This Old Chicago 2 Flat

The buffet project

2008-02-27T07:42:00.003-06:00

After what seems a fairly long hiatus, we have started a pretty significant project of stripping and repairing our built-in buffet outside our bedroom and bathroom. Once you start living in a home that has ongoing work, after cleaning up from a project and making rooms look liveable the cleanness acts as a permanent psychological barrier to beginning any future project which might descend the house back into chaos. Well, this time around, after we covered the furniture, moved bookshelves and removed books, and did a lot of prep for repainting our living room, I thought, now's the time for the buffet!

The buffet suffered from perpetual filthiness. It's been a bit of an embarrassment that it's lasted this long before serious effort. (actual living space was always more important for us). Repeated times before I thoroughly scrubbed the buffet to have it remain looking filthy. It really needed a new coat of paint-which required a fair amount of prep work. In some places, the paint had chipped down to the wood revealing a coating of about 1/8 inch.

The second problem was the interior of the buffet. The back was the original plaster wall which was in disrepair. It looked really bad. Then, there were the shelves. They suffered from the perpetual and neverending filth problem, but they also seemed split and cracked. They also were tiny and hard to get to.

The third problem is some broken exterior molding. When our mason installed the exterior vent for our bathroom fan, some brick fell down and broke 2 pieces of curved molding. We will need to replace these pieces.

Now, onto the work!

I used a heat gun to remove the paint. It was really thick so took a long time. (quite fun with a window open when it's snowing and 15-not the optimal time for work!). It was a slow process. Since most of the buffet has vertical surfaces in a finished area of the house, I preferred to use the heat gun. Stripper is just much more of a challenge on vertical surfaces. Plus, there's the risk of stripper migrating to the finished floor. The down side with the heat gun is the fumes. I had to wear a respirator plus keep the window open.

Here's the buffet in progress, after one long day of stripping:

I also removed all the doors and drawers to be worked on separately. (note do not ever paint hinges!!!)

Now, after completing the paint stripping, and waiting for sanding:

I also was able to knock out most of the shelving.

Next on the agenda? (1) finish the stripping with the heat gun (2) remove damaged molding (3) remove remaining shelf and chisel out bottom splintered shelf (4) work on plaster back of buffet . (I'm thinking for this, we'll just cover the plaster with painted hardibacker. If there's clearly crumbling plaster though, I'd like to take out the broken pieces).

We will use citrus stripper on the drawers and the doors. For the crumbling shelves, I think we might just change them out with new shelves. The original plywood is in bad shape.

Flooding and a Multi-pronged Hunt

2008-02-19T09:40:00.004-06:00

When last I left you, we were returning from vacation to water in the basement. Not to disappoint, this past weekend, the flooding got worse. Basically, an inch of water throughout much of the basement. We were running out the door, when our tenants sent the casual e-mail, and we had to investigate. The fact that we have tons of belongings in our basement did not help matters. But, eventually, after 3 hours, with the help of a broom, 2 wet vacs, fans, etc. we were able to get most of the water out. (we used the broom to push water to the sump pump) We still need to move all our belongings and thoroughly dry them/toss etc. That will be a longer process. (and I don't know how exciting to write about).

We were already immersed in one hunt, but besides for the water source-we are back on the contractor roulette wheel.

Now, our first hunt of the weekend concerned paint. As I've written before, we painted our dining room, then, were planning on painting the living room the same color. We had a big flooring project, and took out radiators to be painted. Prior to reinstalling the radiators, I got another gallon of paint to do touchups. Which, actually didn't match. This weekend, we tried to go back with the original quart container and have Home Depot just use the same formula on the quart can. Well, they couldn't do that because (1) a gallon formula would be different and (2) the base apparently changed-which is the issue. (I don't know why a gallon formula wouldn't just be 4 times whatever the quart kind was). So now, we need to try color matching. Fingers crossed on this. (I'm trying to figure out who would be best with this).

Added to the hunt is a preliminary search for a waterproofer. We'd also like to get a structural engineeer out because we might as well have one assess the waterproofing issue, and while
(s)he's at it some other things around here such as what kind of load our roof can take if we added a green roof, which is on our wish list. Contractors just make me really nervous as they provide possibly a huge price tag, and risk. Yes, getting things done is magnificent. I love having someone else come in and give them a few days-massive progress. But, we've had contractors that we really thought would do great fail miserably and there's nothing more frustrating. There's the added thing that I like when contractors come in and do improvements, not just maintenance sort of things.

Why I hate Lochinvar Boilers

2008-01-28T11:43:00.000-06:00

5 a.m. a cold bedroom, and Glenn trapsing downstairs to reboot the boiler.

Apparently, Lochinvar boilers require cleaning twice a cleaning season. Which means, inadvertently we will run out of heat at least once a season. Hopefully, when it's not too cold outside.

I'm not a fan of the installers-American Vintage Heating either as a result since they recommended the Lochinvar in the first place. (and want to charge us $200 or so for each cleaning!)

Thankfully, I was able to locate someone to come today for the cleaning. it will probably need to be cleaned again in April.

Happy New Year!

2008-01-02T08:44:00.000-06:00

We've been on our Christmas hiatus where all extra time was spent on all holiday happenings...a quick summary.

