13 months later....

Then

and now...

Master bed room then...

and now...

Third bedroom then...

and now..

The bed does not stay... the curtains are blue..

The second bedroom then..

we used it as a kitchen for awhile..

and now..

yes, i need to add curtains and and apparently a register cover!  How did we miss that? And maybe some pictures! And none too soon as our first guests arrive the evening of the 27th of October!!

The kitchen before..

and the kitchen after...

The living room before..

don't you love the lawn chair? 

and the living room now...

click on this to make it bigger... Rich made both chairs, the end table between the chairs, the desk and the desk chair... We aren't sure if this will all stay this way, but after 13 months, we wanted it to look like someone lived there... That brown thing on the floor is a rolled up rug...

The dining room before..

the dining room is that room behind the table...  when we bought it there was drywall and plywood on the walls. This is the best before photo i could find...

Dining room after...

we can't add the hanging light until the table is in there...  We have a buffet, table and pie safe to go in there...and we aren't sure where the table will end up..

This weekend was all about getting it done..

I used these to scrap all the paint off of ALL the windows...then cleaned the windows inside and out, mopped the floors, scrubbed the bathrooms and the house is all clean and ready to move into..

This just might become my regular vacuum .. it really sucks up the dust..

Sad to say that the Magnetic Paint I talked about here...  EPIC FAIL.  This area is roughly 3ft x 3ft.  I used almost the whole quart of magnetic paint and it won't hold a magnet.  NOT HAPPY!!  And I will be calling the 800 number on the back of the can... So this weekend I gave up ... I painted over the black with some leftover white...

And painted over the white with the blue... Yes, there is a big black spot in the middle.  Stay tuned..you will see what ends up there...soon...I hope...

Rich worked on these projects....

lots of tools...

to add this to the living room wall...

For this...a 46 inch flat screen...sure wish we had our satellite hooked up..can't wait for Friday..

Three smoke detectors added and two CO2 detectors added.  Not surprisingly we found NO smoke detectors or CO2 detectors in this whole house when we bought it.  And we have a propane water heater..that wasn't vented properly..

We really tried to reuse the track lighting from the kitchen here in the sewing room.  But it soon became apparent that something wasn't working as two of the lights didn't work.  So this morning we ventured into town and bought new track lights...  We also bought the bulbs...we even had the guy help us find the correct bulbs...we don't have the correct bulbs...so we left one light off the track to take to the store and get the correct bulbs...

He also helped a friend of his haul off all the wooden walkway... and he installed a plug in the basement for the freezer...

Nancy

the small things...

It's getting close ...  A week from today our doorbell will ring and the packers will be here to move us.  I have spent the last two weeks cleaning out drawers and closets, donating stuff we don't want to take with us, and today I cleaned out both freezers.  I have called two electric companies, two telephone companies, two water companies and changed email addresses on Flickr and Facebook.  I have attempted to contact our trash company here and have attempted to figure out who our trash company is at the new house.  I got my hair cut for the last time here this morning...and need to find a new hairdresser in the new town. (I think I have a lead)   We have decided to purchase a flat screen tv before moving and have called a local crisis center and donated our current tv to them...along with the stand, a vcr and various kids tapes...  (luckily for us they agreed to pick it up next Tuesday so we aren't without news!) 

Part of the sewing room... table from breakfast room here will become the table for my sewing buddies (they better come!)  The little wood tv tray will become their personal ironing surface..nothing is too good for my sewing buddies...

This is some of my sewing stuff waiting to be put away... I'm hoping to persuade pay a grandkid to come help me...

I painted this dresser this past weekend.  It used to hold all my paperback books (that were given away) and will now hold my tv in the sewing room.

register cover added to sewing room floor

another register cover added to sewing room floor

register cover added to kitchen

After realizing that the magnetic paint didn't hold a magnet, I added another coat of the paint.  If it doesn't work this time it will become an epic fail and I will paint blue over it...which will mean another three coats of blue to paint over the black...sigh...

Meanwhile, Rich worked outside on Saturday...and I helped him finish up on Sunday...

no more wooden walkway up next to the house

no more wooden walkway from the house to the garage

some of the wooden walkway removed from the hillside.

We used a sawzall, a crowbar and a truck with a chain to remove all this wooden walkway.  We also removed a lot of miscellaneous bricks, rocks and pieces of wood that were strewn all over the yard.

We now have four piles, one pile of bricks, one pile of wooden walkway, one pile of rocks and one pile of railroad ties...  We have a friend that is taking all the wooden walkway this weekend.

This weekend we have more small things to do...

Hang curtains in son's room..
clean all windows, floors, kitchen and both bathrooms...
add electric box in basement for freezer (we I decided to locate the freezer in the basement instead of the back hallway)
help deliver all that wooden walkway..
clean out freezer so I can move the leftovers from here to there...


Nancy

Behold....

the beauty of concrete...

I spread a sealer so it will clean nicely...

I can't wait to cover all that gravel with dirt....and get some solar lights...

and now you don't have to walk underneath the eaves of the house to get to the front door.  I hated that..

her graceful curve...

her long stretch to the driveway...

The day the contractor came to do the shop pad we talked to him about doing a sidewalk. He gave us a price and we said "Yes"...  I kind of walked him up and told him with arms sweeping "I want it to come from the porch and around a corner and to the left of the plantings and then end here" which we marked with two pieces of re-bar from his truck.  I am ecstatic.. I love my sidewalk.. I love a small  town where you just tell someone what you want and they do it. And they do it right.  We didn't give him any money upfront and there was no bill hanging on the door.  We know that he will either send us a bill or stop by and get paid.  And he knows we will pay..

because we have a garage that needs a pad.

Nancy

numbers...

4200 - the number of American dollars it took to get this...  the slab for Rich's workshop.   We rolled  two coats of concrete sealer on it to protect it and make it easier to sweep.  The workshop will be delivered within the next few weeks.  The building is situated right across from the garage and in front of the house. 

32 - the number of minutes it took two adults to locate the water line in the basement... it was hiding under the steps and above the duct work...

13 - the number of ice cubes in the first batch...

6 - the number of lakes we saw here.. Sunday evening we decided to take a bit of a break and drive through this conservation area.  You have to hike to the creek and that certainly wasn't on our agenda so we just slowly drove through and looked.  

5 - the number of  frogs turtles that were sitting on this rock as we drove by...  they jumped as soon as Rich put the truck in reverse to snap a photo.

3 - the number of cans of white spray paint it took to transform this formally red night stand..  I am now on the lookout for a used queen size head board to spray to match.  These are for the guest room. I also need to decide on a quilt and drapes for this room.  The room is pale yellow (think butter), dark floors and white furniture... any color combo's you think would be pretty?  I would like something without gray since that's what our room will be.  

1 - the number of laundry tubs we installed this weekend.  Next weekend we will put a couple of shelves up there...

Rich had to remove a couple of sections of the walkway.. and that one step from the porch because..

 when the concrete guys come back to remove the concrete forms and pick up this..

(which sat in the driveway all weekend), they are going to make a SIDEWALK!!  We will actually have a sidewalk from the gravel drive to the front porch..  you have no idea how exciting it will be not to have to sidestep the dog poop to get to the front door..and if those dogs poop on my sidewalk heads will roll!!


And that was our weekend... 

Nancy

EDIT - not sure why that one part of the text has a white background. I have tried everything to get rid of it so just know that I am not yelling, complaining or asking you to find me a headboard. lol Just can't get that highlighted text to go away...