Adventures in Raking

The fall season is upon us and as new homeowners we get to experience leaves. Lots of them! I was dreading raking all of these leaves and putting them into those Home Depot bags and driving to the conservatory. This would have been 20+ trips. I probably would have rented a van. Lo and behold, we noticed that a bunch of our neighbors were putting their leaves into nice big piles in front of their driveways. Then we got a notice in the mail that the town does a leaf pick-up (3 pick ups for our section) during the fall season to prevent the sewers and gutters from getting clogged. Beautiful! I spent a couple of hours or so Sunday evening, which was a fabulous day, raking up the leaves in our yard. The problem was that all of our leaves are in the backyard, and I had to transport them to the front. Images of the Home Depot bags started creeping in again, but luckily my neighbor gave me a great tip -- rake the leaves on to a tarp (dropcloth works fine) and carry them out to the front. This was genius! I snapped a quick picture in the morning on my camera phone of the piles of leaves in the front before the pickup. It's a shoddy picture because it was dark, so it doesn't do it justice...but that's a LOT of leaves! Good news is that my backyard is covered in leaves again...apparently they're all going to fall off at some point. lol.

P.S. The rake I bought broke!

Nursery Room

The kitchen is not the only project that is underway in our household...we are also working on, well, EVERY other room! Priorities dictate that we handle the kitchen and Nursery room first. I mentioned before that the nursery furniture is coming in next week, so I figured I'd post up some before and after shots of that room before the furniture fills it up. Here they are (you can click on each for a bigger view...sorry about the lighting).





Here's the rundown of what we did so far:

• Ripped up carpets and removed dried up carpet padding
• Removed TILES that were beneath the carpet!
• Refinished floors (contractor)
• Removed all trim and replaced with new trim, including new door
  
• Installed new chair rail
  
• Prepared ceiling and walls for skimcoats...original wallpaper was painted over, needed to be fixed
• Skimmed the room (2 coats). Skimming, by the way, is putting joint compound (a type of putty normally used to smooth out joints in the sheetrock) all around the room. It eliminates many imperfections in the walls.
  
• Changed the electrical outlets (3-prong grounded)
• Changed dimmer switch
• Installed phone jack in wall
• Changed registers (vent grates)
• Removed doors from closets
• Primed and painted!

Wow...I didn't realize how much had been done until I just wrote it down.

Extra special thanks to my brother, who helped me so much with this room. Among other things he did the skimcoats, helped rip up the trim, and installed all the new trim. All while coming back and forth from New York...which can be a real pain in the ass on weekends! I'm sure his little niece/nephew will appreciate it. =)

There's actually a little left to do in this room:

• Ceiling light/possiblyceiling fan (I read that it helps with babies)
• Install a closet organization system for the baby (we sketched out the design)
  
• Curtains for the windows and closet (no doors for the closet).
• Paint the door and put in new hardware.
• Furniture!

Next updates/pictures will be of the completed room.

Kitchen Project

Last week the electrician and the plumber "roughed" the electric and pluming, respectively…lol. Basically this means that the wires and pipes are in the general vicinity of where they should be once the kitchen is completed. I had to take a day off for the inspectors to come and give it the seal of approval. The "inspection" took approximately 2-3 minutes for both the electric and the plumbing. We passed inspection, but then I found out that we also need a building inspection. I don't want to continue to take days off of work, so the building inspections will happen on Tuesday. Sandra will be home (the owners have to be present for these inspections) as the baby furniture is getting delivered and installed that day. Good news is that the insulation is starting today, which will be helpful as the weather is starting to get cold. I'll take some pictures and post up progress shots soon.

Childbirth Classes

Childbirth classes were very helpful over this weekend. We learned a lot and feel much more knowledgeable and prepared for labor and delivery. We learned about what is happening physically during labor, and various methods to deal with the labor sensations. We use the word "sensations" and not "pain", as "pain" suggests that something is wrong. We also learned about what happens in the delivery room and the various options and decisions we need to make. We got to practice various positions that should help relax and ease the contractions. We also tried positions for the pushing. I feel better knowing that I can play a helpful and important role during all of this. I also know that there is a chance that Sandra will yell at me during labor, but that's okay as this can be a pretty intense time (understatement). Our instructor was pretty cool...she is a yoga and tango instructor, and she had a pro-natural vibe to her as you may imagine. Finally, there was a few videos that we got to watch of various deliveries. About as graphic as you can get, but everyone agreed it was very good to watch a few of those births. We are hoping for a natural, "normal" labor and delivery. *fingers crossed*

Newborn Care Class

Yesterday Sandra and I took a newborn care class at St. Vincent's hospital, which is also the place where we will go to deliver the baby. There were five other couples with us, each expecting to give birth in 1-2 months. 3 girls, 2 boys, and 1 unknown (that's us). Mathematics favors a boy. Anyway, the class was three hours and it covered how to hold the baby, how to change the diaper, when to change the diaper, how often, where to put the baby, how to bathe the baby, which products to use, how much clothing to put on, what kind of clothing, and so on and so on.

