See - I DO love you, little house!

With major school projects behind me now, this weekend I finally got to spend some quality time scraping paint and tearing off boards.... ahhh - feels so good!

Baluster Update: 46 cut. 8 full ones and 2 partials to go.

I finished scraping all the turned posts. Which I'm really happy about because scraping turned posts is miserable work. This is partly why (and I'm sure you have all been wondering) I have chosen to replace my turned balusters with sawn balusters - tedious though the scroll saw cutting may seem, it is far less tedious than removing paint from the existing balusters. And since I don't have a lathe & it seems much harder to learn than scroll sawing, the paper-doll-like version seems more appropriate.



I also lasso-ed Jim to come out and scrape where I have been unable to scrape - that tricky spot over the entry...




Yes - I'll admit it, I was very happy to have some of Jim's man-help!



Then somehow I convinced Jim that at 6:30 it was still early, and we had time to tear down the ceiling. That's right - 6:30 is early for summer light. I did a little bit of the demo, but I was not nearly as fast as Jim, so he ended up doing most of it.




Some who read this may be thinking what a shame it is that I tore out the existing bead board... But even more miserable than scraping paint off of turned balusters, is the thought of scraping paint off of bead board hanging on the ceiling. I promise I'll put new bead boards up - I just can't take the tediousness and neck aches that would result! - not to mention the little scraped bits that would fall through safety glasses and into my eyes. So those old board are going into a dumpster. Sorry for the restoration sacrilege!



With the ceiling out, there's just a little bit more paint to scrape, and then we can brace the roof and tear out the floor. I mean floors, as there are 2 layers - why take off a rotted floor when you can just cover it up? And we're contemplating lighting - I'm thinking about adding a few can lights to the porch, to light it all up, instead of just the area above the front door. So maybe a nice decorative light above the door, and a couple of canned/recessed lights along the side. I'll have to do a little bit of research on that...

Agghhhhhh

I have been neglecting you, my poor unhappy little house!

I promise - I'll be done with my crazy summer semester on the 4th of July.... and aside from a couple of weddings, the remaining summer weekends will be all yours! I may even take some time off of work to give you some extra love.........

Heat Wave

Yesterday started a little heat wave here in New England.

Fortunately (or unfortunately) I have been stuck in summer intensive classes the past two weekends - which also means that my work on the house has essentially come to a grinding halt - I can still hear the squeel of the brakes!

But I love to work outside when it's warm. I even love to work outside when it's HOT! Call me crazy - or blame my father for making us (I mean, creating the opportunity to) mow lawns all summer in the southern Indiana heat, which I like to refer to as 90/90 - 90 degrees, 90% humidity.

So as soon as I got out of school yesterday afternoon (yes, that would be Saturday), I trucked over to Homer and picked up some mulch. 10 bags, to be exact. Then I weeded and spread the stuff out along the side and the front. It's amazing how clean mulch makes everything look.


Now, I probably should have been trimming out more of the balusters to use my time more effectively. And I know most of you would have rather spent your time in a cool basement on a 90+ day, but not me!

While weeding, I came across several dandilions. How big can a dandilion get?, you might ask. Well, this one must be in the running... Here it is a day after being hit with a full trigger of Round Up:

Ya. I don't think it even flinched.

And here is a little montage I like to call "Plants around my house that I hate"




ONE DAY, these will all be taken to the Natick Recycling Center to be chopped up into little bits for easier composting! ...well, maybe I'll be kind to the hosta and just split it up into like 20 parts and put it someplace shady.

So I know you have all been asking yourselves
- where's Jim? What's he up to these days -
Ah, yes, well, this has been his little project:

It's a Ford 1936 3-window coupe. He loves it very much. He loves it so much, if he wasn't already married to me, he'd marry it. He says it's now drivable...
I can't wait for a summer time cruise.