What A Long, Strange Trip It's Been

Sitting down to write this blog post - gas fireplace roasting behind me, laptop on a beautiful marble island, beer from our precise fridge - it's hard not to get a little emotional. There are so many things I want to tell you, so many things I want to show you, but it's hard now looking back to capture them all.

That's the thing about time. It's only been a year and half, but it's feels like it's been years. I barely remember the things we did last summer or even this spring. I barely remember the work we put in along the way.

I can tell you that it wasn't easy. There were often days at the house that I thought would end me, moments in time where I would be overcome with the desire to be somewhere, anywhere but there. Sometimes it was a freezing, sunless afternoon drilling yet another hole in the joists through which to run electric wires, and sometimes it was one of those painfully itchy afternoons covered in fiberglass insulation, my long sleeves soaked through with sweat in the early summer heat. Sometimes it was shoveling top soil or dirt. Sometimes it was after getting the angled cut on a board wrong three (or four or five...) times in a row. More often than not, it was one of those tedious days where I spent hours smoothing caulk or nailing trim, following Mom's orders with rolled eyes and tired limbs.

But in the end? I can hardly remember what those moments felt like. Sorry, Adele, but time really does heal you.

And so when I look back now, the things I remember most vividly are those positive memories we made along the way. It's rarely fiberglass rashes or bruised shins that I remember. Instead, when I think back on the past year and a half, I remember the sound of the backdoor opening and seeing one of the people I love the most walk through it. I think about Popeyes lunches and finding the best nursery in town. I remember feeling accomplished and proud after stepping back to admire our day's work. And, of course, I remember GYROS.

So before I get too mushy, here we go with the photos...


The Den:

The room most heavily affected by erosion of the ground outside, the entire den was sloping a little when we bought the house. The solution? We used permanent floor jacks to lift up the first story and added LVLs throughout the entire den ceiling to prop up the floor above. We replaced all of the downstairs windows (besides the decorative front windows) with a more energy efficient option and added built-in shelves in the den for added storage space. We left a narrow passage in the corner of this room for basement access. Of course, we also restored both fireplaces to a useable gas version of their previous selves.

BEFORE: DEN

AFTER: DEN

The Upstairs:

Getting two rooms, two full bathrooms, a laundry and ample storage space required quite a bit of rearranging upstairs. To start, we pushed the hallway wall out in the master bedroom, carved up his/her closets, and ramped up the bathroom space for both rooms by moving almost every wall. The biggest changes? Removing the limiting dormer walls to create more useable space and bumping up the ceiling from a squatty 8 feet to a soaring 10 took the upstairs from cute and cozy to fully functional. We also replaced the tiny window and single door with french patio doors to brighten up our master bedroom.

BEFORE: Master bedroom. We pushed the walls out on all sides to expand the size of the room and then carved a narrow closet in the far right wall in this photo.

BEFORE: Guest room. We brought out the wall out by the fireplace to make a bathroom, using the sloping ceilings to create space for a shower and tub.

BEFORE: Guest room fireplace. The only one we couldn't get clean, we had to opt for paint.

AFTER: Guest room finished and ready to host!

The dining and living rooms:

The formal living and dining rooms we tried to keep as historic as possible, leaving the original walls in tact and adding pieces we thought might be reflective of the pieces that were in the house originally. In the dining room we added wainscoting and a gold leaf stencil along with an antique mantel we found on craigslist the first summer. In the formal living, we used a 150 year old mantel top from Houston and built mantel "legs" using various pieces of Home Depot trim.

And do you remember that old mantel from this post??

BEFORE: July 2014 when we put the mantel "in place" to see how it would look...ha....

AFTER: Dining room with mantel actually in place

The downstairs bath:

Everyone's favorite room is house was also Mom's great idea. While resupporting the house last fall, Dad and Todd found the house's first porch ceiling buried in the ceiling in the back hallway. They were able to salvage most of the wood which Mom then sanded and vanished to highlight the array of paint colors the old ceiling received before it was closed in many years ago. You can see the boards now as an accent wall in downstairs bathroom.

The Kitchen:

The kitchen was one of our biggest transformations. What was originally three rooms in the house, we turned into one, removing the longest wall along the hall and opening up the space to the rest of the house. This made a cramped house a dream home without taking away any of the historic layout from the home's entrance.

BEFORE: Looking from the side door into the kitchen

AFTER: Wall removed and well...duh....

