Perhaps I've gotten too comfortable....

Now that all of the big things are completed (excluding next year's outdoor projects), it's been pretty easy to ignore the rest of the small things that need to be done. I thought that compiling a to-do list might help so I've typed up one big long one to be posted on the fridge.....on that to do list is "find fridge magnets". I've even got a handy deadline of December's house warming party.

The good news is that we are now enjoying a working stove and the furnace is blasting. There's a bit of duct work to be done still but our home is much warmer already.

I should probably also add "post before and after shots on blog". Perhaps that can wait til after the party though....why spoil the surprise?

We are this much closer to having heat and the ability to cook!

Enbridge hooked up the gas line for us on Thursday!!!
They even put down new grass where they dug it up.



Now we just have to get someone to come in and hook it up inside....we also need a new furnace. Speaking of furnaces, the fellas came by to lug the HEAVY old one out to the backyard today. They also took the big old oil tank out.



We're getting there! I'm off to paint.

Our Kitchen!

The kitchen is fast becoming one of my favourite rooms in the house. Maybe it's because it's just so brand new....or maybe it's because it's just so different from what it was before...who cares really? It's awesome!

I'll put up the true before and after photos soon but for now, here are some kitchen sneak peeks:

How can I knit when I have a house to unpack?

Got the knobs and pulls for the kitchen cupboards today! This (and returning a toilet seat) is what I did with my day today. I was baffled that someone out there thought little pieces of metal should cost so much....but I'm tired of chipping my nails while trying to pry the doors open, so we bought them anyways. The kitchen, by the way, looks phenomenal. I refuse to post any photos until it is completely done though. I like the drama of a good "before" and "after". In the meantime, you can enjoy the anticipation.

In more introspective news:
I'm realizing that life as of late has looked alot like a to-do list. Not cool. Even though we keep crossing items off, the list keeps getting longer! When do I get time to craft? The colder weather has me itching for my knitting needles. I'll just have to embrace the to-do list but be sure to add "knit the perfect beret" to it.

Enbrige Update

So if you've been anywhere near me for the least two weeks, you know that I've been cursing Enbrige like there is no tomorrow. Our house is cold. We cannot cook. Had we not initially been misinformed by Enbridge about when to apply, we wouldn't be in this mess and we wouldn't have to wear multiple layers at all times.

Thankfully, Kate's mom passed along a contact for someone at Enbridge and after waiting (not so patiently) for someone...anyone over there to return my phone messages, I sent him an email. Don't worry, it was very professional and I used big words. He evidently passed the email along and I actually spoke to a real live person there today!

The goods:
Because we were misinformed about how long the process takes, they will rush our application. This means we are now looking at a 2 week time frame instead of a 6 week one. And to top it all off, the woman I spoke with was just lovely!

So we will still be cold for another two weeks....but at least we now know that heat is on the horizon :)

We live here now

Well, it's been a lot of work, but thanks to the countless hours of work that my dad put in and Sam's moving skills and my mom's home cooking, we have moved in to the new house. There's still a lot to do and the basement is piled high with boxes full of our stuff but we're getting pretty comfortable here. Tinga seems to be adjusting quite well and she love love loves the basement as cats do.

Here are some recent photos. "After" shots to be posted soon :)



Painstakingly selected paint colours finally on the wall











Our clean up buddy - Henry




















Hanging the kitchen cupboards



















Bedroom wall paint and new hardwood floors











The shower is taking shape













All of our stuff - piled up in the dining room

Has anyone seen my camera cord?

We are all moved in and have been camping out here since Wednesday. I write "camping out" because we have no hot water, no heat and no stove. It's pretty chilly and we've been trekking down to my parents' house to eat and shower. So far, we've got the bedroom and the living room pretty well set up. One room at a time.

Note: I have soooo many house photos on my camera and no idea where my camera cord is. I have some ideas of where it might be so once it is found, I will post lots and lots of photos!

p.s. My dad is working on getting us hot water. Thrilling news!