We started by hosting a total of 10 for Thanksgiving, due to Glenn's sister getting a kitchen redone (the normal host). After basically wrestling Glenn's mom for the turkey, we kidnapped it, and were able to cook it for dinner. We also made crustless quiche and crudite (appetizers), mashed potato casserole (yum!), waldorf salad, my mom's rolls, broccoli puree, apple pie, and pumpkin pie. Glenn's family brought stuffing, sweet potato casserole, and creamed onions.

After Thanksgiving, we jumped into Christmas prep. Glenn had to work his real job a whole bunch in December, so I largely did most of the decorating. We were excited to use some solar lights for the first time this year. (which, oddly enough have an "on" button that took a bit to find-I had assumed poor sun was hindering the charging and lighting for a bit).

I really like how our outside came. But here are some decoration photos.

(the above photo shows the solar panel for the lights.

Our Christmas tree. (we have 2 angels that are currently MIA) Since we already have 2 we weren't going to buy another. Hopefully they'll appear next year.

We have a little niche in our hallway which, at this point, has a sole purpose of displaying another tree.

We also did the wide amount of shopping, and card mailing. Oh, and baking! We always do a ton of Christmas cookie baking and distribute the cookies to friends and family. This year, we had 10 kinds of cookies.

We had bourbon balls too...but I must have taken the above photo before we added them.

Oh, and we hosted glenn's family again for his mom's birthday and brother-in-law's birthday. On that day, I had the idea to have our niece and nephews over early to help decorate the sugar cookies. Unfortunately, while this seemed like a good idea (and they did do a great job), our yield from sugar cookies was seriously compromised due to kids and adults alike siphoning them off.

For Christmas itself, we headed to Stowe, Vermont where my little brother lives and works. As a professional chef, he didn't have off any time around Christmas so we all went to him. He has a cathedral ceiling so opted for the 15 foot Christmas tree. (no, that is not a mistype-I did say 15 feet). Since he lived in the land of Christmas trees, it was a whopping $25! For prospective, my mom, brother's girlfriend, and I are all posing in front of it.

Back in Chicago, we celebrated Christmas with Glenn's family yesterday, January 1. Some gift highlights included, Glenn's pipe wrench ornament (I couldn't resist! We do so much radiator work-that this is perfect-I give him an ornament each year that represents something we did together.) We also gave Glenn's mom a bag of silver bows which were a surprising hit. (she is quite vocale about saving bows and in December commented on how silver bows were so hard to find, so we gave her a bag that we found 75% off at Target-she was quite thrilled. who knew?)

From a weather standpoint, I've lost track of our snowstorms. It snows, warms up, snows, warms up...so on and so forth. Since returning late on the 27th, I've already shovelled twice. As I write, it is 4 degrees, (much colder when you factor in windchill). Sunday, it is supposed to be 55-go figure. I see from our google hits that we are getting many hits for unfreezing pipes. Best of luck to anyone in that predicament.

Hope your new year has started off well and you had a wonderful holiday. Our near term house projects involve taking our house back from the holiday.

Our latest concrete project

2007-11-06T09:29:00.001-06:00

Of course, despite the November date and Thanksgiving fast approaching, we have decided to add another project to our "get done before frost" list. We are in the process of repairing our front step. The prior owners at some point patched the front step. However, they did not do it right-opting for quickness/ease over longevity. As a result, last year, the patched piece finally gave way.

This time around, Glenn used rebar. This past weekend, he drilled holes in the step, glued in rebar cut to fit, then wired the rebar together.

The epoxy takes 24 hours to dry, so we had to wait until this coming weekend to pour the concrete into a form (to be made). We can pour concrete as long as it is 40 degrees (and not currently raining). We are hoping that this weekend that will be the case.

Bulbs and Thorny plants

2007-11-05T15:30:00.001-06:00

I finally got around to planting them. This year, I opted for just digging out (with Glenn's help) a whole section of the garden and planting the bulbs in rows. In so doing, we uncovered previously planted bulbs in various stages of grown. (crocus' and some mystery bulbs-perhaps daffodils). I opted to just add the old bulbs back in with the new.

I hope waking them from their slumber didn't mess them up at all.

I tried to plant some more bulbs in with the ivy. The ivy grew in too much though so it was basically impossible. I think a couple were just planted perhaps 4 inches (instead of 6) down. I'm hoping they still bloom. All in all I planted 100 new bulbs in our front yard-a mix of purple hyacinths, red tulips, snow crocus', dwarf iris, and tahiti double blooming daffodils. The crocus' and dwarf iris' are very early spring blooming. I think I read somewhere there's a possibility of them blooming in February! I'm really looking forward to that.

I also planted a barberry bush-a plant to hopefully deter possible plant or other thieves. At the very least, it should maybe hurt any intruder.

I bought the barberry bush before I started the massive fence project. For a couple days, it was sitting in my front hall. Promptly, it seemed to die. (shriveled up leaves). I brought it outide thinking it needed sun and water. I watered. and watered. and watered. A week goes by-nothing. I, of course, think it's dead, but I leave it there, hoping it would come back to life. (and I stopped watering it). And it did!! Leaves started sprouting up all over. I decided to plant it in hope that in its new home, it will be happier. Let's keep our fingers crossed.

