Looks a bit different than when we started, huh? :)

So while the installation man does his thing, grumbling to himself about never doing an old house again, I putter around and paint doors, paint the trim that will go along the floor, and get covered in soot from cleaning out more of the fireplace. I cleaned the top two floors of the house, removing all the plaster dust and feeling quite satisfied with myself, as that was one thing I could mark off my Saturday to-do list. The cleanliness lasted about four hours, until more of the chimney in the attic (By the way, the chimney coming out is a different one than the one attached to the fireplace we've been working on. We have, or I should say had, 3 chimneys in this house.) was beat down by a certain individual, and now the top two floors are coated in chimney dust instead.  At that point, I just gave up and relegated myself to the dungeon, er, basement, to do more laundry. You know in Anne of Avonlea where Diana Berry talks about how many doilies she has to have before she can get married? My mom would have had them all impressed, because I must have washed no less than 317 doilies by hand today. Alright, it wasn't quite that bad, but pretty close. :)

But progress is being made! Tomorrow I can do the last coat on the front door, and hopefully start painting in the hallway. Once the floor is done, the trim can be put in, then we can wash all the woodwork and the windows, and do touch-up in all the rooms. I'm not thinking any further than that at this point, but the rest of the week involves moving all the furniture back, cleaning the house from top to bottom, a wisdom teeth removal (not for me; I'm just the nurse), and some social functions to attend. Then, of course, Saturday night is the big revealing as my parents will be home to see what we have done. :) I'm really tired just thinking about it all!!!

My second oldest brother (who happens to be in town and can lend us his help :) ) tackled the plaster wall in the hallway with the help of another guy from church. They knocked the whole thing down, coating our entire house with a layer of dust in the process. Even though we sheeted off the work area and I closed all the bedroom doors, every room in the house was affected by the dust, even all the way up in the attic. Yuck! Then they put up drywall in its place, but it's really so much more interesting than that, because it involved rewiring a couple light switches, and de-plastering behind the radiator. Of course, electrical stuff meant they had to find the correct breaker for the hallway, always a fun chore.

I quietly worked in my own little corner, wielded my little paintbrush and finished painting the living room.

I took the fireplace apart and cleaned it out. Tried scrubbing the door but it just fell to pieces. In the end, we decided to leave it off anyway and painted the back black. It still needs some work around the edges, but it looks tons better!

In between I kept everyone supplied with iced tea and coffee, painted the screen door and all its hardware, painted the hardware from the main door, taught piano, did laundry, babysat, and mourned the dusty house. Once everything was relatively done, we had a lot of work to do in cleaning up in preparation for the floor installation. The floor installation is the reason all this madness began! And oh, how the madness abounds! :)

The dining room is done being painted, and the living room is almost there. (About eight feet of wall, two doors, and two windows left) Then it's on to the hallway!

So, first pictures from Day Two, with a few explanations.

I failed to get a picture of the hallway yesterday. If I had taken a picture on Day One, there would have been brown carpet on the floor, and the register would have been an interesting stain/yellow color. Obviously, the carpet is now gone and the register is a glossy white, thanks to my complaining index finger.

Day Two in the dining room consisted of taking off the closet door, taking down the fireplace mantel, ripping out the carpet and luan (not sure how to spell that) underneath, and spackling holes in the wall. And cleaning the ceiling, which won't be painted.

What's that hiding behind the ladder? Why, it's another register! Imagine that.

The living room looks soooo much bigger!! We ripped the carpet in here as well, and a small portion of linoleum. Believe it or not from the pictures, the floor was actually swept...about three times. :)

See that? Two more registers. They are out to kill me.

There were many, many holes to be spackled in our walls. We like our pictures. :)

Day Three:

Not too much progress in the living room. Those boards will be the sub-floor.

Some subfloor was already put down in the living room. Nothing changed in the hallway, so I didn't even bother photographing that.

The dining room is where we spent the whole entire day. I painted all the trim first (I know it doesn't look different, but trust me, it is one hair of a shade darker than before. :) All the little chips and cracks are now smoothly painted over, and it is an eggshell finish rather than semigloss.)

After I painted the trim, I started cutting in the walls, and because we have paneling with deep rivets, there was a lot of cutting in to do. You can see the difference between the whites on that wall. We went from flat bright white, to an eggshell ivory. I think it will be a much softer look.

My older brother worked the whole day on putting the mantle back up and installing the subfloor. Oh, and the chimney guys showed up to work on my library chimney (yay!) so he had to put the roof back together when they were done. He was a busy guy.

