Wednesday, December 30, 2020

Update On The Country House/ Weeks 7, 8, 9 and 10.

Hi, Adorable Friends,
I hope you had a wonderful Christmas. 
It's time for an update on our country house.


 There is still some lingering confusion about our country house purchase. I thought I'd discuss a few things and then update you on our progress. Bill and I have always wanted a little weekend house. 
My desire stems from summers at my grandparent's lake cottage on Lake Sinissippi in Wisconsin. 
Open windows with light curtains whispering in the breeze and beds with cotton chenille bedspreads are two loves from those idyllic cottage days. My H.S. days were spent in a quaint New England village. We didn't even need to lock our doors. (Until Son of Sam was on the loose.) Bill grew up on a big property when Arlington still felt somewhat rural. He has always longed to get out of the city. We've talked about and dreamed of a place for 37 years.


This last year caused has caused us to take a good long look at our future and finally make a selection on a house. Our plans to travel and enjoy time with our friends and family have been turned upside down. The virus has totally changed what we are doing and why. Right now he is working from home but Bill still needs to be near Dallas for work. Time will tell if he needs to go back into the office at some point. Once we are closer to retirement age, we may decide to move to East Texas permanently. We want to make sure we like it. If we do, I'd like to sell both houses and buy something smaller than our city house but bigger than the new house if that makes sense. I think we would also like a little more land. 

In the meantime, the new house works for what we need. It wasn't my choice, initially, but I told Bill that I could make it cute. Gallons of white paint have turned it into a darling farmhouse and I love it. Bill is completely over the moon over this property. 


Bill took three days off of work for week 7 so we had some extended time at the new house.
Here are some older posts in case you have missed anything. 



Bill had a long list of projects that he wanted to get done.  
I had some punch list things to do. 
We are getting close to getting the inside and the outside of the house finished for now so hopefully, I'll have some room reveals starting in January. There are several rooms that are almost ready for their reveal. 

Bill trimmed out the top of the cabinet in my bathroom. (We are using separate bathrooms in the country house.)  


It needed a bit of crown to make it look complete. 
He hung up a light fixture in his bathroom. It's this one from Lowes. 
He replaced sockets with GFIs. 
He hung a shelf for me. 
He started cutting up the fallen pear tree.
He finished the floor molding. 
He replaced one rotten partial wall on the screened in porch.  


I caulked all the floor molding. 
I painted the three remaining closets. 


I walked around with a brush to do some paint touch ups. 
I hung up some Christmas lights outside. 


We got home on Tuesday. Rather than head back out Friday night after work, I
I stayed home for weekend eight.  Bill headed out to the house alone. It was his first time to be alone out there. 
He power washed leaves off of the roof of the guest house. He power washed the front porch posts and the ceiling on the main house. He also installed new overhead light fixtures.


He finished replacing the rotting walls of the screened in porch. Below is the before shot.


     He went and got pavers and laid a new walkway between the carport and the front porch. 


These were a surprise Christmas gift. I was surprised. 


Weekend #9
We painted the finished porch walls. 




Bill continued chopping up the pear tree that had fallen over. 


I wish we could have saved it but the view is much better without it. 


He created a fire ring around the opening of the old septic tank. Haha. Country life. It looks better than the pile of junk that had been there before.  

We also popped into a favorite antique/junk shop. 
I got a few things to go on the shelf that he hung up for me in the laundry room. 
The lighting in here is hideous but the new light is finally here so we can get that changed. 
Somehow it got misplaced at Home Depot but they took care of it for us. 


The yucky ceiling fan in the office/craft room/wine room/ gun room got taken down and replaced with a light fixture. 
Sorry no picture of that. 


The door to this room has a key lock which confused me but I realized it's probably where she had a shot gun locked away from the grand kids. 
We don't have guns out here but I may need one if I spot a big foot. 

Weekend #10

We came out on December 26th. We were both exhausted so not a lot got accomplished but I was able to take down the Christmas decor. 
On Sunday, I finished up the exterior paint on the main house.