The rose bush I bought, on the other hand, seems to be struggling a lot more. It has black spots on the leaves so I'm not planting it. Right now, I'm trying to figure out if I could winter it indoors, or if it's a gonner.

For good measure, here's a picture of the two boxwood we planted last week. One of my 2007 summer goals was to plant items in this section of the yard that would have some seasonal interest. In prior years, outside of the sleeping sedum, we just had the mulch to attract and attention. (now it's cocoa mulch). I still need to come up with a more complete landscape plan for that area of the yard. We'll see next year.

Off to the Market

2007-11-04T19:18:00.001-06:00

Kane County Flea Market, that is! Saturday, en route back to Chicago from visiting friends in Milwaukee (we found out that this was even less en route home than we thought), we thought we'd stop by the Kane County Market. We had heard good things.

The Flea Market happens the first weekend of every month in St. Charles Illinois and attracts sellers from all over. (The ones I noticed included Minnesota and Wisconsin, at the least). The market was much larger than we anticipated. Countless times we would say, oh, lets go down that row, (expecting a quick turnaround) to find at the end of the row basically another football field full of vendors. (or so it seemed). In our quick little "run through," we were there for 3 hours. They have a combination of sellers out in the open, inside permanent buildings and underneath large tents. The permanent buildings are usually used for the county fair, and include names such as sheep 1, sheep 2.

I'm sure that every month the sellers change a bit. This time around we saw a bunch of jewelry (some older and vintage coupled with newer stuff), vintage light fixtures, tools, antique hardware, stained glass, garden planters and decorations, and random older items (such as vases, knick-knacks, dishes, toys (beanie babies and antiques), and cash registers). Pretty much everything. Sprinkled in with all the vintage sellers, were (1) food vendors (including baked potatoes, popcorn, hotdogs/hamburgers, ice cream, apple cider and apples); and (2) newly made items including dog treats, sweaters, garland and Christmas decorations, quilts, among other items.

There were a number of furniture vendors including some antiques, antique furniture that had been refinished, new furniture, and a personal favorite, new furniture made from reclaimed wood. There was a fair amount of furniture that looked to be well made, but very affordable. It seemed like a great place to go if you needed to get something solid. We saw a mahogany table, with 6 chairs for $200.

Before you go:
1. Make sure you bring a vehicle appropriate for your purchases. If you are looking for furniture, a truck or van would be a great idea. (and we saw a lot of them in the parking lot).
2. If you think you may buy something, bring a shopping cart. We saw a number of people with the folding shopping carts you would see in the city. (clearly they had come before) It makes that puchase decision all the easier.
3. Wear comfortable shoes.
4. Have an idea about what you want. There's a lot of ground to cover in a relatively short time. It would be a lot easier if you knew that you wanted a nightstand, or something to put on your living room wall, or vintage toys. It's hard to look at everything at once. I saw a lot of "neat" items that I didn't have a place for.
5. Remember it's a market not a brick and mortar store. That being the case, haggling is the game. Sure, a lot of items have prices but unless it says "firm price" it isn't.
6. The Antiques Roadshow advice. (I remember this from an episode they had showing how to navigate a flea market). Talk to the seller-get a sense of what he/she is saying is true, and whatever he/she might know about the particular item. Buy what you like and don't necessarily buy what you think you can sell to make money. Sure, there are those finds-hidden in the rough items that will sell big at auction. However, there are a lot of items out there that you may think would be worth money, but aren't. If you are looking to really make money, know what you are buying.

Oh, yeah, we didn't get anything. We didn't know enough about stuff we may have been interested to know if items were reasonably priced and are stuffed to our gills in our house as is. We weren't opposed to getting anything-just nothing jumped out as a "must have this." (plus, that long walk back to the car didn't encourage us to buy anything). But, we had fun, and that's what's important.

Halloween in Chicago

2007-10-31T16:47:00.000-05:00

Our Halloween, despite its irritating beginnings, was overall just what Halloween should be. Then, we heard of an absolutely horrendous ending that saddens and angers me.

The Trick or Treaters started late, but ended up coming out in droves. The vast majority of them said "trick or treat" and wore a costume (and were overall polite). Our first 10 kids at 4:45 were not in costume, and included a parent not in costume expecting candy. (Um..nope) One little princess (probably around 5) came with a lunch bag that was ripping apart, so in addition to her treat she got a plastic bag to help her through the night. Our tenants took over around 6 while Glenn and I left for dinner in Greektown. One bonus this year is that they were able to lock the gate when they ran out of candy. (4 costco bags, not bad). Yes, we still had one year olds (but they had costumes, so they got candy). It was a bit stressful trying to give them something that they might be able to eat. (solid milk chocolate it was)

Now, for the horrible sad news that I was confronted with before bed time last night.

From the Chicago Tribune website:

Pregnant Woman Fatally Shot While Trick or Treating with Kids

followed by:
Car Pelted with Eggs, Angry Driver Shot

It's been a touch week particularly for women in Chicago. We also had a woman with a 2 week old and an 18 month old fatally stabbed in her apartment in Aurora; A mother of 3 jogging in the Sauk Village Forest Preserve who was beaten, had her throat slashed and died; A wife of a police Sergeant in Bolingbrook disappeared. (He's claiming that she left him for another guy. She's his fourth wife. Both wife number 1 and wife number 3 died in a bathtub. (both deaths were deemed accidents). I hope he's telling the truth and she did leave him. Time will only tell. This is just one week, only in the Chicago area. Horrendous.

