Same View, Different Day

Today I thought we'd play a little game called Same View, Different Day. Or, in our case, maybe Same View, Different Year. Yeah. That works better. I am always so impressed by the before and after pictures on other house blogs. They really drive home the fact that the pretty room was not always pretty...and quite possibly the pretty room started out as a downright mess. So, without further adieu, the best of our before and afters, kitchen edition:

Before:


Annnnd After:
Although it's hard to tell, this IS the same view. The window you see in the before pic was closed up to allow for the range and range hood (not installed yet). We added a window over the new sink (for reference, you can see the floor mat in front of the sink in the after pic).

Before I get to the rest of the pics, I should add that while the kitchen is almost done and is fully functional, we still have a lot more work to tackle. Our cabinets came with a very nice crown that hasn't been installed yet...we haven't installed the range hood or range back splash yet...toe kicks are nonexistent...same goes for the under cabinet lighting...oh, and that table you see is filling in for our island, which will house the dishwasher and convection oven (that's why there are two pendant lamps over the table). And now, on to the rest of the pics...

Before:

After:
Before:
After:
Before:
After:
Before:
After:
Okay, admittedly that last one is a little bit off, but it's the only after pic of that view I had with me. What do you want for nothin? Geez. :)

Wow! Time Flies...

I can't believe it's been TWO WEEKS since my last post! I literally thought it had been maybe 5 or 6 days. Clearly I'm sleep deprived and a little nutty. Well, I've been trying to put together a nice, long, informative post on the attic renovation. That was where we started when we bought the house and I thought I'd try to catch you up in chronological order. The upside is we have MANY photographs of the attic transformation. The downside is we have MANY photographs of the attic transformation - which makes it difficult for me to clearly and easily tell the "attic story." I do, after all, have a tendency to be a bit long winded. Anyway, I hope to finish up that post in the next couple of days.

Going through a major home renovation with two small children definitely makes things interesting. For example, it's not entirely uncommon for drill bits to show up in the silverware drawer. The kids LOVE touching Daddy's tools. They also LOVE hiding them in crazy places. I always chuckle when I find any of these hidden tools, but the one I found this morning really made me laugh...

Hmm, why is this metal thing stuck next to my mattress? What is this metal thing stuck next to my mattress?

Ahhh, the old putty-knife-in-the-bed-frame. They haven't used this one in a while :)

On a side note, here's me and my handsome husband going to a Fire Department function. He got the Medal of Merit for his work at a car accident - probably why he's so smiley.

Vinyl Siding: It's Not ALL Bad

As I said in a previous post, if given the time and the money, my husband and I would be thrilled to be able to replace the vinyl siding on our house with period-appropriate wood siding, complete with all of the standard Victorian intricacies. Unfortunately, that's not in the budget right now, so we've made do with what we have. At the time we bought the house, it had been sided 6 or 7 years prior. It wasn't in terrible shape and we actually liked the color. We painted the front porch, hung some shutters and pretty much called it finito, as far as the exterior was concerned. The one thing that we did consider doing was replacing the siding on the upper-most peak of the front of the house with half-round (or scalloped) siding in a coordinating color. We figured doing this would restore some of the Victorian charm to the house. But, as with many, many things we have "considered" for this house, it didn't NEED to be done and so it didn't get done. Then fate stepped in...

A couple of months ago we had a pretty bad wind storm. (Can you see where I'm going with this?) No rain, just wind. Nonetheless, there was some minor damage around town and when we got home that day we found that about a quarter of the siding on that top peak had blown right off. Even the insulation board underneath the siding had come off in some places. (And actually hit our neighbor, no less! But that's a different story...) We immediately called our homeowners insurance agent to start a claim. But, because it was the weekend, we had to wait to talk to someone and all the while the wind kept right on blowing. To make a long story short, we ended up losing over 50% of the siding on the top peak. We were the only house on the street - in the neighborhood, even - that this happened to. Shoddy workmanship? Probably. The siding wasn't the only issue we've had with some of the "new" elements of the house. Coincidentally, all of this new work was done by the same company. We decided to give them a call. Not that we were expecting much from them at this point, but we figured that at the very least they should be called out on their crappy work. Well, my husband couldn't even get them to return his call until he pretended to be a new client. Miraculously, Mr. New Client got a call back immediately. Mike and Danielle are still waiting for their return call. After a lengthy and uncomfortable phone conversation, the company basically told us in no uncertain terms that they wouldn't be doing anything to help and 7 years is apparently the shelf life of vinyl siding. Okayyyyyyyyyyyyy.

And so, we got our insurance claim money and my wonderful husband repeatedly climbed up a very intimidating 35 foot ladder to hang our new Cedar Impressions by Certainteed half-round siding (in Cypress) all by himself. And now our house looks like this:

Can't complain, even if it IS vinyl. Oh, and by the way...YOU SUCK, CAMPBELL BROTHERS!!!