Drywall Demo Begins...and Ends

This afternoon we're planning to go out and see if we can get the drywall removed from the walls in the master bedroom. With any luck, we'll be able to get that all off today and then we can get it cleaned up tomorrow and Saturday during the Estate Sale.

I'm going through our schedule again. I'm still worried that we're setting the May 26 move-in date too soon. I guess we'll see. If we can get everything painted pretty quickly, we should be fine.

I'm trying to figure out a way we can go down to Southern California and get that furniture I found yesterday. A visit to Jeff's parents is way overdue, but given our current tight schedule I'm not sure I can see how to do it, not without infringing on Jeff's work hours. Hopefully it will still be for sale in a couple of weeks and by then we should know how quickly the painting will go.

I already received my purple heart earring rack! Wow, they were fast. It's actually a bit bigger than I would like, but I was going by their earring count at the website. They clearly don't expect you not to pack them in as tight as we do. This rack is almost twice as big as I really need. I only have 41 pairs of earrings and they're mostly small ones on earwires. Oh well, I should have known better since I already have one. I do like the purple heart wood and am looking forward to hanging it up in Redwood City.

We're getting another quote today for hanging the drywall and also for trimming out the master bedroom. We discovered our neighbor from our last rental (on Dumas) who we've kept in touch with does that kind of work and he's out of work right now. I always enjoy helping out friends who need work. This will also help us out as we won't have to deal with the trim during our limited number of weekend hours; we'll be able to just come in and paint.

UPDATE at 9PM:

Jeff finished all the demo. He did a great job getting all the sheetrock off the walls and now all we have to do is clean up and dispose of the debris.

Quiet Days at Home

I've spent yesterday and today catching up domestic tasks back at the Cupertino house. Did some housework, laundry and dishes; boring to write about, boring to read about. I've also goofed off a bit online.

Yesterday, I splurged and bought myself a new earring rack made out of purpleheart wood. The earring rack that Jeff and I share has gotten very crowded with all his earrings, so I went ahead and bought a new one for myself. They don't have a picture of the particular style I bought, but it was like this one, only in purpleheart wood and with one more rung in the height. The maker is Ginny's Ear Nest. We originally bought the earlier rack at Portland's Saturday Market and have been happy with it, so I decided to get another that matched.

I probably should be working on packing. I'm trying to talk myself into starting in on my sewing room. That's one room that I can move over as soon as we get the hardwood floor cleaned up. Jeff pulled down some of the boxes we kept from the last move and they are the specially-sized boxes I bought to fit my folded fabric so I don't have to unfold the piles; I can just put two piles side-by-side in the same box.

Shasta is settling into our routine quite well. She's a pretty good girl, but still definitely a puppy. She has so much energy. She is quite the tow vehicle when I wrap her leash around me to slow her down on our walks. =)

Working on Project Plan

I'm trying to plan out all the tasks we need to do on the Redwood City House project so I can map out the dates. I've been working on my own little project plan in a spreadsheet. This will help keep me on track and will help me make sure I've got the correct materials when we need them.

Anyway, I've been pretty detailed in everything we need to do, and I'm not sure we can have the house ready to move in by the 26th of May. One of the problems clogging up the schedule is the availability of my Dad's time. He works full-time and, basically, has a life. But there's several things he'll need to help us with in order to be ready for later tasks. For instance, he needs to help us remove the toilets and repair the subfloors if necessary, so we can have the new vinyl installed.

I think Jeff and I are going to have to start going over at least one night during the week; the weekends just aren't long enough. We need to get started on demolition of the master bedroom drywall so we can get that room insulated and electrical upgraded. Which reminds me, I found someone who would install the drywall and patch that bedroom for $850, including materials, so we're going to go ahead and do it. It will save us on our energy bills, and we'll be more comfortable at night, especially as that side of the house gets pounded with sun all day long. It's already hot in there in the afternoon and it's only April!

I'm really looking forward to the estate sale being finished, because all that stuff piled around the house is making it nearly impossible to get anything done there, other than sifting stuff, that is.

We really need to get going on painting, which means we need the walls clear. You can only do so much painting at one time. The paint has to dry and we're limited by the time we have to spend there. I'm hoping by going out an evening or two, we can get through the painting in time. We want to finish all the painting before we have the new vinyl/carpet installed.