A Housebloggers Photo Montage

2007-10-24T08:52:00.000-05:00

I recently switched my screen saver over to display random photos-of course, forgetting the randomness of my photos. I'm all set whenever we have a party to have it in the background. It's the most eclectic group of photos including holiday photos, vacation photos, photos of the tenant's apartment before move-in and after move-out, plus of course the litany of random photos I take for the blog.

For your amusement, just a selection...

Derailed

2007-10-22T08:27:00.000-05:00

Where have I been hiding? A beach with a mai tai in hand? No, of course not. I've been attempting to save our front fence. Every year, I say, let's do the "must happen in warm weather" projects in the beginning of spring so that I'm not running around like a chicken with a head cut off come fall, dreaming of random house stuff, begging off social committments to get work done. Praying that weather holds off for another week. I hate this.

This year, I started off well- I put together my "spring to-do" list. The vast majority of things didn't happen. The very first thing that was started was fence work. Way back when in April (I think), Glenn cut down the forsythia so we could get to the fence and work on sanding the iron rungs and painting them, as well as do some concrete repairs. (both much easier to do without forsysthia and plants everywhere). I had hoped work would be done before planting my flowers. Hah!

I sprained my ankle which really slowed down house related tasks. I was out of commission, and Glenn was busier trying to do all the "must get done" stuff that he usually does, or I usually do. Then, we furiously got things ready for the rental. Then, my bout of food poisoning...(and various other things taking us away from our task. Our August, September, beginning of October were also riddled with some social and work commitments which were unavoidable (though enjoyable)

Finally, a month or so ago, I said we really need to paint the fence before winter. (and patch a couple holes that were the reason why we tore down the forsythia in the first place). I also want to plant thorny bushes by the front fence to deter plant thieves that needed to happen before the frost).

In preparation for the painting, I pressure washed the whole fence. Once everything was washed, we got to see a whole bunch of other areas that needed to be patched plus a lot of areas where the concrete was worn down to the aggregate.

My wonderful idea? Skim coat the whole thing. So i've been in concrete skimcoating hell. I keep on forgetting to take pictures. Once I do, I'll do a fence post with what I've learned with working with concrete.

Oh-and the other list of "really must get done-please cold weather wait a few more weeks, includes bulb planting, shrub planting as well as the rest of concrete repairs/paint."

I'll be back...

Radiator Snafu

2007-10-22T07:55:00.000-05:00

You would think, that our radiator saga, written about at nauseum, would be done-or on hiatus. We thought so.

A few months ago, we bought a few new to us radiators. One was for our kitchen (Glenn wants to build a bench over a radiator and exchange out the current radiator) The other two were identical-one for our rental and one for our unit to replace a wrongly installed baseboard.

[When we had heat added to one of our rooms, the professional we hired put in baseboards. The result? The heat never worked. (you can't mix baseboard with cast iron radiators-or at the least you need a whole lot more linear space of baseboard to equal the heat put off by a cast iron radiator. If someone ever recommends mixing the two-bring in someone else, do some research on heat loss calculations-don't assume that since it is a "professional" he knows what he's doing. We found contractors on average hate working on cast iron radiators which makes it hard to get anyone in. (which is why Glenn is our favorite radiator guy).]

I digress. Anyway, a few months ago, we got the radiators, took them to be sandblasted, brought them home, primed and painted them, and installed the one in the rental. A little more piping needed to happen in the basement before the radiator could be filled up. Life happened, and it didn't happen. (the past few months have been very busy with non house commitments).

Yesterday, Glenn finished the piping in the basement and started to fill up the tenant's radiator. (I'm outside, in front, working with concrete on our front fence.) He comes out of the house saying he needs my help immediately. (which, I can't do-concrete can't wait). Apparently, sandblasting must have forced a leak in the radiator as it was leaking-not the valves, pipes, or anything easily fixed, but the actual radiator. Luckily, we had a spare radiator (the one we wanted for the same room in our unit) We then had to spend the greater part of the rest of the afternoon exchanging radiators. There was a risk that sandblasting professionally would spring a leak-but we had been optimistic.

Now we are deciding whether we need to run out and buy a "new" replacement one or wait until the spring. We loved the radiators we had chosen. The had all the scroll work on them and were the perfect size. It's too late for any new radiators to be installed in our unit, as our list of "must do" projects before cold is much longer than seemingly humanely possible. We had already pushed off radiators for us until next year.

Environmental Blog Day

2007-10-15T00:32:00.000-05:00

Today, hundreds of blogs are uniting around the world to focus on environmental issues. As a house blog, I thought I'd highlight some of the environmentally friendly things that can be done to renovate a home. Rehabbing an old home is at the core of a environmentally friendly lifestyle-just think of it-what sounds better-restoring the old, or trashing it, and starting a new?

