New Stairs Day 3

Our floor re-finisher came over this week to install new hardwood floors on the upstairs landing and stain the new stairs ... except they only do the floors. Isn't that weird?



So the banister/newel posts etc are still not stained, but here's how it looks now with the new floors. We're jazzed!

BEFORE

AFTER

And here's Matt doing what he loves ... painting!

New Stairs Day 2

The stairs have been installed. What a difference from the way it looked before.

The only thing left to do is the banister that goes into the downstairs family room, it will connect to the upstairs newel post to make it all one piece.

And of course it all needs to get stained and painted.

New Stairs Day 1

Today and tomorrow our new stairs are being put in. Unfortunately, another job delayed our stair guy today so we just got some demolition done, but you can see how it looks ... as well as our new paint job.

Rain Barrel water pumps?

Has anyone had any experience with water pumps for rain barrels?

We are now a 2-rain barrel household, having just installed the 2nd rain barrel on the other side of the garage.  Now the entire roof of the garage goes into a rain barrel (we have 3 separate roofs on our house).

This rain barrel was free; we found it behind my dad's shed, a place where things go to die. Where he got if from is anyone's guess; but then again, the man is a mystery. 

Now that we have these 2 barrels, I have decided that I am sick of carrying watering cans full of water all over my yard. I want to use the hose but there's not enough pressure.

Solution? A water pump.

I saw landscapers using pumps to water our Memorial Park in our downtown; they brought huge vats of water to the site on flat bed trucks and then they pumped the water as if it were a hose connected to a main line. I watched in awe.

I found some pumps on Cleanairgardening.com but it seems that if it says Rain Barrel Pump, the price is double. Is there another kind of pump that works as well? Sump Pump? Pool Pump?

Step 5: Paint

In my inspiration photo, the walls are painted Benjamin Moore's Greenbriar Beige. So I went to the store and checked it out against my cabinet blue doors, along with other beige shades. ( I'm new to beige and I never knew there were so many shades of beige!) I ended up sticking with the original color.Now that it's on the walls, I'm not so sure. It's more green than I imagined, but my mom thinks that's because the room doesn't have enough light. Plus, my cabinet is more blue than the inspiration cabinet, so maybe that's also changing the look.

So now the plan is to see about adding more light -- another can light, replace the florescent tube lights... something to make it brighter.

Step 4: Spackle, Sand, Prime

Stairs on schedule

About a month ago, I talked about getting someone in to remodel our staircase.  I can't believe we took this long to call the guy for an estimate, but I guess between looking at 500 magazines to get ideas and then going to Nashville/Louisville, we never picked up the phone. 

So the work will begin shortly and he'll be installing all the components beginning next Thursday. The best part – it should take 2 days to install.

I've never had a contractor work on anything; so to go through ideas and talk about options was exactly what I needed. And I figured out that the reason my dad and I probably argue so much over remodeling is that I need to talk about projects and have a plan.  He doesn't (or if he does, he doesn't tell you what it is) and that stresses me out.
 
I guess I'm not the fly-by-the-seat-of-her-pants gal I thought I was.

Step 3: Remove trim

Bye Bye Rosettes!

I don't feel that bad about replacing this trim because it wasn't even wood - it was like some sort of Styrofoam. And if I could remove it all by myself (which I did), then it must not have been up there right anyhow.

Now I can paint without having to needlessly tape any of this.

Step 2: Paint cabinet & mirror

LaCrosse

My cousin just graduated 8th grade and made his confirmation, so our gift to him for surviving a Catholic education was to take him to his first professional LaCrosse game.

Yes, professional LaCrosse - who knew they had their own league, the MLL. In Chicago they're known as the Chicago Machine and 2 of their games were played at Soldier Field and we went to one of them Saturday night. They played against the Long Island Lizards and lost by only 2 points.I had never seen LaCrosse played before and it was a fun game, action packed, constant play, and the players are allowed to hit (rather beat) each other with their net-sticks, which I thought was hilarious. Plus we got 1st row seats (no assigned seats and we arrived early) and were right behind the Lizards "dugout."

Step 1: Sand and Prime

It was 95 degrees outside so it seemed like the best thing to do on a Sunday when you can't do anything else for fear of melting.

Inspiration

Matt and I have spent the better part of the last few nights combing through magazines our friend Mike gave us, trying to find “inspiration” for the staircase. The problem with this strategy is that when you comb through This Old House and Fine Homebuilding you’re bound to find inspiration for a lot of other projects too. Coraling all the creative horses running amuck in my brain has been a big problem.

So now I have 2 piles of magazines in my house; one of the piles is labeled “Staircase,” the other is labeled … well “Other.” And by ‘other’ I mean everything from porches, to basement floors, to cabinetry, to bathrooms.

And by bathroom, I mean that I have found my inspiration for the upstairs bathroom. It’s just perfect for my remodeling ‘lite’ project. Remodeling ‘lite’ – this means no ripping up floors or walls, no re-doing plumbing, no 6 months worth of work.

Here’s the photo inspiration for the bathroom.
Cabinet: I didn’t want to replace the cabinet so painting it is a great option and this is such gorgeous color.

Countertop: When Mike was over he recommended we change out the sink/countertop and we had to agree. This solid-surface one with the under mount sink is so much nicer.

Fixtures: Goodbye gold and chrome combo!

Walls: Yes … we might actually have beige walls. My hand is shaking as I type because this is so foreign to me but with a blue cabinet, I think beige is the best option.

So there we go. A new upstairs bathroom should be a 2-3 months away!

Bathroom when we looked at the house

Trading Scotland for Simon

We just made our September vacation plans and they don't involve Scotland, but instead another island that starts with S - St. Simon Island off the Georgia coast.

Matt's parents have invited us along on their coastal vacation of the year, and it's been a long time since we've gone on vacation with them (Charleston in 2006?). We've never been to St. Simon's and it's always fun to go somewhere new -- I've already scoped out some restaurants for seafood and BBQ.

Trading in the haggis for some 'Que, Scotland will just have to wait ...