Second Weekend of Renovations

Hello to all who have been patiently awaiting this blog post... :)

The second weekend of renovations was very productive. Again, thanks to my dad, mom, Debbie, Manny, and Katie for all of your hard work and much needed help! We have gotten so much done...and this wouldn't have been possible without you!

So on to our progress....
The master suite (ha - yeah right) is complete. Take a look at the before and afters! It isn't really that dramatic of a change, but a lot of painting, cleaning, painting, and painting went into this room. You will also notice that on the pic of me and my mom there are white bubble spots...could that be Casper - or just the sunlight???


And no, that is not a pile of sand on the floor...the previous owners smeared paint all over the hardwoods in that room. Who does that?

Another great accomplishment is that the kitchen is no longer green! Whoo hoo! So now, the sitting room and kitchen are the same color. This color should go great with the granite countertops and tile flooring that we have picked out. We hope to have the tile flooring done this week...

The brick backsplash is still intact, much to my dismay. But I think that I am going to wait until I re-do the countertops to tackle that project. So that must mean that countertops are just around the corner! And then we will work on the appliances. As you will notice, we do not have a refrigerator....so I will update next week on how life is going living out of a cooler. Knowing me, there will only be one post about that before I just bite the bullet and buy one.

Moving right along...we transformed the cutsey little baby's room into what I like to call 'An Old World Office.' We actually haven't transformed it yet, because the walls haven't been painted, but we are on our way there! Wall color will be 'Muted Gold' for all you Kilz lovers...

In this room, we will have a very large rug because we were informed that there isn't really anything that can be done to get rid of the big black pet stains...unless we want to replace the boards. And since hardwood refinishing was not initially in the budget...board replacement is definitely not in the budget.

And to contradict my previous statement, the hardwoods are actually being refinished this week. I found a company called Mr. Sandless (mrsandless.com) that comes out and refinishes the floors with chemicals and a brillo pad...not really, but that is the dumbed down version. They will be able to remove all of the paint and 'stuff' from the floors, and then stain all of the hardwoods the same color. I've heard good and bad things about the company...so I'll let you know how they do. They are scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday afternoon...keep your fingers crossed.

And say adios to the dark and dingy fireplace and hola to the recently primed fireplace! The color chosen will be a cream color...no official Kilz color picked yet. I may have to stray...Home Depot is closer to work than WalMart is!

Doesn't it brighten up the room?!? And Shane was able to clean all of the soot and stuff out so we are starting fire on a clean slate!

And, last but not least, the hallway from hell. Jennie and Katie started this project last weekend, thinking they would be taking down wallpaper. Well, wallpaper came off and revealed more wallpaper underneath, which was apparently adhered to the walls with something similar to Super Glue. Which is where Manny comes in...as he attempts to start taking down the second layer of wallpaper, it starts to rip off layers of the sheetrock. Which apparently, in the 1960's sheetrock was a beautiful shade of teal. So after he literally puts blood, sweat, and tears (I am sure that he had at least 5 nervous breakdowns in the bathroom) into this project, skim coats with plaster of Paris (not sure if you capitalize that word...it's a proper noun, right?), we are ready for some paint....which I don't have picked out yet. But I think I'll let Shane take the lead on this one...he loves Dried Fava...again for the Kilz fans. Do I have any Duron lovers out there? Sherwin Williams fans - get your hands up! Benjamin Moore, you in the house?...(silence) Moving right along!

This past weekend was rough. My dad, who is a renovating/moving/yardwork machine, even sat out on Sunday. But he was there every day this week...I simply stopped by to supervise his work. :)

I can definitely say that this is MUCH harder than I thought that it would be. I don't know if I'll ever say any of the following phrases EVER AGAIN:

"Oh, this color sucks. No biggie...we can just paint it!"

"Hardwood refinishing isn't that big of a deal, is it?"

"Let's take this wallpaper down."

"Hey Shane, let's buy a fixer upper! That would be super fun!"

Well, I might say the last one again, but it will be when I am at a point in my life and career where I have at least $5K per month spending money to pay people to paint, do yard work, take down wallpaper, clean, etc., etc., etc. I will be anxiously awaiting that day...

We plan to move in this weekend. We have to move in this weekend - I need furnished pictures for next week's blog entry... :)