Restore|House

end of an era...

After this weekend, the hot pink parlor will be no more.

Pieces of furniture are leaving, new drapes are being hung, and the walls are getting painted.

In order to come up with a paint color for the walls, I grabbed a few paint chips to see what color would best bring out the fireplace tile...

But it's hard to decide when you have brown, turquoise, green, beige, and cream. Which one?
I thought I was going to do blue, since the few blue tiles in the hearth seem to stick out, and maybe a matching wall color would help make them look like they belong.

But it was impossible, even with all the samples I had, to find a match. The blue is this strange royal/cornflower blue that just doesn't seem to exist in the paint world.

Then I remembered that I grew up in a blue house. Our couches were blue calico fabric. Our walls were itty bitty blue flower printed wallpaper. The carpet had flecks of blue in it. And one day when I was in my teens, my mom realized that she HATED blue. She had no idea why she had filled our house with the color, and so the wallpaper was stripped, the couches reupholstered, and the carpet replaced. She replaced everything with green and burgundy and terracotta.

This is getting really off-subject....but I think growing up surrounded by all that blue, and then having to help remove it all, just makes me hesitant of putting it in my house.
[and don't you think for a second I haven't thought of making this room purple - my favorite color...unfortunately, there's not even a hint of purple in the tile :\ ]

Anyways, I narrowed it down to this color...It's dark, dramatic, and matches the tile...it's called "Pinetop"...too bad it's not "Evergreen"...;)

finishing things that were left undone.

Years ago, I removed an unoriginal wall in the back parlor. And it has sat in a rough state ever since.

Last weekend, when Matt came over to help me move furniture, we ventured into the basement, and went through the random pile of trim down there. I noticed a leftover door jam, and some pieces of door trim left from something else...and I scavenged around the house until I found other random orphan plinth blocks..and suddenly I had all the pieces to finish this 3+ year old project that's been annoying me.

How it has looked for the last three and half years...

I started at the bottom, and worked my way up..

 

It appears one of the pieces of trim was a shellac test subject..

Side #2 will be a little more difficult, as the trim meets up with the base of the servant stairs.

Already it's a million times better...

 

Floor refinishing....

When I first bought the house, and we spent the first night ripping out carpet, I was so excited to see what awaited underneath. The floors were in great shape...with the exception of a ton of holes drilled in them randomly for phones lines, and weird red wax spots in an upstairs bedroom.
Then came demo work, and the floors started looking worse. And worse. A few weeks before we moved in, we sanded and refinished all of them.
That was over 4 years ago. And 2 puppies. They needed a makeover.
Wednesday night I started sanding them by hand. The first time around, we rented a sanding machine from a local store, and even though Rob gave a valiant effort in tackling the whole house, I could see where the machine had left "wave" marks in the wood. Because the floors at 113 years old [at last count] and I've read about how floors can only be refinished so many times, I decided to be extra careful with them in order to keep them around for a while longer :)
I tried to be self sufficient, and not ask for any help with this job, but unfortunately, I have some big pieces of furniture that I couldn't budge. :(

Which was a great excuse to have my favorite brother over. [Stephen, if you are reading this, don't get all offended that Matthew is my favorite.  You could easily be granted the title of "co-favorite brother" if you would come pick up your stupid organ already.]

I absolutely hate having things piled up like this. But it's a good excuse to get this project done ASAP.

Claustrophobia = current state of things downstairs.

Good thing I don't really use my kitchen...because the counters are covered with china cabinet things...that ALSO don't really serve a purpose. Maybe I should just shove everything in the kitchen and close the door and never look at it again?

The whole reason I put myself through moving tons of stuff out of one room and piling it up in others, is the end product.

My floors reflect like mirrors now.

And there's something about the smell of polyurethane that makes the house/me feel like something is getting accomplished around here again.

perfect.

After years of extensive research on the house...

...this sign is most likely accurate.

My brother's house is much more exciting...

..than anything going on around here... Last week I procured some awesome OLD  steps for the front porch...[you'll have to wait for pics..] and tonight I painted my porch floor when I got home from work. All this could possibly mean....I might actually start using my REAL front door? :)

Here is Matt's house with burgundy trim.  What do you think?

Matt's incredibly awesome mailbox post he made himself.

My incredibly awesome dad admiring his drywall accomplishments.

And for fun, check this out.  I have boxes and boxes of old records, and no way to play them :( Anyone have an extra Victor Orthophonic Credenza they'd like to get rid of? They haven't been too plentiful at the auctions lately :(

county fair and garden stuff

Last weekend was the County Fair. It was disgustingly hot, and even though I didn't enter anything this year, I went up there to see it.

The amazing 11 lb cabbage.

The division that seems to get the most participation is the flower arranging.

an old hogfeeder used as a planter.

a boot full of hen and chicks.

kitchsy bunny

I loved this little goat. She was so sweet she didn't even seem real. I think she's from the same place as the bunny above.

  She had an anti-social friend with her.

As I walked over to check out the pie booth, I saw the local Engine Club had a display set up.

And I thought, oh, my dad's in the engine club...I wonder if he's up here..

and would you know...there he was, chilling out with his fellow engine club buddies in the middle of the display [see gorgeous photoshopped yellow arrow]
He took a break from networking to come over and say hi to me.

and because it was deathly hot, I came home...and took this pic of my hollyhocks. They seems to thrive on bad weather/soil.