BEFORE: Opposite direction

AFTER: Do I need to comment??

The Summary :)

And so here we are. We can call it a transition or a new door opening. We can say that our house journey is really just beginning and maybe that's true, but it's also the end. It's the end of one of most amazing years (or year and a half...) of my life.

But as heartbroken as I am that my parents are leaving, I know that they are finally, finally, beginning their own well-deserved house journey in New Mexico. (Yeah, sorry, go ahead and toss out those applications you were preparing in hopes of being next in line.) I want to thank my parents a million times over for all of their patience and love and help, but I'm afraid that's something that will take many more years to even begin to express. In the meantime, I'll just be grateful. So, so grateful!

So here it is. Here's to the hundreds of pounds of nails and wood and caulk. Here's to the fast food lunches and mexican dinners. Here's to the gyros and all of the exuberant folks we met walking the streets. Here's to the late night grill outs and early mornings working. Here's to the frustrated tears, the happy tears, the downright sad tears. Here's to everything. Here's to the a year and half I will remember forever.

Tonight we went to dinner, and it was both a somber and joyous experience. For the past 18 months, we've upheld our reputation as loudest (thanks Mom hehe), rowdiest, and most giggly group at every margarita joint in town. Tonight we went down in the books as the teariest.

I'm not good at goodbyes, so let's just half-hearted promise we'll call each other and hang out sometime, ok???


....And that's all she wrote.

What [Kitchen] Dreams Are Made Of

Dad has always said: Renovating a house is like eating an elephant. The only way to stay focused and calm is to take it "one bite at a time." And he's right - but sometimes it helps when you have a village eating.

So when cabinets were scheduled to arrive the first week in October while Todd was out touring Europe, we invited my generous and fun uncle Howard up for a visit and some serious cabinet hanging.

I think I've probably told you this a million times, but despite the lure of prebuilt, fully finished kitchen cabinets, we went the route of custom breakdown cabinets in order to get a custom kitchen for a price that did eat up our entire budget. If you have not done a kitchen overhaul before, I will just tell you that our total kitchen expenses were more expensive than every car I've ever owned...combined. And that's the DIY version. Was it worth it? Well, it's pretty obvious that I cannot bake a pie and cook a fancy dinner in my car, so, yes.

Being the not-so-precise and error-prone person that I am, I was banned from helping with cabinet-building, but hey, I'm not complaining. Howard, unlike the Trom clan, has patience, and that goes a long way when you're setting inset doors and installing complicated stove hoods. In just a week, he and Dad were able to set all the cabinets and prepare for counter installation and gas hookup the following week.

The cabinets look gorgeous. And the counters? Divine. It's one hundred percent my dream kitchen, and I'd bet some money that it might be the dream kitchen of quite a few folks that have seen it.

Cabinets after delivery - 11 pallets full!

Pendants going up above the island

Microwave drawer installed into the island

All the cabinets in place and set.

Watching the granite folks bring in the marble slab our 10.5ft by 5ft island (or continent as it has also been called) was one of the more nerve-racking experiences of this whole process. There were five workers bringing in approximately 1000 pounds of marble over a muddy yard and into our house, and according to them, it took longer to bring the slab inside our house than it did to fabricate it.

But - doesn't it look fantastic?

ArabescatoVagli marble slab with a sink cutout for the island

A job well done!

After getting the cabinets and counters installed, it was back to the punch list for the rest of us. Hanging trim is a seemingly continuous process that luckily Todd took on with pride - and frustration. Mom and I followed closely behind the caulk and paint while Dad took on the more complicated finishing touches throughout. 

Someone told me recently that the punch list - the nearly endless list of the little and unrelated tasks that collect towards the tail end of a big project like this - is always deceiving, and that person was right. But  (!) we've finally passed the point of equilibrium with our personal punch lists, and finally, finally, the list of the things to do is growing at a slower rate than the list of things we have done. 

The days are getting shorter, winter is nipping at our toes again, Mom and Dad's eminent departure is just around the corner, and we've scheduled a housewarming party to celebrate the future completion. I've been waiting 17 months to say this. Bittersweet though it may be, the end is near!

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

It's pretty pathetic when you have so many updates to share, it's almost unethical to put them all in one blog. Queue the second set of updates...

Here we go...one...two...three...

So I've discovered throughout this process, and I'm sure I've mentioned this before, that I work best when I'm given a wide description of a task and left to figure it out on my own. That's my forte. That's my...only...forte.

