Progress...

I haven't posted in awhile because we have been in Colorado for the past few weeks. Luke and I are heading back out to Florida on Sunday and rather than wait until I come back, I thought I would at least catch everybody up on the house progress. We have been so fortunate to have some great people working on the house while we are away. Jimmy is the "go to guy". If he can't do it, he knows someone who can. We had a really weird room that was open to the dining room. I think it used to be a porch and was closed in at some point. Jimmy closed in the wall and had someone sheet rock and plaster it on the dining room side. He put tongue and groove on the walls on the "porch" side which will be painted white. We will use it as a breakfast room and put our German beer garden table in there. We had some bad news from Guy, our plumber; seems the main sewer line was cracked all along the bottom and was leaking into the crawlspace. (I won't post any photos of that!) While he was under there he discovered (along with many animal skeletons) that we had some air ducts that were not attached and were blowing our very precious cool air right out into the crawlspace under the house. Jimmy had a guy come and fix it. He also had a guy come and fix our missing window panes and he is also adding a frameless glass shower enclosure to the master bath. Thank you Jimmy! The yard has now been all cleaned up and trimmed and they have started on the exterior stucco repairs. The missing upstairs windows will be installed on Monday and the roof should be replaced next week. My focus this trip will be to do lots of interior painting and Luke is going to pressure wash the driveway. He will enjoy that for about five minutes! Reed will join us Friday or Saturday, after his next trip. He is flying his tail off to pay for all of this!

Weird porch room?

Dining room side. Can't wait to lose the purple!

With the tongue and groove

Stucco "before'

Stucco "after"

Porch ceiling "after"

I don't have a "before" but it had to be completely redone

Remember the two giant bougainvillea? WACK!

That's all for now. I will update everyone when 

I return on the 11th. 

Thanks for following along!

Two Weeks Later

I headed out to Florida with Roxy on the 21st and Reed and Luke headed off to boy scout camp for a week. My friend Heather was there waiting for me as she had gone over early to be there for a mattress delivery. Keep in mind that it is 95 degrees and there is no air in the house. By the time I arrived, she had even cleaned the toilet. Now that's a true friend! Since we were there last, the entire yard had been trimmed, palm trees groomed (all 19 of them), and things were really starting to take shape. Or so I thought...

 

 

 

 

The guys who were doing the yardwork gave me a really great deal but they also weren't very reliable and in the end we had to get someone else to come in and finish hauling some of the debris away. They were doing that today so I will post some photos the next time we are there.

 

My friend Laura had purchased a cabinet for her shop and wasn't going to use the doors so she was kind enough to give them to me. They have since become the new gate to our courtyard. Thank you Laura!

 

doors before

 

new gate

 

 

 

 

 

 

Megan and I got the kitchen painted, including all of the brick. The after photos really don't capture how great it looks but trust me, it is like night and day! 

 

 Before

 

 

During

 

 

 

after

 

 

This photo makes it look yellow which it is not. It's more of a taupie sage.

 I will take some better pics when it's finished.

 

 

We played around with the cabinets we bought on Craigslist. They are going to work out great. We have more than enough to do the kitchen. They will be painted and glazed on another trip.

 

Sooo... while I was working on some projects I couldn't find the drill. I called Reed to see if he knew where it might be. We had purchased two new drills along with a bunch of other tools the first time we came out. It didn't take long to realize that someone had climbed in through a window and stolen a bunch of things. Drills, extension cord, hose, level, trash bags, hose sprayer, etc. etc. Megan and I went around checking and locking all of the windows and adding locks to a couple of old ones that didn't close properly. This was really disheartening and not the way I wanted to start this project but lesson learned. On a positive note, I have somehow managed to find some really great guys for plumbing, air, electric, framing, roofing, tile, and windows. Friday I had six trucks there from 8am to 8pm installing three new AC units. Yaaay!! So much easier to work with a little cool air. Sunday was the day for some electrical work and my day to powerwash the courtyard. I couldn't wait to get started.

 

 If you remember, I trimmed the courtyard last time we were here. 

 

 

This is the courtyard partially powerwashed

 

and after

 

Right in the middle of powerwashing, I headed for the garage for more gas only to hear a strange sound when I turned the corner... here is what I saw

 

I called my plumber but he was out of town, then the electricians who rushed  back to see if they could shut it off, then the city who said they don't come out on Sunday, then another plumber, none of which had a tool big enough to shut it off. After calling the city a couple more times, they finally came out and turned off the water. This meant that I had no water on the property at all. Monday morning my plumber came out and capped off the leak. I was able to get the guy from the city to leave me his big tool (get your minds out of the gutter) so we can turn it off and on as needed for the next couple of weeks. Reed and Luke arrived at 2:30am on Monday. Reed worked on putting the grill together, adding indoor lights and outdoor motion lights, and even took Luke to the Boardwalk for a much needed fun day! On the 4th, Megan came over and we had grilled chicken, corn on the cob, pasta salad, and water melon. All of the neighbors were out grilling and shooting off fireworks. Luke had a ball playing piro with the neighbor boy Stiles. This would be our first night staying at the house. I will fill you in next time.

 

Thanks for stopping by,