Moving right along

The paint is on the walls.....mostly
The floors are half done.
The fridge is on order.
The requests to set up the gas line have been made.
Our boxes are piling up in the basement.
I have a date with Ikea today to order our kitchen cabinets.
The bathroom tiles are sitting in the front mudroom waiting to be put down.
House cooling party this Saturday.

Amidst all of the chaos, it feel good to remind myself that we are getting there :)


p.s. The paint and the floors look soooo freakin' good! It has finally really started to look like a house!

Things keep getting orange-ier

Apparently the geniuses who were in the house before us chose to paint over the orange walls with a non-compatible paint. I'm guessing the orange coat was oil based and the white latex...or maybe it was the other way around. Who knows. Either way, it was stupid and now we are suffering the consequences of having to chip and peel away all of the white paint to expose the orange paint only to paint over it again. Fun times.

















p.s. I emailed the City regarding the fact that the construction workers outside our place had been starting up their noisy vehicles before 7am. My email was forwarded to the architects and contractors who have apologized and assured me that they will ensure the crews abide by the bylaw from now on. I know that this is a small victory but I intend to enjoy it.

I have no idea what day of construction we are on

The days and weeks have officially blurred together. There has been much progress on the house, so things are good. We even have a toilet, which means we can stop trekking down to my parents' house to pee! For awhile there it was just a hole in the floor, which reminded me of a certain Spanish highway rest stop. *Sigh* Memories.

The plan at this point looks like this:
Finish drywall (I am not very helpful here)
Pack
Paint (which means we need to decide on colours)
Pack
Put down hardwood (this looks like a daunting and tedious task. I thought you just snapped everything together like Lego. Turns out there are nails involved.)
Pack
Tile the bathroom (decide on tiles)
Pack
Install bathroom cabinets and fixtures (pick a bathroom vanity)
Pack
Install kitchen cabinets
Move

Somewhere in there we'll also have to buy some furniture and appliances, make several trips to the Salvation Army and of course, work, eat, sleep and party.

Here are some recent pics from the reno saga:








Bedroom wall to be













Bedroom wall completed














Ian holding up the ceiling to be

















Sam using his head to hold up the drywall












Dad about to embark on a trip up into the attic

We're moving when?!

Oh yeah. So we're supposed to move at the end of the month. In the next month, we have to finish the house (or at least bring it to a livable level), purge and pack the contents of our apartment, clean, move and somewhere in there we also have jobs to go to. Ugh.

Construction inconvenience update:

The increasingly annoying team from Varcon Construction Company have run a fence up our block eliminating the parking lane outside of our apartment. As previously mentioned, this sucks for us because we won't be able to just park a van outside our place to load our stuff on moving day. Most annoying is the fact that NO ACTUAL CONSTRUCTION IS HAPPENING ON OUR BLOCK!!!! Oh yes. The jerks are using the road to store material (sparsely) and drive their trucks back and forth. I should add that said trucks require some serious tune ups as it sounds like breaking glass every time they drive their squealing wheels by our window. Tinga has taken to hiding in the closet a lot.

I have to say that the one good thing coming from this construction hell is the fact that it is making me very bitter about Roncesvalles. While previously concerned that leaving the neighbourhood would require some serious willpower and maybe some tears, I can now push the sentimentality aside with pure bitterness. I shake my fist in anger at you Roncesvalles!! So long, farewell, auf Wiedersehen, adieu!

Days 14, 15 and 16....I think

So the house looks less like a disaster zone and more like somewhere that I will live in! The sub floor is all down, there are frames for walls and the closets upstairs are taking shape. There's even electrical and plumbing! I have the best dad ever! He's been working really hard to get everything done.

Last week, dad took me on a walking tour through the house and we decided where all of the outlets, lights and switches will go. I still can't believe how awesome it is to be able to decide where everything goes. My first apartment had one outlet per room and here I am planning outlets around where I will plug in my straightening iron! The convenience is amazing. We will actually be able to plan our house around how our furniture will be laid out and around how we will use the space.

