House Paint Colors

We WILL be listing our house soon :) And, I have been touching up some of the paint. I figured it would be great to list the colors on my blog for future reference. I hate that I don't have ALL the colors. But, whatever :)

You can check out some recent pics (aka when my house is kinda clean) HERE - feel free to scroll down to see our renovations.

Anyway - here are the paint colors that I know:

Brown Trim - Valspar (Lowes) Brown Velvet
Green Exterior Trim - Behr (Home Depot) Dense Shrub
1st Floor Hall - Benjamin Moore Barely Beige
2nd Floor Hall - Benjamin Moore Shaker Beige
Living Room - Behr (Home Depot) Pumpkin Butter
Dining Room - Behr (Home Depot) Lower - New Chestnut. Upper - Classic Toupe
1st Floor Bath - Behr (Home Depot) Ripe Wheat
Kitchen/Mudroom - Behr (Home Depot) Crisp Celery
Master (gold) Bedroom - Benjamin Moore Chestertown Buff
Bedroom 2 (green) Benjamin Moore Sherwood Green
Bedroom 3 (blue) Benjamin Moore Whipple Blue
Bedroom 4 (beige) and Office - I have no clue. Both are a beige color. I have so many beiges in my house and none are the same lol

4 Years ago today, we closed on our house!

On this day 4 years ago, we closed on a piece of crap, pre-forclosure, dump of a house. We saw the true potential of this house and have made it a home.

Here is a link of the "before" Before is in quotes, because this was the day of inspection, and therefore was "cleaned up". The house was in 10 times worse shape the day we saw it.

We did a lot of demo work ourselves, started renovations, then ran out of money and ambition. We lived for TWO years without a working kitchen, and cooked all our meals on either a one burner camp "stove" or on the BBQ.

In 2008, we hired a contractor and finished all the work. In all, we did the following: siding, windows, insulation, new kitchen, 2 new bathrooms, new walls and ceilling on the whole 1st floor, re-finished the floors on the 1st floor, new electric in the whole house, new plumbing, and so much little such - too much to list.

You can see all the pictures on our house website.

New Chimney - finally

When we bought our house, we were surprised that the chimney was on such a major slant. There were braces holding it up. Because of this, we thought it was falling down. Not the case. Our house is a victorian, and as such the builders made sure that everything was symetrical on the outside. Even if that mean things were wonky on the inside. They wanted the chimney in a certain place on the roofline, and therefore built the chimney on a slant since the furnace is (basically) in the center of the basement.

We had some issues with with our heating, and was told that the chimney was crumbling, and the debris was falling IN the chimney and clogging our furnace.

We were afraid that it would eventually fall over and crash into our second floor.

We finally had the money to replace it. We wanted to have it go straight up, since we plan on re-doing the attic eventually. This way, we can build around it and it will (now) only take up a 2x2 space. Before, because of the slant, it would be more like 2x8 - big difference :) The attic is so tall that they went straight up, and then at around 10 feet, they angled it toward where it meets the roofline.

You can still see the braces in the after pics, which is cool since you can really see how much more straight it is now. The braces don't do anything and will be taken down if/when we refinish the space.

The did not need any tools to take the bricks down, that is how bad they were. Not only that, but they took the bricks from the 3rd floor BY HAND in buckets. They made 3 trips of about 18 buckets each time. Did I mention that you have to go up about 14 steps just to get to my front door? So, 15 steps from the attic to the 2nd floor. 15 steps to the first floor. 14 steps to the street. Um, yeah - that is 45 steps. Thankfully it was not me :)

So - here are the pics:














This is where you can see the bend to the roof. Again, the brackets are doing nothing. But totally held the old chimney up.

Stairs are finished

Talking a lot about IF so I thought I would share some house pictures. The stairs are now done! It is darker than before, but now all the wood is basically the same color - we did not paint any of the other trim in this area.

Back story of my house

Someone asked me for the full back story of my house - so I thought there might be others that want to know as well. So, I am posting the answer here (gonna be a long one).

