Memories of remodeling

 
I've enjoyed the Facebook photos of Keith Fernandes, a friend of our children, spending his vacation remodeling his bathroom. The work clothes and the exhausted look brought back the memories of our first home in Champaign, IL. Sometimes I say "we" remodeled it, however I don't saw, hammer, plumb or sweat because I watched my mother do that and swore I'd never do it. Bob did it all. One night (1962) there was a trip to the ER because something fell on his head. Then there was a truck borrowed from a construction site to haul away debris thrown out a 2nd floor window and the ex-con he hired to help with the heavy wall board and studs. Bob made the mistake of paying him in cash the first day and he didn't come back the second day. This was all done to make it into a working duplex. We lived downstairs and rented the upstairs. It is the only way to make money buying a house--rent it to someone else. When we bought a second house in a nicer area of town we rented out both units and that paid the mortgages on both houses. Years later after we'd sold it on land contract and moved to Columbus, a bank error was found and we were returned some money.

Church council meeting Sunday April 27

 After 9 am church service and Sunday School at Windermere school we drove across the river to have lunch with our Mill Run brothers and sisters and had a congregational meeting. Church Council | UALC

Pep talk on how long the remodeling is taking.  I think we only have the school two more Sundays. Elected new members and had Q & A. 

Where the money went--about 20% to missions. 620454_e830e5a3ebad4a179e53c71d7c5cc867.pdf

Monday Memories--we remodeled the bathrooms in Spring 2013

  
It seems like yesterday we were going downstairs to the basement to shower while the upstairs bathrooms were being remodeled. The previous owner took part of a closet to add a shower to the half bath off the family room so her son could move in.  We use it primarily to store out-of-season coats, but it did come in handy four years ago when we were without a working shower.

New look in the cottage kitchen

Last July there was a terrific rain storm in Lakeside, and although the interior windows were closed, the outside storm over the kitchen sink was not and water filled up in the well, ran down inside the wall, out on to the floor, and actually dampened the counter top under the Formica, causing bubbling.  So we hired a contractor, selected a new color, and had the tops replaced.  The finishing work has been very unsatisfactory with a very odd piece of trim added (not in these photos), so like our Columbus changes, it will appear to drag on for awhile until the contractor decides to fix it.

This week-end we also replaced the microwave, and made more space for food preparation. It’s not that I do a lot of cooking there, but I seem to do more there than in Columbus. Gave me a good excuse to clean out all the cabinets with the flotsam and jetsam of 25 years.  Now I have empty space.  I wish I could get this done in Columbus!

The stove is only about 2 years old, replacing the 50 something that was there.  It’s a good example of penny wise and pound foolish; for another $20 I could have had a door with glass and a temperature gauge that actually worked, but I bought bottom of the appliance barrel. Always buy mid-price with the fewest bells and whistles—I knew that, but let the price influence me.

Remodeling the upstairs bathrooms

One thing we've learned while remodeling two bathrooms (other than it costs much more to remodel than to build new) is that the building trades are doing just fine--they are very busy here in Columbus. If they were sloppy or careless, the recession did them in (as it should--survival of the fittest). However, to avoid what Obama is doing to small businesses, they are running on very small crews and expecting a lot from their employees. I'm hoping deadlines can be met. We're expecting company in June, and I don't want to send them to the neighbors.

My husband was not fond of the wallpaper in the guest bath, but I sort of enjoyed it.  High end decorators with big price tags, two men, lived in here about 23 years ago—I think this reflects their taste.   The cabinets and doors are black.  The guest bedroom had black carpet, yellow walls (lightened by the next owner from a dark green), and black and forest green checkered fabric on the walls and ceiling, plus pink roses drapery fabric with forest green completely covering the window. My husband said it looked like a funeral home.

Three Word Wednesday for Monday Memories

Bone posts "three words every Wednesday (perhaps Tuesday night even, oh wishful thinker that I am). Your mission is to write something"--a poem, story, sentence, anything–using all three words. Then you leave a comment at the 3WW site letting people know they should visit your blog. For January 16 the 3WW cue was

Awkward
Kitchen
Obsessed

<--------------------------------->
My mother wasn't obsessed with remodeling the awkward kitchen in the homes my father bought, but her eyes widened and her fingers seemed to twitch when she first saw them. Every house my father found seemed to have an outdated kitchen--and sometimes Mother hadn't seen the house before he purchased it. The earliest home I remember at 203 East Hitt Street in Mt. Morris was not old enough to be horribly outdated--being perhaps 30 years old--but it probably received fresh paint and new curtains for the southern exposure kitchen window. The wall cabinets had heavy pull-out drawers. I remember dragging them out like stair steps for climbing to reach something. And then falling.

The first home in Forreston was a disaster--an old 19th century farm house with a cold water hand pump in the kitchen and an outdoor toilet. Mother rose to the challenge, remodeling the kitchen and installing a bathroom using one of the smaller bedrooms. When it was livable, dad bought a very nice brick home a few blocks away. It was well designed with beautiful woodwork and amazing closets (each closet had a closet), but the kitchen sink with a sloping drain board hung on the wall. Even a skirt to disguise it didn't help and the ice box (no refrigerator) was on the back porch. Mother went to work and built a standard sized sink cabinet and bought a refrigerator, and then built an eating nook with a wrap around bench which was all the rage then. But the bold colors of the late 1940s were her undoing. I think she clipped too many articles from Better Homes and Gardens, because she painted the linoleum deep maroon, and speckled it (sort of like the 90s craze for faux painting) by dipping a crumpled newspaper in white paint and patting it on the maroon floor. It looked like a frisky puppy ran through spilled paint and dashed through the kitchen.

In 1951 Dad bought several different houses in Mt. Morris, the first two being too small for a family of six, so he traded the second for our wonderful home at 4 South Hannah in March, again with an awkward, dated kitchen. I've used this photo before, but it's all I have to show the features--the old turn of the century wall cabinets to the ceiling with work space about 12" deep, radiator for heat over which Mother had built a shelf, a very tall window, and a wood table heavy with paint. What you don't see is the sink behind me hanging on the wall next to a bathroom door. The bathroom had been installed in what was probably the "carriage porch," and had four doors and a washer and dryer--a door to the backyard and the kitchen plus two other doors to the basement and the music room/dad's office. In front of me in this photo was a door and a window to an enclosed back porch which had cabinets for storage. Mother remodeled this kitchen in late 1955 and again we had a table with a built in bench (they really aren't very convenient, but were very popular then). She only enjoyed it three years.


Their final house in Mt. Morris at 315 East Lincoln Street was probably less than ten years old when they bought it in 1958, and although not dated, the kitchen was awkward and tiny. Out came Mother's box of magazine clippings and down came some walls. She hired a carpenter who built her dream design--a wonderful plan that lasted her over thirty years, and cost at least half the value of the house (which is probably why dad didn't sell it).

In the 1960s she began remodeling her parents' home place as a retreat center, a huge house between Franklin Grove and Ashton. She had tongue and groove cabinetry installed to match some of the original from 1908, and removed the cook stove to install a washer and dryer enclosed behind doors. It was a wonderful, bright and airy gathering spot.

Mom had one last kitchen to tackle before her final reveal. When she and dad moved into their retirement home in Pinecrest Apartments in 1997 their unit was quite new, but not convenient for a short, 80-something woman with a few opinions about kitchens. She hired a carpenter to build in sliding and roll out shelves in all the kitchen cabinets for easy access. She didn't do much cooking during her final years, but she was quite proud of her efforts and when her daughters and grand daughters visited, we appreciated again her knack for handling bad kitchens.