Ian worked on the house all day Friday and he took on the itchy job of putting the insulation up in the kitchen ceiling. Dad and I showed up in the afternoon and we all worked to the sweet sweet classic rock sounds of Q107. Sam has been MIA. I may have to start providing beer and pizza to ensure he lends a hand. We need all the help we can get right now so that we can start moving in.

I spent Saturday changing the locks so we now have keys to the house! I'm not sure where I got the impression that replacing locks is an easy task but I was very mistaken. It's tough! With some Dad help, I managed to get new locks on all four doors. We also carried the new bathtub upstairs. It was quite heavy but my arms only hurt a little bit the next day. I take this as a sign that I am building muscle. No bulging biceps yet....but I can only assume that they are on the horizon ;)

Here's some pics from the last couple days:








The makings of a bathroom wall













The hole where the toilet will go.


















Relaxing after a hard days work in my new tub.













Old yucky pipes.













The guest room ceiling. New and improved without gray insulation and damp wood.

Reno day Nine

Day nine would have been last Friday but we took the day off to celebrate my Dad's birthday with a game of golf. He did go by the house in the morning to do some work in the basement but we spent the afternoon on the green in the sun. I haven't golfed in years so I wasn't sure what to expect. Turns out I'm pretty ok. Turns out I am also horribly out of shape and much like the toll reno has taken on my body, I woke up Saturday morning with sore golf arms. I logically figure that all my sore arms needed was a day of work, so I headed up to the house to meet Sam and Dad to put down the sub floor. I am the drill master! I sure put those arms to work drilling countless screws into into plywood floor. Here's a photo of me in action:


















I started to get a blister on my thumb from all of that hard work and when I asked my Dad for a band-aid to protect my skin, he presented me with a make shift alternative:


















Yes, that's kleenex and duct tape. It actually worked pretty well! I have a small blister, but it could have been worse.

Sam took off to go boating with some friends in the afternoon so my Dad and I were left to get the job done. It was hard work.

Here's the pic of me and the finished product.






















We managed to get plywood down in every room except the bathroom and the spare room. It is so wonderful to have some sort of a floor down. It not only signals the start of construction but it means that when we work or sweep, the dust doesn't keep travelling through the floorboards to the floors below.

Furniture shopping

Awhile back I spotted a listing for a teak dining room set on Kijiji. It seemed like the style and colour I was looking for and it was reasonably priced, so I sent Ian and Sam off to check it out while I was at work.

The set was is worse shape than the photos suggested. In fact, about ten seconds after the money changed hands, the table pretty much fell apart. Luckily I know so many handy people who can help us re-build and reinforce the table. The whole set could use some refinishing too. Sigh. More hard work. So satisfying but seemingly never ending.

Reno Day Four

Ahhh. day four. I awoke on day four with a seriously sore back and very tight and painful leg muscles. The sun was shining, the birds were chirping and I was dragging myself out of bed for a morning at the office. It was a lovely day. Did I mention how hot it was? The second I moved from my spot on the bed in front of the fan, I knew it was going to be a loooong day. After a morning of work, we left the office at noon and I promptly fell asleep in the car. It was loverly. After a brief stop at a flooring store, we were at my parents house where there were Churrasco of St. Clair leftovers to eat. Yum. After lunch, Dad and I made a stop at No Frills to buy many many water bottles and we were off to the house! Tio and Sam were already hard at work tackling the kitchen floor and cleaning up the plaster rubble. Man, was it dusty. I picked up my trusty hammer and got back to work pulling the many nails out of the floors. This time, I tried Ellis' technique of working on my knees to save my back - I was a little more careful about it than he was and managed not to kneel on any nails. Speaking of Ellis, he will no longer be helping us with the house as he was finally managed to secure gainful employment. He will be selling...ahem...intimate items on Queen Steeet.