You can see tons of before - during - after pictures HERE

Frank and I got married in Dec 2005. We moved to a small town in NW, NJ and were renting. We actually moved there in Sept. So about Jan/Feb, for fun we started going to open houses.

It was then that we realized that we would probably be renting for a while. House prices were pretty high still and what we could afford was crap. We decided at that point that we would wait 1-2 years before starting to look again.

Well, since I moved more than an hour and a 1/2 from my job, I was doing temp work. On my off days, I would just play around on the internet. One of my "go to" websites was the NJ Multi-listing. I though that maybe something would just fall in my lap.

Well, exactly that happened!!!!! I would check it usually in the morning. So, I looked at it one day and saw a house listed.

The house was listed with 4 bedrooms, living room, family room, office, decent yard, etc. And then I looked at the price. It was super super cheap. It was about $90,000 less than the cheapest house we had seen. Thing is - there was not one picture.

I really thought it was a mistake. So, I called the Realtor and asked why it was so cheap. I thought maybe there was a fire or other type of damage. He basiacally told me that the seller was VERY motivated to sell. I told him I wanted to see it. It was so cheap that I knew that we could afford it - even on just my husband's salary. The guy told us he would only show the house if we were pre-approved for a loan. he also said that there were no pictures because the house was just listed 20 minutes ago.

We called a guy that they reccommeneded and got pre-approval the same day. I went there at 4:45 that same day (by myself) and totally loved the house. Of course I had to look beyond all the crap and how bad the house looked. But seriously, what I really saw was all the wood moldings - and of course potential.

The house was built arount 1900 (give or take a few years) and had great bones. Plus it was a great size for us. It is really big.

I called my husband as soon as I left the house and told him I wanted it. Now, I have to admit - I would never looked at this place if I knew it was a side by side duplex. never thought I would want to live in one. I also have to admit that the main reason why I wanted the house was the price - but I also loved that it had so much potential. When you are in the house, you can not tell that it is a side by side. The floor plan is not the norm for a side by side.

My husband came bright and early the next day to see it and we put an offer in on the spot. We found out from the realtor (was not really supposed to tell us) that the house was a pre-forclosure. We later found out more details from our attorney. They accepted our offer within a few hours. Which was great, because there were other people that did in fact look at the house.

Basically, a guy owned a house but "rented" to a relative. Their agreement was that he would buy the house and they would pay the mortgage and the taxes and of course all the utilites. I guess they could not get a loan themselves. Well, I guess that agreement did not work out so well. The payments were always late, the owner wound up paying more times than the people that lived there, etc.

When the house was listed, they were very behind in the payments, they had not paid any sewer bills for 2 years, and the taxes were over a year in arrears.

The guy was basically selling the house for what he owed the bank. He was not going to make a dime. The issue was that the price did not reflect the back taxes or the back sewer fees. That all worked themselves out and we closed 45 days later. We also found out 3 days before closing that the house was still not cleared out. I guess they worked all day and night because on closing day, there was just some paint, etc left in the house :)

We knew that we would have to put a lot of work into the house. The house had been rented for about 30 years (different owners) and renters really do not take care of houses like they are their own.

As you can see in the pictures, a lot of the work was cosmetic stuff, but there was also a lot of behind the walls stuff. We have all brand new plumping and electric. The kitchen was not really functional , so we moved it.

When we closed, we went gung ho with demo and did a lot of the plumbing. My dad was helping too. We also did all the cosmetic stuff on the second floor. All the rooms on the second floor (except the bathroom) were fine, just needed the carpets ripped up and new paint.

After a few months, we ran out of money and ambition. For more than a year, we really did nothing to the house - little things here and there. My husband wanted to pay down some more debt before we did anything else.

What really set the wheels in motion was that in November 2007, we were trying for over a year to expand our family. We were getting ready to start seeing a specialist. I told him that there was no way I would be trying super hard (with medical assistance) to have a baby, and that baby has no where to sleep. He agreed - but kind of dragged his feet.

So, in Jan I started looking into a Home Equity Loan. Got all the info and basically he just signed the papers.

