How it looked for the party.

Below you will find some photos showing the house shortly before the party. First, I have to showcase Barb & Doug's gift to welcome other Martineau "Friends":
Here we have Mary setting up some food for the party. Flowers are from Market Blooms in the North Market, of course!

As we haven't moved in yet, we only have the absolutely necessary furniture in... such as the bar. Or as one guest quipped, "I love your dining room table."

Below is the view of the entryway/Dining Room from the study. Yes, we removed the mop and rag box before the party:

Not a great shot, but this is at the top of the stairs and shows the railing, the door to the laundry closet and the (open) door to the master bedroom:

Below we have the door to the master bath... which was nice for our guests that they could actually shut doors when using the facilities.

Next is a before and after shot of the wine cellar door. The door was filthy from being in a farmhouse attic for years. But it did clean up very well. Before:

After:

Of course, the wine cellar itself (pre-filling):

Finally, a shot of the mostly-cleared out first room in the basement, looking on the wine-cellar door:

It was such a simple plan.

Hire a housecleaner. She'll have the house to herself and can wipe down walls and mop floors to her heart's content and I'll have one less thing to worry about before our party on Saturday. Of course, things are not always as uncomplicated as they should be. Our carpenter has been working overtime all week on an ever-moving deadline (I'll be done Tuesday, no Wednesday, ummmm Thursday) and every day I reminded him that he needed to be gone by Friday and every day I was assured it was not a problem. He then showed up Friday morning, but promised he'd be done in a couple hours and out of Casey's (cleaner) way. When I got off work at 4PM, Eric and I headed to the house to check out the progress. Imagine our surprise that not only were there power tools strewn all over the entry room that had not been touched, (nor the den and half the guest bedroom- which had a baby blanket and toys set up on the floor) but the wife and kids (ages 3ish and an infant) were there as well. Not yet thinking about the implications of this I went about other work. And Casey exclaimed "Good! She (toddler) can follow you around now!" I guess I wasn't interesting enough as she actually went upstairs by herself and wandered around while Eric was staining (this I didn't know until later tonight). And I'm still not putting all of the pieces together. After toddler spilled coffee all over the swept kitchen floor and walked across the newly mopped living room floor leaving trek marks through it (she's bringing in stuff from the rooms that haven't been cleaned because they are camped out in them), mom decided it was time to go (or maybe she saw the steam starting to come out of my ears). Casey finished the guest bedroom and bath (it's now 5PM) and said, "I'm really sorry Mary, but I'm afraid this is all I'm going to get done today. I'd have done it differently and gotten everything finished if I'd known it was going to be so crazy around here!" Now the pieces are starting to fall into place. "Hey Casey- HOW LONG has the whole family been here?" Because I was thinking they'd just popped in a few minutes ago to day 'hi'. She looks at me and I can tell she doesn't want to snitch, "since sometime around 2 this afternoon." OK, now my head is going to explode. So, having paid someone to clean the house, I will now have to spend 2 hours wiping the rest of the sawdust off the walls and mopping the floors in the unfinished first floor rooms...Oh, and re-mopping the living room...and it's not like I don't have lots of other stuff that needs to get done before we have friends over tomorrow...ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! So, yeah, I did. Feel free to share your contractor horror stories in the comments section because misery LOVES company!

Cleaning frenzy

My duty tonight was to empty the first floor of everything not nailed down so that a cleaning helper can wipe down walls and mop floors tomorrow. Eric tackled the massive molding (trim, not funky stuff) and random cut wood piles. We're packrats so much more was organized than actually discarded, but one can now walk through all 4 rooms in the basement without peril of tripping. And all tools, drop cloths, cardboard shields, etc. are now gone so we can once again admire our lovely hardwood floors. Justen had worked until about 2 AM on Wednesday night according to neighbor Renos. He and his helper sanded, put up more trim and started their cleaning yesterday too. We took the dogs with us last night because there was a lit less trouble they could get into. We blockaded them into the living room and while they would have preferred the run of the house, they seemed to enjoy the action of watching Justen work in the entry room. Two days until deadline....

Baseboard molding....trim nearing completion!