You can see the subfloor better in this picture. That big pile of long boxes is the new floor which is being installed on Tuesday.

If you can tell in the above photo, I did actually finish some walls completely (to the right of the door). First thing tomorrow I will finish rolling this room, then do some touchup and I can move on to painting the living room.

I'm going to go bury my head now and wonder why I ever brought this upon myself. :)

Here are pictures from day one of the remodel project, which was actually Wednesday. Thursday and Friday's pictures will be posted tomorrow. Basically, Wednesday was spent boxing all the small stuff up and moving it to other parts of the house. We seriously have a lot of 'stuff.' It was pretty annoying, but it's not really mine to throw away, so I just boxed until I ran out of boxes, then I bagged, hampered, stacked, piled, and shuffled.

Rejoice with me! The brown shag is now forever gone!!! :)

To this:: (boarded up holes, nailed up ceiling, and a large white curtain, for aesthetic purposes):

From this:: (plaster decay, lazy remodelers):

To this:: (BAMBOO!!!!!)

Walking through our local home improvement/garden center one day, I happened upon a roll of bamboo:

It particularly caught my eye, because a) I like bamboo, b) it was cheap (although not as cheap as paint), and c) I had a large staircase of plaster that was giving me much grief. I wanted to just paint over all the plaster, but that wouldn't have helped with the structural problems of the wall. I, however, am not a wall rebuilder, so I did the next best thing. I covered it all up. :)

With bamboo walls, a chalkboard wall, newly painted doors and trim, and a curtain to hide the boards haphazardly strewn across the ceiling, the hallway is COMPLETE!

(Can you see the light switch? It has been cleverly 'hidden.' :) )

Now on to the library. The chimney man came and gave his verdict, which is that the whole thing must be taken out, rather than patched up. It means a bigger mess and longer wait, but it also means a bigger room in the end. :)

So first, what have we done? A new light fixture in the bedroom...

This was a big deal to me, and a brilliant idea of my brother's. Previously, there was just a double socket with a pull-chain here...no shades, just stark light. The main problem is that there aren't any light switches, and with only two windows in the attic (one on either end) it tends to get pretty dark even with lots of lamps (and as you might imagine, there are only a couple power outlets). We bought a light fixture that is actually meant to mount on the bottom of a ceiling fan (so it has a pull-chain) and then three smoked globes to go with it. It works beautifully.

Since I can't work in the library, I started looking at the hallway, which is in pretty bad shape. It also lets in bats, which you already know. At first I just painted the trim a nice blue to tie it all together. (It previously had three or four different trim colors.) But then that blank white wall started getting to me, so I did this:

Not too bad, but it turned out a bit messier than I anticipated and with a little inspiration from a next-door friend and good timing at the home improvement store, I picked up a can of chalkboard paint. In chocolate brown. Here is a rather fuzzy picture of the difference:

Now this wall has scribbling all over it by my brother, but I really do like the way it turned out.

Just painting that one wall makes the rest of the hallway look pretty bad. :) Don't you love it when that happens? I have time to work on it, though, while we are waiting for the chimney man. So once I get Mr. Muscles to help me fix the ceiling, I plan on painting the rest of the walls. Want to see the ceiling? This is the view if you look straight up from the bottom of the stairs.

Just look at those holes and sags! The light fixture also will be replaced, although that will probably be the last step in this hallway.

One reason I hesitated to paint the hallway was because of this wall and the one that is opposite to it.

That, my friends, is some sort of plaster wall which is literally falling apart. What exactly they did to it, I have no clue. What we were going to do, I had no clue, and then...brilliant inspiration! But you'll just have to wait to see what we do. :) 

But the rest of the hallway will have to wait a few days as well. This week marks the end of the trimester for me, so I'm up to my eyeballs in studying and writing papers. By Saturday that will all be behind me, and I'll be armed and ready with my paintbrush!

Het 3 liter bier café is weer open!

Tsjongejonge lieve mensen overal vanwaar U maar kijkt en luistert. Wat een weken weer. Door de crisis van 13 t/m 17 mei vorige week geen top 5 van Uw favoriete muziek, kijk en luisterprogramma. Ik kan U zeggen we zijn weer helemaal terug. Gelukkig maar.  Beleef 't mee, hier live vanuit het 3-liter bier café. Dit is het muziekprogramma van alle tijden voor alle leeftijden. Neemt U er iets lekkers bij. En doe wat U wilt, dat U wilt. We zijn tenslotte niet de nederlandse regering. Wellicht zijn cartoons verboden, maar clips en muziek nog niet. Dan gaan we nu snel door naar ons nummer 5 geluid. Helaas nog geen bewegende beelden. 't Draait hier om het geluid.  Komt ie.