We hired a contractor in mid Feb and the work started the next day. We had some issues with our loan and issue with the contractor but I guess it all worked out in the end. The most exciting moment was when my stove was hooked up.

We did not have a kitchen for almost 2 years. I cooked every meal on a hot plate or the BBQ. And believe it or not, I cooked most every night. Heck - I have a growing teenager that I need to feed :)

Now, we are at the point where it is just little things left. Things that we did not want to pay for becuase we could do them ourselves - things like paint the stairs, paint the porch, etc.

But, we are having a big Labor Day party and you KNOW these things will be done before then.

Well, that is the back-story in a nutshell. Sorry it turned out to be super long.

Some more Before / After pics

Here are some before and after pictures. I love how my house looks with nothing in it! I still have lots of After pictures to add. But, I wanted to make sure they were real afters - you know with the trim painted, etc.

Some are old, some are new.

I am loving the slide show thing - better than adding tons and tons of pictures.

Confirmation that a Pro should do floors

Here is direct confirmation that we should not do floors. Althought we thought we got a lot sanded, apparently we did not. Here are just two shots. They are in the order of Before - After we sanded for 8 hours - after a pro sanded for about 2 hours (OK, maybe 3).


So - you can totally tell that the job we did was basically crap. I am so glad we did not listen to my dad when he said that our job looked OK and that it would look fine if we just put poly over our sand job.


You will have to wait a few days until I post after pictures - we can't walk on the floors for a few days.

DYI Refinish Hardwood Floors

We decided to try to refinish our hardwood floors ourselves. Many of our friends and family told us that it was a piece of cake and a great way to save loads of money.

I was all for hiring someone - I mean I really wanted professional results. But, I was willing to put in all the work and save lots of money.

So, here are my tips to DIY Refinish Hardwood floors.

1 - Know When NOT to DIY
Save your money as long as it takes until you can pay a professional. I really can not stress this enough. Even though we attempted to do this ourselves - we are bailing out. It is really a bigger project than we can handle. Maybe if our floors were not 100 years old, or covered in layers and layers of god know what - maybe we would have different feeling on the matter.

2 - Sanders
Rent the best sander out there. Do not believe when the guy at the rental place says that XYZ sander is just fine for residental use. Tell him you want the sander that the pros use. We started with an easy to use sander. It had 3 round disks and was in a triangle shape. This machine was easy to use and got a lot of the film and varnish off the floor. However, after 8 hours of sanding (with different grits) that is barely what was off the floor. Again, if the floor was not as old, maybe this would have been a great sander.

After a whole day of sanding, and our floor still looking like crap, we decided to rent the super pro sander. This sander is called an orbital or belt sander. The sander has a long wheel where the paper sits and it spins like a wheel. This sander worked GREAT!! It was harder to use than the first one, but you got used to it after a few passes - just start where the couch, etc will be.

We also rented an edger - this thing was HARD to use as it was so powerful that it had a mind of its own. It did not have rhyme or reason where or why it sanded. Plus, it was not a long handle type of thing, so you were either squatting, knelling, or on your knees.

3 -Knee Pads
Knee Pad???? - Yup, as much as you can't think about why or when you would need knee pads, trust me - you need them. It seemed like I was on my knees a lot. It was using the vac, using the edger, wiping up the dust, looking for staples or nails......I was on my knees all day. My knees are still red from yesterday.

So, beg, borrow, steal (OK - maybe not steal) - but get knee pads any way you can. Trust me it will be worth it in the end.

4 - No contacts, please
I usually wear contacts but decided not too because the amount of dirt. I am glad that I made that choice because I was still rubbing my eyes often.

5 - Pick your nose!
OK - now I am getting into the "personal" tips. But seriously - pick your nose and pick it often. We did not wear a face mask. Maybe if we did then this type would not be required. But the dirt in my nose was just gross. So, I figured the more I cleaned it out the better it was. And yes, I did try just blowing my nose. Picking was totally a better method.