Of course, not everything can be restored or rehabbed. In those instances, there are a number of "better" options than just whatever you can get at the local store. I wished we knew about some of these items when we started:

1. Recycled products-We have been amazed at the wide variety of renovation items made from recycled products. In Chicago, we have Greenmaker's Supply which has a show room with a number of environmentally friendly options. They have a quartz like counter that has flecks of recycled glass in it. They also have recycled glass tiles that can be used for backsplashes.
2. Salvage yards- We've spoken at nauseum about our radiator foibles. We've gone to our local radiator salvage yard for the new radiators we've needed. There are salvage yards around for basically anything-old doors, hardware, molding. Of course, a lot of what you find might need a little elbow grease to use, but the work is worth it. Not only do you preserve some of history, but you cut down on items heading to the landfill or prevent a tree from being cut down for your remodeling purposes.
3. MDF v. solid wood. If you are planning on painting your trim anyway, instead of getting solid hardwood, you can buy trim in a number of different styles made from MDF. As a bonus, the MDF is cheaper. It's not recommended for high moisture areas.

For the garden, here are a few things we've learned.
1. Rain barrels: Instead of wasting water from the tap, why not collect rain water and use that in the garden? In Chicago, the city offers a program to sell rain barrels for $40 (regularly $80+) in its efforts to encourage residents to disconnect their downspouts (that otherwise head into the sewer system prompting flooding in torrential rain storms) We have one that we plan on hooking up to our (to be installed) gutters on our garage. I'll then use that water for the back yard plants.
2. Native landscaping- Depending on your yard, a rain barrel may not cover all your water needs. An even better thing to do is to make sure that you plant native plants. Native plants have adjusted to the water expectations of your environment so are more likely to be able to survive without outside watering. I'd like to incorporate native landscape in our backyard when we get to it.
3. Green roofs-We really would like to do this, but don't know if/when it will happen. The city offers many incentives to install a green roof, but still its an expense we aren't ready for right now. The concept of a green roof is to add plant material on the roof for insulation and a natural water user. Instead of a lot of rain off from rainstorms, the plants would use the water to drink. Special soils are lighter than regular soil. By having a natural insulator, the temperature stays more temperate inside the home, decreasing energy costs.

Just one of those days...

2007-09-21T08:06:00.000-05:00

An eventful day, but not necessarily in a good way. A quick summary: schedule snafus, broken items dropping like flies, and a violent attack.

We had our parade of contractors come in yesterday to give estimates and an exterminator. The way the day was supposed to work is (1) an exterminator was to come from 9-11 a.m. (a bit of a centipede problem compounded by minimal molding in our unit); (2) two chimney contractors to assess our water problem with the chimney and give an estimate for a liner. Both decide they want to come 12-2 p.m. The other little tasks I had planned for the day aren't really important.

8:05 a.m. I get a call from the exterminator-his truck has been towed so he will be late, but will put our house down first to get exterminated. Alrighty then. I hang up the phone then realize this could be a problem. I have visions of 2 chimney contractors, plus an exterminator arriving all at the same time. That wouldn't be good.

After I get a call from chimney guy number 1 saying he was en route (early) I call the exterminating company and push his visit back until 2. I get both estimates for the chimney work. (one calls for just a liner, the other calls for liner plus replacement of brick). Somehow, I'm able to sneak lunch in, then the exterminator shows up.

During the exterminator's movement around our unit, he moved some furniture around. At one point, I hear an "oh no" look over, and part of our futon has broken. The exterminator is extremely apologetic. (I think it already was broken-but he solidified this). Something for Glenn to fix at some point in the future.

We then proceed to the tenants apartment. They have a cat. The exterminator suggests we just close the cat in one room, and work on the rest of the apartment, then after the chemicals dry let the cat out. I head everywhere looking for this cat-looking under beds etc. The cat can not be found. One bedroom door is closed (the carpeted bedroom). I don't bother to look in there because one tenant sent an e-mail about how upsetting it was when I had inadvertently left the cat in one room with the door closed when we were in there last week. But, what would you know- the cat was in the carpeted bedroom- and ran out when we opened the door.

I end up closing the door to another bedroom to keep the cat at bay, and continue on.

Exterminator finally leaves. I head in to let the cat out of the one bedroom. (so he has access to food, water, and bathroom). Open the door. The cat comes over to me and looks like it wants attention. I feel bad for the thing being locked in a bedroom all day and try to show it some attention. I put my arm down, it slides up next to the wall, then comes over to me, then loops its paws around my arm. I tried to pet it, then it walks away, comes back, and BITES ME ON THE LEG! The bite did not break skin, so in retrospect we determined that it was probably trying to play with me. Its plan backfired though as I promptly shut the door and went back to our unit.

In our unit, I go to empty the dishwasher and notice that there's water in the bottom of our dishwasher that never drained after it was run. Another of the "we'll have to look at that." items.

My next simple task is to upload new software to my windows based treo. Should only take 35 minutes. Of course, 3 hours later, the software is finally uploaded, and treo is synching appropriately.

Poor Glenn has had an extremely busy week at work, so got to come home at 11 p.m. and be confronted with some of my travails for the day. If it wasn't 11 p.m. I think he would have turned around and left.

Finding a contractor is like dating

2007-09-19T21:35:00.000-05:00

Among the many other things we are doing now, we are trying to find a chimney person to inspect our chimney and give an estimate on repairs and possibly a chimney liner. I called a few places, and arranged for 2 estimates. One scheduled one tomorrow from 12-2. The other said "they'd just stop by and leave an estimate." (Odd, I thought, but it's their business). Well, the second person calls back a few hours later and says "I want to come by on Thursday (tomorrow) 12-2.