5. (nieuw) Luisa Fernandez - lay love on you

De volgende nieuwe binnenkomer wordt speciaal voor U geîntroduceerd. Disgo-time!

4. (nieuw) KC & The Sunshine Band - do you wanna go party? 

Is dat even lekker. Ik zou zeggen. Zullen we er samen nog 1'tje nemen. OK, gin-tonic mag ook. 't Is zo'n mooi weer. En dan nu een historiese gebeurtenis. Hij zakte in de Dop van de Tube. Maar als eerste artiest in de geschiedenis van deze nog jonge chart heeft ie het tij kunnen keren. De snelste come back ooit gemeten. Let's rock & roll. 

 3. (5) Shakin Stevens - this ole house (3e week)

Ja en dit is het enige café waar U nog mag roken. Niet te geloven. Gaan we nu over naar wat heet - een echte sluimer hit. Bleef stationair op nummer 4, maar nu maar liefst 2 plaatsen gestegen. Dames en heren. Hier is De Bump!

 2. (4) Boney M - baby do you wanna bump? (3e week)

En voordat we belanden bij de nummer 1 moeten we helaas weer afscheid nemen van een aantal artiesten. Earth & Fire en Middle of the Road. Ondanks de grote klasse en misschien hebben ze ook last gehad van de crisis van 13 t/m 17 mei. We zullen het nooit weten. En dan nu onze nummer 1. Het is geen Jaap van de Gouden Kooi geworden en ook niet Yes-R, ondanks zijn 4 miljoen views. Het is gewoon..

1. (1) BZN - mon amour  (2e week)

 Hoop ik U volgende week weer vol vreugde te ontmoeten. Niet zonder een laatste proost..op de liefde. U had het kunnen weten..

Het komt allemaal goed!

Dop van de Tube is een programma van webjockey Disgo.

DOP VAN DE TUBE DE TOP 5 IS LIVE OPGENOMEN VANUIT HET 3-LITER BIER CAFE.

Het 3 liter bier café is weer open!

 Hartelijk welkom allemaal, g lieve mensen, overal waar U maar bent, als U dit maar kan lezen. Welkom bij alweer de zesde aflevering van de dop van de tube. De top 5. En naar nu blijkt een ultrasnelle top 5. U zal het meemaken. Het is enorm moeilijk - zelfs voor de beste hits - om lang in deze hitparade te verblijven. En vandaag is het niet anders. Maar liefst 3 nieuwe binnenkomers en (ik mag het al verklappen) een volledig nieuwe nummer 1. Beleef 't mee, hier live vanuit het 3-liter bier café. Dit is het muziekprogramma van alle tijden voor alle leeftijden. Neemt U er iets lekkers bij. En doe wat U wilt, dat U wilt. We zijn tenslotte niet de nederlandse regering. En ons nummer 5 geluid van deze week kent U al. Wel 2 plaatsen gezakt, maar dat mag de pret niet drukken. Hier is de swing of rock & roll.

 5. (3) Shakin Stevens - this ole house (2e week)

En dan gaan we nu direkt door naar ons nummer 4 geluid.  Hier komt de  eerste single van Boney M. Niet gestegen maar nog steeds in de charts. Op zich al een knappe prestatie. Do you wanna bump? Bumpt U al? Doe maar mee.  Het is nog niet voorbij. 

 4. (4) Boney M - baby do you wanna bump? (2e week)

Tsjonge. En dan nu een groep die alle bites verdient. Met een sound die nu nog steeds niet te kloppen is en 34 jaar later nog steeds geweldig klinkt. Vooral de zangeres.  Jerney Kaagman - wat een sensatie - tegenwoordig jurylid. En dit is de rede waarom, met dank aan de gitarist. Van deze band gaan we vast nog veel meer horen.

3. (nieuw) Earth & Fire - maybe tomorrow, maybe tonight

Lekker hoor. U merkt het misschien aan me, ik ben vandaag extra emotioneel. Neem nog iets lekkers, want de druk in de top 5 is deze week extra hoog. Zoveel mooie muziek mensen. En zoveel die niet de top 5 halen. Maar met trots kondig ik U aan. Een band met een enorme potentie. Ze waren er drie jaar eerder dan Abba. U weet vanaf nu hoe het werkelijk zit. Waar Abba de mosterd vandaan haalde zeg maar. En let eens speciaal op dit intro. Ik houd U niet langer in spanning.  Uit Schotland ..

