stairs, lights, doors, oh my...

We have stairs! Okay, we have exactly 3 stairs that don't scare me, but the rest are on the way this week. As these were covered with carpet upon purchase, we had no idea that nearly every one was cracked beneath. And yes, the nasty plywood at the top is now gone, in previous post.







Ugly ceiling fan in kitchen=gone
Ugly light fixture at the top of the stairs=gone

Most of the rooms don't have fixtures in their ceilings, so not many too replace thankfully. This project wasn't on the radar yet, but these were discontinued at the big hardware store so we couldn't pass up that deal. We have one more but not sure where it's going quite yet.





Bedroom projects...
Joe finished painting the bedroom, but decided to see what was under the painted closet doors. Never expected them to look like this. You can see the paint color a bit better in these photos, it changes a lot in the light and doesn't photograph well. The first photo shows it the best. If I could only hold the camera straight...

Things under the floor...

Today Joe decided to find out what was really under the nasty plywood boards at the top of the stairs. I was convinced it would be a disaster. Joe's theorry was that a previous owner from long ago just wanted to raise the floor, my theory was giant hole. Optimism won this battle. Compared to the finished floor in the bedroom, it does look bad, but it will be no match for Joe's now expert floor finishing skills!




Since Joe was feeling so adventuresome today, I asked that he explore the hole in the flooring of the second bedroom that we have yet to tackle. I pulled out an old Cheetos bag a few weeks ago and caught a glimpse of the debris in there, but the hole was too small to continue excavating. Joe pulled up the broken board and..
.

Batteries, toy cars, wheels from something, Pokemon trading cards, bandaid wrappers...all from this hole in the floor.


We can't figure out what the *$&%^ this is...


Unfortunately, no jewelry or cash. However, we did find pieces of the old bathroom wall down there with wallpaper intact. Very quaint little flower pattern.



I continued with the wallpaper removal project in the bathroom, saving the best for last-the area behind the old toliet. As I summoned the courage to reach back there (dousing the area with bleach hasn't seem to do a thing) I realized that the old leaky toliet had really damaged the wall. Joe decided that we would probably need to remove the whole wall. We had planned to expand the bathroom eventually, but it seems that the odor is not going away until the wall goes. That'll take 2 weeks;)



Cats with good taste....

some before and after photos

My paint stripping project is coming along on the built in pantry. I have finished the drawers (right) and removed the paint from the bin pulls.







I am still working on removing the wallpaper in the bathroom. Thankfully, wallpaper wasn't covering most of the walls. There is some ancient wallpaper in the 2 existing closets, but this has to be even less fun than cleaning....





Above is the nearly finished bedroom floor, prior to painting of walls and trim. This was the "blue" room with the nasty carpet and layer of some sort of faux wood laminate. I can't believe it...


Joe painting the bedroom walls a very light salmon pink faux finish and trim in a light brown- without overhead light fixtures (or any fixtures yet) it's tough to photograph some areas of the house.




Here's what the heat registers looked like before.... and now...not the best photo, but the registers look like brand new, yet old.
The walls are painted a variety of shades of white to take advantage of the little light that gets in, it's hard to see the texture in these photos.


Once the awful porch is demolished and restored to what it should be, there will be more light in the living room.