This stuff is the absolute best! I was using regular 409 to clean, but Joe picked this up and it worked miraculously. I cleaned for another 5 hours today and I'm completely exhausted now. It's so hot!
The walls of the basement stairs were absolutely disgusting because the stairs are so steep, one must put his or her hands on the walls to keep steady on the way down. I thought that the walls were just discolored with age, but alas, it's just dirt. Below is the before and after of the ceiling at the base of the stairs-a quick spray and a wipe with a papertowel and suddenly it's white again. It's a miracle.
I finally managed to get the chocolate syrup off the pantry, using my new best friend and a knife...I had to dig out the paint between the boards to get the chocolate out.
I decided to take a break from the cleaning and wander through the woods to pick up trash, and I found this improvised "planter" made of concrete blocks. I also found some old stone steps down the hillside and parts of an artificial Christmas tree. Didn't these people understand that fake trees don't belong in the woods???
A few of the tires in the woods...I think there are about 20 of them out there. I picked up dozens of beer bottles and soda cans, plastic bags, broken glass, etc., in addition to half of the artificial Christmas tree-not quite sure where the rest of it is. Filled about 2 garbage bags before I lost interest. Have to be wary of mosquitos as well, especially with all of the tires out there. There was a strong breeze so that kept them at bay for a while.
3 hours today cleaning, washed all of the windows inside, at least downstairs, then I ran out of window cleaner....
Swept the front "porch", found an empty drink container tipped over the edge of the window behind the lovely wardrobe. Moved the wardrobe because it was blocking the window, then realized that the porch has such a tilt that the doors won't stay closed if it's not on a side wall...grrr...
Cleaned the front door inside and out. Looked at the basement stair wall...used remaining cleaner on that and barely made a dent in the layers of dirt.
12 latex gloves 10 rolls of paper towels 2 pairs of super rubber gloves 1 bottle of 409-Heavy Duty 1 bottle of Fantastic Cleaner-Antibacterial 1 bottle of Simple Green (donated by the PO, very generous but not quite powerful enough for this level of disgustingness) 1/2 box of TSP substitute
I highly recommend the pet drinking fountain, hours of amusement for all!
This is the first photo I've gotten of all 5 in the same place. It involved catnip. Today is also my last day of freedom as I start working tomorrow-yippee!!!
I won't have as much time to sit around watching the cats all day and taking photos.
The living and dining room floors are finished!! Remember what these looked like before? Absolutely amazing! Joe is so happy with the results, he's going to stick with it and finish the library room next, maybe even upstairs. He's decided to move onto painting for some variation in the routine...now onto the fun of choosing paint colors! So far, strike one on the yellow. We were hoping for more of a brown, so this paint will end up in the bedroom of my townhouse that has yet to be painted before I put it up for sale.
I decided I couldn't tolerate the bathroom situation, so since the Home Depot is running 6 months no interest, no payments, I bought the toliet and new pedestal sink. Buying the toliet was more complicated than I thought, how many options in white can there be??? I figured we didn't need a $200 model, but I thought the $45 option was probably a bad idea, I mean, it is important that it works!
We didn't have much time since Joe's mom wanted to stop by and see the place, so it felt like we were on one of those old game shows where the contestants have to spend x amount of money in a minute. We had 2 carts and were racing around the plumbing and bathroom departments. Had to spend $299 to get the financing deal, so I ended up with $80 toliet, $80 pedestal sink and $110 faucet! We have decided to go with the rubbed bronze finish for the fixtures, like this photo. The faucet we bought is similar to this one.
Threw in some paint to test out and a new paintbrush, some hose things for the plumbing and voila, just over $300 with tax. We'll address the floor in the future since the master plan is to widen the bathroom a few feet. I still don't know how I'm going to actually wash my hair in the clawfoot tub, but I've got some time to figure that one out. There's always the scary shower in the basement...
Wow, choosing kitchen cabinets is amazingly complex. We went to the 2 major home improvement chains about 5 times in the past week. I think this is what we ended up with. Trying to finance these projects and figure out what we want to live with FOREVER is definitely a challenge. I know we ordered this style and the color is close. The cabinets won't be ready until mid-September, however, so I attempted to clean the old ones. It was really a lost cause. I used everything I could think of and they just feel sticky, not to mention all of the stuff stuck in the bottom of the drawers. I found oatmeal flakes, caraway seeds, and even part of the door knob to the bedroom door that we found in a closet. So we have ordered the cabinet to hold the sink, a 1 door cabinet with a drawer and another cabinet of 4 drawers.
We decided to splurge on the farmhouse type sink in white, the photo looks a bit off white...anyway, that should arrive in 4-5 days, though we have to wait for the cabinets before we install it and still need to purchase the faucet. Joe has decided to make the countertop himself from wood which saves quite a bit of money.
So we will have one wall completed by mid-September. Still looking at the other appliances to determine what we can fit where. Below is what we have on order right now:
Far left by the wall will be the 1 door/1 drawer cabinet, next to it will be the 4 drawer cabinet. Then the wonderful farmhouse sink under the window, with the dishwasher (yet to be purchased) to the right of the sink. The square represents the chimney column, and behind that will be open shelves of some sort. Looks like we're going to have a cooktop on an island with a wall oven built into the island as well. Not sure yet how all of that works, but if we want the refrigerator actually in the kitchen, that's the way it will need to be!
This stuff is the absolute best! I was using regular 409 to clean, but Joe picked this up and it worked miraculously. I cleaned for another 5 hours today and I'm completely exhausted now. It's so hot!