This coming week I'm going to try and start cleaning the bathrooms. I think the cupboards are still full and I'll also need to start removing the existing vinyl on the floors. I can probably get started on that before the sale. And if I finish that task, I'm going to start cleaning the walls, masking and painting. I can at least get the master bath painted before the house is empty.

In the evenings when we aren't working on the house, I spend a fair amount of time cruising around the furniture section of craigslist. I'm still looking for good deals on 1950s style living room and dining room furniture. There's a few pieces I'm watching, but since they're not exactly a great deal price-wise, I haven't gone and bought them yet. They may sell, but new sets get listed regularly. (There were a few good deals, but they were too far away to jump in my car and get them. Once we move, I'll be more willing to travel a bit of distance.) 

That's the one glimmer of brightness in this sorry economy, there's lots of quality furniture for sale. There's a fairly significant number of people who are selling everything to move or to pay the bills. Sad for them, good for us.

By working on this plan, though, I've also realized I have to get started with the packing. I cannot spend all my free time over in Redwood City; I have to spend some amount of time during the week packing up this end. Sigh, I hate moving. And this one will be more difficult because a chunk of our stuff is moving into a storage locker, at least temporarily. We need to spend that much more time thinking about what we'll need at the house and ask ourselves if this thing we're about to pack is going to get used again soon, or ever....

I was hoping to go to the local SCA event this weekend, but we're far enough behind that we may not have time. I'm missing SCA; I think the last event we made it to was in December.

Mostly Finished With House Planning

During the last few days I visited at least five different flooring sellers and I think I have settled on what I want to put in my grandmother's old house. If this house wasn't going to be a rental when Jeff and I move out, I would put in Marmoleum to keep the retro rancher integrity, but alas I needed to choose an easy-care and durable flooring. And this year fake-stone vinyl is in; nearly everything has some sort of fake stone look, be it slate, limestone, or others. So, that's what I'm choosing.

Also, paint colors, as far as I can find, were bold and bright. Too bright for modern preferences, but I'm going to mostly go with them. I hate beige, so this plan will work for me, at least until we buy a house. I won't be using more than one bright color in a room, though. Here is one picture from a 1950's ad. This is not the color scheme we're going with. ☺Here's a better kitchen from an ad.
(Both of the kitchen images were lifted from the really great Retro Renovation blog.)

Here is our general paint pallet:


For the Kitchen I am choosing Mannington Naturals Pompeii Ash 17360 flooring:

It will contrast nicely with the yellow birch cabinets and also work with my cherry furniture, if I don't manage to find a good deal on birch furniture while I'm there. I'm still debating about what paint colors to use; it will depend on what dining room set we end up using. It will probably be some variation of a yellow, but we may also use Chelsea Gray SW 2850, since all the cabinetry is yellow.

For the front bathroom, which has yellow tile with brown trim, and white fixtures, we are going to go with Manning Benchmark San Tropez Earthenware 3761:
The room has knotty pine wood panelling above the tile, so there is no painting required in that room.

For the master bathroom, which is mostly white with gray mottling, I'm going to use Armstrong Doylestown Pine/Cream 64605 Flooring.
The green medallion looks pretty washed out in this picture, it is actually a bit darker. (I've included a somewhat better picture.) I'm going to paint the wall over the tile wainscoting Cascade Green 0066 from Sherwin Williams.

And I'm going to recarpet the master bedroom in a dark pine green. I've been looking for a carpet with post-consumer recycled content, but I haven't been able to find any that have the dark color I want. So far, all of the recycled carpets are all pastels and mellow earth tones. I want dark! Something along the lines of Vogue Green 0065 from Sherwin Williams. And I'm going to paint the walls in the master bedroom Rose Tan SW 0069 (the darker of the two swatches). I'm going to paint the trim in Classic Sand SW 0056.

I'm still thinking about painting at least one wall in the living room with the color Orchid SW 0071. I'll probably paint the trim with Porcelain SW 0053. I'd like to find a decent used couch in something similar to Deep Maroon SW 0072.

And with all these great colors, I think the house will be bright enough! Now I just need to keep an eye out for a good couch. I'm not moving over my beige couches. They get dirty too easily and I just don't like beige.... ☺