2. (nieuw) Middle of the Road - soley, soley

Tsja, de 70's strikes back deze week. En van wie hebben we afscheid moeten nemen. Atlantic Ocean, ondanks die prachtige video met de dolfijntjes. Maar ook van Fats Domino, Jerry Lee Lewis, Ron Wood en Ray Charles. Het is niet altijd makkelijk. Zijn  we nu aangekomen bij de nummer 1. Nee - ook Dixie's Gang (de zomer van g is begonnen) moet vanuit de eerste positie de top 5 verlaten. Zo snel is de Dop van de Tube. Het zal de zomer wel wezen. En het enorme verlangen naar liefde. Hoop ik U volgende week weer vol vreugde te ontmoeten. Niet zonder een laatste proost..op de liefde. U had het kunnen weten..

1. (nieuw) BZN - mon amour

Hou vol !

Dop van de Tube is een programma van webjockey Disgo.

DOP VAN DE TUBE DE TOP 5 IS LIVE OPGENOMEN VANUIT HET 3-LITER BIER CAFE.

U ziet het. Ook aan deze Koninginnedag komt weer een einde. Maar niet voordat we uitpakken met vuurwerk. 

Boney M - painter man

Rob de Nijs - zonder jou

Once I finish moving all my things in, I will finish up the hallway, and then we begin the largest phase of this project - the library! :)

Here were the before pics. Here are the after pics:

The curtain is a vintage embroidered scarf I picked up at a yard sale a couple years ago. I think I paid about two or four dollars for it? Works great! The lamp is temporary. It works, but I have something else in mind.

The last picture was too dark, and this one is too washed out! I'm too lazy to use Photoshop today. :) This is the wall to your right after walking in the door. Directly behind the door is the closet. Don't mind the extension cord running through there either...that will be leaving hopefully today! The large black frame on the wall has nothing in it yet...I'm still on the search for the perfect picture.

And this, well, this is the highlight of the room, which is why I saved the best for last. :) This is the part I've been planning and looking forward to for quite a while. There you see my new bedspread, just a plain white quilt. The canopy is just sheer curtains, tacked to the ceiling and tied back. It turned out so nice!

Eventually, I want to make my accent color a deep red, but what I had for now was pink and sage green. (I minimalized on the green, since the bathroom is already green.) I would like to make some red pillows, get a couple small red rugs, maybe a red lamp? I'm not sure yet. As you can see, this seems to be a disease I have. I just can't stop!!!

And a picture of my picture-taking helper, just because he is so cute. :)

The very first thing we did was paint the register. That was Sam's pride and joy, and it turned out beautifully. If you have old registers like this in your home, I'll explain to you what we did so you can try it next time you are painting. Using an air compressor, we blew all the dust out of the little cracks. Then we used sand paper and smoothed out the areas where the old paint was chipping or had dripped at the last painting. We laid newspaper on the floor and used masking tape around the edges, then shoved a bit piece of cardboard against the wall behind the register. Then spray paint! It worked so easily and nicely, never more will we sit for hours forcing brushes in between all the little sections. Here's a picture, albeit low quality. I didn't want to use a flash since it reflected badly, but with no windows, the light was a bit dim.

The ceiling and floor were fairly new and we didn't have to do a thing to them. We painted the walls a moss green, and the little bit of trim with a sandstone brown color. Most of the fixtures in the bathroom had already been painted a sandstone finish, so we left some of them that color, like the light fixture below.  

But others we removed, and black spray paint became our best friend for this project. Can you find all the things we spray painted black? With so many 'styles' and colors of items, it really helped pull the whole room together, and looks striking against the green.  

The black spray paint was what really tied it all together. The picture frames were ones that I already had and just painted over to make them match. The pictures are prints of various landscape photos we took in Africa. For the 'mat' around the picture, I painted a piece of cardstock with the sandstone paint, then distressed it a little with sandpaper and taped the picture on top.

Of course, you can see all the handles and hinges on the dresser and under-sink cabinet were painted, as well as the frame around the mirror. Some other things we painted black... 

I really like the way the whole bathroom turned out, and it has inspired me to move forward!

The bedroom is now painted and carpet will hopefully be laid this week. Maybe I can move in next weekend!!! So here's a sneak peek of that room.... More to come!!!

Anyway, here are some pictures of what I'm up against. First the hallway...