6 - Dirt is GREAT for your skin
What the heck am I talking about???? Dirt can't be good for your skin. Well, I have to beg to differ. The amount of dirt on my face was totally gross. But let me tell you - when I took a shower and started cleaning my face - well the dirt was a great exfoliator!!! My skin was so smooth after the shower!. I might just bottle up some dirt and sell it as the next beauty secret!!

7 - Know when to call it quits.
First let me say that my neighbor is a floor guy. We got a quote from him last week - higher than others we got.

After sanding for 8 hours with a crappy sander, I told my husband that we should have floor guy (FG) come over and at least give us some info. I really wanted to know if this was going to be the best that we could get. I said that FG might be able to give us a tip on how to do it better or might even say we are doing it all wrong.

But - my husband is stubborn - even more so than me. He said, "no, lets just get the other machine"

We spent more money to rent 2 more machines and more money getting the paper for these machine. We worked for another 2+ hours today before my husband finally said, "This fucking sucks, we will sand for another 5 hours and still have the floors look like shit" - "Let's just throw in the towel and ask FG to do it." - "Maybe since we did some of the work he will knock off a few bucks"

So in the end we will have paid about $200 for rental fees and paper used. We are able to return anything that we don't use.

So, if we can knock off a few bucks form FG's price, then it will basically equal what it would have been if we jujst went with FG in the first place.

I feel so defeated. I really thought this would be much easier. Again, if our floors were in OK shape and maybe were not over 100 years old, well then it may be a different story. But with the edger so hard to use, the marks where the sanding is uneven, the hallway that has to be done by hand because it is too narrow for the machine, and the fact the our bodies are HURTING, we are throwing in the towel and getting a pro to do the floors.

We will stick to DIY projects that are annoying - but do-able (aka painting the stairs)

I will post pictures our our sanding job and then pictures of the FG's sanding. I am just hoping that it can be done this week!!!

OK - some house news

Things have been CRAZY around here and I have been slacking in the house updates. The past two days I have been painting my stairs. We originally were going to strip them and then stain them to match the adjoining wood trim. This proved to be a bigger job because we could not get stain to match the 100 year old wood trim.

Myhusband is not a fan of painted wood in a brown shade - he is OK with white, but feels that if you have dark wood, it should be stained not painted.

But, that proved to be our best option. We were not about to strip all the woodwork when it is in good shape and has never been painted. Half the house has the original trim in the original color (well aged color)

After searching high and low, we (that means I) found a paint that is SO SO SO close to the trim where the stairs meet. So, I painted the steps and the baseboard this dark brown and the spindles white - well actually I only primed them so far, but you get the idea. I also primed the "kickplates" - I don't even know if that is the right term.

I only have a true before picture - which has carpet. i should have taken a picture of the stairs after I tore up the carpet - but use your imagination. The stairs were ugly - has several shades of stain, paint, etc and the kicks were a yellow beige kind of color.

Here are some pictures:

Remember my backsplash problem......

Well, the contractor finally showed up and started the backsplash. I love it. The colors look great. I just can't wait until it is totally finished!!!

Here are a couple of pictures:

Almost there

The house is not done - but the contractor's stuff is 99% done.

We still have lots of stripping to do, the floors need to be re-finished, still some painting and a bunch of little things that we have to do.

So, we we have been slowly "unpacking". For the past 2 years all of our stuff has been in our extra bedroom.

It was like seeing the things for the first time again. Most things I got for my shower and we moved only 6 months after we got married. So, there was a lot of stuff that I forgot that we even had.

So, we have put everything in it's place, and did MAJOR cleaning. I even mopped and waxed the floors. I wanted to make the floors shine even though we will be sanding them down in the very near future

It still is not clean clean, but most of the dirt is at a minimum.

So, now we need to start decorating........if I only had a clue how to do that LOL

I started making a list of all the thing that we would like to buy - but are not really NEEDED right now. Things like a new mailbox, new numbers for the house, a SS garbage can, a SS knife block, area rugs, new kichen table, living room tables, nice recycle bins, etc, etc, etc.

All of these things we can live without right now - but they are wants.........and I WANT them!

Bathroom is DONE!

