Our New Old House

I was feeling presidential today so I thought I’d clear some brush. (wink)

I focused on the fence line along the alley.

Before:

After:

More Before:

More After:

Zoot watched through a new storm window.

I found a stick with four snails on it. Can you see all four of them?

Here’s a closeup:

There was a dried out puff ball mushroom left over from last fall.

I stepped on it to help Nature along. Fungi are a very important part of the ecosystem and they get a bad rap.

While I was walking through the yard I found evidence of violent warfare!

Not very threatening when you put it in perspective, though.

This tree has grown around this rock.

Wish I knew what kind of plant this was. Anybody know?

The east side of Des Moines has an awesome system of alleys. Here’s the view north up our alley:

And south down our alley:

I did not take a before picture of that one, but notice how clean the fence line looks after I got rid of all the dead sticks and weeds.

I’m so glad spring is finally here!

[tags]yardwork, trees, photos, alley, weeds[/tags]

This weekend I stripped another door.

Today I put another coat of polyurethane on the test door. It’s looking so cool!

Then I worked the rest of the night on the front bedroom. No pictures yet because darn it, after all that work it doesn’t look like I did much. But I kept heat gunning the paint off the window frames and baseboards, then I applied Citristrip to the front window frames to take off what was left of the paint and the excess varnish. It needs another round.

It feels like I’m getting nowhere right now, but I’m sure I’ll feel better in the morning. My arm’s just sore from all that scraping.

[tags]varnish, woodwork, heat gun, Citristrip, paint removal[/tags]

Here are some before pictures:

And with new windows:

Now the only problem is that the shiny new storm windows now make the interior windows look that much grosser! Motivation!

[tags]storm windows, photos[/tags]

Brandon thought he was getting a day off when his flex schedule worked out that he didn’t have to go in to work today.  I fixed that in a hurry!

At 8:00 this morning, the storm window company, Corn Belt Aluminum, began removing our old storm windows and installing our new attic windows. 

At noon, Joe Kemple is coming over to tune the piano.

Sometime between noon and 4pm MidAmerican Energy is sending someone over to check our gas meter.

At 4pm Brandon is taking the car in for some work on the tinting. 

Kinda makes my day at the day job seem boring. 

I’ll have pictures of the storm windows when I get home this afternoon.  I’m so excited!!!

[tags]attic, windows, contractors, storm windows, awning window, gas [/tags]

Here it is folks!  I edited together the video I took of Angela Thorne’s demonstration at the Des Moines Rehabbers Club meeting, April 5, 2008. 

The video is 50 minutes long, so give it a few minutes to buffer. 

In addition to this video, Steve Wilke-Shapiro is working on an update to the Des Moines Rehabbers Club website explaining Angela’s process with photos.  Don’t miss that!

[tags]windows, double hung, video, demonstration, Des Moines Rehabbers Club, glazing, reglazing, wood windows[/tags]