An actual post about my home!

So, after a lengthy hiatus (I can't even count how many times people asked me "So how's the house coming along? and I had to sheepishly reply "Uh, it's not. It's the exact same.") we decided to get moving again. It's amazing what a warm weekend does for the drive.  The plan is to do as much demo as we can to get ready for new floors to go in the first floor, so we are going to be removing all the old flooring and.. dun dun DUN - taking out the horrible half wall and prison bars between the kitchen and family room! I seriously HATED this wall, but because it had 2 outlets on it, it wasn't something we could just tear out without help (we know nothing of the mysterious forces that power our cell phone chargers). Here it is, lookit how ugly:

 I never bothered to strip the wallpaper because I knew it was coming down, so it was even uglier.  And the view from the other direction:

 (That's our new bathroom sink sitting there on the family room floor. It's only been sitting there, eh, 5 months?)

First casualty - the bars:

 Brad decided to saw this one then we switched tactics to the old "smash it out with a hammer technique" (I use the term "we" freely). Ha, Brad's face:

 And then they were gone. Brad spent a few minutes trying to convince me that we should just keep the half wall and it would be a good place to set your drink. No, thanks. It would be a good place to set a lot of other crap as well! The main reason I wanted to open this room completely up is because I thought it would be best to have one continuous floor and make the room more versatile - we could put a few tables together to make a looong table for holiday dinners or pull a bunch more chairs in to watch TV for a Superbowl party or something. Can you tell I like parties?

Don't forget your protective eyewear! And your camo hat, redneck!

 Off came the top:

 

And the trim:

 Here's the part where Pat "cool guy" Zim kicked through the wall and his leg went right through and he was just standing there on one leg with the other sticking out of the other side of the wall.  I'm so pissed I don't have a picture of that, but you can see the damage:

 

Turns out some of the boards went right through the floor and were nailed into joists (they didn't mess around in this place) so we have an odd rectangular shaped hole in the floor. Can't wait to see what I drop in there over the next few weeks.

And then she was gone!!!

 

And then Josh and Pat put their butts up in the air, and it was done. YAY! 

 

 We did a little test to see how hard it was going to be to remove the white tile in our kitchen. It's apparently attached to linoleum, which is glued to the sub-floor, so it will probably be a huge pain in the ass.  We will see. It's in good shape, but ugh - it really showcases what a bad housekeeper I am. It always looks so dirty and every little speck of dirt or debris shows up clearly.  I will not be sad to see it go. 

 Meanwhile, I kept going outside just to poke around since it was so warm. Since we moved here toward the end of summer, I haven't seen what springtime plants will be popping up, so it was a fun treasure hunt! I found a bunch of unidentified bulbs coming up in the weird corner bed out near the street:

 

And crocuses! (I think!)

 

Don't know what these are but I like them!

Then I started clearing out the raised beds in the garden. This thing is legit, and seems like it will keep out the critters. It is under a tree though, which IS questionable.  I've never had a real garden, so I'm actually really nerding out over it.

 

Then I went serious hippie shit and went out and bought a tumbling composter (oh, yeah, it's made of 100% recycled plastic. Get off my cloud, man). Yeah I'll probably forget about it in a week. We'll see. I always get overly ambitious with yard shit when we get a few nice days, but I'm hoping that this ridiculously huge property will turn me into a gardener and then I can have garden parties and then I'll use enjoyable yard work as my cardio and I'll be in great shape.  (HHHAAA!)

 

 Speaking of the yard, our nephews came over and we ran around pretending to be bats:

 

And then we burned the wall in the fire. I know you're probably not supposed to burn it cause it was treated or stained or something but I was just not winning that fight. I succeeded in convincing them not to burn the painted wood. Me and my hippie shit.

 

FIN.