Monday, August 30, 2010

Pepco is here! Hooray electricity!

Friday, August 27, 2010

UPDATE---MOVING IN....

hey all...its been a hectic week as we prepare to MOVE IN this Monday [8/30/10]

the house is mostly done...touch ups still to come....the kitchen still needs some lovin....but Mr. Pepco is scheduled to come on 8/30 to give us juice, so we're coming in right behind him

stay tuned....

Sunday, August 22, 2010

New/Old doorknobs...

this one was all Jenny....
after spending 10 weekends in a row stripping old doors of toxic lead paint, they were finally primed, painted and hung by the crew.  all we were missing was the hardware: knobs, locks, and strikeplates.  since the doors were old school [and were already cut for the old-style locks], we decided to go old school on the hardware too.  the original doors, had original handles, but most of it was too far gone to salvage.  and there wasnt enough of it that matched.

so then came Jenny to the rescue.

through the power of Ebay and her usual persistence, we obtained 5 sets of 100yr old door hardware [and some other odds and ends that people threw into the packages too.  anyone need a crystal door handle?]

the result: REALLY COOL doorknobs that give the new place some more of that old-time flava.

check em out

Friday, August 20, 2010

We didnt forget about the basement....

the basement is key...its going to be an income-generating rental unit.

so the idea is to make it [almost] as nice as the upstairs....
as spacious and open as possible  [check]
a nice kitchen [almost check]
a large bedroom [check] and
wood flooring [check]

we've devoted more resources recently to getting the upper levels ready, so the basement is moving along at a slightly slower pace, but not too far behind.  yesterday, they finished up the wood flooring...it looks great [even if its only a synthetic-factory-blend of wood like products]

looks pretty good to me!

New Front Door....

we finally have a new front door.  and its GLORIOUS  [pics here]

for the first time, i walked out of the house and used a regular old key to lock the door.   no padlock. no heavy chain.  pretty cool, I think.

and: you may notice the transom above the door that was written aboiut waaaay back when.  looks real nice in the sunlight.

the only kink in the plan is that we dont have any front steps yet, so I had to do a superfly snooka jump off the door threshold onto a not-so-stable plywood platform.

safe: no.  liberating: sorta.  exciting: definitely.


pics here

Monday, August 16, 2010

The Finishing Continues....

here are some photos of the trims, doors, moldings etc.  all the finishing work is coming along very well.  I'm a huge fan of the crown moldings against the brick.  looks sharp.

The [not so] Big Dig

so we've mentioned having a second entrance to the basement through the front of the house.  Waaaaay back in the day, the house actually had a front entrance, but it was closed in for some dumb reason.  so now we're going to bring it back to its past glory [and it gives us the most important piece for the income-generating rental that we have down there]

we've been waiting MONTHS to get started on this...mostly because we wanted to do it after the utility companies did their thing...but we could not wait any longer! [and yes, that means we still dont have gas or electric]

so we started digging.

a few jackhammers and truckloads of hauled-away dirt later...we have a nice sized hole that will eventually have steps and a door to the new apartment.  pretty cool.  see it here.

Sunday, August 15, 2010

Kitchen Preview

the kitchen cabinets are going in now....we still have a few adjustments to make with them before the countertops, hood, and shelving can be installed, but they are looking GOOD so far.  I like the rich color [i mean, i chose it, so of course it like it!]

peep the preview HERE.

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

The Haves...and the Have-nots...

we've had a little break in the posting action, but not because we ain't been doin nothin!

quite the opposite.

we're about 2 weeks away from the move-in date...and its both exciting and frikkin scary.

some things are done...others are not.

for example:

We DO have: wood floors [pictures here]

We DON'T have: electricity

We DO have: working toilets [pictures of the new bathrooms here]

We DON'T have: natural gas

We DO have: a backdoor entrance for the basement apartment

We DON'T have: a frontdoor entrance to the basement apartment

so, yeah, we're making progress in alot of areas, but  still waiting on others.  the crew is working double-time to get it all finished, and its looking GREAT.....but there's just alot to do.

we're keeping the faith though.  and since we kind of have a hard "out" of jenny's place at the end of August, delaying things is NOT an option [one more thing we don't have!]  but we'll be close enough to start setting up and continue working on the little things until we're "done" [but are you ever really done?]

keep your fingers crossed for us...we're gonna need it

Sunday, August 1, 2010

All the pretty colors....

its FINALLY looking like a house!  we got paint....

Jenny and I spent a fair amount of time looking over paint chips and deciding what goes where.  after the tug-of-war was over ;-)  we let the crew know what to do.

it took them just a few short days to spray the walls with a few coats of paint and completely transform the house.

no more of that spackle/primer look.

say hello to:  "Silver Birch" "Slipstream" "Wheat Bread" and "Gentle Rain"

its just lovely.

AND: if you take a good look at the pics, you will see those old doors that we spent MONTHS stripping.  well, they are finally done and the crew primed + painted them as well.  they look really good.   it was worth the effort.