Katie vs. Landscape Cloth

Greetings, Earthlings!  Every now and then we look like this when we are working over at the house:

I know what you're thinking.  Sexy, right?  I couldn't agree more!  Between all of the funk, dirt, dust, particles, etc. sometimes it's good to just cover everything up and go at it.  Lee has been through many more of these suits than I have.  Usually I'm cool with just letting myself get dirty to avoid the shame I feel when stepping up onto something and hearing a good rip down the leg.  I tell myself it's because I'm tall...that's it, right? 

I believe that Lee will soon be doing a post on the structural repairs, which is probably best to make sure you get accurate information.  Until then, I thought I would show you what I have been wrestling (literally) that has me still sore on Friday from work I did on Tuesday night.

Directly in front of our porch is a funky little tree that shades a bunch of spider plant looking thingamajigs.

Well, that didn't really bother me until I saw all of the landscaping cloth under the plants.  I really have a hatred for that stuff.  I tackled it in our other front garden bed last summer, and decided to tackle this space when I got to working the other night. 

The bad news is, you would think this stuff were superglued to the ground.  It is so engrained into the dirt, held down by tree roots as if they were staples, that after an hour and a half of wrestling the stuff from all different angles I gave up in defeat.  I will continue again, with a shovel, some other day in the future (even though the landscaping is the least of our worries at this point).

This weekend should be jam packed with several small accomplishments.  I can't wait to update you on them once we cross them off the list!  Until then, we hope you have a fantastic weekend of your own!!

 

Floor Joists

Our (and by "our" I mean Lee's) latest project has been floor joists.  Hip hip hooraaaaay, hooooo, flooooor, joooooist...that doesn't really flow but I figured I would give you a glimpse inside of my brain and the things it comes up with. 

I randomly get pictures like this texted to me:

and nothing, I mean nothing gets me more excited than these random photo texts.  Progress!!  These are the floor joists that had to be replaced in the living room/dining room.  If you have looked through the photo links on the top of this page you will notice that the square where the fireplace was is now gone.  This picture is from last Friday. 

This one:

is from yesterday, more progress!! That is the floor of the spare room, and they continued on to finish up the entire kitchen.  Pardon the dark picture, but hopefully you can see what I mean...

Maybe one day I will whip out a real camera instead of using my iPhone, but until then we will all have to deal with pictures like this!

Next up on the to-do list is to lay a moisture barrier against the ground before we put a subfloor in.  This will help to keep moisture that builds from the ground off of the brand new (dry) wood we have put in, therefore preventing mold from growing up under the house.  It's a crawl space, but we want to try and control it as much as possible.  We are also going to spray down the old floor joists that will remain with some mold spray (just to be better safe than sorry).  I can't help but think how different this post would probably read if Lee were to write about it, our minds view this whole thing so differently!  I'm the cheerleader and the helper, he actually has to figure this stuff out...bless him!  Hopefully he will grace this blog with some posts from time to time, that way you won't just get one side of the story ;)

The Low-Down

Let me start by giving you the low-down on what's been happening up to this moment. Back in April of 2010 Lee stumbled upon this cute little (as I refer to it) "doll house" on craigslist. We have always had our eye out for a house to fix up, but it was hard to find one right up our alley. Well, we found it, and it is a project and a half let me tell you. Out little Tucker Station house is celebrating its 100th birthday this year, and we are so glad we are helping to ring in that celebration by giving it a makeover! We spent last summer gutting it, if you remember it was like one of our hottest summers in the history of the world here in Louisville. It actually felt good (EXTREMELY good) to walk from the inside of the house out into the 97 degree, 100% humidity! That's when we knew it was bad. But after 4 very large dumpsters filled up with plaster, lath, flooring, a cast iron bath tub (translation: HEAVY), and other various things, it has been completely gutted since around September. At that point we had to take down two non-functioning fire places, brick by brick.

Then came winter. With the frigid weather came the most brutal part of the rehab - the structural repairs. Thank the lord for Lee, and for his Dad, Charlie. They worked so hard together through the winter to replace the main girder and a few seals. And thanks to them, our house is safe and sturdy!! There was so much termite damage it was almost scary. We knew this going in, but it was still shocking when they actually removed the damaged logs and we could see just how bad it really was! We called the structural repairs "Phase 2" (Phase 1 was the demolition/gutting process). And let me tell you what, I have never been so happy to say "PEACE OUT PHASE 2!! I hope the door hits you hard on the way out!"

Now we are starting Phase 3, the fun part, putting it all back together with our own ideas and our own style. Hell-to-the-yes! And with this phase comes spring, and warmer weather, and green grass, and pretty flowers! Can you tell I am excited? Because I am. Like, ICANTSTOPSMILING excited! Plus I can start helping again, which makes me happy, I like to get down and dirty! Nothing like a little sweat-equity to get me excited.

So, as I type this and get this whole blog party started, Lee is at the house with his Dad finishing up getting all the new floor joists in. Hopefully this first post served as a good back-story, and we can move on from here project by project, picture by picture, smile by smile, kartwheel by kartwheel!!!...you get the point. If you didn't read my description on the side of the page, feel free to comment, share your ideas, and enjoy the process with us!

-Katie