I found it to be tremendously helpful because I have no real experience with babies and I'm terrified of them. Especially NEWBORNS! But after this class, I feel better knowing the basics. I'm sure I'll forget once we bring the baby home and he/she starts crying and pooping. The bad news - the baby poops around 10-15 times a day in the beginning. The good news -- I get to practice cleaning and changing diapers 10-15 times a day...I'll be a pro in no time!

Anyway, this weekend we're taking our childbirth classes. Two days from 10-5 each day. These are the classes where Sandra will learn how to breathe and I will learn how to coach her (i.e. not be an annoying idiot) during labor. I hear some men pass out during these classes.

Should be loads of fun!

Kitchen Project

Kitchen has been demolished! Many thanks to my friend Adam, who came down to help on Saturday. To spend an entire Saturday hammering, breaking, cleaning, dumping, etc. in a cloud of dust is quite a lot to ask a friend, but he came through in the clutch!

Anyway, I learned a few things while doing the demolition:

• Not all water pipes have valves! We spent a good 45 minutes to an hour searching for the water valve to the sink, but we couldn't find it. We even opened up a couple of holes in the basement ceiling to see if it was hidden. Turns out that in older homes (ours was built in 1956) they didn't do that. So we turned off the water to the whole house, and then put a cap on the pipe. Actually, I had to first cut the pipe using this handy little cutting tool (think can opener, or wine foil cutter), and the caps just snap into place.

• Not all gas pipes have valves! Once again, we followed all of the pipes to the stove and nada. Same reason and same solution. However, unscrewing the pipe from the stove was impossible. The solution (after 2-3 hours of labor) was to dismantle the stove, detach the entire cooktop and basically rotate the whole thing until the pipe unscrewed. Think of it this way -- instead of turning the pipe to unscrew it, we turned the whole stove to unscrew the pipe! The leverage worked. And to cap a gas valve, you have to first put teflon tape around the rings of the pipe and then attach the cap. The tape is a thin, putty-like consistency, and it creates an air tight seal. Don't forget to turn the hot water heater back on or else it's cold showers in the morning!

• Older homes have really crappy insulation! I was shocked to find out that the kitchen insulation to the exterior wall was foil! One sheet of aluminum foil! Apparently this was the way it was done when oil was cheap and heating a home wasn't a cost issue. The insulation from the ceiling (attic) to the kitchen? Cotton!
  

Well, with all that said and done, the kitchen demolition went as well as could be expected. As a side benefit, I now have in intimate knowledge of all the piping in my house should anything ever come up. The whole thing is gutted and the electrician should be there Monday. I will post up pictures soon!

Kitchen Project - Post 1

One of the first things that we wanted to do when we moved in was to renovate the kitchen. It's incredibly outdated...1960's vintage. After a few months of living here, we've finally started (sort of)! We've chosen a contractor to do just about all of the work and they will start on Monday, the 13th. I, and some willing/unwilling friends, will have to complete demolition by then. The plans are to do the major demolition on Saturday/Sunday. I have the dumpster scheduled to come on Thursday. That will also give me a chance to finally clean out the garage from all of the other trash we created (carpets, doors, frames, etc.).

It took us longer than we expected to arrive at this point. We just never thought about the layout we wanted, the appliances, the cabinets, budget, etc. It's difficult to set aside time to think about those things while moving, working, growing a baby, eating and sleeping. And since it's a major project with a considerable cost, we want to make sure we met with different contractors, got different prices, options, layouts and whatever. Anyway, we're really excited that we've started!

Today is post #1 and I'll continue to post on the progress of the kitchen project. The thing is supposed to take 4-6 weeks (from the 13th). Today, the appliances arrived (we ordered them early because of a promotion GE was having through September) and I cleaned out the dining room to make way for our temporary kitchen. We'll be without a range/oven for this whole time, so we're planning on crock pot, microwave, George Foreman Grill, and take-out food for a while.

Our future appliances:


Kitchen that will meet Mr. Sledgehammer in a couple of days: