Video Tour of our Master Bedroom

Posted on January 2, 2015 by lyndsayss

A few days ago we did an interview with the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette about this blog and the projects that we have completed in our home. As we were giving the photographer a tour through the house he asked us to do a short video…. a live, unscripted video! I was instantly transported back to speech class in high school and college. I was so nervous to talk about the house with nothing planned!! The link’s been active for a few days but it took me awhile to even work up the nerve to watch the video 😉

Anyways, I finally took a look and it’s not half bad. Check it out for yourselves 🙂

<p><a href=”http://vimeo.com/115439568″>Who Lives There? Lyndsay Sheets and Raul Perez.</a> from <a href=”http://vimeo.com/thejournalgazette”>The Journal Gazette</a> on <a href=”https://vimeo.com”>Vimeo</a>.</p>

Adding a Vintage Farmhouse Sink…alternately known as The Day My Heart Broke

Posted on August 21, 2014 by lyndsayss

During our quest to bring a bit of vintage flavor to our new kitchen remodel we did a lot of research on what kind of sink we wanted. There are tons of options- stainless steel, copper, farmhouse, under mount, yada yada yada, the list goes on. We really had one requirement- the sink had to be big and deep. We didn’t want to deal with the same kind of problem we were facing with our old sink. I couldn’t even fit one skillet in the sink basin to wash it after use.

We had the extreme good fortune of coming across a sink that our neighbors were not using while looking at a job with my dad in their basement. This wasn’t just a modern day take on the farmhouse sink, this was the real deal, drainboard and all! Of course that also meant a hundred and fifty pounds of cast iron and porcelain that we had to figure out how to move upstairs but alas it was love at first sight. A deal was struck and arrangements were made and we set to work moving the sink from their basement to ours.

The sink is from the early 20th century…and having been removed at some point in time this baby had accumulated a lot of dirt and grime.

Even under all that dirt the beauty of this sink was still visible. I did a lot of research trying to find ways to clean up this sink but in the end we couldn’t get rid of a lot of rust spots and chips so we ended up calling a bathroom refinisher to help us out. I read all the literature online about the pros and cons of refinishing a porcelain sink. The downside is obviously that this process is a bit pricey (expect $200+) and also does not last for more than a few years. The upside is that the sink looks gorgeous in the interim. We decided to go ahead and take the plunge.

We hired a local individual to clean and fill the chips in the sink. Then he basically sprayed the sink with a latex high bond paint. The whole process took about 3 hours.

After the sink was looking beautiful again we had to devise a way to hang the sink under our new window. We devised a way to attach a 2×4 to the wall and hang the sink on the 2×4.

WARNING: This is where the story gets sad. The picture above lasted for about all of 4 minutes. As we were making braces to place under the base of the sink the whole thing came away from the wall and ended in a devastating crash of porcelain on the floor. All of us stared at the disaster in shock, afraid to get any closer. It was a rough day.

Eventually we had to examine the damage- 5 floor tiles cracked, several dented corners on the sink, a scratched faucet, and a chunk of the sink just absolutely missing. This single incident has been our greatest setback of the whole project. We walked away from the kitchen for a few days to regroup, as you can probably imagine tempers were running high.

When we picked up work again we decided to try to salvage the sink by either repairing it or covering the broken corner. First off we had to come up with a more secure way of mounting the heavy sink. Our solution was to use the strength of several 2×4’s nailed together. This time we would also add a metal bracket.

The stack of 2×4’s not only added strength it also created an 8″ shelf that will be a pretty cool feature behind the built in backsplash of the sink. We added some sheets of plywood to create a base and finally we were ready to attempt mounting this sink again.

So, lesson learned the hard way folks. Proper planning is essential. It’s also important not to get in a rush. We are lucky that no one’s foot was crushed as this sink came crashing down to the floor…or worse.

Now, onto researching ways to hid the blemish on the corner as well as some spots on the two upper corners where the latex paint was gouged! Any pointers are welcome!

Realities of Renovation

Posted on March 25, 2014 by lyndsayss

I know it might seem like it’s all fun and games but these are the realities of renovation:

No matter how well I tape off all doors and openings this house just won’t stay clean.

Plaster dust why must you torture me so?

Still fightin’ it out at the demolition derby!

