wall during the winter. It'll be a lot easier to keep just that part warm in the winter.

Sunday, I installed the vinyl flooring and started putting up the chicken wire. I used a roll of vinyl flooring from Lowe's, which was very easy to install. Rather than buying the $25 container of flooring adhesive, I bought a $9 roll of flooring tape, which I used on all of the exposed edges. And I didn't even use half of it. Cheaper and quicker than the flooring adhesive.

The chicken wire is actually plastic poultry mesh. We bought it about a month ago, with the intention to build them a little outside area to play in while they were still small. We never built it because I was too scared about them being picked up by a hawk (I really shouldn't read stuff online... it makes me paranoid). The roll we bought is 3'x25', which is perfect.. I have 4 sections that are 3' wide and 6' tall.

I ended up breaking our staple gun, and R wasn't home when I broke it (of course). I tried to fix it, but I've never really used it before so I'm not sure what was wrong, other than that the staples weren't coming out anymore. I think it might be jammed or something. By the time R got home it was late and we were both exhausted, so he said he'd fix it for me tonight. So I didn't get to finish putting up the wire, and the chicks still aren't able to move into their new home. Patrick did visit it today though and approved.

A Permanent Dryer Vent

This is what we've had to do every time we do laundry for the past year... Stick an adjustable dryer vent out the window. Not cool when it's snowing or raining, or when bugs decide to take you up on the open window invitation.

So we had my dad come over this afternoon to help us install a permanent dryer vent. We not only needed expertise, but also his non-exisitant fear of heights (our laundry room is on the second floor and there was no way either of us were getting up on a ladder).


We first had to decide on a location. I thought that from the outside it would look best if the vent were centered under the window. However, from the inside, that would mean I'd still somewhat see the metal vent between the dryer and washing machine. So we decided to just put it directly behind the dryer, about a foot off the floor. Of course in an old house nothing works out the way you want.

Both R and I were working on other projects, and after about an hour I went upstairs to check on my dad. Still no vent.. not even a big hole in the wall! He kept drilling small holes in the wall, only to have his drill get stuck and refuse to go any further. He kept leaning out the window to see what he could possibly be hitting (like the shutter?), but there wasn't anything he could see. Finally he got a big enough hole (about 2' higher than we had originally decided on) to see inside the wall... There was a big corner brace coming off of the beam in my bedroom closet, going down to the floor at a 45° angle. Now that he could actually see what he kept hitting, he was able to go a little bit above it and cut a larger hole. Only to run into more problems. The first layer was plaster, then lathe, then the brace (plus some other random vertical boards, which looked newer, and didn't really have any purpose, lots of blown in insulation (basically just a bunch of fibers), then some newer blown in foam insulation, then really really thick sheathing (this is where the drill kept getting stuck) and finally the wood siding.

What was suppose to be a quick afternoon project, of course, was anything but that. Because of everything in the wall it was very very hard for my dad to get a hole big enough for the vent. Eventually he was able to get it to fit, but of course by then it was 6:00, and we were all exhausted. Spending over 6 hours laboring in the sun and 85° weather isn't a lot of fun. 

Some night this week R will have to caulk around the vent, fill in the holes in the wall and reconnect the dryer. Until then I can't do laundry.. don't you feel bad for me? :) But basically it's done.. which makes me really really excited.. No more opening a window just to do laundry!

Kitchen Floor

We have been without a kitchen floor for a year now. This was the floor when we bought the house:

It matched the actual brick hearth just so well. For some odd reason though, the floor just wasn't for us. Not sure if it was the fact that it was so dirty it was a completely different color underneath the cabinets (so different it looked like a completely different floor) or the fact that it was just flat out hideous.

I first started tearing it up in September of last year. Thanks to a heat wave, I didn't get much done. I got back at it after Christmas, using a Christmas present from my mom. It is not fun work. R kept telling me I was wasting my time. He felt that it would be okay to put the new floor over the lovely brick. I, for some reason, just wanted it gone.

So this has been my kitchen floor for the past 9 months.... That's four kinds of flooring you're seeing there.. Brick, brick underlayment, another type of brick, and dirty nasty plywood. Nice, huh?

In May I got a quote from a contractor I work with to tear up the existing plywood (with brick) and the original sub-floor that is underneath. They would then put down either some new plywood or the existing plywood. While this seems pointless, it would make it so that our kitchen floor isn't raised up 2" from the other rooms. While the quote was very very fair, it was just too much for us to spend right now. We're still considering this..

We did make a step in the whole "get S an actual floor" process. We actually picked out a floor! That we like! And won't look fake. Pretty much every floor we found in our price range just looked ridiculous next to our 240 year old 20" wide floors.

This floor is Bruce's Cliffton Plank Cherry. It's a 5" wide 3/8" engineered hardwood. It can be glued down or installed as a floating floor. It can also be installed on plywood, wood, concrete or vinyl flooring.

We had narrowed it down to 3 different color choices. Copper Kettle (shown above), Sangria and Ponderosa. After having the samples sitting on our kitchen floor for about 3 weeks, and asking everyone who came to our house, we finally decided on Copper Kettle. It goes well with the Living Room and Dining Room floors (which are different colors), but doesn't exactly match, which is good because it doesn't look like we were trying to match it exactly. It also looks great with our kitchen table and my baking cabinet, which both have cherry tops.

Cookbook Storage

Remember that 100+ year old wooden box that I got at a tag sale last month? I found the perfect place for it. I filled it with my smaller cookbooks and extra recipe cards and put it on the shelf above the cookbooks. It looks so cute! And it comes in handy. The small cookbooks were always getting lost between the larger normal sized ones and I was always losing my blank recipe cards!

Front Hall/Staircase

One of our larger upcoming projects is the front hall (upstairs and downstairs) and the front stairs. I don't have a paint color picked out yet, but I'm leaning towards a light, neutral color, either a light beige or gray. The color will have to match four rooms (two bedrooms (green and blue), the Living Room (tan) and the Dining Room (gray-blue). All of the trim and the stairs will be painted white. I'm still undecided about what to do with the treads. They currently have old boring carpet on them, which is also in the upstairs front hall. I haven't decided yet if I want to get a runner and install wood flooring upstairs (it's plywood upstairs under the carpet) or leave it wood and stain it. We'll also be re-painting the front door and installing two new light fixtures (one downstairs on the wall next to the closet and one upstairs centered on the stairs/hall). And the biggest project will be replacing the ceiling. It's old plaster and is all cracked and peeling. Painting the ceiling and walls will be fun too.. yay..

Here are some "before" pictures, taken when we first viewed the house last year (stuff in pictures isn't ours).

Looking in from the Dining Room

This was the ceiling a year ago.. it's only getting worse..

Our old-fashioned doorbell

I love this shelf! I'm not sure what to put on it though. Any suggestions?

The upstairs Front Hall

Looking in at the Guest Bedroom