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Matching entries from House in Progress Diary
A Nice Reveal of the Living Room and Dining Room
We've been tidying up the house and moving furniture around to accommodate the twenty or so people coming to eat oatmeal and watch the inauguration of the new president on Tuesday. I snapped a few photos. It's so often we...
Our "Look What I Did" Contest Entry - Wood Windows
This post was written for Houseblogs.net as part of a sweepstakes sponsored by True Value. Housebloggers can register to win a $300 AMEX gift card but entries are due by Tuesday, July 21st--go here for details. Since we're running the...
From the Depths of the Murky Basement...
...comes the results of my most recent endeavor. Staining all of the poplar trim for the living room, foyer and dining room. I took these photos late at night, after the midget was asleep, and I was ready to pitch...
Charles and Hudson Interviews Kevin O'Connor
One of our favorite home and garden bloggers, Charles and Hudson, caught up with Kevin O'Connor of This Old House for an interview about his career, his own house and DIY coverage on the Internet. Of all of the TOH...
Where am I? What happened?
Every year we go on two family vacations. One with Aaron's family and one to visit my family. Both families are very generous and go to great lengths to lure us away from the House Where To Do Lists Go...
The Forgotten Film of the Upstairs Bedrooms
Yep. Still more forgotten film. This time of the upstairs bedrooms and hallway. Unfortunately (or fortunately), YouTube does not allow you to smell the "before" version. Or taste the dust on your front teeth. Or hear the pitter patter of...
Matching entries from Reviews
Out Damn Spot! Getting Rid of Old House Stains
This house eats our clothes. Seriously. Or it tries to, anyway. So I use the "one-two punch!" to fight back or else we'd be a) dressed like ragamuffins ALL of the time, or b) sinking all of our extra...
Matching entries from House in Progress Diary
Installing a Door Jamb Extension, Pt. 1
Yesterday we finally broke through the 'baby barrier' and--believe it or not--did some work on the house. With power tools. And wood. And a tape measure. No, seriously.It wasn't a full blown project, just part of one. We're definitely pacing...
Exterior Door Stained
After getting solid advice from several readers and other houseblogs, we took the plunge Sunday and stained our new exterior front door....
Advice on Finishing an Exterior Door?
Even though we haven't finished everything that needs to be completed upstairs, we're going to spend a fair amount of time on some other projects that really need to move along. Among them: installing our new front door. We ordered...
Second Floor Punchlist
For every construction job, after "occupancy" occurs, there are always things that need to be finished. Thus, the final "punchlist." Our own project is no exception...we still have things to finish upstairs even after we've moved in. The difference here...
Second Floor Trim Installed (Mostly)
We finished our trim installation rather late at night, so we had to wait until the next morning to get good photos of the stuff installed. Anyway, here they are… As you can see, we still haven’t gotten everything in....
How Easy It Is to Forget...
A. worked like a MAN POSSESSED all weekend. Arms and legs FLYING! So, I'm a-crawlin' out of my blogging slump to write something. Specifically, a big thank you to my best friend and helpmate who is SO talented and dedicated....
12 Hours Hard Labor, 1 Lesson Learned
Well, after only getting in 30 minutes of meaningful work on Friday we certainly made up for it Saturday. We were able to work on things pretty much non-stop from 8am until sundown. I woke up this morning and my...
30 Minutes Hard Labor
So the plan was to take Friday off so I could get a jump on a solid long weekend of house work. Maybe, we figured, if we could just put some solid effort in on finishing the trim we could...
A Little Shellac Goes a Long Little Way
After fixing up a batch of fresh shellac, today we set about applying it to the second floor trim. The best part? My sister Kjerstin was in town from Anchorage this weekend and volunteered to help! This actually wasn't the...
Matching entries from Reviews
Fresh Shellac Kits
Mixing your own fresh shellac can provide a smoother finish and isn't as difficult as you might think....
Matching entries from House in Progress Diary
Staining the Trim (Twice)
Our posts of late probably make it look like we haven't been doing anything. The truth is we actually had a pretty productive weekend. With no obligations on our calendars and beautiful weather in Chicago, we were outside staining the...
Yesterday we were wondering...
...if any of the other housebloggers had good advice about shellac. For that matter, what are the best techniques for stripping wood? Wouldn't it be nice if there was an easy way to actually search all the houseblogs to research...
Refinished Floors
OK, now we're talking! I can say that refinished floors are definitely right up there with painted walls in the satisfaction department. The before and after payoff is just so gratifying.... What a difference a day (or four) makes!...
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