I like to space things out a bit. It just doesn't seem right to have 2 here at the same time. Of course, a contractor should know that a homeowner will call a couple places, but it still seems shady to confront them with it. Dating is the same- you might go on a date here and there with a few different people, but I don't know how much each person would want to know there's someone else. When I was dating, I was always uncomfortable going out with muliple people at once-even if it was just a first or second date. Contracting is no different. I've been burned too in the contracting world by contractors who promise to stop by, or give an estimate, or countless other promised. Hence, the need for calling multiple contractors.

What's the best way to handle this? I opted to just come clean and explain I have another estimate at the same time. I was just a bit flustered and both chimney people wanting the exact same time, what are the odds?

I suppose I should have just scheduled them at different times. This can either work out well-competiting for business etc., or both can just walk away.

A slight hiccup with the gates

2007-09-19T21:16:00.000-05:00

We now have lockable gates, but we haven't really locked them yet. The two gates (one for the side of the house, and the other for the front of the property) require 2 separate keys. This is just not practical-particularly with tenants. That would mean that we would have (1) front gate key (2) side gate key (3) front door key (4) 1st floor apartment key (5) first floor apartment skeleton key for some of the locks (6) 2nd floor apartment key (7) storeroom key (8) 2nd store room key. Doesn't that seem like a lot for one house?!? Of course, we don't carry all these around at once, but it is still a lot!

I didn't realize I needed to specify at installation that both gates should use the same key. I really don't feel like paying $100 for a locksmith to correct the problem. I'm now on the quasi hunt for somewhere to get them rekeyed. (yes, I know, a locksmith or home depot or something). The little wrinkle is that we upgraded to Baldwin locks. Home Depot is by far the cheapest option, but when I asked about Baldwin locks, the person said "they are the same as schlage." I have a bit more faith in a locksmith...

Besides for that, the gates have garnered a little attention. We have been here for 4 years (about). There's a woman who lives across the street who has never smiled at us, said hi, acknowledged our presence in any way. Odd. Wednesday, I'm getting in my car, and she says "do your gates lock now?" She follows with "my landlady said someone stole all your flower pots."

Hmmmm....

No, I don't think this woman was responsible for the pots or other stolen items-I just think it a bit odd that in 4 years now it's time to call out across the street.

Mission Accomplished

2007-09-18T20:09:00.001-05:00

After 4 years from the first time I contacted an iron worker for an estimate, WE HAVE GATES!!! They finished things up today.

Here they are:

We also had the workers paint the spokes on the concrete fence and insert some spokes where there were none. Each gate requires a different key to lock it, which we will need to fix. Sort of nice to know though that I can lock it. Of course, with the height of the fence, if anyone really wanted to get in the yard, he could. We weren't up to dismanteling a 100 year old fence though-and it adds some character. I'll be planting some thorny bushes to act as a bit of a deterrant, or at the least, to give any intruder a rough entry onto our property.

We had a fair amount of confusion with our contractors during this process. Overall, they were responsive, did good work, and got the job done. However, due to a death in the family, they originally sent out a dentist to perform the estimate. (yeah, I know) His estimate wasn't detailed enough and apparently was incorrect. Then, Glenn and the owner worked through a second estimate that was a lot more specific. Finally, I handled dealing with the actual project manager. The result was a lot of "who's on first" scenes. In Glenn's dealings, he said he wanted black locks, and paid for an upgrade in the locks. We ended up getting nickel locks.

I still think it looks nice.

Now onto painting the fence...

Gates and More Gates

2007-09-17T08:42:00.000-05:00

We've had a number of gate projects that we've been working on along with a variety of other activities. On a positive note, we have located and hired a gate contractor for the front gates! :D. Last I wrote, we had estimates brewing. One guy we just eliminated because he kept on telling us things than not following through. (ie. estimate tomorrow, then calling at 8 p.m. 5 days later on a Saturday night). Today, the gates should be installed! We are really excited. It took 3 separate visits to come up with the design and finalize the installation. I'm crossing my fingers that it comes off without a hitch.

Now, of more house-blog related interest, we spent labor day weekend and the following weekendthe building and installing a new back gate. We sort of had one-but it was extremely hard to open, and clearly in a whole bunch of disrepair.

For the project, I was the painting queen. (I also happened to sell an old TV while I was in the back yard painting all the slabs-talk about efficient!) Glenn, on the other hand, handled the construction.

The play by play (sort of):
1. Glenn affixed a post support into the concrete. In the bottom right of the photo of the dilapidated gate, you can see the black post support. It is set back from the other gate because he needed the gate support next to the garage to be attached to a garage joist. If he tore down the gate, then put in the gate, we would have been without a gate for a period of time, which we didn't want.
2. Paint like a fiend. We used pressure treated lumber, and I furiously primed and painted everything. (I handled the painting, while Glen did the rest)
3. Build the gate "surround" Ie. A 2x4 along the garage (where the lock will go), the post in the post support on the other side, and a bar going across the top for added support.
4. Add in post support. (the angled 2X6 in the photo)
5. Construct the door with a gate making kit. We found ours at Menards I believe finally after looking for months, so it seemed. It came in a big yellow square box and had the hardward that would allow the user to construct the rectangular structure for the door.
6. Add the slats to the door. These were affixed to the gate structure from 5.
7. Hang the door. With this, there's a lot of finangling with a level. if the door is not hung right, with everything level, this will cause neverending issues with the door not closing properly.

