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Old Kitchen & Old Appliances (And our realtor)

Demo Begins

09/14/09: Baby arrived, kitchen is a long way off still. Definitely could use some appliances!
These kids deserve a great kitchen!

The before and "almost" after

Behr "Cream Rose" on Top, and Behr "Sandblast" on the bottom. I have to add the white chair rail, new ceiling fan, one more coat of paint in the closet, fix up the closet with lights and clothing racks and shelves, rehang the doors, and replace the chimney vent. Oh yeah, and touch up the ceiling. Then the floors just need to be resanded. There's just a few things left to do! LOL!

Whoops!

Ok, I am totally blaming this on pregnancy brain. I finished the first gallon of paint in the Master bedroom, and started to work on painting with the second gallon. I quickly realized the 2nd gallon was darker, and was blaming the paint mixer at Home Depot. It occurred to me to check out the paint lids to make sure they both were belgian sweet...(I think you know where this story is going)... The original gallon was actually Toffee crunch, but for some unknown (pregnancy) reason i had it in my head that it was belgian sweet. Well, whatever. The room is now a shade darker, and that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Color Scheme

The Color scheme for the master bedroom is this chocolate brown by Behr (Belgian Sweet)

With White trim, a white headboard and white and aqua bedding. (Pillow by Target)

The Bathroom before

Current upstairs bathroom status...

Girl's room

We have been experimenting with lots of different pink colors in the girl's room, and I think we have finally settled on one.

This is the closet in the girls room. Don't know if you can tell that I painted it lavender.

Jared and his dad jacked up the kitchen and bathroom from the basement, and the result is some new fractures in the old plaster. Yikes! Guess they really moved things.

Some color on the walls, at least

More Progress Reports

Jared, per usual, has been just as busy as I have been, working in the downstairs. The latest and greatest news is that we not only have water running to the house, but it actually comes out of a spigot! This is exciting stuff. The two outdoor spigots, and the utility sink in the basement are all plumbed. Now for some HOT water...

Jared has also been busy framing things up, which is also very exciting, because I am starting to see all of our "plans" laid out in reality. Super Cool. He has divided the bathroom and the pantry. Check it out below:

The claw foot tub encased. Such a lovely room, why did we have to go and ruin it?

Mmmmmm...Where the bathtub WAS.

The divider separates the new pantry from the bathroom . In the foreground will be the pantry. Our fridge will be sunk in towards the left of this picture.

The wall between the bathroom and the dining room. We will put frosted glass in the squares at the top of the walls.

"Pecan sandie"

Pain in the Paint

So, I didn't think picking paint colors would be so darn hard! But as it turns out, I am by no means a natural designer, because what I think I like, I don't like when it goes on the walls. Here is the master bedroom. Thought I would like the dark brown. Don't like. Thought I would like the trim color. Want something brighter white. Think I like the light beige-ey color, and I may, but I am still deciding! I think I am going to stick with the light color, and we have switched the trim to a whiter white. We'll see if the changes stick. Hopefully I like the color I picked out for Helena's room!

Problems with Insurance

Boy oh boy are insurance carriers a load of balogna. Yes they are willing to take our money and be our insurance carrier if we live in a brand new house, with no visible signs of wear... Argh.. I am a little bit frustrated with travelers insurance for dropping us after doing a visual exterior inspection. I'm not sure what we are going to do, but it probably includes going with a local company. I guess that is better for the Maine economy anyhow!

The Day that Got Better.

My Mom is visiting from out of town, and this gave me the opportunity to work on the house without the kids around. I went over with plans to roll out the bedroom ceiling with paint. The problem was when I started to do this ALL OF THE CEILING PAINT WAS STICKING TO THE ROLLER! So I spent the next hour painting the ceiling by hand with a paintbrush. Not exactly fun times. However the day did get better, as I was able to roll out the girl's ceiling, finish priming the trim in their room, put a final joint compound layer on the holes, and then ***JOY*** I got to paint the trim in the master bedroom with real official color. And by color I mean slightly off-white...
And while I was doing all of this, Jared was working on getting the beams installed in the kitchen, which is almost finished.

The first Beam installed.

second beam tied into first

Both Beams completely installed. Wow! I'm so glad we decided to take down that wall between the DR and Kitchen.

Bedroom

A different Before and after view. Note the skilled cover up job on the ugly chimney vent. (Gotta say, I am a little bit proud!)

Bedroom update

The before, of course

The Middle

All Primed and ready to paint

Trim Paint on

Sample paint on the wall, closets painted with 2 coats.

One big Lesson in Patience

Things are a bit slow right now. We have been back from our trip for two weeks (almost) and I think we are having trouble getting back into the swing of things. It didn't help that Jared's band had a show last weekend and that Helena, and now Odessa came down with the good old fashioned flu. I'm just praying that Jared and I stay healthy, because that will really put us back! I did manage to prime all the trim in the Master bedroom and roll out the walls with primer. I started to roll out the ceiling, but I was getting flaking, so I went back and painted over much of it with a paintbrush, which I hope will help the paint stick to the ceiling when I roll it with a roller. (Phew, that was a sentence!) I patched some holes in the closets, and finished patching and sanding the girls' room. And I filled some of the holes in the hall and stairway. It really sounds like more work than it was. It's always amazing to me that the prepping for painting is really the most time consuming thing! I always think "i'll be painting tomorrow" and then I have to put down tape, and vacuum the floors and walls, and use a tack cloth, and then I'm like "oops! I forgot all my painting supplies at the other house!" Renovating is just one big lesson in patience!

On a side note, I was getting kind of bummed out about the quality of the walls in the girls bedroom, and was starting to second guess myself, if I should be skim coating them. But, now that our room is finished I realized that perfect walls+two curious little girls=an unhappy mother! I will be able to worry less about them doing "damage" to all my hard work if I leave the walls in their bedroom the way they are!

We're Outta here!

Heading to Vermont this weekend for a weekend away from house work!  Painting the master bedroom will just have to wait!

The old door to the left, including the wall still in tact.

Door removed, and widened and wall gone!

Jared at work

Beautiful New Door!
New Door

What Jared's been up to

So while I have been laboring away in the bedrooms, Jared has been keeping himself busy with about a billion other projects. Last weekend his dad came over to help out, and they did a lot of discussing about how to properly remove the old studs, and replace with a header beam, so we would have a more open concept between the dining room, kitchen and the sunroom. They have so far successfully, removed one whole section of wall (beam still to come) and we have one more section to remove. It is so cool! Especially since it was getting hard for me to fit through the spaces between the 2x4's. Now I just breeze right through. : )

The Before! Looking into the dining room through to the kitchen.

What is under all that vinyl anyhow? REAL hard wood.

Same view but with less walls!

And the more open concept. The support beams will go once the header is in place. And then the studs between the sunroom and kitchen will come down too.

The job finished with two support headers in place, and all 2x4's removed!

Then today, he thought it would be good to install one of our new front doors. He started on the sun room door. Since the weather has gotten warmer we haven't been able to properly latch it, let alone dead bolt it! We replaced the old 32" nine light with a giant 36" one light, and it is so cool. I hate to put a privacy curtain on it, it look so good like it is! Pics to come!