It took all day to paint the trim around the screens. 
Bill continued chopping on the pear tree stump. 
Bill put his new Gorilla cart together. He also spotted some bulbs popping up. 
I transplanted them since they were not in a good spot. 


I think they are daffodils. 

Once he headed back to town on Sunday afternoon, I gave the porch a deep cleaning. 
I stayed behind to wait for our king size mattress which was supposed to arrive on Tuesday. 
I woke up Monday morning ready to paint the cabinets. 
It was my last big painting project in the main house. 



This had been a topic for debate. I knew I would paint the cabinets on our second viewing of the house. 


The first weekend after the closing, we took down the big upper bank of cabinets over the peninsula which helped tremendously. 
I pulled the formica backsplash off of the wall.
I painted the window frame. 
It all helped but I couldn't love the wood. 


The big bank of cabinets on the stove and refrigerator wall was not my favorite. 
The grain on these cabinets is weird.



Above is before we owned the house.
Below is after we owned the house a month or so. 
Even new floors didn't help.  I was not excited about how dark it all felt.
My brother even commented that he thought I wouldn't be happy until the cabinets were painted. 


It took 12 hours to get two coats of paint on most of the cabinets.


After a fitful night sleep, I got up on Tuesday morning and finished the pantry, did some touch ups, and painted the toe kicks. 

''

Bill said that it highlights how we need new counter tops. 
That is on our list of things to do but I don't care if it takes a while. 
It's in the plan so it will get done eventually.  
The big bank of cabinets looks so much better now. Pinterest will help me decide what to do on the tops of them. 



Cabinet pulls will be added. Bill will help me put up open shelving above the peninsula.


The bed never showed up. They said they called me but I didn't get a call. 
I'm not totally comfortable sleeping out here alone yet so I'm not excited about waiting out here next week for another delivery that may or may not show up. The company is sending us a free sheet set to compensate for any inconvenience. They really need to send Dixie something because she's the one that got yelled at during the whole debacle. My only excuse is that she wouldn't poop and she was acting weird. She was freaking me out. I didn't want to encounter a feral hog while I was waiting for her to do her business.  I'm sure you understand. :) 

While I was painting the cabinets the former owner showed up to ask us about some mail that she is missing. 
"Oh hi. I've completely changed everything about your house." Awkward. 
I wasn't able to help with the mail but I was able to ask her a few questions. 
What I hoped was a gardenia is a gardenia so I'm excited about that. 

Check Instagram for more up to the minute progress. 
I'd love to see you there. 

That is all for now. 
We have snow in the forecast. That would be exciting. 
Katie 
Happy New Year if I don't post again before then. 

4 comments :

  1. I hope the new owner was wowed when she saw the house. I'm wowed and I didn't even have history! It's fabulous and you two have done mammoth tasks in a short time. Well done, Katie. Happy New Year!

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  2. I'm amazed at what all you have accomplished. It doesn't even look like the same place! Of course I love your white cabinets; such a huge improvement, oh and the paver walkway. so sweet of your husband to do that. It's wonderful! Have a great New Year's weekend. Prayers for a Blessed and Healthy New Year!

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  3. Katie, this is fabulous! I think I could really get into a project like this, but more than likely with a sister and/or son-in-law helping vs the Mr., lol. You guys make a great team. I would likely feel skittish about staying alone too, and it's nice having the dog...next best thing to guns. ;) Happy New Year, and I'm looking forward to jumping into the past updates on this house.

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  4. I totally love your new farmhouse!!! What a great place! And man, you both have done a TON of work... Great job! Maybe the daffodils were meant to be out in the meadow... Anyway, happy that you came over and linked up for Share Your Style. I am happy to have featured your post this past Wednesday at SYS #288. <3

    So excited for you! Would be fun to stop by once we are all inoculated from the Covid virus sometime in the future. :)

    Hugs,
    Barb :)

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