Fortunately, Todd is much, much, much better at handling the little menial tasks that often get handed to the two of us by one parent or another. I'm not sure if he's just better at taking direction, less bothered by the mindless stuff because he's so calm and relaxed in general, or just trying to keep a good face because, I mean, these are his in-laws. Regardless of reasoning, Todd just tends to handle tasks across the board with much more composure than I do. Therefore, when I get orders from the big cheese (that would be project manager Mom), I try to pass them off to Todd as much as I can. It's terrible, I know.

BUT I like projects! So when I ran out of flooring to lay and no one had mentioned started working on our "mini mud room" in the back entryway to our house, I jumped right on it despite the frustrated groans of Mom and Dad.

But let's backtrack a bit. During one of our many house clean out mornings [those times when Dad gets so frustrated by all "the shit laying around" that Mom orders an emergency purge and reorganization of tools, materials, and actual shit (packaging from lord knows what, bits of wire insulation, tiny scraps of wood, etc)], Dad noticed the old framed glass panels that lined the sides and top of the original door. A rant that included the words "disgusting," "rotten," and "trash" followed, but I wasn't surprised. He was right after all. The panels were rotten and disgusting. They had rotted away in the frame of the house until they were no longer secure then ripped out and left to decay, eaten away over the years by water, dark, and bugs. But, they were also lovely. And original. So when Dad wasn't looking, I snuck them away into a dark corner of the basement only to be pulled out when the time was right.

That time arose in the months after our wedding when it came time to build our mud "room." I knew I wanted to include the old panels, but the spacing was tight and I had to work around both the alarm panel and the electrical panel. I played around with a few basic structures, but finally settled on one where I would be able to use both remaining pieces of glass paneling.

The panel that would have stood on one side of the original front door was in fairly good shape so I knew I wanted to use that in its original form as some kind of a door. It had about a 3/4 in rotten section along one side, but with Todd's help, I was able to remove that pretty easily with the table saw. I employed Todd's help in the constructing the first tall box, and together, we built our first cabinet! Then I did a little scraping/sanding of the old paint and prepped the door for new paint with the usual caulk and patching.

Laying out the mud room with the first cabinet box built.

Cabinet door sanded and attached!

Plywood shelving in process.

Open shelving beside the tall cabinet was an easy choice to fill the space connect the mud room bench on the perpendicular wall. The bench itself was a pretty simple job - just a piece of plywood trimmed with brick molding and attached to legs.

The real fun started with the top cabinets. I wanted to use the old top door panel, but unlike its matching side, the top panel was nearly completely rotten and held together in many spots by the glass or glazing alone. I knew I would have to cut it down, and I wasn't even sure if it would be salvageable once I did so.

The original glass panel in it's totally rotten shape.

First, I built the largest box I could that could accommodate the alarm box position in the middle of the one wall. Then, I took the old panel outside and determined exactly what parts were rotten and what parts were strong (if any). As it turns out, almost the whole panel was rotten, but I measured two pieces that would work for doors with a good amount of trimming and replacing.

Top cabinet doors constructed from the old front door paneling.

No part of the mud room is perfect. The cabinet doors are all a little beaten up and missing little pieces, the top cabinet isn't quite level to the wall or floor, there are still many layers of paint tucked below the original glasswork, and the whole left side leans a little at the top.

BUT it's got character. And it gave us an excuse to keep those dirty old front door panels we were hoping to save. Not to mention, it's a great place to keep our things.

But cabinet doors aren't the only old thing we've been updating. I really wanted to save the original hardware that was left on many of the old five panel doors, and somehow Mom got behind this idea as well. Before we sent the doors for stripping, we removed the hardware. Then Mom took all the pieces home to cook in the crockpot (this helps loosen the paint) before intensely scrubbing every nook and cranny with a wire brush (her favorite tool - remember this??).

Hardware after the paint was removed.

You can see in the photo above that after scraping and sanding the metal to its base, Mom repainted the new pieces in a shiny silver.

I've said it before and I'll say it again - we're learning an unbelievable amount while we work on this house - not just about renovation or construction, but about each other and our family. Sometimes when I'm looking around the house in the evenings - wine in hand, lyle at my heels - admiring the work we've done and pondering the work we have left to do, I can't help but to feel a little overwhelmed still by the tasks ahead. The idea of reaching the ever-distant "completion date" is little like finding the end of a rainbow, but when I'm feeling overwhelmed, I try to look back and see how far we've come. If you need a reminder, check this out.

