Our real jobs have gotten in the way of working on Sunnyside. Greg has been sequestered upstairs making coats for people before the holiday season really gets underway. There have been a few auctions out there for me, and today will be spent attempting to buy an 18th century needlework pocketbook at auction here in Maine for clients in LA. Tomorrow we both take off for New York on business, so poor forlorn Sunnyside will have to wait until we return next weekend. We will then have less than two weeks to get ready for the new windows. The house will really show some progress once those windows are in.

And, ok, I lied. I never got around to whacking the support post in place before the holiday tryptophan set in. I spent two days alternately baking or watching movies. So, no photos of the event. When I am not driving an hour to this auction, I will be cleaning and making some dessert for our evening hosts tomorrow night.

So, more from us after the 4th of December...stay tuned!!

We are at the wood buying stage of the program. Yesterday, we started shoring up the cottage. Greg took some of the old studs and made them into supports for the big manufactured beam that "holds up" the second floor at the back of the house. The beam is almost 1/2" an inch off level and only had two 2 x 6" boards holding direct weight. Greg put in two more post and hammered them into the others and now, one end of the beam is perfectly supported. This will be important when we jack up the other end of the beam so that more load will be transferred. Before we do that though, we have to put in a proper support post underneath the house, directly under the wacky column that "supports" the manufactured beam. The existing column sits squarely on the floor board between two joists and has nothing underneath to support it, like a foundation wall. So, we bought a concrete pill which I dug into place and then tomorrow, I will cut the 6 x 6" support column and wack it into place. I think this should do wonders for the stability of the house.
Pictures of the work tomorrow.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Another day of recycling yesterday. I really want to try and use as many old boards as possible in the new scheme. I am removing old nails and cutting the tongue and groove boards down. getting rid of damaged ends, etc. I hope to have enough materials between the tongue and groove boards and the old studs to make the kitchen cabinets. Have come across so many old 19th square cut nails, that I decided to try and save those as well. There has to be some decorative wall treatment I can do with old cut brads.

Put out a curb alert on Craig's List to get rid of the bathroom vanity. I honestly think it was never used, for it looks brand new. Within about 30 minutes I had some guy from Waterville ask me to hold it for him. He is driving down tomorrow to pick it up. It's a good feeling to know that a lot of this stuff is not going to land up in some landfill.

We placed the window order yesterday. We probably could have found them cheaper at some big box store, but we wanted the good quality Anderson windows that are not as cheap as the ones at one of those BB stores. And, I feel good about ordering from Viking...they are a local Maine company and probably need the business. I've asked our BFF contractor to put the windows in for us. I can see where the previous windows have leaked and since I have no experience in putting in an 8 foot sliding glass door, I want it done properly. The small square windows that are probably original have caused all sorts of leaks, so I want to get those done up right too. We have to take out the bay window (there are leak marks all around it) that was installed in 2000....I think I can probably sell it to pay for part of the other windows. I cannot wait to get rid of the front picture window...it's old and not too weatherproof.....and its so ugly!

SOLD!

Got rid of the Thomasville Oak Hutch that I was about to give away to the Goodwill. Craig's list rules! A nice couple from Bath drove up to see it this morning. They were waiting when I got here, and she walked into the house and gasped that she loved it. They just bought their first house after 19 years of marriage. I love these stories almost as much as I love making the money.

Exciting day today. Besides finally getting the floor up in the bathroom, we had our building consultant, Larry Jones of Whitecap Builders, come in and look over the place. He pointed us in the right direction with several things, and gave us the ego boost we needed when he agreed with us that the project was not overwhelming.

We ordered windows and doors. 10 new windows and a set of 8' sliders to replace the upstairs bay window. We are replacing the front picture window and accompanying side lights with three 6 over 6 mullioned windows that match those downstairs. We are replacing the side door with a window to make the downstairs bathroom.

We discussed what to do in the basement and decided on plastic sheeting and four inches of pea stone to level out the floor and keep the moisture levels down.

We got rid of the last giant piece of furniture when the walnut head board found temporary digs at the Goodwill today. I thought we were going to have to break the thing up for firewood because it wasn't going down the stairs when the walls were up. Guess we might've waited to get those beds down the stairs!

Here are some photos I took during a break. It's been the best November on record here, warm clear days. Wouldn't I love to be on the water today!!

View from the soon to be second floor deck

View from the second floor windows at the front of the house. Neither Greg nor I want to put in walls up here cause the view is so amazing. If we were going to live here, we would leave the second floor open. As a rental though, It needs to be more than one bedroom.

