Tagged With: Home

Grandma’s Bedroom

Photograph taken on Tuesday, December 05, 2017 by Henry
Grandma's Bedroom

Grandma’s Bedroom

I’ve posted a few pictures of the progress that’s being made on the new bathroom and I’ll put up another one soon, but tonight I thought I’d post a picture of grandma’s new bedroom, formerly our family room. Well, lately it’s been neither. It’s been the storage and work room for out builder, and in this picture you can see tools, two doors leaning up against the shelves, the hardwood flooring for the new hall, and even the bathroom sink faucet in the upper left. Later this week lights will be installed in the ceiling of this room and next week the carpet should come up and the floor refinished (along with the new floor in the hall).

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Grandma’s Bedroom, Part 2

Photograph taken on Thursday, December 14, 2017 by Henry
Grandma’s Bedroom, Part 2

Grandma’s Bedroom, Part 2

Nine days ago (see Tuesday, December 05, 2017) I posted a picture titled Grandma’s Bedroom. That showed our former family room full of tools, building supplies, and a bit of waste. The room has changed pretty drastically since then, mostly in the last few days. When I got home on Tuesday the room was empty and the carpet was gone (well, it was in small rolls on at the top of the driveway. Today, the floor was refinished. I have to say, it looks pretty nice. Certainly better than the old carpet. It’s closed up now, so that the top coat can dry. And of course the house smells pretty bad. But that will fade, eventually.

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Computer Room

Photograph taken on Monday, January 08, 2018 by Henry
Margaret and Cathy In The Computer Room

Margaret and Cathy In The Computer Room

Now that Cathy’s mom has moved in with us, we needed to integrate her computer into our home network. The small office just inside our front door (and now just outside her bedroom) is where my computer has been for over a year and where Cathy’s has been since the construction started towards the end of October. Now Margaret’s computer is here, as well. By the time I’m writing this, on January 14), the table is gone from the middle of the room and it’s much easier to walk around. My computer and the printer is to my right, along with a tall bookcase. We need to put a few pictures up on the walls, but it’s coming together.

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Dot’s Place

Photograph taken on Tuesday, June 19, 2018 by Henry
Dot in Her New Home

Dot in Her New Home

Mom moved to a condo today in a retirement community. We’ve been very busy with my mother-in-law’s move so were not able to do as much for her as perhaps we should have done, but between George coming down on Friday and staying through the move and the folks at Let’s Move, the move has happened. There is still plenty to do yet at the house but most of her things that she will have at the new location are in place and set up. As you can see, she seems pretty comfortably situated. There will be more adjustments, as well, of course, but the big moving day has come and gone without significant incident.

Oh, and Dorothy drove down from Massachusetts to surprise us. We were very surprised and naturally also very pleased. After a little while at Margaret’s house, we all went to see Dot in her new location.

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Dot’s Old Place

Photograph taken on Saturday, June 23, 2018 by Henry
Dot's Old Place

Dot’s Old Place

On Tuesday I had a picture of Dot (otherwise known as mom) in her new digs. Well, today’s picture is back in the old place. It isn’t quite empty yet, but it’s getting there. As you can see, there are some books that are yet to be either claimed or given away. The lamp (an imitation Tiffany) and the wall hanging are tagged with their new destination. We also need to take down the hooks for her quilt-hanging rod and then put them up in the new place. The cabinets and shelves that dad built around the fireplace have held up pretty well. The original mantel was much more traditional. Dad had asked if he could replace it and when mom finally said yes, she came home to find the old one burning in the fireplace. He wasn’t going to take the chance that she’d change her mind.

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Tree Felling

Photograph taken on Saturday, October 06, 2018 by Henry
Felled Colorado Spruce

Felled Colorado Spruce

I finally got around to cutting down the dead or nearly dead Colorado spruce (Picea pungens) in our front yard today. I took both before and after pictures and I may put two together into an animated sequence that switches back and forth between the before and after. For now, this is (obviously) the “after” picture. I cut the tree off fairly far up the trunk to be sure it wouldn’t reach the driveway. I could probably have cut it a bit lower and it would have been easier, but I got it down without incident. Since then (I’m writing this on Wednesday, October 11) we’ve cut and dealt with most of the branches although the standing trunk is still there and about 8 feet of felled trunk is still lying next to it. I took one van load to the dump and I’ve burned four wheel barrow loads. I still haven’t decided what I’ll plant in its place or even how much effort I’ll put into dealing with the stump and roots.

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Cookbooks

Photograph taken on Sunday, December 09, 2018 by Henry
Cookbooks

Cookbooks

I know these “shelfies” aren’t really all that interesting but it’s an easy out when I haven’t taken a picture. Work continues to e quite busy and I’m finding it hard to get out during the day. That means I have to take a picture somewhere around the house in the evening, unless I happen to get a nice sunrise or sunset. This is (almost) one third of a large bookcase that I built when Cathy and I were first married and we had it in our apartment in Bethesda. Ralph had it in his basement while we lived in Alaska and while we were traveling. After we got back, I had it in our apartment and then in our two houses. It’s very sturdy, with 2×4 supports sandwiched between heavy plywood for the uprights. The shelves are fixed in terms of their location, although the whole thing comes apart for transporting. There is one more tall shelf space below the five shown here and the other two sections are basically the same as this one.