Posted on March 20, 2014 by lyndsayss

Ugh! So ready for this phase of the remodel to be over! The house is permanently covered in dust and since we are still removing parts of the kitchen you don’t “see” a lot of progress. Most of the things we are doing are still behind the scenes so it is harder to keep a positive attitude when you don’t see a lot of change happening. The thing about old houses is that you never know what you are going to find. We ran into two huge messes- first, bass-ackwards plumbing that I showed you guys in my last post. Now, we are contending with 110 year old electrical wiring…that has been “fixed” several times. It sucks when someone tries to fix this type of issue with no real electrical wiring competence Besides that, we are adding several lights inside of cabinets and also under cabinet lighting so we are having to run lots of new wire anyways. It is very time consuming to say the least.

We do have one huge change to document, however, and that is the installation of several can lights. I cannot stress the difference this has made already and they are not even completely installed yet! WATT a difference (see what I did there?!) 🙂

We also had to finally remove the cabinets from the walls in order to tear out the plaster and access the electrical components. Trying to fit the entire contents of your kitchen onto your dining room table is not fun! It hard to find anything to eat because I can never find a pot to cook in!

My typical look on Sunday! #selfieforthewin

Goodbye laminate floor!

After many hours of work and several trips to the dumpster, we have finally gotten down to the studs. I think I must have forgotten to take a picture but there was hardly any insulation at all in these walls. No wonder the kitchen was always so cold!

If you look closely in the upper middle of the above photo you will see the remnants of the original back door frame. The frame was pretty tall- we think there was probably a door with a transom window. How cool would that look now?! It’s a shame that the door is long gone 😦 You will also see that the window on the left was originally much larger and a very different shape than what you see here. Our plan is to remove the window on the left and replace it with a wood window and corresponding trim that better suits the look of this house. We will also be removing the 2nd window in order to install a back door directly off of the kitchen.

We also rerouted the gas lines and changed the placement of the stove. In our new design plan the stove will be centrally located on the south wall of the kitchen.

Until next time!

-L.

Demolition Derby- Round 1

Posted on March 5, 2014 by lyndsayss

We are elbow deep in dust, dirt, and demolition here! And boy, am I ready for this part to be over!

We have been slowly tearing the kitchen apart for a few weeks now. Raul is in his last semester of school (yay!) so he has been way too busy to help much with the process which leaves me and my parents to cram in as much progress as possible every Sunday. The tricky part is tearing things down and still trying to maintain some semblance of utility in the space we are currently calling the kitchen. All of the contents of our many cupboards and cabinets have been relegated to the dining room for now which makes preparing any meal very easy…not. We are currently operating with no ceiling and 2 out of 4 walls. Oh! And no dishwasher (the horror!) We have been surviving on mostly cereal and canned soup in order to avoid any kind of food prep which gets old, real quick.

Our first task was to remove the false ceiling that had been added at some point in time. We noticed the drop ceiling last year when we had to gain access to the plumbing due to a water leak coming from the upstairs bathroom. After I was able to poke my head through the access hole and determine that we were losing about 8-10 inches of space with the drop ceiling we began to form ideas of removing the ceiling entirely.

Once we got all of the plaster knocked out if was painfully obvious that the plumbing was an absolute mess. It looks like a sadistic game of Mousetrap up there, doesn’t it?!

It took 2 days to reroute the plumbing but it was well worth it. We raised everything and either tucked it nicely into the original plaster ceiling or ran it in a horizontal line down the center of the kitchen. The plan is to add a beam to our new ceiling that will hide all of our plumbing and electrical. Now everything looks nice and organized 🙂 If you can’t tell the difference, no worries, a month ago I probably wouldn’t have been able to either. But now, after several hours on a ladder and even some burns on my hand from dripping solder I can see that this setup is much better!

Next up, bye-bye soffit! Since we plan to install new cabinets that extend all the way to the ceiling then there is no need for this bad boy anymore!

20140202_121005

Here is an up close look at the Fiestaware backsplash that I had mentioned previously. Because of the way this was installed and also due to the nature of the “tile” itself, removing this backsplash was tedious work.

We decided to go ahead and remove the 2 layers of plaster from around the chimney to have a portion of exposed brick in our new kitchen. Basically, we are looking at the backside of the fireplace that is in one corner of our living room. I think the exposed brick wall looks awesome! I added a satin finish concrete sealer (3 coats) and I am really happy with the way it looks…also, one project completely done (yessss!!!).

20140130_200957

Unfortunately, we were also forced to strip the paint off more doors! I swear, this is the one job that continually tests my patience the most…but I am becoming somewhat of a pro at it. Here’s a picture of Raul modeling the proper usage of a heat gun which I have concluded is great for simultaneously removing 3 layers of paint but not so good for getting old varnish off. If you look closely in the bottom right corner of this picture you will see the 3 colors of paint that used to be on this door- white, tan, and lime green (WTH!?!…just, WHAT?!).