Merithew Square

The houses on the North end of the Square..still out the front window

Renovation IS glamourous!!

It's taken me an hour to take up just half of the homasote floor in what was the upstairs bathroom. There are nails every inch and the flooring itself is dry and brittle and stuck down along the tub with old moisture. Good news is that the floor underneath is in wicked good shape!

Found a board the other day in one of the upstairs rooms that has someone's initials on it written in chalk. We carefully set the board aside and I photographed it to send to the Bayside Historical Society. I inquired whether the Society collected old boards and was enthusiastically informed that the society had a wonderful collection of boards from other cottages. Our board is now amongst friends in the Historical Society Collection!

Though we feel like we didn't accomplish anything yesterday, we got the whole upstairs gutted. The photo below shows the view from the window at the front of the house. The sunny patch at the lower left is the stairway opening. We took out the second floor because the homasote ceiling height was at 6'7" and I just barely made it around the rooms. When we first bought the place, I was upstairs and turned around suddenly, breaking a light bulb with my head and tearing out the fixture....yeah, it was time to take out that ceiling. So, we had to take out the walls and will reuse the boards elsewhere in the house. After insulating, we will take the new walls all the way to the peak of the roof so that the two rooms upstairs will have 20 foot ceilings in places. Two new peak windows will really help with the light upstairs as well.

A good pic showing the bathroom while I was removing the fixtures. We will save the cast iron bathtub, which is in fantastic condition. Note how wet the under flooring is. We have leaks from all the old windows upstairs. Meeting tomorrow with a contractor friend who will help us with that.

And, the final shot of the bathroom totally deconstructed. We want to make the bath a bit bigger, perhaps by a foot or so in width..I think it will make all the difference.


Hauling away the second floor in the man-truck.....whew...what a day that was....This took us about six hours total. Greg started at 6 and left at 8:30, then back at 11 for another hour and I worked from 7:30 to 11 and then made the dump run. We were both whipped...shows what a 43 year old man cannot do anymore!!

I'm gutted this evening.

Cannot move. We hauled and toted all yesterday and took this morning to partially gut the upstairs. This is the view from the stairway into the second bedroom. And that is the bedroom wall in the foreground. We will try and reuse the wood for wainscoting or for the kitchen cabinets.

Greg and I nailed cross beams up between the roof joists and then while I was getting rid of the bathroom vanity and the rest of the walls in the bathroom,he was pulling down the bedroom walls.
Here are the before and after shots of the bathroom: We got rid of the very pretty green plastic tiling. Underneath was not something waterproof, but rather more homasote.
I cannot believe how open the second floor looks. With walls going all the way to the roof, the rooms will soar with airy-ness. I took photos but am too tired to find my camera and fiddle with posting the pictures. Tomorrow you can see the transformation.
I also planted about 80 bulbs today and took down the awful "Victorian" corner braces on the porch. Speaking of the porch, found that the support posts for the covered porch outside are just floating..I moved one over about three inches when I yanked one of the fiberglass corner braces off. Jeez, I am now realizing that our home renovations, as inexperienced are we are, is going to be great!

My Sunday for those of you who are not my facebook pals

1. Recycled: four computer monitors, two tvs, and two VCRs with the Belfast Rotary Club
2. Took to the scrap pile where someone will take them apart and reuse the insides: FOUR air conditioners from the 1950s and two lawnmowers.
3. Gutted: one bathroom where I found an erotic magazine from the 50s behind a wall
4. Took guts from the bathroom and the ceilings on the second floor to the dump
5. Went to a funeral
6. Made milk chocolate cashew peanut brittle to bring to dinner hosts tonight
7. Planned a deal to purchase a client's great-grandfather's desk
8. Had to lie down so my back could heal!

It's electronic recycling day today....I know we can do microwaves, but can we do air conditioners as well?

The power of Craig's List!

I spent the last few glorious days in Maine outside in front of Sunnyside, raking up two years or so of leaves. After filling 12 contractor bags full....and I mean full....I was wondering what to do with the bags. It seemed a shame to take them to the dump and unpack them onto the brush pile. So, I put them up for free on Craig's List under the heading "Eco-Insulation for the outside of your home" I listed them around 10pm. By 9am the next morning, I had an email excitedly asking me if they were still available. A man and his wife drove 60 miles round trip to pick them up because hay bales have gotten out of sight expensive. He saved $40.00 on hay and I saved about the same amount by not taking them to the dump. Love it.

