It Takes a Village

The saying "It takes a village to raise a child"

holds true for house renovation too.

It takes a village to get crap done.

This past weekend was a very busy one.

Windows were measured 

for replacements.

Thanks to the window sale at a home improvement store, 

we'll have replacement windows soon.

My dad and husband did the measuring, 

and they'll be installing the windows too.

There was a lot of painting going on as well.

My mom and my cousin came to help.

I would not have been able to get as much

accomplished in the painting department if 

I didn't have the help of family

(you'll remember my cousin and aunt helped with the hall and the living room).

These are just teasers of the paint color in the kitchen.

I'm still working on finishing up last minute touches,

so I don't want to share photos until I'm done.

It's amazing what a fresh coat of paint can do. 

Painting the trim and doors white made a massive difference

in their appearance.

We managed to get the laundry room painted too.

I just need to finish the trim work, 

but the walls are done.

I've been looking at decorating ideas on all the rooms

that have been painted.

And we can't forget all the work on the electrical wires in the house.

Without the help of our friend,

it wouldn't have been done.

So we measured windows, painted 2 rooms and had 2 separate

electric meters converted to one.

So a big THANK YOU

to those who have helped.

Even the dog helped.
You'll notice the white on her ear.
There's also white on the end of her tail,
and she has a red food.
She was oh so helpful.

Rewiring the House: Day 2

A husband, a dad and a blind electrician walk into a house.

No, really, it's not a joke. 

Our electrician wasn't blind, 

but he had broken his glasses so it became the joke of the day

(especially when I used day of the dead skull duct tape to "fix" them).

Anyway, it was a day without electricity in the downstairs of the house.

Dinner was interesting.

The crockpot was plugged in upstairs cooking all day

and the mashed potatoes were prepared at my parents' house, 

brought to my house,

and kept warm on top of the gas heater in the laundry room.

We ate by oil lamp.

My neighbors must think we're really romantic

since we seem to use oil lamps and candles whenever we use the dining room.

 There used to be shelves at the bottom of the basement steps.

I came home from some errands,

 and my dad told me there was an earthquake that took down the shelves.

I imagine he must have thought I wanted the shelves, 

but I had already come ot the conclusion they weren't worth keeping.

What was amusing was that yesterday evening there was an earthquake

centered in a location about an hour and a half away.

The shelves had to be removed to make way for the new larger circuit box

(or whatever it's called).

The guys worked well into the night

and even had the electric company come out.

Nothing like have a giant electric company truck 

in front of your house with flashing lights at 9pm.

At the end of the day 

(really, it was like 10pm when everyone left)

the house is now all on one electric meter instead of two,

and I don't have to walk around with a headlamp. 

This doesn't mean we're done with the electric, 

or that we've gotten the hard part done.

We still need to replace old outlets with new ones,

and run new wire for some things.

And figure out the whys and hows of the work that was done previously.

Like the mysteries of the kitchen outlet that is on a 220 circuit but it's a 110 outlet 

so the 220 has been split and we don't know where it splits to.

Fun times.

It was a pretty crazy busy weekend of house work,

so stay tuned for all the other updates on painting and whatnot.

Rewiring the House

Old houses typically have old wiring,

unless someone at sometime has taken the time and money

to have it rewired.

No one has had anything rewired in our place.

We still have old knob and tube wiring.

Above you can see the old wire and the pile of dirt under it

which is in fact the disintegrating pieces of the old wires' casing.

Lovely. 

Here our handy master electrician friend works on what I considered the scariest outlet.

It had caught on fire at one time

and the wall also showed signs of scorching.

 It's amazing that the house hasn't burned down.

It's lots of fun hearing the electrician say things like"

"What the hell?!"

"I've been doing electrical work for a long time and I'm never seen anything like this."

"What the hell were they thinking?!"

After a while, everyone had to switch to headlamps as the sun

was going down and the electricity was not turned on.

In fact, I was priming the kitchen walls
by oil lamp.
We're still not finished the rewiring process.
We have the whole upstairs to do and the kitchen, dining room and back room
to finish downstairs.
We haven't met an outlet that doesn't have some sort of issue.
Stay tuned for the continuation
of the Rewiring project.