Only the cosmetic stuff (shower curtain, towel rod, etc) are left.

I am sure you all remember the before so I won't post the pink plastic tiles again.

But, here is the after pics

Backsplash

OK - My blue/green backsplash got shot down. So, we think we are going to go with a slate backsplash.

This is our first choice:

It is Indian Autumn colored slate (who knew slate came in so many colors???)

The colors are great with our cabinets and I think look pretty good with the countertop. I also think it adds a punch of color but is still kind of neutral.

The only things that I don't like is:

1 - the price - not too expensive; but we have more than 30 sq ft so that will add up quick.

2 - it is special order from Home Depot - they say 7-10 days; but we all know how that goes.

So, I am going to go to a local tile shop (which may still need to order it) and see what else I can find.

Granite Countertops

We canceled our order from Home Depot for our Kitchen Countertops (long story). And, we decided to go with a local granite company. So far they have been GREAT!!

We will have our countertops INSTALLED by mid next week! YAY.

We choose "Kashmir White" - here is a generic picture of what it will look like.

We are thinking of this blue / green tile for the backsplash. The walls are celery green. This picture really does not show how much green is in the tiles. We have not bought anything so it could still change. But so far this is our #1 choice.

Any opinions would be great!

Special Order is just not worth the trouble

Right now I am pissed off at Home Depot AND Lowes. We ordered "special order" countertop for the upstairs bath. There is nothing special about it. Basic black - but it is for a 60" vanity so it had to be special ordered (Lowes).

The sign next to the granite (in the bath section - not kitchen) it says "most special order counter-tops arrive in 7-10 days". Well, I guess generic black is not considered "most"

We ordered it 2.5 weeks ago and it still is not here. The contractor can not do the rest of the work in the bath until the countertop gets here. I have called Lowes several times and they keep changing the delivery time. As of 5 minutes ago, it will not be in the store until 4/4. That will be more than 3 weeks after we ordered it. Pisses me off.

Home Depot is no better. We had to wait until we had the cabninets and the appliances before we could get the countertop. We knew exactly what we wanted and paid for them a few weeks ago. We had to call them when everything was in to get the template scheduled.

Well, it does not matter that it was paid for weeks ago - nope we get put in "line" with everyone else. So, here it is a week later and we STILL have not been called to set up a template appointment.

We went with Home Depot for the counter-top (Stilestone) because we opened a Home Depot Home Improvement Loan - and paid for the countertop with that.

Now my husband is pissed off at Home Depot because we do not even have the template done. He thinks we should cancel the counter-top and just get it at a granite yard. I think it will be more expensive PLUS I still think it will take a few weeks.

UGH - all this is just so frustrating!!!!

Appliances!!!!

All the Cabinets are in!

New Appliances today

At least the amount of progress on the house is lifting my spirits!

Today we are having our appliance delivered. I am not sure if they will be installed today - not sure if the contractor is ready.

Yesterday he installed the base cabinets - apparently it was a pain in the butt!!! All of our walls are slanted. So, he had to "build up" part of the wall - just to make it even.

We also painted the dining room - well most of it. We still have to fill in all the nail holes and paint the trim. But I LOVE it so far.

It is hard to take pictures, because there is so much other crap in all the room. Like saws and boxes, and just STUFF. I promise I will take some pictures tonight and load a whole bunch.

Plus - my camera's display is not working. So, I have to take the picture, then load it into the PC in order to see if the picture is clear, etc.

So, I guess this post is "to be continued"

Our cabinets were delivered today!

Our cabinets were delivered this morning. They probably won't be installed until the end of this week. But, they are in the house!!!

The contractor still has to do the floor and the last sanding of the drywall. The appliances are being delivered on Tuesday - so they HAVE to be installed by then. Otherwise we have to push back the appliance delivery.

In a few weeks, the house will be DONE!!! I am so excited I could cry!

Some House Pictures

2nd Floor bathroom Before

2nd Floor bathroom - in progress

Back of the house - after the siding was taken off

Back of the house with new siding (picture makes the siding look distorted - but it is not)