I will be moving into our attic, gaining a sort of 'apartment suite' with two rooms and a bathroom. It means I have to give up my large bedroom and four big windows, but I think it is worth it in the end. I'm excited about having a powder room (no shower) to myself. :)

The hallway, as you can see, has many difficulties, none of which I am up to addressing at this time. I didn't even take a picture of the crumbling walls that lead up the stairs! It would take some serious reconstruction to whip this little place into shape, so I'm just going to paint the trim and call it done. The carpet is new, so that will be staying. The trim is presently a dark green, but that particular shade clashes with the colors I have chosen for the three rooms, so it will be changed to a smokey blue (which you can see we started to paint on the door to the left). A few broken walls just add to the old house charm, right?

Those two pictures were of the room that will be my bedroom. This room really isn't in very bad shape, all things considered. Three of the walls were paneled about 8 years ago (?) and we then painted and carpeted the room about 4 years ago. The ceiling has some water damage, so we will start with the scraping and painting there, just a plain boring white. I would like to replace the light fixture, but that will probably be down the road. The two shelves you see will be ripped out, and the register will be spray-painted the color of the walls. The walls will be a warm shade of creamed coffee, and the trim will be a satin almond white.

The carpet is still is great shape, but I am so very sick of that color green, which is the same shade that my present room is centered around. So the carpet will be taken up and moved to another room (which is also in great need of renovation!) and a more neutral color will be put in, probably something similar to what is in the hallway. The room across the hall will have matching carpet. Speaking of that room, that horrible room, the to-be-library room...let's take a look! 

There's that pesky chimney! This is all that is left of the chimney, as it has already been removed on the two floors below, but they never bothered to take out this portion. I have no idea if it is sealed off to the outside or not. I would imagine so, or it would just be a large bucket to hold rain water! It can't be completely sealed off, however. See that peeling part next to the window? Those are holes that go all the way through, and you can feel the breeze blowing through them. Nice, huh? This picture also shows a portion of the ceiling, which looks fantastic with the exposed beams running through. However, the ceiling has water damage that must be repaired, and past attempts at repairing water damage left drips and smudges of white paint on the dark beams. We're still not exactly sure how we will fix that, aside from stripping and sanding them, or priming and painting them. Neither sound like fun options to me... 

The door to the library room. The carpet! The red!!! Yes, I think we certainly have our work cut out. Can you envision this room redone? Think a pristine white ceiling, with dark wood beams. The chimney removed and the walls repaired. The carpet replaced with a neutral textured one. The walls wine red color, and the trim a deep dark chocolate brown to match the wooden beams. Bookshelves along the long wall (not shown in either of the pictures, since it is presently holding up a couple of dismantled beds), a cozy little seating area with ample lighting, and small desk/table/shelving area with room for storage.

Yes, it is possible. It will just take a whole lot of work!

Last, but not least, is the bathroom. This room was painted by yours truly about three years ago. I was in an inspirational mood, and ready to change the dark paneling for something a bit more cheery. Well, our yellow was nice while it lasted. But when I thought about facing that bright room every morning (and you already know how I'm not a morning person), I thought I should change to something a bit more relaxing.

A couple quarts of moss green paint, a little creamed coffee trim, and a couple cans of black spray paint, and I can scarcely believe the difference. I want to wait until it is all done to show you the finished product, but here is a sneak peek. :)

Those of you who know me well probably knew that it wouldn't be long before I began redecorating something. I've been thinking about literally dozens of ideas lately. Everytime I would let my mind wander to its little corner of interior design obssession, it would soon be spinning with options and plans. Once the bug bit me, it was just a matter of time before I began tearing things out, moving furniture, sewing curtains, or repainting rooms.

So this wave of redecorating is focusing on three rooms - two bedrooms and a bathroom. Two of the rooms are easy-peasy compared to how it usually goes in this old house. A Friday evening and Saturday afternoon saw the bathroom completed, and we will start on the other easy room this week. But that third room. Oh, I just groan to think of all that needs to be done there, which includes the ripping out of a chimney. We might have to call for some professional help on that one. :)

When the redecorating is complete, I will be moving my bedroom into one of those rooms, which I am very excited about. A chance to clean out all of my things!!! Just think how organized I will be. Is it horrible that I get such pleasure out of these things? In my defense, I've lived in the same room since I was two, and as much as I like to organize, I do tend to be a bit of a packrat, so this is a prime chance to clean it all out with a vengeance.

Are you wondering what the other room will be? A library. :) I can't tell you how happy that makes me. I am all-a-tingle with excitement over that!!!

Today's feature is...paneling! A good deal of our main floor has been paneled, mostly painted white. All in all, I like paneling. I think it gives walls a unique textured look as opposed to flat and boring. And of course, there are all the old nails, starting to come up in some places.