Sweat Equity; now with photos

We're just back to the apartment from a trip to Kent Hardware for more masks, tools, etc.  We'll be back down to the house in a bit.
Started the day with a plumbing consultation; Paul helped cap off the pipes to the downstairs bathroom and advice on what needs to be done and what can be done.  Paul will do small jobs for us; he's retired and not up for a major plumbing jobs (bath or kitchen remodel).  Hopefully, when we get to that stage, he'll be able to recommend someone.

The stack exposed

So far, Greg has muscled out the old, icky stall shower in the downstairs bathroom; he's working on demoing the rest of the walls - we need to get a look at the state of the piping and the stack.

Starting to dismantle the basement shower

Breaking thru gyproc - view from adjacent furnace room!

I've pulled the carpet and padding in the downstairs hall and the living/dining rooms.  I'll get to work on the upstairs hallway which should be much quicker.  Then attack the staples and carpet tacking.  Nice to be rid of the pink wall-to-wall carpet; too bad the tile underneath is so ugly.

Main hallway; living/dining rooms soon followed suit

As of 5:00pm NL Time

we are home owners!

Our realtor dropped off the key to the house.  By 6:00pm, we were in the house.  Me, pulling wallpaper - it came off like buttah in most areas.  

And Greg, putting together his new Fiskars push mower - the backyard was a jungle.  A big concern that cropped up:  do we have poison ivy ?  Greg hasn't broken out in a rash (so far).  I sort of doubt it. But if anyone has any ideas what we're looking at here, please make a comment.

We also pulled up the carpet in a number of places.


Not exactly what we'd hoped for:  icky linoleum tiles (some pretending to be wood, others not) in the living room and hallway.

Main floor hallway

The stair steps look promising.

Stairs

And the master bedroom:  under carpet, padding, some more carpet, linoleum and newspaper from 1954, it looks like we have original wood.

Master bedroom floor

Think we'll get down to original wood in the living room and hallways - it'll just take a lot more work than we'd thought/hoped.

Good News, Bad News

Bad news first:  we didn't close on the house this week.  The sellers are still getting the survey finished.   So disappointing to miss having the weekend to do some work and clean.

The good news:  LILACS!!
We went this morning for the final walk thru (at 8:00am, thinking the closing would happen by lunchtime), and I've been dying to get in too see what the bushes out back were.  I had seen a single tiny purple bud back at the beginning of May.  Was hoping for lilacs but expecting something else (the leaves didn't look right for lilac).

And the two of them are massive; they come up a full story and will perfume the air over the deck.

Backyard in early May

Backyard now !

Lilacs peeking up over the deck.

Plenty of privacy now that it's greened in.

Here's hoping the papers are all in place for closing on Monday.

Bittersweet

Packing up my apartment was harder, and easier, than I thought it would be.   Harder in that I didn't accomplish it as quickly as I would have liked, taking away time to visit family and friends.

And easier, saying good-bye to Manhattan as I look forward to making a home here with Greg.

The time passed far too quickly.  I'll be back again before you know it.

Sunset in St. John's

Being at a higher latitude has a nice advantage at this time of year:  the days are really longer.  Sunset tonight was at 8:59p.   And it isn't even the longest day yet.
I was driving home from the store around 8:30p and wasn't really conscious of it being that late because I'm used to it being darker earlier.  When it registered, I decided to drive up to Signal Hill to catch twilight.