The First Week (and a few days)

It has been one week and 4 days since Tony closed on the house, and while it feels like we've literally been working non stop, it doesn't exactly feel like there is a lot to show for it.  Most of the work we have been doing is destructive (lots of tearing down wallpaper, sanding, preparing, etc) and I'm just looking forward to the more fun stuff.

Here are a few pictures from the first week or so of the new house:

Not the best picture, but this is us right after Tony closed and we first walked in the door.

So, the previous owner's family left a handful of little things around the house.  Including some really nice Calphalon cookware, Pyrex bowls, lots of ziplock baggies, foil, mixing bowls, and my favorite thing: this "Meals in Minutes" bag sealer along with tons of boxes of different sized bags to be used with it.  The previous owner was incredibly clean, and took excellent care of her things, which is evident in everything we find.  The same can be said for this awesome little machine.  It isn't anywhere near as great as the vacuum-sealing contraptions that they have now a days, but I just think it is adorable and very retro.  I had fun sealing extra screws in little baggies :)

Seal A Meal...love it.

Like I said...I was sealing lots of random things...just for fun! :)

The very first thing Tony did when we got to the house was remove this gingerbread decorative door things.  They were in the entry, living room and the closets in the master bedroom, and he immediately removed them.  It was quite a relief.

The entry wallpaper proved to be quite the task.  It took a total of maybe 10 hours of 2 people constantly working on the  walls to finally get it all off.  Not to mention, once the wallpaper was gone, we realized that underneath the wallpaper was a skim coat that was put on over another layer of wallpaper.  So, after finding a kind of destroyed wall beneath the wallpaper, we realized we were going to have to add another skim coat to keep a smooth surface.  Tony is about halfway through putting the skim coat on, so hopefully it provides a smooth enough surface to paint, otherwise, we might have to end up wallpapering the entry (which after removing all of this wallpaper, I never want to deal with the stuff again), so we're hoping the skim coat works and we can paint it.

While Tony and his dad worked on the wallpaper in the entry, I decided to tackle the hallway wallpaper in between letting paint dry on the cabinet doors.  I was prepared for it to be just as difficult as the wallpaper in the entry and in the kitchen, but shockingly it came off SO much easier.  Poor Tony, I go into the hallway to begin, and come out 10 minutes later with a strip of wallpaper that would have taken them 2 hours to get off.  I was really proud of my strip of wallpaper :)  And ignore my really cute hair/lack of makeup.  It had been a very long day.

Found this in one of the cabinets...we kept it so we could try it some day :)

Poor guy spent so much time in this room getting the wallpaper off.  Then, once it was off, the wallpaper they had taken off the walls ended up all of the floor stuck to the marble.  So, then he spent a lot of time cleaning that up. :(  At least it's done!

This is where I spent a majority of the first week.  I had no idea painting cabinets would be such a task, but it was.

While removing the wallpaper in the kitchen, we found that originally, the walls beneath the wallpaper were blue.  It was kind of fun to find out that we had chosen to paint the walls a similar color as what they had originally been painted.  Kind of made us feel like we made the right choice :)

I could say a million things about the picture, like how 1) we are so unorganized and this is our "supply room" but the main reasons I'm posting it are to "show off" the infamous mirrored wall, and to show off my amazing head lamp.  First, the mirrored wall...if you haven't noticed it in any house pictures, then good...but if you have you were probably wondering why there was a floor to ceiling mirror right in the middle of the formal living room...so were we.  We really don't like it or want it there, but due to be unsure of what is behind it, and because we have a hutch that will fit in front of it and cover most of it, we aren't worrying about it right now.  When Tony told his realtor this, the realtor told us that if he sells the house down the road, he will make us remove the mirror before he lists it...so I guess it will eventually have to go...it's just so large...and daunting.  #2: My headlamp.  I never thought I would love a headlamp so much, but I do (seriously).  This thing has been AMAZING while painting, and when I don't wear it I feel like I can't see anything.  I kind of feel like that fish on Finding Nemo:



Anyhow, the thing stays on my head the whole time I work, and I swear, without it I would have screwed up a lot more edges that I already did :)

O'Keeffe's Working Hands: This is another product that has been an absolute life saver.  I've seen it lots of places, but randomly picked it up at Ace Hardware the first day we were in the house before I even realized we would need it.  It is so much better than any other lotion I have used because it is incredibly moisturizing, but not greasy at all.  Tony and I both swear by it, and have been using it religiously.

I just love the way this house looks in the snow.  I can't wait to see what it looks like in the summer with that big tree in the front yard on the pretty corner lot, but for now, I love driving by it and seeing all the pretty snow on the white house.  I took these the day after a big snow last week.

-Annie