We completed these first 7 tasks all in one long, drawn out exhausting day.

The next day, we worked on installing the locks and fine tuning the work from the day before.

I'll have to come back to add photos, as apparently, my memory card wasn't as complete as I thought. I'll try to get Glenn to revise this as well to be more accurate with the how tos.

Help put a murderer behind bars

2007-08-15T15:41:00.000-05:00

Although not house related, the seriousness of this warrants mention. The father of a good friend of my friend was brutally murdered in his office, (and found by his daughter). They have now found the murderer who escaped the country and is now claiming French citizenship. I beg of you to take the time to e-mail the following to your Congresmen/women. This family deserves justice.

Dear Respected Official:

I would like to bring to your attention and seek your support in obtaining American Justice in the tragic death of Dr. David Cornbleet. Specific details on the case are available at:
http://www.nbc5.com/news/10152819/detail.htm &
http://www.myspace.com/dr_david_cornbleet_murder

On October 24, 2006 the beloved father, husband, doctor and friend to many was found by his daughter, tortured and killed in his downtown Chicago office. Stabbed over 20 times, Dr. Cornbleet was brutally murdered and left for dead by a former patient named Hans Peterson.

After committing this horrendous crime, Peterson fled to and hid in the French portion of St. Martin. Before confessing and turning himself into French officials, Peterson applied for and was granted French citizenship merely based on his mother’s nationality. Even though he was born and raised in the United States and filled out his French citizenship application after committing the act of murder, France granted him citizenship in May of 2007 based on the fact that there is French blood in his lineage. As a French citizen, France claims that he is protected by their laws and has refused extradition. If he is ever tried and convicted, under French law at most he will face 20 years in prison, what the French consider being “a life sentence.”

As an elected official it is your responsibility to protect your constituents from criminals. Even when dealing with domestic criminals, this responsibility cannot end at our country’s borders. In this situation, by failing to force the hand of the French government to extradite this suspect, a template is created in which all domestic criminals may operate. A loophole within our legal system has been found, and any domestic criminal, no matter their location, can strategize a full proof plan to escape American Justice.

The Cornbleet family deserves an American court to adjudicate this crime under American law. Hans Peterson sought French citizenship as a criminal and his application is solely for the purpose of bypassing the American justice system. We cannot allow American criminals to pick and choose which country’s law should apply to them!

As a “Friend of Dr. David Cornbleet” I plea to you to put continued pressure on both the United States and French governments to bring this cold-blooded murderer back to the United States to face trial for the vicious and unjust murder of Dr. David Cornbleet under American law.

Sincerely,
(Provide your name)

All good things must come to an end....

2007-08-15T10:27:00.000-05:00

For the past month, we've been getting rent and the tenants have stayed away. (Love that arrangement!) There's been a slow moving in of furniture, repair/upgrade requests, but we've basically had the run of This Old Chicago 2 Flat. (of course, we honored their tenancy and weren't hanging out in their unit, but the laundry room, front hall, etc. were all ours. I didn't have to pay attention to whether I was calling for Glenn in another room, wearing my shoes over hardwood, stepping on creaks...)

Well, last night the two tenants took up permanent residence. One (I'm assuming) arrived late late at night from California. (we still haven't met her, but will do so tonight). Her flight was supposed to get in after 11 and we were long asleep.

I'm really hoping that it all works out. Fingers crossed.

Iron Contractor Status

2007-08-14T10:55:00.001-05:00

All is good and done that we came up with a design but we are still on the hunt for a contractor. The contractor (dentist) who came down on Friday was supposed to drop off an estimate on Monday. Never received it.

Then, we were supposed to have someone call us between 8 and 10 a.m. on Saturday about stopping by, and noone did.

Servicemagic sent out our request (including a contractor in Georgia-go figure) and no one was interested. (what a surprise!)

Finally, I saw our neighbor on Sunday, mentioned the flower pet thefts, and she said "oh, you need a gate." Which, I responded, well, yes, I've been trying for 4 years and noone has been showing. She was able to give us a card of someone who she thought could help. He's in the suburbs.

I call the neighbor's contact on Monday morning(who had been told about the flower pot incident) and he said he'd come by that day, after lunch. Fast forward to 5:30 p.m. and I get a call saying he tried to call but no one answered (leave a message!), then that he'd be over after 7 definitely wants to get there today.

Fine. So, finally he shows up at 7:45. (right when Glenn gets home)He mentions some concerns which are valid (ie. the size of the door opening). Says he can do the work this week and he'll give us the estimate today.

So, under normal circumstances I might write the guy off for not calling until 5:30, and coming 45 minutes later than I anticipated. (always wonder if they can't show up for an estimate-will they show up for the work?) But, under the circumstances, if the quote is reasonable, we'll probably go with him.(oh, and if we get the quote).

