Another Day, Another Find

While cleaning up outside around the house this past weekend we noticed the bottom of a bottle poking out of the ground.  After a few minutes of digging we pulled out this cool milk bottle from the Richmond Dairy Company.  Who knows how old it is, but this was back when milk was still delivered to your door and is another reminder of the history of our area.  There must be so much that lies buried around the house, so hopefully we'll uncover some more things as the renovation continues out into the back yard.

Here it is after removing the dirt and grime.  The glass must be at least 1/4" thick.

And here's where it came from, the Richmond Dairy has now been converted to loft apartments I think. You can see it's the exact same shape and logo as the little bottle.


We've been doing a lot of other things around the house that are relatively low cost, mostly painting.  So far the front is done except for the porch, the back area around the kitchen and the new window is painted and about half of one side.


A couple weekends ago we finally got down to the task of rebuilding one of the hearths upstairs which had busted up bricks that were uneven, and a gap about 4 inches between the bricks and mantle...so in short it looked terrible!  We removed all the bricks and cleaned the ones that were salvageable, and then removed all the sand that was beneath them (including a 1926 Mercury dime).  Since the fireplace will not be used again, and since the house has settled a bit unevenly, we decided to not replace the sand but to build up the cavity under the bricks with scrap wood.  This let us fairly easily correct the unevenness and provide a nice even brick reveal all around.

This shows how much the floors have settled...this cavity was filled with sand and then the bricks on top.

A 1926 Mercury dime was buried in the sand.  It seems old but our house had already been around for 30+ years.  It's also close to the year of the clawfoot tub (1928), so it makes you wonder if some remodelling was done on the house around this time.

It took quite a bit of work to get the platform all nice and even around each side, but eventually we got a nice 1/2" reveal all around.  The gap between the mantle and bricks, which used to be about 4 inches, is now much smaller.  Best tool of the day: Rubber Mallet

Even though we really liked the look of the natural brick, we decided to paint them.  The hearth in the other room had been painted in the past, and to make everything match we painted everything the same dark brown color (we also used this color to paint the stair hand rail)

It's hard to believe it all looked like this just a few months ago.

Bring on the Rain

With money a little tight these days, Sarah and I have been taking care of a few things on the exterior which don't cost too much...just time and a little sweat.  We're trying to finish up the painting on the back kitchen, and needed to install new downspouts since the old ones were either broken or the ugly rectangular kind that don't match the period of the house.  We found a place close by that carries the round downspout we were looking for, so last week we picked some up to be ready for this weekend.


With work being so crazy recently this "work" was actually pretty relaxing:

Here's the upper downspout...this one empties onto the kitchen roof.  Check out the cool straps we found to secure it to the house.  The old one wasn't attached at all and was a strong wind away from taking someone's head off.

Here you can see what we have planned...  We're installing a rain barrel to catch the rain from our roof for the garden, well the garden we'll have someday.  We built the base for the barrel from scrap 2x6's we had laying around.  The barrel itself we picked up for $10...it's an olive barrel and still smells like them.

Sarah working hard.

Millie and Abbie checking on our work from upstairs.

And here's the rain barrel installed.  My project for tomorrow will be to put on a spigot and overflow.  We also finished painting the triple window...by the way, triple windows are a HUGE pain to paint.

Out of Hibernation

It's been a while since we've updated the blog and that's because, well, we just haven't been doing a whole lot on the the house.  Winter seems to be dragging on this year and has made it hard to get much of anything done outside.  This weekend we finally had some warmer temps so we planned to tackle painting the back wall of the house.  


We think it's looking pretty good now:

This is the back of the dead bolt we pulled off the front door to fix it.  Looks like the date is Feb 11-90...and we assume the 90 is 1890.

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And Then There was Light

This past week was a "back to real life" type of week with both Sarah and I back to work...at least the type of work where we get paid.  The contractor stayed on the job most of the week and was able to get a few big things done for us that we've been waiting a long time for.  One of the main things we're trying to do on the lower level (where we will live one day) is to bring more light into the space.  And what's the easiest way to do that?...knock some holes in the wall of course.  In the back wall where the kitchen will be we're enlarging a 24" wide window to a 72"+ wide window and we're adding a completely new window on the west side of the living room.    

The opening's all ready to go...now this should let in some light.

Setting the window in...I look like I'm doing more work than I actually did.  I was just making sure the window didn't lean and fall out while the contractor screwed the window into place.

Sarah braved some crazy cold to get a big pile of siding painted while the window went in.  I think her feet are still frozen.

While Sarah was freezing outside, Millie and I worked in the warm upstairs kitchen installing shoe mold and base cap to finish off the trim and put the final touch on the kitchen.

Did I ever mention we have the greatest contractor ever?  After talking about cycling with him he mentioned having a road bike he didn't use anymore and said it was mine if I wanted it.  Hmmm... a free bike worth some major $$...sounds good to me.

