Shed project progress and Garden...

So today I stared work on the fun part of the shed project - that is to make it match the main house with the exposed rafter tails and beadboard overhangs and such, so it looks like it has always been here.

As I was building the fake rafter tails, I had to snicker because the original intent of the craftsman movement was to eliminate "fake" decoration and reveal the true construction details, and here I am making "fake" construction details...I am sure Gustav Stickley is rolling in his grave, but at least it LOOKS Real!

In other news, the front yard is looking amazing...the roses have gone insane and it looks like a postcard...the hard work is slowly paying its dividends...

Outdoor progress...

So over the past few weeks we have been building a storage shed in the backyard - A gift from my Dad. The original plan was to build it from scratch, but we stumbled across a perfect kit at Home Depot that was less than the cost of materials, and actually looks really good - It looked and was scaled like a 1920's garage. We spent the time with my dad getting the structure built, and then he and Steve emptied out a rented storage unit, which will save us quite a bit of money.

The next phase of the project is for me to add craftsman brackets and a wide overhang so it matches the house - The kit roof had no overhangs, so we extended the roof off the sides a foot and the front and back 14 inches. I will be making some fake rafter tails and we got some fake beadboard that I will attach under the overhangs so it matches the house. The brackets will be smaller versions on the one on the house, and I will also make new door trim to match. So much more to do!

I also had a little mishap this weekend with the sprinklers, again! I installed all of the sprinklers, but one of the ones in the lawn is set too high, and I have it adjusted as far down as it can go, but it still gets caught on the lawnmower and snaps off - This has now happened a few times and I always have a nightmare getting the broken nipple out of the pipe - So today I decided to google "sprinkler extractor" and low and behold, they make a tool called nipple extractor that is designed to grip and remove the broken stub, and is only $3.95.... Mind you up to this point it had taken me 45 minutes to an hour to get the broken piece out. I had given up yesterday afternoon so I will be picking a nipple extractor on the way home....

Blast from the past....

So last night when working on the window project, I had to move a stack of boxes from the service porch to access the sash cords from the dining room window. In the boxes, I found pictures from our first house, and a picture of the crystal fixture that now graces our front hall...Now you can see why I didn't realize it was crystal. Somebody had the bright idea to put the chandelier in the

kitchen, Now it would be considered chic, then, downright scary....I honestly thought it was cast iron, so I placed in a bucket of hot water, and out comes a brass and glass fixture...who knew???? So we went down to a vintage light fixture parts place and I replaced the missing parts and voila, the resurrected fixture!

So a few months ago, steve was inspired to replace the multitude broken sash cords in prepartion of summer - after 100 years, most had given up the ghost, but several were still intact. Well ,over the course of the summer weather, the remaining ones gave up the ghost, so I decided today to finish the job, and get a couple of windows that Steve had not had time to finish....
I am now convinced that this house was built by morons and "maintained" by idiots....

As a bit of a background, I have renovated a number of old houses, so I know what the inside of a sash pocket (where the weights live) look like, and what the weights are like.

In this house, no weight are remotely alike, and weren’t even the same size! They must have been in the discount bin in 1910….

So, I replaced the cords, and in the process discovered that the most of the window trim is rotted, and hacked from when they installed the new screens. I have known for awhile that no to windows in the house are the same size (they vary from ½ to an inch), but when they installed the aluminum screens, its clear they made the mistake of measuring one window… So, the screen installer took his reciprocating saw to the trim and hacked the trim so it would fit, and used a chisel for the rest..

The other discovery was the that when they built the house, they used scrap bits of sash cord as filler between the window trim and the siding – When you have clapboard siding, which is beveled, and you install a piece of flat trim on top, you have small triangular gaps between the siding and trim. In most other houses I worked on, they had wood filler pieces…here, they used cord. I am picturing some poor sot coiling bits or cord and stuffing them behind the trim….that must have been painful! When I repaint, I will probably apply liberal amounts of painters caulk…

So everything was going fine until I got to the big dining room window on the back of the house, this was tricky, because one of the houses craftsman brackets was “attached” to the top corner of the frame – at least in 1910 it was… In the years since the bracket had pulled away from the house, and had left a gap in the sash pocket, since the trim was cut around it – so the pocket was filled with pigeon poop, feathers, and stuff I really don’t want to know about… I retied the weights, and then set my sights on repairing the bracket so seal up the pocket – so I took my hammer, pounded the bracket back into position, and then watched the whole bracket crash into my rose bush…oops…. SO… I found a piece of scrap redwood, nailed it over the gap in the siding, dragged the bracket to backyard, and then poured a glass of whiskey… Isn’t the house supposed to look better after a day of repairs????? OIY?

Im not cheap, I am just recycling...

So, we have a get together planned for next weekend and want to use our Barbeque. Unfortunately, the backyard looks like a war zone and rock quarry rolled into one huge mess. so over that past couple of weekends we have been working on a patio made out of the cement slab from our tumbledown garage foundation that is ready to fall over - back in the days of yore, someone decided that it was a good ides to build a garage with a basement - put a wood floor over it and then a thick layer of cement over the wood - moisture + wood + 100 years = nightmare. Since we really need to tear down the thing, I thought why not reuse the cement broken into flagstone like sections and lay it out - at the same time, using the piles of dirt to level out the area at the base of the back steps. So we have been busy moving dirt and cement, and cutting up and throwing away the piles of tree limbs and other assorted piles of junk in 1/4 of the backyard nearest the house - Its actually looking half bad and there is a glimmer of hope -

Craziness...

So our marathon of house repairs were done, and the appraiser came by today and did a walk though. Of course, while he was outside at least 3 planes flew over the house (we are in the flight path, a fact that I did not realize till after escrow closed and I got the keys) and a fury of sirens went on for at least 5 minutes - Nice. Then, the finis was classic - He was all done except he needed a picture of the water heater, which is on the back of the house. We go to the back door, and the 100 year old mortise lock jammed and the door would not open AT ALL... We had to go outside and around the gate - after he left I had to pry the door open with a screwdriver and discovered that the latch BROKE - it could not have happened earlier in the day or after he left, but right then - .......

Of course, I have a collection of at least 8 mortise locks and so I went on a hunt to see if I could cannibalize another lock for the broken piece - I should no better - out of nine mortise locks, no two were even remotely similar - even the screws that hold the cover plate on are different - so I ended up replacing the lock with a different one and had to chisel the door because it was slightly different - after that fiasco was dealt with, I had to readjust the strike plate because the latch was in a slightly different place -

Needless to say, I am on my second Soju martini...

Progress Report

So, over the weekend I set out get a whole list of things done prior to the appraisal, and we got three checked off the list - The Porch has been repainted, the hallway wall has been realigned using a trusty car jack (no cracked plaster!!), and the hall floor has been replaced - I am very happy how it all turned out. I copied the hardwood floor pattern I had in my San Francisco apartment built in 1907 - it is a simple border using the regular flooring that creates a frame around the room. Its a nice little detail I think - I will also do it when I redo the dinning room floor.
The other items on the list should not be too big of a deal...