This weekend we are back at it again tearing out more plaster and hopefully finishing the sanding on the 3 doors I have stripped over the last couple of weeks. I have my fingers crossed that we will be putting up new drywall in 2 weekends (and the extended forecast even shows temperatures in the high 50’s, I know you are all ready for Spring, too). Here’s to a productive Sunday! Thanks for following along!

Decisions, decisions!

Posted on August 9, 2012 by lyndsayss

Sometimes being a grown up is hard. Choosing curtains has been the worst decision that I have had to make for this house!!

1 tequila, 2 tequila, 3 tequila, FLOORS!!!!!

Posted on August 9, 2012 by lyndsayss

That’s what I feel that I need after these last few weeks. A nice big shot of tequila. Make it a double.

Wow! I’m sorry to all my readers (all 10 of you 😉 I have neglected this blog over the last month. Things have been non-stop, go, go, GO! at the house. It seems like every day I have the same routine. It’s wake up at 7. Work 8-4. Then jet over to the house and put in 4 or 5 hours of work before I head home for a quick shower and a chapter out of my book. Then it’s lights out.

I think that has been part of my blog writer’s block. I feel like the last month has been like the movie Groundhog- we are working our asses off day and night (and not just me- mad props to my MOM, my DAD, Raul and his FAM,too) yet we aren’t getting anything actually DONE.

There is definitely one thing I have learned though; I waaayyyy underestimated the time that it would take to get this house looking like I want it…Oh! and I also learned that I never, ever, ever, ever in my life and in all my future lives want to strip, sand, and refinish a hardwood floor again. Ever. The process is long, messy, hot and EXPENSIVE!!!!! Granted, it is not as expensive as new hardwoods but stilllll….

When we first purchased the home the floors were not even a priority to me. They were kinda one of those projects that was lingering in the back of mind- I knew they needed to be done, but honestly their ugliness wouldn’t be any kind of barrier to me living in the house.

And then…we started making everything else so beautiful around the floors. They became a huge eyesore. So we decided to tackle the upstairs. At first it was just the master bedroom. There was just a fine layer of stain left on the original flooring. A bit of sanding wouldn’t be too difficut. Right? WRONG!!! Then the bedroom looked so good that we decided to do the hallway, too. Now the hallway was covered in 3 layers of ugly grey paint. We had to add tons of stripping to the process. Then sanding. Then staining. Then protecting with a glossy polyurethane.

And then we figured as long as we were doing the hallway why not do the 3rd bedroom, too. Just while we were at it, you know. That room was also painted. And we soon discovered that whatever paint they had used on the floor, well, it wasn’t coming off with regular paint stripper. Like not at all. So that meant a lot of heavy duty sanding.

To make a long story short the whole process was very complicated and took ffoooorrrrreeevvveerrrr. In fact, it took so long, and affected me so deeply, that I would rather not even write about it. I will, however, provide you with a lot of cool pictures! The progress is amazing!

And voila! I will post pics of the finished product soon! The most exciting part is that now we can get furniture!! 🙂

We takin’ it allll off!

Posted on May 16, 2012 by lyndsayss

At this point we are halfway thru every project that we have started. Depending on whether you’re an optimist or a pessimist will change whether you see this as a good thing (yay! almost there!) or a bad thing (ugh! so much to go!). Me, I just see it as there is a LOT of shit everywhere I look! 😉

I feel like my life is literally in shambles right now. (Shout out to Nicole G…literally in shambles because everywhere I look there is dirt, dust, and things either falling apart or partially assembled! Oh and I feel like I only have 3 outfits anymore since I am always wearing work clothes 😉

Check out the picture of the master bedroom and you will understand exactly what I am talking about.

There is more bare drywall than paint!! You can’t even see the floor anymore! And I feel like I haven’t been properly clean for weeks, despite my 3 showers a day.

So, naturally, we decided that we needed to really dig in and scrub this place from top to bottom- or in our case, from bottom to top since we did start in the dining room and work our way up the stairs 😉

Everyone knows that when you want something cleaned right, you gotta call in the big guns. Granny Big Guns, that is. My lovely, wonderful, Grammy came down armed with a mop and plenty of windex and set right in to work.

She also made a great lunch for us! Yum!! THANK YOU!

My mom pitched in, too and showed off her own prowess with the mop.

The results were Ah-mazing. Look at the before and after of the master bedroom floor where we did the majority of the drywall application and dreaded sanding.

The dining room fairly sparkled after they tackled all the woodwork with qtips, toothbrushes, and plenty of Murphy’s oil.