The best part of the day was getting to use a power saw! I cut through the wooden beams that were in the wall between the spare room and the bathroom. We didn't get any action shots because Sam was busy standing by to make sure I didn't break anything, but here's a shot of me posing with my power tool in the backyard:























And here's a shot of the closet in the hall. I ripped off all of the laths (sp?) a.k.a. wooden slats that are nailed between the beams to make a wall. It was pretty fun and very satisfying. The plaster dust was gross - but I powered through.























Turns out, that gross two layer kitchen floor was REALLY stuck on. Dad had to really go at it to get the floor up. Here's the satisfying after shot:



















The bin was gone after day one so the rest of the rubble ended up getting piled in the backyard. Tio was very helpful - carrying out bucket after bucket of rubble and broken wood.























So all in all, things are going well. Progress is being made. Not much else can happen until the roof is done - that should be going on this weekend. It's an overwhelming job but it's pretty awesome. I can't wait to see the place start to take shape as floors and walls go in.

Unfortunately, our move may be hitting a snag. Roncesvalles is undergoing some serious renovations too. New streetcar tracks, digging up the roads and all new watermains. Yikes. The construction has closed the southbound lane and the block just south of us is now only one lane northbound. If they move up and make our block one lane we will be screwed as we won't be able to park a truck outside for all of our stuff. Ian and I have vowed to start the purging and packing process ASAP so that we can move a little bit at a time in the evenings. We can store a lot of our stuff in the basement at the new house.

Reno day Three

Day three was Thursday. I went to work in the morning and then over to the house with my Dad in the afternoon. I had vowed to tackle the backyard jungle and took this vow very seriously. Clippers in hand, I battled bees, wasps, mud, spiders and snails to take the big overgrown vines back to a reasonable size. I think I did a pretty decent job. I also cleaned up the piles of old wood and the broken fence. The fence behind the vines is really old and will need to be replaced eventually. Parts of it are only being held up by the massive vines.

Here's the before:

















And the after:

















I unfortunately had to really cut back the vines. It should look prettier in a couple weeks. For now though, we can enjoy a yard with less wasps and bees. We also now have lounge chairs in the backyard (courtesy of my mom) that got well used on day four - it was a hot one. More on that later.

Here are some more pictures from day three:

















Here's what the bedroom floor looks like now - I pulled out many of the nails that were in here. It took me a while to get my groove going but I'm like a pro now when it comes to pulling nails out of floors. A very useful skill, I'm sure.






















This is what the landing upstairs looks like. That's only radiator that hasn't be carried to the mud room yet. The mud room looks like a radiator grave yard right now - and will until they are taken to a scrap metal place. And as you can see, the floor planks are all crooked here. It's kind of scary to see what the bare bones of a house really are. There's really not too much to it! I'm looking forward to having some beams reinforced and the new floors put down :)






















Above is my artsy shot of what's left of the bathtub. As planned, it got shattered and carried out in pieces. This piece stayed in the bedroom for a while. I guess the novelty of shattering a cast iron bathtub wore off and this piece got left behind.


















And last but not least, here's Sam doing his classic muscle man pose in the dining room.

Reno Day Two

Day two involved a lot more of the walls coming down as well as the floors being ripped up. If you've ever torn up hardwood before, you know you can expect a lot of little nails all over the place. These have to come up before the new floor can go down. Ellis had the bright idea of crawling along on his knees while pulling up these nails - needless to say, it was really easy for him to figure out which nails he had missed. The hardwood on the first floor really wasn't in terrible shape - aside from the rows upon rows of 3 inch nails they had put in to them. We assume this was to minimize squeaking.

Here's some pictures of what the first floor looks like without the walls and the hardwood.


































Ian and I both had to work at our paying jobs on Wednesday so we weren't able to help out. Part of me wishes we had been there but my muscles and my bank account are thanking me for spending the day at BizzyB's instead. We did swing by the house in the evening though to check out the progress. It is so much fun to come by at the end of the day and se e the transformation. My favourite aspect of the visit was when my Dad turned on the basement lights and the hardwood-free first floor lit up like the night sky. I took a picture of it....but it's pretty crappy compared to how cool it actually looked...so I'm not gonna bother posting it.Once the dust settles a little more, I'll start bringing my DSLR to the house. For now, my point and shoot will have to do :)

Reno Day One

SO exciting!