Our carpenter is going to town to get all of his projects done by Thursday....ummmm, yeah, that's TOMORROW! He made huge strides today on the first floor baseboard molding that Eric had stained and polyurethaned (much easier than trying to do it on the wall as we'll do with the window trim). Here's the front door:

The living room:

The finishing trim work between the brick and drywall:
The kitchen:

See the big white patches in the photo above? Eric got out the joint compound yesterday and filled in the myriad holes, dings and gouges we've put in the walls since we painted them. Tomorrow night we'll sand them down (or judging by the white dust maybe E's already done that) and touch them up! Our darling study:

The study's even got the quarter round going on! I got the grout haze off the river rock in the bathroom before going to work this morning:
And managed to not give myself a shower in the process this time. I also put more of the wine rack together and Eric finished off the job this afternoon. We'll try for some good shots of that tonight, but they're hard to get in a five-foot-wide room! I guess you'll just have to stop by and see it in person. Tomorrow night the cardboard boxes come off the floors and the cleaning starts in earnest on Friday. It will be funny to actually be able to see our floors again! You might not have noticed in photos but we cut open every cardboard box (and there were many for everything from kitchen cabinets to appliances) and put it down to protect the floors. I am so excited to see them all again...it will feel like we're almost home!

Party Approaching!

Now that we've invited 100 people over to the house on Saturday we're working frantically to get a short list of stuff completed. When I got off work today I went straight to the Tile Shop for a final (we hope) bag of charcoal grout and grouted the river rock shower:
The rocks are still a little hazy, but I got a good story out of the task. I seem to be naturally inclined to be a clutz around plumbing fixtures. After I'd made the first pass to clean up the big grout globs, I stood up to rinse out the sponge and accidentally turned on the shower. On me. And the newly grouted rocks. In the shower. With the drain taped off to prevent grout from getting into it. It took me a little while to figure out HOW to turn off the shower (I've never used it before). Then I had to rip the million pieces of blue tape off the drain to let the gallon of water drain out of the basin. Then I had to mop up the remaining water with my sponge. I don't think any damage was done and it certainly did a better job cleaning the grout off the rocks than my sponging efforts had been going. But it freaked me out just a little too...And now I was slightly soaking. Justen worked on more trim today. Ooh, and put in the back door. Here's the result of both efforts:

And he trimmed out the doors from the outside too. A little green paint and we're done (haha and my picture is upside down)!

The door to the basement is now up:

Remember this? It's the stack of Ikea wineracks pre-staining and pre-assembly:

The lovely Suz continues to help with this task. With the lure of wine we got her to help us begin the wine rack assembly. Much more wine will be needed to complete the task:

House blog hijacked....for the cute kid....

I spent last week in Oakland visiting with Heather and Bernadette. It was a lovely getaway to a warmer climate (I missed our blizzard) and great fun to see them both. Here they are walking down the hallway at the hospital where Heather works:

Here's Bernadette sitting pretty and showing off her impromptu potty skills on a tree stump at the park:
Here we all are ready to get on the ferry from Oakland to San Francisco. Obviously Heather and I are a little more excited about it than B:

Mama and baby snuggling on the wait for the ferry:

Bernie checks out the colorful flowers near the ferry entrance:

Playing with the pig face in the wall of a restaurant:

Looking stylish in her auntie's shades:

San Francisco from the ferry:
Taking a break in the plaza across from the Market tower:An apple a day keeps Bdette at play:

Fun at the fountain:

"I am so over this...can we go back to Oakland now?"

Monday update

The blizzard kept Eric at (the old) home this weekend and I was fortuitously in sunny Oakland visiting sister Heather and niece Bernadette (since Wednesday- what perfect timing). While I enjoyed gorgeous 65 degree weather, perfect company and such adventures as travelling to the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market, Eric was shovelling snow and hibernating with friends Brian and Suz. I'll get up some cute niece pics up later, but you can check out Heather's blog for hers in the meantime because she's on it like that!(http://cafines.blogspot.com/) So we both got back to work yesterday. I finished the river rock base in the master shower and have plans to grout it tomorrow. Eric poly-ed more of the base trim. Then I started patching nail holes in the trim on the second floor with wood filler and Eric sanded it down to prep for eventual staining. I put in the last carpet square around the door and we set up the futon in the den...we have actual comfortable seating! Justen arrived on the scene to put up the basement and front door molding. He's promised he'll be done by Thursday, which will be perfect timing as I've hired someone to do a "big clean" on Friday because we're having folks over to check our progress on Saturday and the place needs some serious scrubbing. So E and I are prioritizing stuff to get done. Some of it is questionably sill stuff like completing the wine cellar. So Eric and I returned to the house yesterday evening and finished staining the last of the wine rack pieces with hopes of assembling it before Saturday.

