Of course, we made a list, a rather long list of everything we'd like to do and then we prioritized based on stuctural issues and cost. As it turns out, we have a number of things we can do that will cost next to nothing. Projects that have been cued up for a while and just pushed aside.
We have a stockpile of some materials in our basement also (read: oak, more oak, and some more oak)and it will be nice to clear some of that out! Steve is still working on our kitchen table at the wood shop. He is hand scraping it, which is the method used before sandpaper was invented. The effect is more burnishing and smoothing as opposed to sandpaper, which leaves fine scratches on the surface.
He's kind of a luddite when it comes to making furniture, but he does make "hand-crafted" furniture. This is why it takes a while too.
As an example of the kind of projects we are undertaking, our latest project was to install a Hunter ceiling fan we purchased in 2006, back when we were remodeling the 2nd floor.The funny thing about this little "freebie" project is that it ended up costing us close to $100.00 after we retrofitted the ceiling outlet with hardware to hold up this monster ceiling fan. The house gets the last laugh this time, but just wait, the year has just started.
Projects on the boards for this year include:
Building out our mudroom/entry area with a mirror and hooks for coats etc...
Tuckpointing the garage and basement walls.
General maintenance of roof, concrete repair, window glazing etc...
Install missing shoe moulding in Living room, dining room and mud room.
And no summer would be complete without me refinishing at least one door so...we will be buying a salvage door for our den (Steve's office) and I will refinish and then install it.
There's a bunch more little and not-so-glamourous-or exciting small projects that I won't bore you with here. I'll try to post when something exciting happens.