The crew was out and in fine form for the big day. Those gents are serious demo machines. Every time I turned around another wall was down. I was very torn about taking down the living room wall but when I saw the walls separating the first floor hallway and the dining room come down, I got really excited about the "open concept" look and finally gave in to the pressure. We are now without walls on the first floor and I LOVE it!

Mom and I were pretty absent when it came to the actual work on day one. It was a really dirty day with the water rotted ceilings and walls as well as the old plaster walls being torn down. We spent the day at Home Depot and Lowes making the tough decisions. I decided on a nice medium-dark brown for the new hardwood. The hardwood will run right into the kitchen and we'll be going with white cupboards from Ikea. Oh and we found some nice bathroom tiles as well - and they were on sale! One of the best parts of the shopping trip was getting to use that customer service button at Lowes. It only took a couple minutes before a nice gent named Danny came to our assistance.

Here are some pics from day one:





















Sam takes a union sanctioned Timmy's break. It's only 9am and he's already filthy :)




















Ellis working on the kitchen demolition. He and Daniel took the cabinets down and discovered a window and the old milk delivery box.


















Little known fact: Our current living room on Roncey was painted in these beautiful ketchup reds and mustard yellows when we first moved in. It was the condiment room for about a week until we painted it a lovely green (thank you Ian). This picture is of the original kitchen floor...as you can see, the condiment colour scheme has follwed us to the new house. As mentioned before, this will be hardwood eventually.























Here's my fella hard at work.



















The gents in the demolished living room after a hard day's work.























The cast iron bathtub made it as far as the hallway. Sam and Ian made a good effort but it was quickly determined that the thing was not only insanely heavy but too big to get downstairs. It will be broken into many many shattered pieces later.



















Yucky yucky water damaged ceiling upstairs. Thanks to Sam for getting up there and pulling it all down and out of the house. As much as I love the house, you couldn't have paid me to do that.

So....we're moving

It begins:
On August 10th, the whole house dream became totally official!
It is cute and in a nice neighbourhood and there's parking and a backyard....however, the place needs a lot of love and work and we've got 6 weeks to get it move in ready!
I've been snapping pics like crazy so I figured it might be fun to document the reno in blog form.

A little background on my experience and history when it comes to home renovation:
If you know my parents, you know that I have never lived somewhere that was really "finished". Don't get me wrong, we have always lived in beautiful homes that look perfect and finished to the untrained eye, but trust me....they are not done. There is always some construction project that needs to be started or finished, and if there aren't any projects to start or finish, you can better believe my mom will come up with something to upgrade. I only moved out 6 years ago and their place looks different. Now, one may assume that living in this environment of constant change would mean that I am a total pro when it comes to the whole home reno business. You would be wrong in this assumption. I am no pro. But I figure you've got two stages here before we are move in ready. Stage 1 being the actual knocking down and building and stage 2 being the decorating. While I pledged to be involved in Stage 1, the plaster dust, rusty nails and sheer yuckiness of this stage thus far have kept me on the sidelines, flipping through Ikea catalogues and perusing design blogs. This brings me to Stage 2...or the comfort zone as I like to call it. I have ideas, I have plans, but man am I spoiled for choice! More on this later.

The plan (for now):
New roof
New floors
Take down the walls on the first floor
Make the front mud room more functional (closet space)
New kitchen
New bathroom
New furnace and ducts and stuff
New electrical
Cut back the crazy backyard jungle

And of course, the before pics:




















Front of the house (and tarp on the roof)





















First Floor Hallway
















Living Room






















Kitchen
















Looking into the Dining Room





















The Messy Backyard





















Water Damage in the Spare Room
















Bedroom (it came with a TV! Score!)





















Bathroom
















Gross Basement