splityarn

sold!

The Husband and I flew down to Austin last weekend to finish the last chapter of our time there.

We sold the house.

I'm sad to see it go, but I know some time in the future we'll have another special little house to reshape and make our own. For now, I'll spend some time remembering that amazing kitchen (I'm still kind of shocked that I built that,) our pretty green mosaic tiled bathroom and thanking (and scolding) whoever left Bicoe behind for us to find.

Before and after shots of the house are in this flickr set.

like, africa hot

I've always been a winter kind of gal. Snow, sweaters, dressing in layers and a crisp chill in the air all make me giddy. But the truth is, I love summer too. I love to be barefoot and sit in the grass. I love green leaves, a warm breeze and hanging my feet in a pool or a lake. But there's a point though that it gets too hot for me. I'm toasty at the coldest of times, so anything above 30 C (86 F) pushes my comfort buttons.

I maintain the hot summers in Austin are just like a cold winter. You have to stay inside, you rely heavily on central air and your activities impeded by to the temps outside. The key difference with a place like Austin in the summer or Boston in the winter, is that you're ready for it. Prepared. Just like when Austin issues frost warnings, a heat wave in Boston sends the locals into a heat frenzy.

We prepared as best we could for this last heat blast. We ordered an air-conditioning unit, we moved our bedroom down into the much cooler guest room for the summer and we brought a couple fans to keep the kitties cool. All would have been well if the AC unit hadn't arrived broken. D'oh!

So we've been sweating a lot, swearing a little, keeping hydrated, and remembering why Austin could be so miserable in the middle of the summer. Austin and Boston both make me wish I lived on a lake or that I had a pool in my backyard. Safe to say I haven't knit a stitch. And when the thermometer goes over 100 in my sewing room, I retreat for a siesta. Which is my long-winded way of saying I have nothing crafty to report. But really, can you blame me?

elbow grease

The Austin house is empty. The moving truck has come and gone; our stuff is already stacked in the hallways and rooms in our Boston house. Two of the three cats are settled after the long plane ride tucked under the seat. All that's left is me, Bicoe, the air mattress and all my tools. There's quite a few holes to patch, paint touch ups, a little grouting and trim work before we can put the house on the market. The last few days have been all about hair in ponytails and sweat equity. (The sweat part comes easy, it's 33 C (92 F) today.)

No turkey for me this weekend. I'm on a steady diet of Vitamin Water and whatever else is left in the fridge. Please have some stuffing for me and make sure you have a happy Thanksgiving!

the many phases of moving

I have a few general guidelines to moving that I've tried to follow. In your college years and early twenties when you move, you do it all yourself. 80 million trips back and forth in a car is really nothing. You give your pals beer and pizza and they'll help. When you get to late twenties/early thirties, you hire a truck. You still pack everything yourself, but you're better off hiring a couple guys to schlep all the boxes in and out. (Funny how your late twenties friends are usually busy when you call for help.) Mid-thirties is time to start hiring folks to pack for you. That's where I am right now. I packed 95% of the house in the last 5 days, but I'm letting the moving company pack all the breakables. It's a huge relief not to worry if dishes get broken along the way. Ideally the next time we move I'll be well into the next phase of moving. The much-glorified "hire someone else to do the whole lot of it" phase.

One can only hope.

next up, more lace

For a moment I had thought once the bathroom was finished the house remodel work would be done. Really though, is work on an older house EVER really finished?

One of the last next projects is the floor in the patio room. The previous owners didn't tile under their crap built-ins (and how could they? Cute little mice had made nests there. Sheesh!) so that leaves me to repair their atrocities.

This morning I will set the tiles so I can grout when we return from Vegas. (Vegas baby!) I'm motivated to wrap this up quickly so I can get to my new knitting project. Are those beads? Is that Sea Silk? Could it be I have forsaken the sock and cast on for Hanami?

Oh hells yeah.

eye candy friday, finished bathroom edition

Our contractor estimated that the bathroom remodel would take 1-2 weeks. Having done this sort of thing before, I thought I knew better and planned for an extra week or so beyond the original number. Even with all that planning? We were five weeks start to finish with the hired guns and a week or two for me to find and install the doors, mirror and shelves.

We went 29 days without any means to shower or have a dunk in the tub so every second or third day we would go to Amy or Meg's place. Oh sure, there were plenty of bird baths (or Navy showers as my mum calls them) but without good pals, we would have been REALLY stinky. The absolute worst was the week of the tiling. We went 6 days and nights without a toilet in the house. We'd drive up to the grocery store during the day, pee at the neighbours house before bed and used Glaceau water bottles at night. (Hurray wide mouth bottles!) Needless to say, I spent most of that week very dehydrated so I wouldn't have to use the facilities.

The last step to getting it all finished was the tub. It's a big ol' cast iron behemoth original to the house and it seemed a shame to just toss it because it was a little dinged up. We wouldn't have been able to get it out the door anyway, so we left it in place and had it re-enameled. Ta Da! Shiny and new!

All in all, a successfully rehabilitated loo. Ain't it pretty?

(You'll find the before pictures here.)

one thing at a time

Our house has been turned on its head for the last few weeks, but we're starting to see progress. We're at day 22 of the bathroom remodel, but the tile is going up and the tradesmen have been here almost on time almost every day. My office, which had been the "I'll just put this here" spot has been turned on its head too and reorganized too.

Tunnel? Do I see a light?

disarray

Everywhere I turn right now is In Progress.

The bathroom remodel is In Progress.
My knitting is In Progress.
Needlecases are In Progress.
Closet organization is In Progress.
The car transmission replacement is In Progress.
Keeping a sane mind is In Progress.

Top to it all off, everything (and I mean EVERYTHING) is covered with a layer of drywall dust and grime. I am in a spring cleaning kind of mood but my hands are completely tied.

don't think about running water

He was only two days late, but the demolition man finally arrived. (This is par for the course with sub-trades. Why is that?) It took all of two hours to gut the bathroom. He hammered off all the old wall tiles, chipped up the floor tiles, ripped down the old built-ins and hauled it all away. The next visit will be from the plumber to raise the shower head and reset the commode. Since this morning I've been dancing around trying not to think about peeing. Do I hear a truck in the driveway? How 'bout now? Is the plumber here now? I think a trip to the gas station up the street may be in order.

There was one unintended casualty with all the crashing and banging. I forgot to empty a shelf on an adjoining wall and my Dan Cloutier Canucks bobblehead took a header. Sorry Clouts, you didn't make it longterm as a Canuck and you didn't make it longterm as a bobblehead either. At least PeeWee landed on his feet.

new loo

Thanks for all the birthday well wishes. We had tons of fun. Judging from the fact that Kristin and Meg didn't leave my place until 3am (on a school night!) I'd say they had fun too. The tattoo and the camera are both in the works this week and both will get their own posts as they happen.

On to this week's excitement.

One of the last house projects we have on The List is the bathroom. Remember way back when I mentioned what the horrible people who lived here before us did to the tile? It's finally time to tackle it. Tomorrow morning, 7:30 am the demolishing team arrives. we're at T minus 1 day for a bathroom remodel.

Let's have a tour of our teeny loo. Please be sure to note:

• grotty light switch that was painted a hideous yellow, a really dark blue and finally covered with white before being half scraped off.
• the interior colour of the built-in shelves. Through archaeological evidence we have determined that at some point the entire bathroom was this colour. (Accented with a cobalt blue)
• the defunct ceiling fan (and I use the term loosely) and the ceiling cracks
• the flaking wallpaper on the tiles. Seriously? Who would WALLPAPER OVER TILE? They deserve a punch in the head.

I wish that the tile was in better shape so that we could maintain some of the vintage values of this room, but it's not going to make it. The built-ins will be ripped out, the vanity replaced, the floor tiles changed...I can't wait. I can't say I'm thrilled about not having a shower in the house for 3 weeks, but sneak peeks at the new tile are helping me get me through.

sold!

In the midst of all the other shenanigans going on in Austin this week, I just got word that the sale has officially closed on my bachelorette pad in Vancouver. I am sad to sell it, but the reality is that we won't be living in Vancouver for a few years yet and the timing was right with the market. Super fast too; from listing to closing in 15 days. Sweeeeeeet! Many thanks to my brother Jeff, who is the best realtor in Vancouver.

Goodbye awesome 30th floor yaletown view! Goodbye striped walls that I lovingly painted 1980's style! Goodbye my painted concrete floors! Goodbye funny naked lady etched into the cement at the front entryway, I wish I had photo proof of you!

I'll miss this place and I will curse the fact that I didn't have a digital camera when I lived there to show you better photos.

a happy Canada Day indeed

I was going to write a diatribe about the challenges we had getting an Air Conditioning company to fix the duct problem in the kitchen (you know, that *thing* I asked you not to mention in all the pictures) but you know what? It's a boring story and most likely you'd rather just look at the pictures.

We subbed out the electrical, the drywall and the plumbing, but everything else in this kitchen renovation was done by me. I did the painting, tiling, cabinet building and installation, countertops, sink installation and a lot of swearing. The cabinets, sink and faucet are from IKEA, the appliances from Sears and the floor tiles from Home Depot. I still have to do the subway tile backsplash but for all intents and purposes the kitchen is complete as of this afternoon.

Did someone say it's time for a beer?

last May and this May

The trees in our front yard had been on the edge since we bought the house last May. Arizona Ash only have a 30-40 year life span (according to our arborist) and ours have been there for more than 50. After that big storm two weeks ago took another few branches, it was time to say goodbye to one of the trees. Our house faces south and it provided the much-needed shade from the Texas sun, but it wasn't worth risking the only branch left falling on the roof, the car or the kitties. So Friday while I was at work, it came down. It must have been amazing to watch the guys work, swinging around like monkeys with chainsaws on tree limbs that I didn't think had the strength. Many thanks to the Husband for taking the pics from start to stump grinding.

Goodbye big ugly tree that dropped moss balls and hosted the birds that pooped on our car and driveway! The cats will miss scratching your roots and we'll miss your shade. Now I just need to find a fast growing oak. The house looks naked.

More pics after the cut (heh - cut.)

you wouldn't be knitting either

Right now we have two pinball machines in our front room. Makes it hard to get much else done, I tell ya. When we were moving into the house, we arranged for our pinball machine (Star Trek - TNG) to go to the spa. We had the repair guys come and pick it up with the intent of geting it serviced and delivered it back to the new house. That way we didn't have to worry about how to get the behemoth up a narrow flight of stairs. Good idea, right?

Sort of.

Pinball repair types are a specialized and rare breed. From our experience, they're kind of...I don't want to say flaky, but they're definitely quirky. Ours is no exception, which is why one year later we still don't have our machine in the house. At wit's end and in an elevated pinball-withdrawal state, the Husband rented an Addams Family for the month. That's machine number 1. He called the repair guy (again) and gave a drop-dead date for the ST-TNG to be back in our house. "Blah blah blah the CPU, blah blah....what? Wait! You have another machine in the house? From my competitor? OMG! I'll be there this week with a Star Wars machine that you can use until yours is ready." That's machine #2. And that's why my knitting sits forsaken on the coffee table.

an exciting evening

When Texas has a storm, it has a STORM. High winds, big hail, plenty of rain and wicked lightning and thunder. We were lucky last night, not a ton of hail, but man, did the wind wreak havoc. We have two trees in our front yard, both Arizona Ash. The arborist told us they have an average life expectancy of about 30-40 years. Ours have been growing since sometime in the fifties, so they're well past their prime. Since we've moved in, we've lost three huge limbs and last night in the storm we lost two more. We've been lucky, they haven't hit the house yet (knock, knock) but they sure can be a pain to clean up when you don't have a chainsaw.