Another little concern I have is no photo of the lintals. He drew a rendering real quick, but I'd fell more comfortable if the person actually doing the fabricating has a plotted picture. I think if we get to a contract, I'll ask for a clearly drawn picture or do one myself.

Gate Design and Plant Security

2007-08-14T10:38:00.001-05:00

We may be one step closer to having a front gate. In connection with actually trying to get people here for an estimate, to get an estimate and maybe one day someone to actually work, I've been trying to figure out the actual design.

Maybe I'm the only one who sort of stresses about this. It's just so permanent. You put a plant in, and don't like it, you can move it. (or inadvertently kill it) Don't like the fence color? Paint over it!

A gate? I guess in theory I can just drop a whole lot of money on new ones, but that's not too realistic.

So, as a reminder, here's our house:

We originally wanted to put the gate at the front of the fence, but that would only leave a 28 inch opening which wouldn't be practical for moving things in and out. Now, we are going to put the gate at a little in more at the end of the fence. (so in effect there'd be an entranceway). We will also add some spindles on the sides to prevent large animals from coming in and using the restroom. (and also bump up the security component. I'll also need to plant more prickly plants on the sides to hopefully increase the security more.

Of course, this isn't fort knox, which in keeping with the design of the fence, and house, would not be feasible. (8 foot fences with barbed wire would not look too nice!)

Having the gate look like part of the house was extremely important. To do this, we decided to pull out the scroll work in the lintals and the basic shape of the lintals. I'm hoping it comes out as planned.

A Perk of Tenants

2007-08-10T22:55:00.000-05:00

We share a DSL connection with our tenants. Imagine my surprise when all of a sudden I had access to 3200 more songs on itunes. Apparently, my tenant has clicked "share songs with network" clicked and I have "look for shared songs." Do you think I should now include a music interest question on my application?

A contractor showed!

2007-08-10T14:01:00.000-05:00

Sure, he's a dentist, and came in scrubs, but we had someone come to give us an estimate on the gates. I found this guy in a google ad. The first question I asked, of course, when he came was "so, are you looking to switch careers?"

Apparently, the business was his uncle's. He has work people who know what they are doing. Let's see if we get an estimate...

As for everyone else-the guy I contacted on Monday, then again yesterday morning, never called. I e-mailed someone yesterday-haven't heard anything. I'm supposed to have someone come by tomorrow. I've heard nothing from Servicemagic.

I think I'm going to call a few people from Angies List. (I called everyone on there on September and never heard anything).

Groundhog Day

2007-08-09T17:32:00.001-05:00

You know the movie? I feel like I'm living it. Yes, back on the search for an wrought iron gate contractor in the city of wrought iron gates. (seems like everyone has one, or a fence). The first time I looked (way back in September or so 2003) our neighborhood guy said he'd stop by. Never happened. Called a couple other places, noone stopped by. Put it on the back burner.

September 2006, after the air compressor theft, I went back to the drawing board. I called every iron worker in the phone book. (7-8 people). One person came by, gave an estimate. (whose name I forget). Never got another estimate, and got distracted with getting our radiators sandblasted.

August 2007, after the flower pot incident, back to the drawing board. Called the local guy after someone else recommended him on Monday. The guy said he'd send an estimate.....Today, I call back and say "hey, didn't get an estimate yet, but wanted an idea on timing for the estimate." I was told someone would call me today. Humdedum.....no calls.

So, back to the drawing board. I did service magic, googled a bunch, clicked on a google ad, and supposedly someone should be by tomorrow and Saturday for an estimate.

What are the chances?

Current Projects

2007-08-08T12:24:00.000-05:00

For the past few weeks or so, we've been largely doing maintenance related work. We've had to do some minor things to the rental after one of the tenants took their keys. (I'm hoping that the requests will dwindle one they are here full time-we'll see).

This past weekend, Glenn had to replace one of the circuits in our kitchen (for our refrigerator). The circuit just plain stopped working. (after ever increasing times of failure).

In light of the flower pot robber, I've renewed efforts to locate a contractor to install a couple front gates. I'd like to keep the front gate (when installed) locked at night. But, locating a contractor is easier said then done. There are not enough iron gate contractors in Chicago! i've gone back to the drawing board calling contractors who I've called in years past but never showed up. This is not soemthing I like to do-but one was recommended by someone. It's quite frustrating.

We are also trying to figure out how best to secure the pots to protect against the lowlife who goes around and steals other people's flowers. Ironically, if I google flower pot security, alarm and the like I come up with flower pot safes. It would be nice if we were able to just stick tracking devices in the flower pots. (then I can catch the $%$^$#%$# too!) Optimally, we'd have an aesthetically pleasing security system on the pots that either would (1) secure the pots and prevent a theft (2) scare the perpretrator through sound/light (and my favorite, mace) (3) act as a deterant.

The hurdles to cross with the security are (1) the pots will be wet, or might have standing water in the dish (2) the pots need to sit flat (3) the pots are full with flowers now and can't really be emptied then replanted (4) the pots are a mixture of ceramic and terra cotta so risk breaking.

We've been brainstorming. One idea I have is a steel cable rope lock that would connect the pots. However, the locks would need to be affixed to the pot in some manner-either glued (with a glue that would be strong enough to withstand the lock as well as the moisture).

If anyone has any suggestions that work and are aesthetically pleasing, we are open to suggestions.