One Sixty: The Un-Photoshopped Among Us

I realized I forgot to include an un-photoshopped picture of my house for you happy bloggers to compare with - Here it is! TA-DA!

Aren't you impressed? No? Well, you will be. I'd like to point out some features that Robert Thompson added to the house when he bought it. You see that little triangular addition on the right side of the house? That's our mud room. When we tore out the ugly 70's style wood wall panelling poo and the ugly gross never was in style linoleum and the weird probably asbestos ceiling tiles - we made an interesting discovery. This addition is actually a pre-fabricated shed that sombody just attached to the house! The slope of the original roof, shingles still attached was maintained and everything. So I had to go up there in an attic space we created (by cutting two square holes in the upstairs wall) and tear off all the old shingles. Sound easy? PSHAW! It was mid August and hotter than hades! (Hay-dees, is that how you spell it?) I nearly died.

Anyhoo - behind that little addition is the two car garage... with only one door. Not one big door like normal garages with one door - one little door. Why? WHY? I'd like to ask someone what the rationale behind that was. I wonder if 'ol Herb Allen would have wanted a garage for the fated Ford? Probably not.

Blog Story

My now husband Mike and I purchased this quaint home back in spring of 2004 - our first home - and, being the handy folks we are, expected to have the entire thing renovated in about a year or so.

And here we still are... renovating away.

This house needed a complete overhaul. Its plaster walls were uninsulated, its attic floor covered in 2" of bat guano, its basement - dirt and snakes, its exterior - asbestos siding, and lead paint windows in every room. The electric had not been updated and light sockets hung bare from the ceiling. Plumbing featured cast iron radiators - and only one for the entire upstairs.

We began by gutting almost the entire house from top to bottom. (sans bathroom - we needed to pee) We rebuilt the entire upstairs, with a new floor (not new carpet or wood - the once unstable framing underneath) and turned 3 small rooms into two. We reinvented the downstairs by turning a closet into a hallway and eliminating interior exterior windows and doors from old half-assed additions.

New insulation, windows, electrical wiring (including phone and CAT-5 internet), plumbing and baseboards, and drywall were all added.

We purchased kitchen cabinets from a yard sale. (None existed previously.) Our families helped us replace and purchase new appliances including the once also missing washer & dryer.

Then we had the entire house lifted - straight into the air - dug out the dirt, and had a real basement foundation poured. We updated our oil tank and burner and created heating zones.

Outside, we took down trees and planted grass. We dug out an awkward hill to create a 2nd part to the driveway and used the rocks our house once sat on as a retaining wall. We electrified and repainted the garage.

And of course, we spent many an hour on finish work like paint, trim, closet doors, lighting fixtures, hardwood floors, curtain rods, dimmer switches, and many other things everyone else takes for granted. We are still working to complete all this final finishing, but happy to report that we are FINALLY nearing completion of all little things in all rooms!

In 2008 we began overhauling the exterior by creating a new french door entryway and building a farmer's porch and garage addition. We replaced our roof and then stripped off our siding and replaced with new clapboards. We then planted two new flowering trees and a maple in the front yard - our first major landscape purchases. I'm happy to report that here in 2011, the porch is nearing completion and the back yard is on the road to recovery with some new loam and grass. More plantings soon to come!

In 2012 we plan to attack the last MAJOR (emphasis on major) job in the house - the dreaded BATHROOM! We plan to first add a second bathroom in the basement. Then, demolish our current bathroom and rebuild it, adding a second bathroom on top for the upstairs.

And that pretty much brings you up to date. The battle continues day to day as we try and complete everything.