Just had an email about the Fugly Thomasville Hutch that is still left in the house. Hopefully, that will be gone this weekend. I decided to keep the table for now since it works perfectly as a large work surface. We'll donate it to Goodwill when the time comes for it to go.

In Boston for the night. Greg and I found excellent shoe deals at Marden's in Portland yesterday. $69.00 for a pair of $300 loafers in my size. I can't believe they had Ted Baker shoes for $49.00!

Won't be back at work at Sunnyside until Saturday....and that is a clean up day for the ceiling upstairs.

I have some random images that I have taken of the house in the last few days. Just taking a break from leave raking and listening to the Black Eyed Peas on the stereo.

View from the stairway up to the bathroom and the absence of ceiling! Woot Greg!!



The last of the wall was removed yesterday..money shot!

Looking from the square straight through the house to the water...love the double front doors, they are probably my favorite part of the house.

yes, these will be removed and new ones put on...but the view from porch to view is spectacular!

umm, house shake much?? One of my temporary supports for the second floor.

This is the only support for the stair, I raised the corner there by about 1/8"

I put a curb alert on the "free stuff" posting on Craig's list for 10 contractor bags of leaves last night. Got rid of them today. Here in Maine, lots of people use filled leaf bags to surround their house as insulation...I've done it at our own house. Some woman emailed me to ask if they were still there and she is sending her husband out from Union, probably a 60 mile round trip to pick them up.

I am just glad that they didn't end up at the dump!

Demolition progresses rapidly. Greg got up blessed early yesterday and by the time I awoke and remembered him getting up, he had half the ceiling down on the second floor of the cottage. The ceiling was a low hung homosote ceiling with stained trim pieces in between the sheets like you see below. This is the bathroom ceiling, which I have to take down today. The ceiling in the bedrooms was so low that I could stand on my toes and bust my head through the homosote sheets. Now it looks like this:
We will raise the height of the cross ties and then take the walls all the way up to the peak, creating airy spaces that are perfect for summer houses. Of course the window comes out as well and will be replaced with more appropriate windows.

I stayed home for part of the morning and did real life things, like try and interest clients in artwork coming up for sale. I took the dogs over to Sunnyside around 10am and Greg had just finished with the upstairs. It looks amazing, but he was tired and cranky, so I made him walk with me for a hour...it was nice enough to take the dogs swimming for a minute, so they had a great time.

Greg took the dogs home and I decided that it was nice enough that I should get the two air conditioners out of the upstairs windows where they have been for 30 + years. It didn't take but a bit of yanking and out they came. I now just have to add some plastic sheeting to the exterior of the windows and we be good to go for the winter, or until we get some new windows.

Before:

After:

The absence of the air conditioners really opens up these little windows on the inside. There was actually sun streaming through this window, giving so much more air and light to the rooms upstairs. The cross breeze is amazing and I can see how the architecture of the dormer will play into our charm scheme when done up properly:

I believe the temperature for November 9th was around 60 degrees yesterday, so I took the opportunity to rake the leaves on the lawn...10 bags worth. I arrived home last night sore and barely able to move!

Cheers!

Every intention of going over to the cottage and ripping out the bathroom this morning. Got there and went upstairs to investigate the ceiling. Found that the wobbly floor was really getting me down. I looked above the ceiling and found a small lumber pile, two 2x4s of relatively the same length, though one was bowed a bit. I grabbed some scrap wood and made a support post, spanning between two cross beams. It isn't perfect, but I stopped some of the shake on the second floor. I got obsessed with putting in supports and found a post for the corner of the stairs. I raised the stair corner by about 1/8th of an inch and you can feel the difference upstairs. The front room is now more shaky than the back of the house! That is a good thing and with the stair wall and the new bathroom wall and supports, I think we will be just fine with bracing the upstairs.

Quitting early to make dinner for friends A squash, turnip, sweet potato and leek soup with several different focacia breads and a big salad. Mac and cheese as a filler for those wanting more.

Dismantling the kitchen today. I finally got rid of the ultra cool, but non-working 1950s stove. Greg and I took it to the dump today and left it for some dude to shoot at. It's huntin' season here and all of the appliances in the scrap pile had multiple bullet holes in them! Here is the before shot:

Found a lovely mouse nest with a lot of seeds in it...like thousands of tiny seeds found in the box that surrounded the light over the sink. Also found a leak. The interior of the boards between the kitchen space and the stairs are all wet. Finding all the nasty carpet again too. MMM rot behind the sink...gotta replace a few of the board on the back of the house. Here is the after photo...still not ready for architectural digest yet!

