things I missed

So looking back at my posts I missed some things.. first here is what the bathroom looked like before painting and installing all the new stuff

and the fireplace in the bedroom is FINALLY scrapped clean. Dad and I still have to build the cover but it still looks about 100 times better than it did

the home stretch

First and foremost a HUGE thanks goes out to my family (Mom especially who has spent a ton of time working at my place) and my friends for all the help. I'll be asking for a lot more as things come down the wire in the next couple of weeks..

Alright, lets go with some updates - I got my stove and refrigerator delivered last week and a new boiler installed. These were the last major expenses so I'm glad to have them out of the way.

I was, as many of you know, going to have a big birthday/house warming party on Saturday, but the house just wasn't ready. That of course didn't stop me from putting my friends to work. Here we see two PhD Physics students, Kevin and Andrew, using the wrong end of a rubber mallet to install doors. We do have to give Kevin credit though, he was very hung over when this picture was taken. and look what we have here! Another grad student hard at work putting a second coat of red paint around the fireplace.

and perhaps the smartest creature in the whole house? The Roo-Bear, looking very relaxed and not hung over or over worked

This is a good shot (all these pics have been taken with my cell phone, so 'good' is a relative term) of the living room after Adi got the second coat of paint on and Rich and Andrew put the shelves back up. I'm very happy with how it turned out!

the last bit of work this weekend involved me putting some finishing touches on the bathroom. The medicine chest is up, the sink and toilet are cleaned and reinstalled, all the hooks, towel rings and soap holders are installed, and the shower curtain bar is up... Plus Grammy painted all the trim work and doors white. The only thing I really need is the cover for the ceramic gas heater which is going to the powder coater this week (that's what that big hole in the wall is)
Also, Mom did a very good job getting the fireplace bedroom ready for furniture so I'll hopefully have a bed at my house as soon as the weather breaks and it's nice enough to actually go get it from storage down at the factory.

getting in on the ground floor

Since my brother and I were very young our family has always had a 'do it yourself' attitude but from the second I pulled up the carpets in my house I knew I would have to get a professional in to refinish them. I wanted to get them done before I started moving in so on Wednesday of last week I had a company come in and by Friday morning my floors looked like this... (if you scroll down to some early entries you can see the before images)

So I finally have a room I can walk in with no shoes on (two actually, the living room and dining room) I also finally picked out a medicine chest and looked at tile for the bathroom floor. Lowes actually has some great marble tile on sale for ~3.50 a square foot as well as other nice tile for ~1.50 a square foot and considering my bathroom is only about 80 square feet it will be very affordable to put nice tile or even marble on the floor!

Other events this weekend included a light being installed in the 2nd bedroom and a light being installed above the bathroom sink. There was also more paint stripped off of the fireplace, and look who was home to help rip out the stupid asbestos gas insert!

Last, but certainly not least, in something I should probably put in a separate entry entitled "home ownership isn't all fun and games" or "why people bitch about being homeowners" Dad and I spent a sizable amount of time this weekend in the basement fixing (patching together) my boiler.

The short story basically goes - the boiler system was broken, we fixed it. But the long story goes..

I've been keeping the heat down because I'm not at the house full time yet but to refinish the floors the heat had to be turned up to help the finish dry properly. This was the beginning of the end for my 50 year old boiler. On Saturday morning Dad went to the basement to find the pump motor had seized up and the pressure relief valve leaking like a sieve. The boiler itself was still working just fine (even if it is only 50% efficient or so to start with) but without the pump to circulate water and the valve leaking precious hot water all over the basement floor my heating system was in sad shape. This sets the scene for Sunday night... Dad and I tore the pump motor apart and rebuilt it on Sunday morning then went to the Steeler game... (GO STEELERS!!) Then after the game we went down to Monongahela to fix the leaky valve and put the pump motor back. We turned off all the water and power to the boiler and started to remove the faulty valve. I turned the valve with a big pipe wrench while Dad stood by ready with a plug for the pipe. As soon as I lifted the valve three stories worth of water pressure from all the radiators in the house shot a stream of water out of the pipe all the way to the ceiling before Dad could even get close with the plug, water (at least it was nice and warm) got just about everywhere but nothing disastrous.

Luckily I was planning to replace the boiler so before this whole ordeal even started I already had 3 quotes for a new boiler.. awesome.