Sarah painting even more siding...luckily this time in the house.  You can see the new window in the background.

Another view from the living room looking towards the back kitchen and both new windows.  Turns out we have a little bit of a skyline view of downtown from the window on the right.  These two rooms are now about four times as bright as before so I'd say a job well done.

Here's where all that siding went that Sarah was painting and you can see both new windows.  Next step is to paint all the trim once the weather warms up a little.

What a Difference a Week Makes

This past week and a half has been just about the most productive time so far during the house renovation.  Even after taking time off to travel for Christmas and New Years we were able to get quite a lot done including:

- tearing out the old lower kitchen cabinets upstairs
- having the new lower cabinets and counter top installed
- painting all the cabinets white
- finishing laying and grouting the tile...finally!
- cutting and painting baseboard, shoe mold and base cap for the upstairs kitchen
- having the triple window installed in the downstairs kitchen which involved rebuilding the entire wall
- having the double window framed out in the living room downstairs
- getting the dishwasher installed upstairs
- replacing one spindle on the stairs, reinstalling another and tightening several others
- having the contractor repair the foundation wall under the kitchen downstairs
- installing the kitchen sink upstairs


And now, since pictures tell a much better story, here are the last week and a half's highlights:

Millie's supervising to make sure I'm putting the sink in right.  Turns out I forgot the plumber's putty under the trap and it leaked the first time we tried it out.  Problem's solved though and everything works great.

Sarah painting the new cabinets we had to buy.  Turns out the old ones were too far gone to be able to install a new counter top.  When we took them out they just fell apart.

All the lower cabinets have been removed and everything's ready for the new ones to go in followed by the counter.

Finally the kitchen is done!!!!!!  Everything's been installed and painted and even the tile is actually finished.  This  was a tough tile job for our first one considering the unevenness in the floor but we think it turned out great.  The only thing we might do is add knobs to the cabinet doors but that's something that can wait for another day. 

Another shot of the new kitchen

Here's what the kitchen used to look like.  Pretty much the only thing we kept the same was the layout, the stove and the upper cabinets.  It's taken a lot of hard work, time and money to get to this point and it's certainly a milestone for us.  A big THANK YOU to everyone who's come to work on the house with us, especially during those first couple hot and sweaty months while we were rushing to get things done before the wedding.

An Early Christmas Present

Reading the title of this post you'd think I was about to tell a story about something positive that happened with the renovation, and well yeah there is something good to tell, but not before we get through the muck.  On Wednesday morning Sarah noticed no water was coming out of the sink, and that happened to be during this recent super-cold spell in Richmond where temperatures have been in the 20's for a high.  So our first thought is frozen pipes, something we've been dreading since we moved in.  Since it was time for work I figured we'd deal with it later that evening...


After work I crawled under the house to the crawlspace and began searching for the frozen pipe which only took about 30 minutes to locate...since there was an icicle on the side it made it pretty easy.  So instead of recognizing that the pipe had ALREADY burst and that's the reason there was an ICICLE on the pipe I brought down the space heater to thaw it out.  Note to everyone else...the ice acts like a plug...and if you're lucky enough to have the pipe plug itself DO NOT THAW THE PLUG!  So needless to say about 10 minutes into the endeavor water began spraying everywhere and I was sitting there holding a space heater (bad).  I then noticed a valve just upstream (good) from the break and figured I'd just shut the problem off right there.  What I didn't know is the connection at the valve was weak so when I shut the valve the connection broke so even more water was spraying everywhere.  Since I have the water authority on speed dial, within 10 minutes the city came out to shut the water off.  Two days and many dollars later the pipes have been fixed and insulated.


Now, if you're still reading, it's time for the good news.  Yesterday while trying to remove vinyl tile from the sheet of luan that's at the mantel I noticed how sticky the tile was.  Not wanting to remove it all I figured I'd just take it off and flip it around.  I then proceeded to damage the luan beyond repair and just ripped it off.  For the rest of the story I'll just leave it to the pictures...

Here's what the fireplace used to look like...you can see the vinyl tile over the front.

Well the tile and luan are gone, but behind is some sheet metal with a hole cut out...looks like someone had a coal stove hooked up to this at some point...of course I had to see what was behind so I stuck my arm in...

Lucky me it's filled entirely with coal dust...5 buckets worth to be exact...so what's behind the sheet metal?

But first some more cleanup...

Starting to tear off the sheet metal...this was harder than it looks...do you see what's behind it?

The first view of the original cast iron surround which looks to be in perfect condition....but first...

a little...no I mean a lot of cleaning.

The final product after Sarah added some white paint around the surround.  Sure beats that old vinyl tile and to just think it was just sitting there this whole time is crazy.  Why someone felt the need to cover this up is beyond me...or paint the wood floors...or cover them with carpet...or...well you get the idea.  This old house has had a couple surprises but nothing like this yet.  Who knows what else we haven't uncovered yet?