Saturday was a house day for us, with our focus being on the upstairs hallway. We’ve made some progress during the week, and even got a bit of drywall on the ceiling. But today was a day to continue that work, and to start prepping the walls a bit more.
It’s kind of a two-fold strategy: aim to stop working at 5PM, and shift gears to work on the house instead. It somewhat ensure we don’t overwork at our jobs, while at the same time prioritize our own house work. Any progress is still progress.
Scored the plaster with a razor, and was able to demo out a small little area. Found the space between two studs, and easily removed the lathe with a multitool. Broke out the sawzall to get through the siding.
It’s been a long while since I was up here. I had a bit of nostalgia, remembering all the work involved in getting that space cleaned up. And how good it felt, to get new insulation put in.
With us in the last week of our time off from work, Liz and I have set out some house tasks to complete. Work was particularly busy for the both of us, in the last months of this year… and we’re trying to get back into a rhythm of working on the house, consistently, again.
Also – you can’t hear it, but I assure you there are sea shanties playing in the background.
Liz spent a lot of time today, cleaning up hardware pieces. Using a newer approach, I think, of soaking things in vinegar and then using an SOS pad.
Liz has been at work, stripping paint off the vintage kitchen door we got, earlier this year. I stopped down in the basement to check out some of her progress.
Having finished up her hall window work, Liz has started tackling the restoration work on the vintage door we picked up, earlier this year.
It’s incredible to think about how much work went into our backyard arbor. From the planning and prototype, through the power augur and construction… it’s been a very involved, multi-step process.
A lot of the complexity is in the paint needing to overlap the putty slightly, and make contact with the glass. This ensures a proper seal, but is also incredibly tricky in that it’s paint on glass (and has a tendency to run and not remain in a straight line).
Woke up early this morning, for a trek out to Reuse Depot. Liz was looking for some wavy glass to use, for her window resoration project – and the best option was to find some older windows, and to cut the pieces she needed from them.
Liz, continuing her work on restoring the hall windows. Because all the previous glass panes had a lot of scratches… she cut new window panes by hand, and applied the putty to set each pane into the window.
The first one took some time, but it looked like she found her rhythm.
Navigating the large bit of plywood solo was a little tricky, but I did manage to get the hang of it. I only had to haul it up here a few times, after hauling it back downstairs to do refinement cuts. Turned out pretty ok.
Liz is a very careful painter. When she explained things to me, I learned that this task especially, requires a very steady and precise hand.