The absolute, very last ever post on the mudroom…maybe

March 13, 2017March 17, 2017 / Apple Hill Cottage / 11 Comments

Why?

Because it is finally finished. And I have to say this final bit was all Mr. H.C. The only share I had in this last wall was painting one coat of paint on the door.

There won’t be too many words about this, because words cannot describe how completely and utterly finished it looks.

Unfortunately photos can’t do it justice either. Because it is all painted in Sherwin Williams’ lovely creamy white color — Steamed Milk. The same color as the kitchen walls. The same color as the dining room walls. The same color as the living room walls. The same color as the ceiling in all those rooms as well. Yes, we like creamy white walls. And ceilings.

In my humble non-decorator-just-average-person opinion, creamy white walls make a humble cottage look bigger, lighter and brighter, and just all-around more cheerful. And anyone who saw the cottage before, with its orange walls and wallpaper and 70s dark paneling would agree.

So without further ado, here are some befores, durings, and afters of our finally-finished-after-five-years mudroom entry to Apple Hill Cottage. (Trumpet sounds here…)

One can see that it is so new, there isn’t even any art on the walls.

This gallery below shows the progression of the outside wall of the mudroom — from the initial window, cedar shake walls, and plastic ceiling — to what it looks like now:

Cedar shakes and old window

New door and window

trimmed door and window

The next gallery of photos shows the progression of the second wall:

Cedar shakes used to cover the walls

Cedar is gone, the walls are insulated and drywall over the insulation

…the desktop reimagined as a coat rack and painted green (Blooming Grove by Benjamin Moore)

The floor has been done for a couple of years, but it still merits a before and after photo shoot:

Not only does the floor have a level problem, there are also some serious cracks.

It was the coldest week of the winter, 2015 when we laid the tile in the mudroom.

The finishing of this room took so long because an exterior roof was necessary before the interior ceiling could be installed. Since the roof was finished this past summer, this winter we were able to proceed with the ceiling:

The cedar is gone and so is the plastic ceiling

Here you can also see the wire problem…

the ceiling now matches throughout the cottage…

The last wall to be finished (February/March, 2017) was the wall with the most issues. There is an electric panel two feet from the wood stove; there were wires traveling the whole length of the wall that hooked into the electric panel; and this wall was also the orginal entry into the kitchen before the mudroom was enclosed and was just a porch. When we took off the cedar shakes, the wall was down to its original siding and it wasn’t pretty:

There’s a lot to look at here — but you can see the shadow of the old entry door. You can also see the wires going across the wall above the doorway.

Here you can see the lovely fixed siding

…and here is the doorway, framed in.

These photos below show the electric panel side of the doorway:

The ugly electric panel

the pocket door built to cover the ugly electric panel

And the pocket door painted and closed. Here at the top, you can see the secret hinged cover that opens to allow access to the wires.

The sliding door that covers the electric panel is made from concrete board and trimmed with wood grain concrete board so it mimics the other interior doors in the cottage, but it is safe for being next to the wood stove. It hangs from the ceiling with pocket door hardware.

Tackling the Mudroom

The pocket door next to the wood stove

tile installed and window trimmed

One of the best things about having the mudroom finished is that now the doorway into the kitchen is finished as well. In the last post on the mudroom, I showed you the photo on the left. Now the far right is the finished picture.

Finished and Unfinished…On the left is the finished kitchen….On the right is the only unfinished wall of the mudroom.

Trim on the kitchen doorway is finished.

Five rooms down, two to go. Three if you count the back porch; four if you count the laundry room.

But who’s counting?

143. All the Gray Is Gone…

August 27, 2015August 27, 2015 / Apple Hill Cottage / 10 Comments

Just when I think I’m going to post about the new back porch that is finished just in time for September (it’s not);

Or the new door that we’ve found to replace sliding glass door #3 (we haven’t);

Mr. H.C. surprises me by saying, “Let’s do the front of the house.”

He must have read my post a month or so ago, when I listed all the projects that need to occur for the front of the house to look ~~good~~ better. (See post 136.)

This is the cottage up until two days ago. (Uhmmm — the way it’s looked for the last two years. Just let me say that the front looks WAY better than the back.) So with the red brick, the faded blue gray cedar shakes, and the white clapboard siding, there was just way too much going on. Sort of a stripey effect, don’t you think?

I’m actually favoring the colors of white, red, and gray; but in a google image search for “white cottage red trim” this is the first image that showed up:

old_kurtz_house
Please pardon me, if this is your house, but it’s not at all what I have in mind for the cottage. Though it does look about like the color of red that is our back porch — Segovia Red — this color right here:

Back porch rails and ceiling, newly painted

The back porch color can be seen from both sides of the house as one drives down (or up) the road. So it counts.

I always thought when we did the exterior of the cottage, that we would try to emulate what it looked like in the forties; but we can’t really.

Back then it was white with forties green trim.

The roof was green, now it’s gray, and it will stay that color when we put on the new roof (next year?).

There was not a red back porch.

And there was no brick on the front. I’ve looked at photos of white houses with dark green and red trim, and no, I don’t want a Christmas house.

Here’s what we have now:

Neither of us are used to seeing it without the gray. Mr. H.C. thinks it might be too much white. I was originally thinking of whitewashing the brick, but now I’m thinking yes, that might be too much white…

The sliding glass doors will be replaced sometime before winter with doors that look something like this:

There hasn’t been an interactive post on this blog for awhile, so here is your chance:

Should we paint the brick? If so, what color of gray? :-) (Maybe if we paint the doors red, it will tie in the brick color?
What about door colors? Both front doors can be painted. (Keep in mind that the back porch is Segovia Red, and one can see the porch from both sides of the house.)
What do you think about shutters? Mr. H.C. brought that up the other day, just as I had been thinking about them too. But I have an aversion to shutters that don’t fit the windows, and that’s a 3-window series there in the front… I’m thinking more along the lines of flower boxes under those 3 front windows. What do you think — flower boxes or shutters or neither?