Alright, that's it for this entry, next time expect some pictures of a finished bathroom and maybe even a bed in the bedroom.

the essentials + Chris strips

Well gang,


This weekend we continued to focus on getting 'the essentials' together. Most of my time was spent in the second biggest bedroom (14x14) which I'm going to use while I work on the 'master' bedroom. I decided to start here because I thought it was going to take less work than the big room, but I could be very very wrong. Here is Pap, Grammy, Mom and Dad working on the hardwood floor. The floor was in sorry shape thanks to carpet padding but we're trying to get it into 'good for the time being' condition.


Chris and I got to work on the fireplace in the second bedroom. The fireplace on the first floor is wood burning but the one in this bedroom has a gas burning insert (I guess people 70 years ago didn't like carrying wood up stairs, lazy assholes). The fireplace on the first floor is also marble while this one is finished with glass tiles. It was painted several layers thick so out came the paint stripper. It took several applications (with 20 minute waits) and it's not done yet bit it's starting to look good. (There is a mantle that's not in the pictures because we removed it to work on the tile)

We also cleaned the kitchen, mounted a bell for Rooney to ring, cleaned the fireplace on the first floor, and debated about color choices for the bathroom. I'm taking this week off of work at job #2 so I can go straight from job #1 down to Monongahela and hopefully get this place ready for a giant birthday/house warming bash on the 24th.

I'll keep everyone updated,

-Aaron

beer and razors?

Hello all,

It's been a while since I updated this blog, but that doesn't mean I haven't been working. On the 30th of Dec Chris, Dan Schmitt and I went to the house to finish tearing up carpet and pulling tack strips. Chris also brought me some furniture which was very nice of him. The floors look pretty good and are all ready for refinishing.

We also had our first beers at the new house..

Mom and Dad have been helping me a lot, and we decided to start working on the bathroom first. Today (new years day, 2009) we deconstructed in the bathroom, removing towel bars, towel rings, doors, door hardware, the rusty medicine chest and the terrible old light above it. Check out what we found behind the medicine chest..

it looks like the previous owner put the razor slot in the back of the medicine chest to good use. We made a trip to Lowe's to get a light and new fixtures.. we also started picking out paint samples and I will say right now, I have NO idea what colors to put anywhere in this place. If anyone wants to come over and help me pick out colors I'd welcome some second opinions.

I've also been appliance shopping and I've had estimates for replacing the boiler and refinishing the floors, and I installed a new kitchen faucet at some point (I forget when). So everything is in full swing and I hope to have a bedroom a bathroom and the kitchen in some sort of living condition soon. Expect another update on Monday or so..

-Aaron

Jackpot!

Hello again everyone,


These are some of the most exciting pictures to date. After I signed papers on Monday the 5th, Mom, Dad and I went over to see what was under the hideous, cat piss stained carpet covering the floors. When we looked at the house several weeks before we peeled up a little corner of the carpet and saw hardwood floor as expected in a house of this age, but I was not prepared for what we found when we pulled up all the carpet.

Here is what it looked it when I bought it


and here is what was hiding underneath. This is in the dinning roomand here is the living room/entry wayRooney approves and Mom was cleaning 2 seconds after the carpet was up
close up of the inlay in the living room

I'm getting a few quotes for professional refinishing because I'm afraid to do anything myself. It's going to take a while to get all the staples and tack strips up but I'll be sure to post some before and after pics

MY house.. still hard to believe

Hello all,

This is a very exciting time for me, and following the suggestion of my friend Matt Morgan I've decided to publish a blog to keep everyone updated on the progress of my house. I signed all the paperwork and closed on Monday December 5th, but the first time I saw a picture of this place was on Halloween. Then on Monday November 3rd my Mom and my Aunt Kathi (who was also my realtor) went to look at the house while I was working at Huntington (tutoring). They called me and told me that I should make an offer, so they came to my second job and I signed an offer sheet without ever seeing the house in person. Later that night Mom and I went back and I finally stepped foot into the house that would soon be mine.

Well enough story telling, here is the house.. Monongahela is a city on the Monongahela river about 25 miles south of Pittsburgh. The build date in in questions, but it's an older place for sure, I estimate the build date as sometime in the 1930's. It's a three story, ~2200 square foot, 4 bedroom monster. Here you can see the windows in the dining room and master bedroom. You can see the Mon river from the windows on the 3rd floor
and one of the best parts of the house, a two car garage with a basement. Between the basement in the house, the basement in the garage and all the closets I have more storage space than Mom and Dad do!

My next blog post will have more about the inside of the house, including some pictures of what I found under the ratty old carpet