The Big Reveal

So the long awaited moment has arrived! The moment when we unveil the many months of sweat, hard work, and admittedly, perhaps a few bad words. Of course, as with my one siblings reveal earlier this week, there a few little details left to do. There are some more pictures to hang, touch up painting to do, and a few other things as well; but none that will make a substantial difference in pictures. It was a rather dreary day here and we took the pictures at dusk, so they did not turn out the best. Someday we will take pictures when it is sunny, our south facing windows let in some awesome light! So here we go:

Before: Looking east from the kitchen

After

Before: Looking SE from corner of Dining Room

After

Before: Looking South in Dining Room

After

Before: Looking South in Living Room

After

Before: Looking SW from corner of Living Room

After

Before: Looking West from edge of Living Room

After

Before: Looking East into the Kitchen

After

Before: Looking SW into the Kitchen

After

Before: Looking NE into Kitchen

After

Before: Kitchen looking West

After

There you go! That is what the majority of our nights, weekends, and, yes, arguments, have been about for the last 10 1/2 months. And, it has all been well worth it! We love it! We'll have pictures of the den coming real soon. I promise it will not be another 6 months! It is almost done!

After that the next phase of the remodel involves removing the chimney from the house. Yes, thats right I said removing the chimney. Which involves replacing our existing furnace. Which will be expensive. So, we are going to take a break for at least a few months before starting on that one. 

To family and friends on the east coast, we look forward to seeing you, or at least as many as possible, in a few weeks.

- Eric and Hannah too (who is currently making Peppernuts and Gingerbread Men (People?) Cookies

With Deepest and Most Humble Apologies

Okay, so it has been awhile since we have last updated. We feel guilty about this, really we do. We have just been a little busy. Busy with work, it seems to take up a lot of time, busy with remodeling and just in general busy. Not that this is any excuse for neglecting our family and friends. All that aside we are actually very near the completion of remodeling half our house. So close in fact that by the end of the week there will, hopefully, be reveal pictures of what our finished project looks like! Stay tuned!

Mondays Off

We have decided that we need to have every Monday off. If we did the house would get finished a lot quicker. Monday was a big day. Hannah cleaned and organized the kitchen while I installed and plumbed our new kitchen sink. We then moved onto installing some of the trim work in the kitchen. After lunch Noel and Diane came over to help out for a bit. Noel and I installed our dishwasher while Diane and Hannah worked on painting some of the baseboard and window trim that needs to be reinstalled. I also managed to find the time to hang one new light fixture above the kitchen sink. Mondays off are good.

Its Been Awhile...We've Been Busy

Okay, so I know I say this often, but it has been awhile since we last updated. But it has been a busy few weeks here at our house. Part of that time we have been busy waiting on counter tops to arrive. We found it hard to install what was not here :). So here are few pictures of the last few weeks.

Installing counter tops was a tight fit at times...good thing I am not any bigger!

Finished north side of the kitchen. Unfortunately I don't have any good shots of the south side...at least

ones that are not covered in tools...

It has been hot here. So hot in fact that last Saturday I came in from outside to do electrical work.

Our new overhead kitchen light.

Our new light over the peninsula.

Hopefully more to come soon!

Peace,

Eric

An Update

I know it has been a while since we have last updated this blog...but we have been busy. What follows is a brief picture essay of what we have been up to for the last two weeks.

We've patched kitchen drywall

We've painted the dining/living room and the kitchen

We've sanded the dining/living room and kitchen floors

and shellacked the kitchen floors

We've hung two new ceiling fans

On Memorial Day we installed over half of our new kitchen cabinets

The south side of our kitchen cabinets are completely installed

South side of the kitchen from the dining room

This week we hope to finish hanging the cabinets on the north side of the kitchen. Two are already in, leaving only five more to install! Last night we placed our order for our counter tops....only two to three weeks before we have a kitchen again! We now feel like we are in the homestretch of this project, although we realize the details are what sometimes take the longest.

Sky's overall feelings about the commotion of a remodel 

This photo could also sum up our feelings toward Sky right now. She picked this weekend to learn that she could jump the fence that surrounds our yard. So instead of making lots of headway on little things on Monday Hannah, Diane, Maureen and Papa John spent the day running two lengths of wire along the top of the fence posts. This seemed to work...for awhile. We were not 100% sure how she was getting out (going over the fence or between the wires) since, of course, she would never do it while we were out there. Our neighbors saw her though, she was jumping over the wire. This means folks that she was clearing 4 1/2 feet of fence and according to our neighbors she was clearing it easily. Which is why I am going to spend my afternoon installing a buried dog fence. 

- Eric

Cooking Made Difficult

this weekend we embarked on a new adventure...and adventure of living without a kitchen for at least the next few weeks. our kitchen now looks like this:

a gutted kitchen

a temporary kitchen...you can almost make your coffee from 

the shower

temporary pantry storage under the stairs

the fridge

oh the joys of remodeling!

this weekend we also put 24 tomato and 11 pepper plants in our garden. i knew i was buying this many plants, but it didn't hit me till i was home that 24 tomato plants is a lot of plants! yikes! 

peace,

eric

A Completed Project

Last night I finished the texturing of the walls and ceiling in the living room and dining room after spending about 6 hours standing on scaffolding. I think I spent about 30 hours total on this project alone, so it feels good to finally be done. It also took  6 1/2 buckets of drywall compound, at least we have a good supply of 5-gallon buckets now! Hannah spent the day stripping wallpaper in the kitchen and tackling the enormous mound of laundry and other cleaning tasks we have been neglecting over the past few weeks. Painting the living room and dining room and removing the remaining kitchen cabinets by next weekend? I think it can happen!


Peace,
Eric

Dreary Morning

It is a dreary morning here in our little corner of Nebraska. It rained, poured actually, during much of the night, which figures since I took the time yesterday to water the garden. And, they are calling for highs only in the low 60's for the next week. This is May to April! Where are the May flowers? Where are the Pilgrims? I suppose I could contribute part of my mood to the fact that I stayed up way to late last night reading. A few weeks ago I picked up the much talked about international best-seller The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson. Now I am almost finished with the second book in the series The Girl Who Played With Fire. I wouldn't call it excellent writing (of course they were translated from Swedish) but they sure are great stories. I would highly recommend them. ...just be prepared to go to bed way to late.

Progress remains steady this week here at project house. We may even be placing primer on the walls by tomorrow afternoon. I am finding it hard to work from home and look around constantly at all that needs to be done and not be able to go do it. Hopefully I will be able to get into office space soon!

Peace,
Eric

Cool Interview

Krista Tippett's interview with Desmond Tutu was excellent. Take a listen!

http://speakingoffaith.publicradio.org/programs/2010/tutu/

Cabinets!

Today our new kitchen cabinets arrived!

New kitchen cabinets waiting to be installed...

...many things left to do until that happens

I am meeting Hannah after work today to buy a microwave, the last appliance we are purchasing at this time. Our refrigerator and range have a warranty on them until the end of next January, so we are not going to replace them at this time.

...its been an expensive day in the remodeling world...

Peace,

Eric

Progress!

The past week and a half has seen noticeable progress for the first time in awhile. Recently, it seems, our projects, while important, have not yielded noticeable results. This past week we put up a wall, a change of pace from taking them down. Our kitchen had a strange little corner that was empty with nothing in it, but too full when a table was placed there. So, we decided to erect a wall to make the kitchen more a galley-style. The little walled off portion (approx. 8 sq. ft.) will eventually be part of a bathroom. For right now it is a little hidden room...anybody need a place to hide?

Before the new wall

After the new wall

Our refrigerator currently lives in the middle of the room

Our new cabinets should be in this week. Things should start to look dramatically different soon! Anybody who wants to come and help is welcome, we'll pay you with something grilled! ...since our kitchen is not very conducive to cooking inside.

The construction project may slow down a little though since I (Eric) have found a job! I am working with a brand new ecumenical supported youth center in Beatrice, NE. The 429 Factory will have a gymnasium, game tables, meeting rooms and more!  Our aim is to be up and running by the end of the summer. The space for the center already exists and is almost ready. I am really excited about this new position. My brain has not shut off since I was hired last week...you can ask Hannah.

I have uploaded more photos of the remodel to facebook if you want to see more of what we have been working on!

Peace,

Eric

Whoopie Pies in Nebraska!?!

The biggest change for me in moving to the midwest has been the seemingly endless amounts of time you spend in the car getting from place to place. The closest supermarket to us is about 20 miles away, however seeing that it is a town of 12,000 people (and that by most standards out here is large) it leaves something to be desired. So, we usually do our grocery shopping in Lincoln (the big city at 250,000 people) which means about 45 minutes on the road each way. - I shouldn't complain about this. Hannah does this drive every day to go to work -.

I say all this because when you have plans in Lincoln, you schedule other errands around said activity. This is the situation we found ourselves in Wednesday night. The Student Audiology Association (SAA) at UNL was having a fundraising event at the dowtown Noodles & Co., which Hannah, being proud former member, wanted to go and support. I was going to meet her there after work. I was going to run errands beforehand.

I left home at about noon and started with a haircut. (remember it was almost 1pm till I got there). Then I went across the parking lot to Lowes and spent the next hour spending a couple hundred more dollars on remodeling supplies. A stop by the local western outfitter yielded a new pair of brown boots (gotta look good for the job interview next week!) The next step was the first of two grocery stores where we shop. And now we are finally at the whoopie pie in Nebraska story. Usually in the grocery store I try to steer clear of the bakery. However this time I really needed to kill some time. I only had two more stops before the errands would be complete and was not sure what I was going to do until I met Hannah for supper. I almost was done perusing and was on my way out when I noticed what looked like a whoopie pie...it was a whoopie pie...sort of.

A vanilla and strawberry whoopie pie

Yes, that is a vanilla whoopie pie with strawberry cream...more like icing really. As all our Lancaster County friends and family know, this is not normal whoopie pie. ...it doesn't taste normal either. The cakes were okay, but the cream was, for lack of a better word, synthetic. On a scale of 1 to 10 (with 10 being the best) these fell somewhere around 3. So I suppose we will have to learn to make our own whoopie pies.

In house news: We have picked paint colors for the living/dining room and the kitchen. Other then that progress remains steady. While we are getting quite a bit done, it, unfortunately, is not stuff that shows up well  in photos. Hopefully by the end of next week things will look noticeably different.

Peace,
Eric

Dang! Them Some Big Gophers!

This past week we took a break from the inside of our house. Taking advantage of the warm spring days we moved outside to start a project that we have been wanting to do since the day we moved in. We started installing a fence for the dog. You see, in Pennsylvania we had a fence. We enjoyed it. When the dog had to go out you just opened the door and out she trotted; awhile later you opened the door and back in she trotted. Call it lazy if you like but we are tired of going outside with her every time she wants to tinkle, poop, or just run in circles. I am sure she misses being free outside too. 

One of 44 holes we dug in the yard

What we used to dig the holes...you didn't think I was going

to do it by had did you?

Fence posts are in. Stretching the mesh this weekend.

We also hope this fence will corral our cat...at least a little bit. Some of you may have heard that Orbit was sick. As in probably not going to live through the night sick. Well...he feels better. This adventure started about a week ago. Right before we brought him home he was neutered. The incision got infected. We started him on antibiotics and he seemed to be improving...but it still looked nasty. Last Thursday I took him down to the clinic and Nora opened it up and drained out all the puss. (Nice mental picture?) He never seemed to snap out of the anesthesia so we ran him back down at 9 on Thursday night. Well, he was an anemic little kitty. Nora pumped him full of meds and he spent the weekend at the clinic. Lots of drugs and one blood transfusion later (thanks cousin Jackson!) he appears to be his frisky self again. Climbing on things jumping from high places, exploring 3' post holes. Yesterday while working in the garage he would climb on my back anytime I was on my hands and knees. Kind of endearingly cute...but not very conducive to getting work done. 

It's a beautiful day here in southeast NE. Sunny and 70's. Time to get outside!

Peace,

Eric 

    

Walls, Orbit & MCC

We have been very busy around here this past week. Last Saturday the wall between the dining room and kitchen looked like this:

Now it looks like this:

Once all the framing has drywall on it this will be how open our kitchen will be to the rest of the house. There will be a short peninsula coming off of the left hand side. Needless to say we are really excited about getting this project done. Our already small kitchen has even less counter space now that we have cut out some cabinets and counter in order to remove the wall. Hopefully by the end of the week we will be close to ordering our new cabinets! 

In other house news the dining room/living room is almost half textured. We made the decision to texture the walls and ceilings after having to patch with drywall where the wall dividing the original two had been. We choose to do a venetian plaster texture. While it looks really nice, it is very time consuming.

Orbit. That is the name we have chosen for the newest addition to our little clan. We were joking around about going for a celestial theme with our pet names...and Orbit kinda stuck. Orbit has not been feeling well this past weekend. Probably a combination of moving and being neutered all in one day. One round of antibiotic down and he already seems to be feeling better :).

Saturday we headed out to Aurora, NE  for the 31st Annual Nebraska MCC Relief Sale for those not familiar with MCC (Mennonite Central Committee) check out there website...then donate! While we didn't buy anything at the auction we did buy some cheese, a delicious grilled windsor loin/grilled chicken dinner and, or course, ice cream. 

                                                                                                                                      

                                        

This week does not look too promising for getting lots of inside work done. Highs in the upper 60's to upper 70's through Sunday, time for outdoor projects to get under way!

Peace,

Eric

New Kitty

Yesterday we got a cat. Why? Well, we're really not sure ourselves. We can try to blame it on Hannah's sister, Nora, but it really is not her fault...at least not entirely. You see, while having dinner on Sunday she mentioned that there was a too-cute-for-his-own-good stray cat at the animal clinic where she works. We had been thinking about getting an outdoor/garage cat at some point and decided to take a trip down to see this guy...knowing in the back of our minds that we would probably end up with him. What we didn't expect was to show up and find him freshly neutered and vaccinated and ready to go that night. So, at 9:45 last night we pulled out of wal-mart after buying cat food and a litter box.

Our frisky feline friend.

Sky is not too sure of him yet...but he sure loves her

We are looking for help in naming him. So far the suggestions are (in no particular order):

- William of Orange

- Milk Dud

- Rusty

- Tangelo

- Symba

Progress on the house remains steady. The lack of photos is because current projects are not all that exciting. Moving electrical wiring is time consuming, but the end result does not look all that different. Thanks to Noel for all his help! I'll post some photos from wall demolition this past weekend sometime later this week.

Today, however, is a beautiful day so I will be working on outdoor projects this afternoon. On the list:

- Move all the lath we removed from the removed walls to the shed.

- Finish constructing compost bin #1.

- Patch in the grass that was removed by the snowplow and deposited elsewhere in the yard.

- Start cleaning up the sheds (anybody want a rusted mixer, old pop-top beer cans, or old bales of blow-in cellulose insulations?)