The books on all but the bottom shelf in this photo are cookery books of one sort or another. Some I use a lot, others almost never. I have pulled out some to give away and will probably get rid of some that are still here. I refer to some of these books quite regularly and others quite infrequently but most of the books have contributed at least something to my cooking know how.

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Iris and Seth’s New House

Photograph taken on Saturday, February 15, 2020 by Henry
Iris and Seth's New House

Iris and Seth’s New House

Iris and Seth moved into their new house today. We went over last night and got a van load of things and took that over with Seth. Shortly after we dropped him off at the apartment he called to say he decided to hire movers to help with this morning’s move. He already had a truck rented and the two of us could have managed everything but it sure was nice not having to lift anything heavier than a box of dishes. The truck he got would have held everything but we used our van for most of the boxes and oddly shaped items. The furniture and few larger boxes went in the truck. By 1:00 we were done, everything was in the house and by the time we left, the shelves from Ikea were back together again and up in the living room and it was looking like a home already. It was just about the easiest move I’ve ever helped with (and I’m not complaining!).

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New Roof Rising

Photograph taken on Monday, January 11, 2021 by Henry
Roofing Materials Being Delivered

Roofing Materials Being Delivered

The kid in me still loves big trucks and heavy machinery. Put a crane on a truck and lift pallets of shingles onto a roof, and I’ll watch. Needless to say, I enjoyed the process of preparing for our roof to be replace tomorrow. The truck needed a surprising amount of space, because it has seriously long outriggers so they can reach the crane out to the side as far as this, positioning the materials as close as possible to where they will be needed. We had work done on our chimney in December, so we’re all set to have the roof replaced now.

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Roofer Madness, Day One

Photograph taken on Tuesday, January 12, 2021 by Henry
Roofer Madness, Day One

Roofer Madness, Day One

As mentioned yesterday, we are having our roof replaced. The materials were delivered yesterday and the crew showed up this morning and got to work. Of course, getting the old roofing material off is a big part of the job and we had two layers of shingles that had to be removed. The plywood on the front half of the roof was in pretty good shape although there were a couple places on the back that needed to be repaired with new plywood. We also had them remove the chimney from our furnace, which is no longer being used, so that’s one less opening in the shingles to worry about going forward. It’s a noisy business, especially when they are tacking down the underlayment. Then they start up their compressor for their nail guns and it’s blam, blam, blam, for the rest of the afternoon.

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Roofer Madness, Day Two

Photograph taken on Wednesday, January 13, 2021 by Henry
Roofer Madness, Day Two

Roofer Madness, Day Two

Continuing with our ongoing roof replacement, the contractors were back this morning to handle the “bump” and the garage. Some of the houses in the neighborhood have a one story piece between the main part of the house and the garage and others—like ours— have a two story section. We call the two-story version a “bump”. Anyway, the roofing went on that and the garage today. The garage roof needed more repairs to the plywood but the joists were sound, anyway. Once they finished they spent quite a while on clean up. There’s a fair amount of debris, although they put drop cloths down, it didn’t catch everything. They also went around with a magnet picking up nails and staples. Tomorrow I’ll show you the finished product.

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Our New Roof

Photograph taken on Thursday, January 14, 2021 by Henry
Our New Roof

Our New Roof

The roofers finished late enough yesterday that it was a bit dark to get a good photo of the front of our house, which faces eash-northeast in any case. So, here’s a photo of the front of our house taken this morning and without anything in the driveway. Getting a new roof is one of those things you don’t notice unless you’re specifically looking for it. Or I suppose if the old roof was leaking and now it’s dry inside when it rains. But when we bought the house the inspector told us the roof was pretty warn and we should plan on replacing it pretty soon. Soon became 14 years, but we beat the odds and haven’t had any significant problems. And now we should be good for a long while.

I compared this photo to one taken when we bought the house and the two holly trees, one by the driveway and the other at the left corner of the house, are much larger than they were then. Otherwise, the house doesn’t really look at that different.

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New Blinds

Photograph taken on Tuesday, June 22, 2021 by Henry
New Blinds

New Blinds

Dorothy ordered blinds for her the windows in her new room and I went over to install them today. It’s not exactly rocket surgery, but it’s significantly easier after the first one. If you’re ordering blinds, I can sat that it’s a little easier if you make them about a quarter inch shorter (side to side) than what it measures. Every one I’ve put up (one at home and three here) were just a little too long. The plastic end pieces come off and that shortens them just enough, but they’d be better with those still in place.

I also brought over a wall mirror for one of the others in the house, but forgot to bring the mounting pieces, so that will need to wait for another visit. Finally, they had just bought a used refrigerator and have put that in the basement. The doors open the wrong way and I started to switch them to have the hinges on the left instead of the right but some of the screws were just too tight for me to get out with the tools I had on hand. They are square drive screws and I only had the bits for my drill, which are not as strong as those in the Greenlee drivers I have at home. I’m hoping that between those and a little penetrating oil, I’ll be able to get them out.

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