Summer Work

This summer is so busy! We are working full force on our major house projects, trying to get them wrapped up before Jacob Leigh becomes [more] mobile and the rainy season here in Portland starts. Once that rain comes down, it won't stop until next year! We had floors put in in our living room and weird little old furnace room (we also took out the crappy and ugly clunky furnace to make the space more usable)! When we purchased the house, it was covered in pee soaked carpets, so we ripped them up immediately. We hadn't been able to put real floors in until a couple of weeks ago, so we had laid out a bunch of rugs in the living room and painted the chipboard in the little room. This was gross, but fine for a temporary solution. Man, we really love these floors! It took a while to get what we wanted (2 1/4" bevelved edge red oak, FSC certified), but they were worth the wait for sure. Jacob Leigh sure loves them, too, now that he's on his way to crawling! (next up: the kitchen floors! they are currently just floor leveler painted grey, we are ordering the marmoleum tiles very soon) The back side of our house had been a bit of a disaster for a while, too. We found out we had powderpost beetles, and had to rip up the siding and cut chunks of the exterior walls out. We also added a bathroom window and changed the upstairs door to a window. This had made the house pretty ugly to look at, but all that is solved now! We firred out the walls an extra two inches to have 6" thick walls vs the usual 4". This will give us much more insulation and make our heating and cooling a lot more efficient. We had spray foam insulation put on and spray foamed the rest. The new siding is up, ready to be painted, and the header is now in place for our patio cover! Sadly, we had to get a huge tree on our property cut down. It was a 40 foot cedar, rotted and swaying a little too much in the wind. It's a bummer to have it gone, but we will be able to use the firewood on our property, and spread out the bigger stumps for seating. I can't believe so much has been done already, and I can't wait to keep going. We've got just a handful of big projects left, then we can get to the fun stuff like decorating! :) I hope y'all are having a great summer, and taking advantage of the nice weather. But, come on and hurry up already, Fall.