Hmmmm... a bit of rot behind the sink and below the window. The second leak is from the upstairs window

When I pulled out the fridge, I found the old cellar stairway that has been blocked up. It runs under the second floor stairway.
Some over zealous homeowner decided at some point he or she would stick that linoleum down once and for all...and then they screwed it down...with over 20 friggin'screws in a 3 x8" rectagle! I was able to get about half out and then I stripped the others. What a bitch! embiggen the picture below to see the crazy screw job.

I have to admit that I am not so into the demolition yet, but I need to be. Kept telling myself that I would go over there today, but my REAL job got in the way. I've played phone tag for a few days with a contact in Chicago made through Facebook and ended up talking to a Chicago collector about his amazing tale of buying a stained glass factory in Chicago and all the stuff he found inside! I also wrote to a collector about a desk he owns that belonged to one of my client's great-grandfathers. I thought I would see how amenable he would be to a sale of the desk, which he purchased in the late 90s.

I tried to get to the house, but with the dark days, 3pm seems like 6 pm for me until I get the hang of the darkness. It's only 7pm and I feel like it's 10pm...could be the pjs thing all day. That should not be allowed for people like me.

Can I also admit that I want to be cliche and get green glass knobs for the beadboard kitchen doors for the kitchen here.

I rescued most of my sister's cache of green depression glass that she wanted to sell at the yard sale. I would like to put it here at the cottage and match up the knobs to the plates and glasses....I am so gay...but you know, this idea works for me and will convey a factor of 6 on the charm scale...speaking of which I decided to keep the red iron farm scale we found at the cottage and put it back...probably a factor of 8.5 (would be higher but it isn't balanced)

I know, I should have dreams of ripping off homosote and the corresponding rug scraps off the walls and getting started jacking up the corner of the house so it doesn't fall on me and my Ruby Slippers.

Yesterday was a light day at ole' Sunnyside, Greg and I were still smarting over the No on 1 vote and wanted to just spend some time together, counteracting what the religious right was saying about gay relationships. We decided to move beds around, mostly to get the space we need upstairs to start the demolition process. I thought it would take about an hour. We found that one Queen bed was old and should just go to the dump and we found that the King bed was nice and that we could use it at our own house. We found someone who wanted our own bed, a four year old memory foam King, so we were going to bring that to Belfast.
No sweat, I thought. I was wrong! After measuring, we figured that the previous owners had brought both beds in through the window openings when they replaced the windows upstairs!

So, first we ripped out the bulkhead for the stairs. We were going to do this anyway, as well as ripping out all the walls upstairs, but I wasn't mentally prepared to rip out the wall yesterday. There is now a wonderful gaping hole in the second bedroom. Isn't he cute?


Here is one of the original window openings with a 1950s air conditioner still in place. I met one of our neighbors, an oldish man, who looked up at the window from outside and said..."I've been here since 1975 and that air conditioner was there before I got here." The pink color is the original color of the interior walls in the living room and the stairway. I can't wait to get those air conditioners out...there are two of them.


We thought we had it! With that in mind, we proceeded with the Queen boxspring

Oops! It didn't fit.

an hour of knocking the shit out of the boxpring with hammers and a crobar got it down the stairs and into the man-truck..a bit worse for wear. Off to the dump where getting rid of the bed cost us $10.00.


Luckily, the King had a split boxspring, though we still had to fold the mattress in half to get it down the stairs.
I have no idea how we will get furniture back up the stairs. There is no way a nice comfy couch, for instance, is making it into the master bedroom.
Stay tuned to see how we get the 1970s walnut queen head board down the stairs...its friggin' HUGE!

Typical Maine Transaction: I got back to Sunnyside yesterday after being in Florida for the weekend to find $5.00 in ones tucked under the front door. Rather, my friend Margaret found it stuck there and gave it to me. I figured it was money owed to me by a friend who came and took stuff from the estate sale. While I was showing Margaret around the house, a neighbor from across the park came by and said: "Did you find my $5.00?" "I took your $10.00 lawn mower and left you $5.00. If it starts next year, I will give you the rest of the $$" I thought that was great.

Have just one thing to sell: The damn dining room table, chairs, and hutch. I tried to sell it for $19.99 on Ebay, but that didn't work either. Oh well.

We've been slow to get back to work what with the vote on marriage equality happening yesterday. Today, though I wanted to work, I couldn't focus on anything and spent the day feeling sorry for ourselves.

Til tomorrow