House Things

[Phoebe]

Are any of you working on projects in the house and yard, or planning some for 2017? I am interested in hearing about it, if so, and especially if you're working on any of the things on my to-do list. My pace is snail but steady on these things. Right now it includes:

Outside: pick and plant a new tree and some border plants. Construct a tiered vegetable garden in boxes, like stairs going down a slope. Repaint fence. Spray-paint wire plantholders.

Inside: LIGHTING, generally. Construct DIY curtain rods for bay windows (I have a great "Recipe" for this from Pinterest btw, very eager to try out). Stain or re-stain some wood trim and paint doors. Make a roman shade with fabric, or something similar. Figure out how to effectively block cold air coming in two old windows that won't be fixed until... who knows when, requires husband. Figure out how to cut an intact piece out of my floor in one spot and then put it back down again with just the seam showing, but no other breakage. (Requires Superman with micro-fine eye laser.)

Every once in a while I like to examine houses for sale in my general area that are way fancier than imaginable, just to see what you get for a couple million and pick up some decorating ideas where applicable. I am always shocked by a couple of things: one is that massive $$$ do not purchase decent decorating taste, as you will see the most gruesome assemblies of extraordinarily expensive ingredients in some of these places, and the other is the degree to which otherwise sane people will go to destroy otherwise healthy oak trim and woodwork. People really hate oak, to the point that they will pay thousands of dollars to permanently destroy it. I don't get it. Everyone wants to paint it, or at least paint the walls some sickly shade of pale gray in order to compensate for the oak. I cannot believe the gray trend will last much longer, and when it goes, it will go hard and grays will be suddenly dated. Wood is warm and pretty by nature - I think the only reason this gray trend happened is that non-wood materials are so much cheaper and preferable for builders now, and people cannot obtain or afford the lovely woods they once used. But wood will be desirable again.

That said, this morning I saw a truly beautiful home that was all decked out in grays - one of the few I've seen that did a good job of it. They added just enough exciting color to make it work, and everything was very relaxing. I was wondering, who on earth even lives in these homes? Who can afford this? Discovered the person selling it was a retired pro-basketball player. Okay, makes sense.

[Tahlvin]

We get a new garage door, including all the hardware and opener, this coming Tuesday.

Not sure what we'll get to in 2017. Our house was built in 1963, we bought it in November 2001, and the last major redecorating was done around 1992 for much of it. Over the years, we completely remodeled the basement, and replaced most of the flooring. Other tasks we would love to do include:
- Paint
- Replace all the wood trim upstairs. It has hollow-core doors, and several have had holes put in them or been otherwise broken. The previous owner, who was the original owner and a retired school teacher and his wife, did all the work on it, so he did things like saw the bottom off all the doors when they put carpeting in the house, leaving the doors open at the bottom and weakened, or stick in the frames, or don't close all the way, or the hardware doesn't line up, etc. So we want to put in new doors that are a lighter color wood, and replace the wood trim to match, and fill in some gaps where the quarter round broke when the flooring was being replaced.
- The bathroom and kitchen are still original, except for a few appliances, and need to be completely remodeled at some point.
- I'd love to have California Closets come in and remodel and organize the bedroom closets. They're small closets from the 1960's, with sliding doors that have all come off the tracks and have broken wheels so they no longer slide. So new doors (maybe with mirrors on them, like we had in another house we lived in) are needed, and some organization would go a long way towards making them useful despite the small size.

Nothing major will get done in 2017. It will probably be 2018 that we get the bathroom or kitchen done.