Moving right along...

This is the back of the house. Our house is perched up on the side of a hill and the back of the house it up on concrete wall/stilts while the front of the house (road side) is at ground level. Underneath the house at this point there is a crawl space. But my favorite thing about the back of the house are all of those windows. This is my craft room... and I get to look out those windows onto the tops of all the trees in the neighborhood and enjoy a kickin' view. Lucky me!

Just below those great windows are some vents ... which were in pretty bad shape. So this new structure for those vents was finished today. Doesn't it look neat? I wish I would have taken a "before" pic... 'cuz they were B-A-D!

Notice - directly under where the clapboard ends, there is a concrete wall. When we painted we decided to have him continue the paint all the way down the wall so the concrete color matches the clapboard. Hope we like it when it's done!

This is the west side of our house... right next to our tandem driveway. Just another view...



This is a detailed shot of one of the binding sections for that old clapboard. Apparently it was quite the project to sand down the rough edges and fill in the gaps. But once it is all painted those edges will hardly be noticeable.




And here is a pic of our kitchen window and the outside of the house (the road side of the house). Yet again, just another view of the progress so far.

Stay tuned for some more riveting updates on our big renovation for 2008!

Let the projects begin....

And this ol' house, built sometime between 1900 and 1930 is getting a small face lift. No MAJOR renovations... just a paint job on the outside... tidying up of the kitchen cabinets... removal of some acoustic on the ceilings... some new lighting fixtures and other similar tiny fixes.

The first day of work kicked off with cleaning up and spraying down the house. This wasn't just a spray - this was a jet of water! I'm telling you! These old windows don't have any seals on them... and I found water splatters INSIDE the house 4 feet away from the window. This sure was fun cleaning up after!

Stay tuned... more to come... this is just the beginning...

Big project on the horizon ...

We are thinking about putting our house on the market (mostly because we want to take advantage of the buyers market and upgrade at a discounted rate)... and we know this ol' house needs to get painted, spruced up a bit, etc. We've been interviewing contractors, paint guys, landscape dudes... you name it. I've just about memorized the Better Business Bureau directory... and am already tried of having large trucks parked in front of my house.

But hey... it is what it is. I want this place to get fixed. And the wood on the outside of the house has been screaming about a new paint job. So we better JUST DO IT.

Today our contractor (Jason Shiels) brought over some equipment and cleaned up a bit with the plans to power wash the house tomorrow and start working on the outside paint job.

More to follow...

A visit with my Mom's Dad

My parents came into town for a visit... and they didn't even stay with us! No, instead they stayed w/ my Mom's Dad... my Gramps, and his wife Maryann.

My Dad helped w/ odds and ends around the house (yes, he's making a 'stinky face' because he was working on his vacation) ... and Mom did some cooking and grocery shopping and helping out as well during the week they were here. On this night,Lee and I went down to visit for an evening of chatting and catching up... and we had some dessert together. Really nice visit.

As our family learns about Alzheimers we spend as much of this time as possible with Gramps... talking through the stories he still remembers and reminding him of our names every now and then but most importantly telling him we love him.

a day in the life...

Today I had the pleasure of receiving some surprise guests... my best girlfriend Debbie, and her most adorable daughter Karina, stopped in for a visit.

This warmed Auntie Lori's heart... I needed some girl time today. So I was glad to have my two favorite girls in the house...

Happy Birthday Brooky!

A happy birthday to Brooklynne... she shared with friends... she opened gifts and got silly... and it was another reason for us girls to get together and be crafty with some card stock and ribbon. But we cannot take credit for the stunningly adorable cake. That's was handcrafted by her Grandma Aldous... who packed up the needed kitchen gadgets and shipped them ahead so she could make this cake once she was in town.

CUTE!!!