Ramping Up To Home Improvement

We're finally back to working on the house! Not that I left it completely untouched over the summer months, mind you. Our main focus has been on vacation/camping and the garden for the last couple of months. Now, as my hubbie puts it so nicely, comes the time of year when being house-bound and bored out of our skulls leads to actual restoration progress. We've been getting busy on the exterior to try and finish before winter really hits. Also, the fireplace is starting to shape up, and plans for hearth tiling are in the works. Curtains are going up, albeit slowly, and the guest room looks less and less dreary. I'll be making quite a few posts in the next few days to make up for the long summer hiatus, so stay tuned in!

Breaking The Prolonged Silence

Well, I've just now gotten our internet back up, and we've been in our new residence since last Saturday. Still getting used to things in the house, and the neighborhood for that matter. So far my only trouble with the shared driveway is remembering to straighten out before backing down it each time, to avoid any scrapes. My boys are thrilled that we have a 3 and a 5 year old living next door, and invitations to play have already been exchanged. As for the house, projects move slowly and haltingly, more due to the toddler than the projects themselves. I have managed to start painting the master bedroom in "Juniper Berry", a great improvement on the stark white walls. It looks like that is the only room that still has all the original trim, so after I get it stripped I'll be using that as a guide to making trim for the rest of the house. I started work on the kitchen as well, but to my dismay the plaster appears to be in shambles under all that painted wallpaper and faux paneling. For the moment I've decided to leave the paneling and spackle all grooves for a smoother surface, then primer over and paint it all lime green. Sounds alarming, I know, but the kitchen is already so modern there's not much hope of going totally period on our current budget. I will still do the subway tile backsplash and probably bamboo countertops, the current cabinets will stay but get a retro facelift (think International Orange, blond wood and brushed chrome!). The windows all look great up close, only the front sidelight need replacing, and then new wooden screens all around. I did have a beastly time with the exterior water spigots, luckily the home warranty covered replacing some leaking segments of galvanized with PEX and now we can water our very dead lawn right before I rip it out. As for the rest, I will post more updates as soon as I can get some decent pics of what we've done so far. And of course some of the fun we're having in our new surroundings in the Wasatch Mountains. It's good to be home!