Oh! And you can also check out my awesome new paint job in the dining room! Thank you Susan and Joe for all the help you gave me in there a couple of weeks ago!! I loooove the way it turned out! I will definitely get better pictures soon but the bottom half is a dark grey almost purple and the top half is a light lilac color. It looks great with the dark woodwork.

Raul’s mom, Margarita took on the ungodly task of cleaning the oven. The previous owners must have never, and I mean, NEVER cleaned this thing because it was absolutely covered in burnt food and grease. Even though we are not planning on keeping these appliances, we do need to use them for at least a couple of months so Margarita offered to shine them up a little.

Believe it or not, the boys even pitched in and did their parts to get the house looking spic and span, too.

My dad polished these 100-year-old doorknobs and the difference was amazing!

You can even see my reflection if you look hard enough! 😉

Raul defied his acrophobic mama and climbed out on the roof to scratch paint off the windows with a razor blade and spray them down with a coat of glass cleaner…or two. The amount of light that was being blocked out by the layer of dust and grime that coated these windows is gone and the difference is incredible! These babies even sparkle from the street! The only bad thing is that now I know we need curtains like ASAP!

Yes, he’s for hire!

Cleaning up the house meant starting to strip away layers of old paint, too. And I have one thought on that process. Ladies and gentlemen if I am ever elected president (which was my dream job according to my 5th grade journal) I will make it a punishable crime to paint antique doors and floors!!! The paint removal process takes hours of time and boatloads of patience. It is not a pleasant task. If you ever find yourself doing this my advice to you is to spend a few extra bucks and get the really, really potent stripper. I bought two different kinds and the $30 gallon was infinitely better than the $20 one. Spending a little extra will save you lots of time and energy. Plus a stronger stripper can prevent excessive sanding after you get the paint off. Stripping can be expensive (we are already through 3 gallons of this stuff) but I think that the impact of returning the floors and doors to their original sheen will totally be worth the effort.

In total we have 8 door fronts to strip plus a hallway, the floor of the 3rd bedroom, and several feet of trim board. It is gonna be a loo-ooo-oooo-ng process. Also, the stripper burns like a you-know-what when it gets on your skin. It literally ate away my fingertips when I was working on removing the paint from the individual door panels with a razor blade. I promise you all that a manicure is my first stop as soon as we finish this house!

For now though I just feel sooo much better with the dust gone and the few steps that we have made toward a living space that we can actually inhabit!

Gettin’ down and dirrrrrrty

Posted on April 8, 2012 by lyndsayss

This house being over a century old and all, I had guarded some hope of finding hidden treasure. Maybe a rare coin. A forgotten savings bond. A suitcase full of cash. Whatever. So naturally, breaking down old walls and digging holes tends to make me a little excited. I hardly thought that the biggest treasure we would uncover would be in the master bedroom closet.

The bedroom has a little alcove off it that has some built in closet shelving and drawers. There is even a cool old guide with rotating piece that directs men on how to pair a suit, tie, and shirt and make sure all three are color coordinated! 😉 However they are really old…and ugly. So out they had to come.

Phil and Tyler stopped by to help again with the demolition and with the aid of a couple hammers and crowbar we got down to work. Pretty soon the mirror and shelves were gone and we were left with just one drawer. Phil dug in…and that’s when we struck big.

HIDDEN TREASURE!

Take a look at the surprise that we found.

What theeee….!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Of all the possible things I could possibly find, I find this!!! And there’s not even a pack of batteries included?!

LOL

Tyler wanted to know what all the commotion was about so we told him it was just a toothbrush case (good one, phildo)…obviously.

But let’s just put this into perspective. Before we purchased the house, a woman lived here alone…with just her 5 kids for company. And good lovin’ ain’t cheap 😉

Don’t worry, I put on my hazmat suit before I picked that up and put it in the trash.

With all the shelving removed my Mom and I got to start my least favorite job- removing all the nasty wallpaper.

Luckily, after 2 billion years of being glued to the wall, it was relatively easy to remove.

Now the walls will have to be washed with bleach water (notice the mold?) and then filled with mud and sanded (ugh, more sanding?!). Then, we can lay a few 2×6’s and a sheet of plywood down in order to make a platform and transform this alcove into my dressing area. I’ve already got a great 6′ mirror with antique detail that will be the centerpiece for the space and I spotted a great little chandelier for a reasonable price at Menard’s last night during an emergency trip to purchase a new bathtub. But, that, my friends, is a story for another time!

Have a great Easter/Passover! XOXO

ourvintagepleasure

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