March 9, 2011

New direction

Posted in Uncategorized at 9:21 pm by Rudimentary Ramblings

I’ve been thinking about what I want to do with this blog. In the beginning it started out chronicling my adventures (or misadventures) with a new house. Then I introduced my pet and now it looks like I’m introducing a new interest of mine. So, I think this will become an all-purpose blog, just to keep people I don’t see very often updated. Right now, I guess I’ll just see how things go with keeping up with the blog.

April 23, 2010

New Member

Posted in Uncategorized at 9:46 pm by Rudimentary Ramblings

Last week, Thursday, we welcomed a new addition into our soon to be family. His name is officially Yukon. On Tuesday of last week, we did an interaction at the Fort Wayne Animal Care and Control. It went very, very well. We were told if we were interested to call back the next day by 10am.  Patrick and I were wanting to wait to adopt until after the wedding, but we saw him and felt the time was right.

Yukon has adapted into his new environment well. As always with a newly adopted pet, there are some rough patches. So far we have either dealt with or are currently dealing with the following: fleas, ear infection, marking around the house, getting on the furniture and barking when we leave aka separation anxiety. We have gotten him groomed which will help with the flea problem. Although he continues to scratch, I think that will go away. We may be dealing with some food allergies, so we shall see.

Yukon is about 6 years old and is a love! He loves being around people and will get in your face to tell you so! Yesterday he got his first cut. He looks so much nicer these days. I think he might be a little cold though because he is so used to his long coat. Here are some pictures of what he looked like prior to his cut:

March 25, 2010

Finished

Posted in Uncategorized at 6:38 pm by Rudimentary Ramblings

The family room aka the room from hell is almost complete! All I have to do is complete the staining and polyurethane the wood for around the windows, entryways, chair rail and baseboards. Have I told you my thoughts about white trim? I hate it! Honestly, I think it is a cop-out. I prefer sanding the wood and staining it. I get to know every grain (and splinter) the wood has to offer. I called it “getting personal with the trim.” Right now, I know which pieces of trim have and haven’t caused me problems. It has become my “mission” to change all of the white trim in the house to more of a natural state. For me stain and polyurethane make the room more cozy and protects the wood. Okay, now I’ll get off my soap box and talk about something else.

The downstairs bathroom has a new sink! We took out the old vanity and replaced it with something newer. The main reason we did this was to give us and those who visit our home more room between the toilet and the sink. Unfortunately, I lost storage. But, I never stored anything there anyways so I’m really not missing anything! We painted the wall the sink is on a warm and bright green, so it would fit in better with the green already in the room. The contractors said when they pulled out both the sink and the top vanity, there was a horrible nicotine smell. It is amazing how much nicotine can seep into things and lurk. I’m just glad it is gone!

Back to the family room, it is painted with two colors of blue. A darker one is above a lighter one. The chair rail will go in between and break it up better. This past weekend (3/21) was the first time we used the room and it was for a bridal shower. Before the shower, on Friday and Saturday, Patrick and I moved in furniture. So there is a couch, entertainment center (that has been out in the garage forever), papasan chair, some lamps and speakers (for surround sound) in the room. It was very nice to be able to share this room and have it for the shower.

The house is not just a house anymore, it is now what I call home. On to the next project!!!

Here are some other pics!

February 18, 2010

Valentine’s Day 2-14-10

Posted in Uncategorized at 8:03 pm by Rudimentary Ramblings

Okay. I have finally had enough. Well, in my last post I had enough too. I’m finally bringing in a licensed contractor to do the work in the family room. On Valentine’s Day, my fiance and I spent some quality time in the room tearing off the wainscoating and molding around the entry ways and window. We found out that stuff can hide major sins. We found black and green mold in two different places in the room. The first was behind the downstairs bathroom sink. The second spot is behind the outside water spigot. Not fun at all.  Needless to say, we are not replacing the wainscoating. Instead, we are going to replace the drywall that is ruined and Spanish lace the room. Phase 2, will include staining and putting up a chair rail and painting the room two different colors. One color above the chair rail and a lighter color below.

I’m really trying not to complain too much in this blog. I just like to be able to vent my frustrations! So, I’ll put in a good piece about Valentine’s Day at our new house. My gift to Patrick was a Money Tree aka Schefflera Plant. It is our first house plant! I also gave him a nice stand to go with it. My Valentine’s Day gift included a pair of white gold hoops, chocolate and dinner at Casa’s! Overall, it was a good day except for what we found behind the wainscoating. I hope to provide pictures in the next few days of what the room looks like at this stage. I just hope and pray our contractor doesn’t let us down. We have an official deadline for finishing this room – March 21. By that date, all of the furniture has to be moved in because on the 21st, there will be a bridal shower at the house. I don’t want people seeing the mold on the walls!

January 11, 2010

Broken

Posted in Uncategorized at 10:13 pm by Rudimentary Ramblings

It has been awhile since I’ve written. In the mean time, our cooktop has gone out. Thank goodness for home warranties! Word to the wise: when buying a home it is worth looking into houses that come with home warranties. Especially if most of the equipment in the house (cooktop, water heater, ect) happens to not function within that year. We were able to call our home warranty agency and they were able to replace our cooktop. Sure, it is cheap and it doesn’t match the counter top (or anything else in the kitchen for that matter), but in 5 or 10 years we are planning on doing a remodel project. Then we can expand our kitchen and get a range!