Weather Update

No house news, but thought some might like to see the view from the old house after yesterday's blizzard.

Stainin' & Urethane-in'

Yesterday saw me start the polyurethane on the baseboard molding. I also finished staining the last few pieces of molding.

Next, I did some more staining of the new wood added to the salvaged casing. Below are photos of both doors to the guest bathroom. Our woodwork is going to be a medley of wood tones, which frankly does not bother me in the least. My only concern is the all-new casing and how dark the poplar is taking the stain. I might have to change the stain color for the new casings...

Below you can see what our carpenter did on Thursday. He brought the future basement door up from the basement and delivered casings for the exterior doors and the basement door. That's all to report. He says he'll be done on Tuesday of next week. I hope so, but I think that would take a miracle as there are dozens of items which have to be started or finished.

Here... the door appears.

Next to it is the casing. As it is not sanded, I can't stain it yet.

And for those who read this and don't live in Columbus, we are currently experiencing a full-on blizzard. There is about 14 inches of snow on the ground right now and it is still snowing! I'll try to post some photos later if I brave the elements.

The Wall

So last night John finished the glass-block shower wall. The 2 coolest features involved John cutting one of the blocks in half so we could have a rounded cap piece over our 4'' blocks (we could not find 4'' rounded blocks). He also put in some rebar and a bracket which I fashioned so that our shower rod would serve as a structural support and anchor the glass block.

Otherwise, I spent my time staining the new trim pieces, trying to match them up to the old. Here are a couple of shots showing the work.

Monday's Action

Yesterday we had the 2 front doors installed. The dented metal door and the barn-siding which used to fill the second door opening will not be missed!

In other news, the baseboard molding was delivered and Eric became a staining machine last night. Meanwhile, Mary completed the laying of the carpet squares in the den. Pictures of these accomplishments? We lit out of there so quick we forgot to take photos, so you will have to wait.

Shower wall, going up...exterior doors, not so much

We promised you photos of the exterior doors last week, right? So here you go:
They are still sitting in our living room as our carpenter is awol. Maybe next week instead.
On a happier note, John who did our tiling came back Saturday AND Sunday to work on the glass block shower wall in the master bath. Here's Saturday's progress:

And by the end of Sunday the wall was almost complete:

I enjoyed admiring it from every angle. Here it is from the shower seat:

Note the perfectly levelled matching mirrors. It only took me a couple tries to accomplish that!
Friday night we installed our shower curtain in the guest bathroom:

The Ikea curtain gives a lovely shot of color to the room. We picked up the tension shower rod at Target. Saturday Eric put the doors on the IKEA vanity in the guest bathroom:

So when you come to visit we're almost ready for you. Sunday I decided to start laying the carpet squares in the den. Here's my test run:

And here's as far as I got "for real":

It seemed like it should be such a simple task, and for the most part it was. But, ala tiling, once you get to those edges there's a lot of measuring and cutting to contend with. I've still got the final two rows to go, because I had to quit. My hands were aching from the uitility knife and carpet scissor use. Sunday I also grouted in the wine cellar. I'm liking the contrast of the terracotta grout with the earthy tiles. It feels very craftsman style. Wall to the left:

Left wall and a hint of the main wall:

Other stuff that got done:

Eric did some trim staining.

Brian and Suz helped us remove the dryer from the hallway and stack it on the washer.

We tried to hook it up. It involved an acrobatic Brian removing his belt and pants and shimmying into a gap between the dryer and ceiling and attempting to plug it in. Alas, the plug does not match the cord provided so we'll have to take it our and change out the cord. Ugh, that will be a pain.