Since we are planning on doing so much work I thought a Blog would be a great way to keep track of everything and keep our family and friends up-to-date on what is happening ...
I'll be using this place to keep track of ideas ... check lists ... suggestions ... numerous trips to Home Depot and all the projects we work on ... in addition I'll post pictures of everything in the actual post as well as in a photo album of progress ...
So to recap our first weekend with the new home (since we haven't moved in yet) here goes:
On Friday after work David, Sonni, Mark and I all met at the house to check it out ... it was the first time we were allowed to go in without an agent and we just wanted to hang out for a bit and wander around the place ... it felt great to check everything out and start working on plans in our head ... but to be sure the "to do" list gets longer and longer every time we go to the house ... but it doesn't matter ... in the end when it is finished it will be a magnificent place ...
On Saturday morning David and I headed to Home Depot ... we have a new set of walkie-talkies that we took with us and I can see they are going to come in very handy for our Home Depot trips ... no more waiting around for each other ... since we usually get separated ...
anyway ... David headed to the lawn and garden section to pick out a new lawnmower and I headed to hardware to get new locks and doorknobs for the front and side doors ... as soon as we loaded up our purchases we headed to the new house ...
David put together his new Lawn Boy push mower in no time and got to work mowing the overgrown lawn ... while I installed a new door handle and deadbolt on the front door ... we had plans to go to the fair and headed out but on the way home from the fair we stopped at Home Depot again and bought a big set of gardening sheers to cut down this way overgrown shrub that was completely blocking the picture window in the kitchen ... David was a bit excited to try them out so we stopped at the house again ... Mark met us there on his way home from the fair and while we were in the back talking I grabbed the sheers and went to work ... I was hacking away branches left and right ... I felt a bit like Faye Dunaway plaing Joan Crawford in the scene from Mommie Dearest where she is hacking away her rose garden ... once I tired out David went to work cutting everything down to stumps ... the change was amazing ... you could actually see out the window and it looks beautiful ... the change was so great that it inspired another project ... we are going to expand the deck all the way across the window and put our future grill there ...
On Sunday David and I again headed over to the house early ... I went to work replacing the door handle and lock on the side door while David took a pickaxe to the stumps in the backyard ... I also removed the door knocker/door bell which left a big hole in the middle of the door but it appears to be the perfect size for a peephole ... I was beat from yesterday but knew we had to get some stuff done ... so I again grabbed the shears and went to town on the overgrown greenery next to the driveway ... it looked like it had been years and years since anyone had taken care of it and the out of control limbs would whip people in the face getting out of their car if they parked in the driveway ... so I just kept cutting and cutting and cutting till my arms tired out and then David took over ... between the two of us we cut down pretty much everything we could reach that was overgrown ... and again - huge improvement ... we then spent the next several hours cutting all the branches into small pieces so we could bag them and get rid of them ... 6 contractor bags in all filled to the rim ...
When we got home we found a $50 Lowes gift card from our realator and even though we were beat we showered and headed over there ... we checked out all sorts of stuff and in the end wound up getting a new doorbell (since I had ripped out the existing one earlier) that plays 62 different tunes ... holiday stuff ... birthday ... patriotic ... even a dog barking and birds chirping ... I can't wait to install it ...
| Before using the new Lawn Boy lawnmower. | After using the new Lawn Boy lawnmower. |
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| Bay window view from inside the kitchen. I use the word view cautiously since the overgrown plant blocked the entire window. | |
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| View of the bay window from outside. One can hardly tell there was a window there. We talked about removing it from the moment we looked at the house ... the time had come ... | |
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| Part way through the removal process | |
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| Pretty much finished removing everything ... now we just need to dig out the stumps and roots but the difference is huge. | |
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| The new view from inside the kitchen. The window is spectacular now. | |
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| Notice the overhanging branches next to the car. You couldn't even get out of the car without being attacked by branches. | |
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| David and I took turns snapping limbs and clearing the area. Then we spent hours cutting them into small pieces and filling 6 industrial size trash bags | |
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| But the after result was so worth it. It looked so much better all cleared out. | |
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