Teamwork - and hard work - are a beautiful thing.

The Big Move-In (And Everything Before)

It's coming to a close. I know, so fast, you're saying, but that's how it happens in these stages. One day you get sheetrock, the next you're moving in your furniture. That's a little exaggerated, of course, seeing as we got sheetrock in June and just moved in two weeks ago, but that's certainly how it feels. 

September was a mad dash of crossing lines out on our own personal punch lists and packing the rental house - me into boxes, Todd into piles - choosing what we would bring upstairs and what we could live the next two months without.

The plan went like this. Sometime in late August, after a long day of work, the four of us were lounging around the patio table out back, likely eating some kind of sausage in a tortilla cooked on our snazzy new charcoal number, when Mom mentioned moving. Up until this point, moving was still an abstraction, some incalculable endpoint of the unknown future, a point that seemed not only far off but dare I say, still impossible. You see, our plan all along had been to move into the house when, and only when, we were entirely finished. It's not like Todd and I hadn't brought it up before. We talked about it often during those long and late night drives home, heading from one messy house to another, but we figured the answer from my parents would always be the same: only when we're finished.

So I would be lying if I said I wasn't shocked. Or that I didn't jump on the idea right away (my mind: $$$$$$ - hello rent savings). Mom figured that if we could completely finish the upstairs of the house, we could easily move in without a useable downstairs. What do you really need everyday besides a bed and a bathroom, really? Wo needs a kitchen? I like takeout. 

It didn't take long before our punch lists were drafted and we were off to the races, or Home Depot as it were, tackling the to-do's big (finally replacing the hardwoods on the stairs) and small (light fixtures, light fixtures, light fixtures) and preparing for our big move. Mom continued with the neverending task of caulking and painting, following closely behind the finishing trimwork and door frames. Dad and Todd set shower glass for the three bathrooms, installed the master sinks, and had the marble installed for the master vanity (woooohooooo!). We finished door frames, completed trimwork, refinished the original doors, and so, so, much more.  

And we made it! With days to spare. September 26 we loaded up the remaining items into our cars and invited our landlord for a walk-through. That night we climbed into our freshly made bed and relaxed - but just for a moment because the work is never finished - because we were finally in!

And now, of course, the photo evidence...

After much debate over keeping and finishing the original stairs, we decided it would be easier and nearly as cheap to replace them. It's funny, we you start a project you have all the grand dreams about preserving every last piece (ie the floors, the stairs), but somewhere around 10 months in, when you all but given up, the easier route becomes decidedly more desirable. So that was that. I fought for the original stairs for about a week and when the time came down to, I opted for new treads. The old floor was covered in paint, cracked, and missing pieces - not to mention it wouldn't match the new floors. We found unfinished hickory treads for a great price and Dad finished them before he and Todd installed them one day.

The unfinished treads

Old stairs

Ripping out the old stairs

We may have replaced the stairs, but the original things we didn't give up on: doors, door frames, and transoms. Last year, Todd met a hygienist at the dental office down the street who renovates old homes in East Nashville with her daughter. Having done a number of old houses in the area, she had collected a wealth of information which so fortunately included the number of a man who dips old doors to remove the finish. He charges a flat $100 a door and the doors come home still needing some sanding and TLC, but we were sold. We saved all the doors we could that would fit existing and new frames and ordered new five panel doors for the others. 

Five panel doors during refinishing.

Some stain and polyurethane turned the old doors into new, preserving the history minus the layers of paint. 

Here, a refinished transom above the bathroom door looks into the master bedroom. You can see the finished five panel door on barn door hardware leading to Todd's closet.

In the past month and a half, I've learned that when big things delivered, they don't get delivered inside. Instead, they get dropped off at the curb of our street where we have to wait....

Shower glass delivery.

The crazy heavy crate of shower glass. Wait...we're having Todd handle glass...?

Glass installation in the downstairs bathroom.

Glass install in the master  

For the tubs, we scoured the salvage yard a few times, but decided on new acrylic tubs since we were worried about the weight of two giant cast iron tubs upstairs. Thankfully, this also made them easier to carry up our narrow stairwell.

New clawfoot tubs! 

Moving into the upstairs also meant having a place to put our clothes, so we ordered and installed the storage in both of our closets. Thanks, Kelsey for designing the space!

Until next time...