home in 3 days

Ever since we closed on our home two weeks ago today (wow that went fast) we've been breaking our backs getting it move in ready.  I took 7 days off work.  We cleaned, cleaned some more, used a grinder to remove soft mortar and some unstable bricks from the basement wall and repointed them, wire brushed the brick to remove chipped, loose paint, cleaned the walls really well and brushed on a couple of coats of waterproofing paint.  (Mark says we know karate now.)

Man, does it make a huge difference down there... the photo grid shows various stages to complete.



Then we took on paint.  Since the house is 110 years old, it has lead-based paint in it.  Just to be on the safe side, we tested all the areas where paint was chipping.  Most of it was okay.  But, for the areas where the test was positive, we abated by removing the loose with a gel that traps the yuck into your disposable cloth and hit it with a special, thick sealer paint.  Then, for best measure, we are coating everything with yet another coat of fresh paint between our babies and the yucky stuff.  It took us three straight 18 hour days of two people working to get the painting this far, where the major areas have at least 2 coats and we just have to hit the edges and trim.

 But, again... Oh man does it look much better already.  The colors we chose really bring out the highlights of the stained glass.  The window treatments are at the dry cleaner, but it's going to be beautiful, I think. 

We also tore out the floor in the foyer upstairs to put in a new subfloor before we lay the new wood floors.  Mark removed the china cabinet doors, drawers, and hardware so we can refinish them (lead) later in the garage away from the babies... We found part of the beautiful textured wallpaper behind a mirror above the fireplace, but there was not enought there to save it... :( 

Despite the fact that the house is still pretty torn up and needs at least two more days of cleaning and prepping before we move in, we decided that it's about time we start filling boxes and working on exiting the old house.  Mark already packed over 15 boxes and thinks he needs at least 30 more... so much work.

Who needs to go to the gym when you have a house?

getter done

We have an appointment to sign the contracts and close our loan... on Monday.  Thank you, Heavenly Father, for finally helping me understand the meaning of "eternity" and for bringing it to an end for this process.