I’d like to hear your thoughts, dear readers. Of course, then we’ll do what we want anyway — whatever that might be…

Here are some more shots to get you thinking…

The remodeled cottage of the seventies

The siding has only one coat of paint still — hence the yellow tape.

Does there need to be a piece of trim between the siding and the shakes?

130. City House For Sale SOLD; or, more than ten reasons to never sell a house…

March 29, 2015March 30, 2015 / Apple Hill Cottage / 13 Comments

So you’re thinking of selling your house? Heed this warning:
Don’t ever sell a house.

The exhortation again: Find a house you love, in a place you love, and never sell it.
Or just rent.

In No Particular Order (This is not a top ten list):

It is unlikely that you will get out of your house what you’ve put into it. Forget about all those stories you’ve read or seen about house flippers, HGTV renovators, or just regular people making a mint in real estate. It may happen once in a blue moon to a professional, but IT WILL NEVER HAPPEN TO YOU (shouting, yes). Even if you’ve lived in the house for twenty years and the mortgage is paid off, if you have done routine maintenance and updating — new roof, new kitchen, new baths — you’ve probably put in twice the amount it will sell for. Especially if you have added on or done an outstanding job with a basement or patio remodel. And if you’ve done landscaping or gardening, forget it — the new owner might not be a gardener and could rip out all the plants you’ve lovingly planted.

If you haven’t done routine maintenance or updating, you’d better start now. That roof you’ve ignored? Fix it, or you will be required to by the inspection services. The room(s) you have just put up with because you didn’t have money or time (or both) to fix? Update them now, and at least you’ll have the benefit of enjoying the new room(s) for awhile. If you are normal people in a normal house, it can take you up to a year and a half to get your house ready to sell. Update a bathroom; remodel the man cave; buy a new awning; re-do the upstairs attic bedroom; put in a new sewer line ($$$$); replace a cracked glass block window; spruce up the driveway; cut down and trim the trees; put down new mulch; clean and paint the back basement; and paint every room but the hallway. (Are you tired yet?)

If you don’t know how to do things yourself, you’re really in trouble. You need to have on hand ready for any and all emergencies: a plumber, an electrician, a roofer, an HVAC repair person, a landscaper who works all seasons, a glass-block guy, a remodel company to update your bathroom and/or kitchen, a tree company, a radon company, and a good painter if you can’t paint without dripping and splotching. All these people are expensive. And once you get ready to actually sell your house, you need to find a realtor who is your trusted friend.

Be prepared for your beautiful house — that you’ve loved and sweated over — not to sell right away. Or perhaps someone will love it and make you an offer that is so low it is almost insulting. Or perhaps someone will love it and not be able to get financing. Or perhaps someone will love it and ask you for seller assist. Or perhaps you will be almost ready to show your house and the dining room ceiling caves in. Or perhaps someone will make you an offer as well as a simultaneous offer on the house down the street. Or perhaps no one will offer to buy it at all, and you end up taking it off the market.

For sale

Showing your house is very hard. Be prepared for people to be critical. The bedrooms are too small; the stairs are too steep; the driveway is gravel; only two bathrooms?; ugh, the kitchen has OAK cabinets; there aren’t enough closets; there isn’t whole house air conditioning… Yes, the gap between the house people want and the house people can afford is very large. And your house stands in the gap. HGTV should have never been invented. Do you have children? Keeping your house neat at all times is almost impossible, even without children. Sometimes you have an hour’s notice that someone wants to see your house. And you do want them to see it, don’t you?

city house

Generally, you are selling your house because of a life change, and you don’t need more anxiety. A new job, a new baby, marriage or divorce, a death, retirement — they are all reasons for selling a house and those reasons themselves are enough to provoke Life Change Anxiety. You don’t need the frustration that lies in wait around every corner of selling a house. Whether you have to sell your house fast, or you have time to wait for a ~~perfect~~ buyer, there is nothing rewarding about selling a house. Let the seller beware.

unnamed

Inspections. After you have a prospective buyer, you have the joy of having your house inspected by someone hired by that same potential buyer. In other words, they are hired to find everything possible or potentially wrong with your house (that you’ve recently put into tip-top shape just to put it on the market, right?) You are fairly confident that you have done everything but the radon test, and you expect that. But what you don’t expect is a 35-page report of everything that could possibly go wrong with a house. If you are a first time home-buyer, just read one of those inspection reports — you will go back to renting forever.

Negotiations. Nothing more needs to be said here, except this is where your trusted realtor friend is invaluable.

Spending more cash to do what the prospective buyer wants. If you weren’t broke after you fixed up the house to get it on the market, you will be now.

Trying to decide what stuff to keep, boxing up all your stuff, getting rid of all your stuff, moving all your stuff, arguing with your spouse about all your stuff… Yeah, that says it all, too.

Waiting on the closing can take forever… You, the seller, are at the mercy of everyone else. The closing can be postponed again, and again. And after everyone has taken their cut, you, the seller are left with just about the amount that you spent to get it on the market. The only other person on the list who deserves every penny is your trusted realtor friend, who walked you calmly through every crisis. Thanks, Linda! :-)

Sold

There’s more. You will have unexpected emotions that come out of nowhere because of friends, memories, and events that have happened in your loved house. But the chapter on the house finally finishes, and you leave behind those good friends and memories.

And you can finally turn the page for the next chapter… (unless you are too exhausted.)

(A clarification: Not all the problems listed here happened to us; some happened to neighbors and friends and relatives, but they all have happened recently to real people)