Nearly three weeks ago, we sent our clawfoot tub to a professional restorer, having very little free time and zero confidence in the do-it-yourself kits. When we dropped it off, the Tub Guy said he’d have it done in one week. A week later, we called to check on his progess. He hadn’t started, and […]

On Saturday, as we puttered around the bathroom pulling nails and readying the walls for drywall, it occured to me….. the walls were ready for drywall! I got downright giddy. That is phenomenally exciting to me. I was expecting our progress to be much, much slower. I think this is one of those projects that […]

I haven’t shared much in the way of finish material plans yet, but that’s because we’re kinda winging it. I’ve been hemming and hawing, big time because I have trouble choosing finish materials when I can’t “see” the space. Once the walls and subfloor are in I’ll have a much easier time pulling the trigger. […]

The bathroom may have thought it’d have plenty of time to settle in and enjoy life as an empty shell, but it was sadly mistaken. Obviously, it doesn’t know us well enough. Teague had two days off in between construction jobs, so while I was at work sitting on my butt he was home leveling […]

This weekend was a complete success! Maybe it’s the layer of grime that runs from one end of the house to the other, or the fact that animals have been crawling into our ceiling nightly. Or maybe it’s the breeze that blows through the cracks in the wall, letting us know we’re heating the outdoors […]

With old houses, you come to expect it…. even the easist of projects are never easy, because you’ll inevitably uncover some mindblowing new problem while trying to fix the original one. And when you gut a room? OHHHHH, the things you’ll uncover. It’s the reason our kitchen remodel took 6 months, and our master bathroom […]

We just finished up the type of work weekend you can only pull off a few times a year….. one where you get more accomplished in two days than you usually do in two months. And even though my lungs are full of drywall dust (despite the safety gear), my snot looks like dirt, and […]

Every time we open up a wall, we’re secretly hoping to find a big wad of cash – or at least some fun little trinkets. Obviously, I’ve watched too many episodes of “If Walls Could Talk” on HGTV. When we started busting open the master bathroom walls this afternoon I was really optimistic. Alas, we […]

Though it needs a railing, newel post, trim, and some touch-up drywall, you can now see where we’re headed with the stairwell project… Here’s the new view from the dining room: And here’s the new view from inside the stairwell: When you compare it to a photo pre-removal, you can see how much more open […]

In order to get our rather large tub upstairs, we knew we’d be doing some finagling. Our stairwell is tight, to say the least. It twirls to the right the minute you enter it. It’s steep angles and uneven steps are not for the faint of heart. We’ve had a number of run-ins with large […]