The family room. What can I say. We are almost finished with what should’ve been a 3 week project that has turned into 3 months. We didn’t prime before Spanish Laced the ceiling. So, after we primed the Spanish Lace, it began to crack in some areas. It cracked primarily where there was old mud on the ceiling that turned chalky. We should have figured if it was going to BARELY hold on the the popcorn, it would BARELY hold up the Spanish Lace. Another lesson learned was to always prime the drywall BEFORE Spanish Lacing it as well as maybe re-mud the old mud. So, now it is re-mudded and primed ready to be laced again. Hopefully, that will happen sometime this week! Then we can paint! Yea!

After the family room fiasco, we are going to wait until I’m living there full-time to work on anymore remodel projects.

Our couch that we have broke on us as well. Luckily, one of my friends was gifted with new furniture, so she has no use for her leather couch anymore. Now, I’m not a fan of leather, but the price was right – FREE. And it beats a broken couch and sitting on the floor because of it. Do you know how cold a cement floor with carpeting, but no padding can get? Cold. Now, the leather couch has a history. It was in a house fire. So, the back has a huge hunk of leather missing and frayed, so you can see the green and the frame inside. However, we put it up against the wall and no one will ever know, unless they read the post and go looking for it. Do we plan on keeping the couch? Absolutely not, it is just a temporary fix until we can get something better. Strangely enough, it matches our dining room furniture! Odd!

Now, we are working on getting a water heater. More on that later!

November 26, 2009

Disheartened

Posted in Uncategorized at 8:30 pm by Rudimentary Ramblings

As most of you know, I am a go-getter. No matter what the project is, I try and tackle it the best way I know how. Except this house. I have a major weakness and it is called “lack of tool-girl skills.” So, to make up for this weakness, I have to rely on other people to help me. One thing I’m definitely getting schooled on real quick is ceilings. To make a long story short, after we Spanish Laced the ceiling and then primed it, the ceiling cracked. Okay, it didn’t just crack, it looked like how the Sahara gets when there is a long drought — the sand and ground begins to crack. Well, that’s what it looked like, except it was on our ceiling! Okay, so I’m being a little melodramatic, but it isn’t too far from the truth! Anywayz… our good friend Nathan came back to the house to see what was up. No pun intended! 🙂 He scraped a bit of the ceiling away to find that it wasn’t sticking to the parts of the drywall that had old mud. If you look at pictures after we had scraped the popcorn off the ceiling and notice the white lines of mud. Well, it is in those areas where the Spanish Lace came away from the ceiling. I was livid after seeing the new Spanish Lace come down in foot chunks!

So, now we are pretty much back to square one: What to put up on that ceiling and make it stick? On Saturday, Patrick and I bought a product called Peel Stop. I think it is the solution to our problem! It is like decoupage for ceilings. We are going to make this ceiling stick! This week is another week spent scraping the ceiling and decoupaging the ceiling. I may not have tool-girl skills, but I do learn quickly. I may be disheartened but it won’t last for too long! Pep talk of the week: Let’s get out there and seal up that ceiling so it stops coming down!

November 4, 2009

A Whole Bunch of Whatever!

Posted in Uncategorized at 6:59 pm by Rudimentary Ramblings

I think I’m getting abit behind or maybe I just want to make a blog about each individual thing that we do. Either way I want to do a what ever post because that is how I’m feeling right now!

First, I should give you an update! Since getting the family room smeared with mud to make Spanish Lace, we have primed it. ALL OF IT (except for the wainscoting, which was below the burgundy)! It took Patrick and I 5 hours and almost 4 gallons of white Bullseye Primer. I hate that stuff! It has a very strong ammonia smell. I’m sure it wouldn’t have taken us as long as it did, if I hadn’t had to take a break every 10 minutes to get fresh air. You probably ask, “Did you have ventilation?”  The answer is a resounding YES! We had the screen door open because it was a nice warm fall day as well as a fan going. It’s just that the paint stunk — BADLY!!! So the room is now a solid white.

I’ve also taken some more pictures, besides the family room! I took them of the kitchen. I thought that it was time to get the pictures taken. Primarily, because it is no longer a mess of cleaning supplies. We also unpacked on of Patrick’s boxes, which some were full of kitchen supplies that we needed!

However, I went to the house on Monday and Patrick pointed out to me that certain spots on the ceiling are beginning to crack. Where did we go wrong? Too much paint? Not enough mud smeared? Who knows! Luckily, Nathan is going to come over and check it out. He knows the answer, I’m sure of it and he can help us!

I also posted pictures of the house on the first blog. There are two, one of the front and one of the back of the house. Enjoy!

November 3, 2009

New Furniture

Posted in Uncategorized at 6:53 pm by Rudimentary Ramblings

Last week I bought some “new” furniture. It is new in the sense that it looks new and it is new to me. Since we don’t have any ceiling lighting in our house, the best way to provide light (besides natural light) is to have lamps. So, here are some that I bought:

I am so excited to get the family room done so we can move the furniture in and feel “moved in.” It is also exciting to have the feeling of owning the house with a finished room. We are finally putting our stamp on the house!

October 31, 2009

Halloween

Posted in Uncategorized at 9:50 pm by Rudimentary Ramblings

We celebrate Halloween tonight at our house! It’s just you run-of-the-mill trick or treating! I’m looking forward to it!

October 27, 2009

More pictures

Posted in Uncategorized at 6:58 pm by Rudimentary Ramblings

I’ve been so concerned with getting the Family room started, getting Patrick moved in as well as cleaning the new house, that I have been remiss on posting additional pictures. I keep remembering the inside, but forget to take the outside. I promise they will be available soon! But, here are some more inside pics!

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