Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to All!

We made it. We had a lovely holiday with family and friends!

A new counter

We ordered a butcher block counter from Lumber Liquidators. We had to get an 8 foot piece, but we only have a 6 foot counter.  We were able to use the other piece for a small base cabinet that also needed a counter. The counter is cherry.

Little things

Last night we installed a vinyl baseboard on the kitchen cabinets. The previous owners installed awful tile for baseboard, and the remains of the bonding material was hideous. I sanded it down and used prestick stuff. We thought to go with brown, but decided to go with something closer to what the wood work will be. It covered a lot of sins...

And...while I was doing this, Gina was sewing curtains!!! We are really happy with the fabric we chose for one of the bedrooms...although it doesn't photo well. It looks A LOT better live.  It is much darker and not as shiny.

Multitasking projects

In a flurry of trying to get some things done before the holiday. We got some kitchen cabinets from a friend. They are the same style as our cabinets. The wood is oak, ours are birch, but the tone is pretty close. For now, they are good. We took our trailer up to Walden an brought a whole load  home. We first cleaned them in the driveway. Some of the units will be used in the basement near the bar.

Our first attempt to install the wall cabinets was unsuccessful.  Our plaster walls are 1 inch thick, so we needed longer screws. We also decided to cut wood to set the cabinets on since Gina doesn't have the biceps of Martina Navratilova. Our second attempt worked! Yay! The photo of the upper didn't turn out.

We had our chimney sealed on Saturday. They said they would be at our house between 7:00 and 7:30 am. At 7:30 am I opened the front curtain. The contractor was parked out front...but appeared to be sleeping. He slept through dog barking and Gina knocking on the window.

She went out twice. Finally about 10 after 8 I went out and BANGED on the window and yelled his name. He finally woke up. He took a few minutes to get out of his car, but finally got to work. He said he was waiting for the roof to warm up. yeah, right. Any way, he did finally get to work and we will be able to have a fire in the fireplace!

Our other task was putting base moulding in the dining room and kitchen. I purchased a new nail gun the night before, only to find out the guy at home depot pulled the wrong one off the shelf. So the job started a little later than I wanted. Amazingly it went in pretty smoothly with no bad cuts and we only had a small handful of trim left after the project. We still need to caulk and paint it...but that will have to wait. It sure looks better than the crappy void that was left after we removed the tile stuff.

Me wearing safety glasses!!!

We aslo started prepping the base cabinets for installing a vinyl base at the kickboard. We have to do something to cover where we removed the tile baseboard. 

I am using a Nextec unitool...works great but you need to have spare batteries on the charger. 

Gina continued making curtains...which seems to be an endless project. They are turning out great though. 

The convection oven!!!

Finally! After 4 months in a box on the dining room floor the convection oven is finally installed above the range where it belongs. Yay! We hired a contractor to start doing some jobs...this being one of them. We joined Angie's List to find contractors after our first one was a bomb. So far, we have been very pleased. This one is a general contractor, Hire Her, Inc. The wall cabinets aren't as deep as newer ones...so the oven sticks out a little. He did a great job and then Gina got to reorganize the spices! (our cabinets are not this green looking!)

Sealing up the windows

Well until we get new windows, we need to seal up the drafty windows. We used Scotch window insulator kits. They are the plastic shrink material so there are really no wrinkles.  We used the outdoor kits for the kitchen and bathroom windows -- where we have blinds. Didn't realize it was going to be a daylong project.

Lodi, Mr. Helpful, stood guard.

Coy-tins paht two!

Yay! The living room curtains are done. We are really happy with the color. We got our fabric from www.fabricguru.com.  Was a good price and their website was fairly easy to sort and look through tons of fabric.

Gina in her Andy Spano shirt... our former County Exec who lost his last election.

Lodi, ever helpful. Needs to color coordinate his bed.

We have double rods and have hung the thermal curtains behind the new curtains. We plan on hanging sheers in the summer. These windows face north, but do get a lot of light reflecting off of the neighbors houses.  Gina did a great job. I was busy too...making fire roasted tomantillo salsa from the last of our farm share produce.

Coyt-ins!

Winter's coming and we need to get windows sealed up. We ordered some lovely plastic and some lovelier material. The curtain project is just beginning.... we are starting with the living room windows. Good thing the basement is huge to spread out!

this is the material... it is more subdued really.

Door knobs!

Anyone who has been to our house thinks it is strange because there are no door knobs. We have had them; they have just been in a box. We took them off to paint the doors and clean them. They knobs are original to the house and solid brass. The previous owners weren't the best painters and there is a bit of paint on them as well.

Well Gina read that we could boil them in vinegar to loosen the paint and clean them. We just needed an old pot that we didn't want to use for food because the paint on the knobs may have lead in it.

Gina making door knob soup!

After and before!!

MMMmmmmm,,, door knob soup.

The boiling vinegar did a great job. It was really quick. But...the smell is a bit much. It wasn't too bad if your feet were on the floor...but not so great to up on a ladder cleaning a chandelier!! Maybe next week the doorknobs will get back on the doors. 

The crystal chandelier

Well, every time we sat down to eat at the dining room table I couldn't help but look up at the chandelier which was dingy, dusty and dirty. Who knows the last time it was cleaned.

I first just tried to dust it and then a crystal fell off....so I had to take all the crystals off.

I cleaned it with vinegar and a little steel wool.  I didn't want to make it too clean, as it is very old and it would probably take a week of polishing to really clean it perfect. I draped a cloth with warm vinegar on an area covered with paint. It softened it up great. I wiped everything down with a mixture of vinegar, rubbing alcohol and water.

I then washed all the crystals in warm soapy water....all 51 one of them!

After everything was clean..the long process of drying and putting each crystal back on began.

Was it ever shiny when I was done. If feels so much cleaner and shines so much brighter!

All sparkly. The crystal didn't reflect much before.

the grunge before...this is before we painted too and the wood floor guy added another layer of dust.