Let there be (not ugly) light!

Admit it: if you've visited 83 Durant, you've thought, in passing, "wow, those lights in the front hallway are kinda ugly." You know you have. I have thought that roughly once a day every day we've lived here.

Today, that has changed.

For those of you unfamiliar with our now old lighting fixtures, here's a picture:



My main problem with these was with the glass, which was tinted a light brownish color, almost as if the fixture was made of sunglasses. Also, we were less than crazy about the brass/gold color. There were in fact two of these in the front hall, the first thing you see when you walk into our house.


This project was long delayed by the problem of finding and purchasing the actual fixtures. It's not easy to shop for lighting. We saw a few things that we really liked, but they were crazy handmade pieces of art and well beyond our budget. Most of the other things we saw left us feeling "meh." Finally, after several disappointing trips to look at actual lighting in stores, I actually ordered fixtures online. I went with Lighting Direct, and I'm happy with the service and product. I would not have thought that online was the way to go (I really felt like I needed to see them before I bought them), but the site had a good return policy if it turned out I didn't like them. Well, it turned out that I really liked them a lot. They're Energy Star rated (always a plus) and I found them on sale w/ a coupon, so it was a pretty good deal. Our wonderful next-door-neighbor the electrician came over to do the install for us today. And here's the new look of the front hall:

Here's a closer shot of one:

Sorry those aren't great shots, but really, the fixtures are SO much better. I really really like how they look! Hooray!

Basement Cleaning and Questions

We have a basement. Some of you know that it was once called "Man Town" by a plumber who was impressed with how much space we had down there. That space is shockingly full of crap. Oh, there's some important stuff down there (like the furnace and hot water heater) and some stuff that gets used sometimes (like skis, snowshoes, snow tires and the like) and then there's all the tools and workshop and bike stuff.

But then there's the crap. Like stuff left from previous owners, like this ugly lighting fixture and these roller skates/blades:












We're putting the lamp in the trash and the roller skates/blades out for the neighborhood kids to claim (should we get takers to sign an insurance waiver?). But then there's this totally bizare contraption that claims to be Admiral Fitzroy's Barometer.
If any of you know Admiral Fitzroy, please tell him to come pick up his barometer, which appears to be filled with a lot of mercury. Actually, I guess our first reader question is: what should we do with the Admiral's barometer?

We're working on getting the basement a bit cleaned up so that we can set up some exercise equipment down there and make the space a bit more useful. Today, while working towards this plan, we came up with a few of our

QUESTIONS FOR FAITHFUL READERS:

QUESTION 1) What can we do with this:

To explain, we think this is probably where the oil tank once was. The rest of the basement floor in this area is finished and painted concrete, but there's this oddly cut out square that goes down to the dirt, and there are some pipes showing. The question is, can we safely fill in this area with concrete?

QUESTION 2) This is an opinion question. There are no right or wrong answers (except that the answers that agree with my answers are righter.) Jake and I have a disagreement regarding lighting in the basement. We are in agreement that we could use a light fixture right inside the basement door to the outside. There is a switch already wired up to an outlet, so it would be a light that you could turn on as you came in from the outside. I think we should get some kind of wall-mounted flat fixture, like a simple tube-kinda thing (like we have elsewhere in the basement). Jake favors this arrangement:

Yes, that is a table lamp suspended from the wall and ceiling rafter with bungee cords.


In other basement news, we're getting the boiler cleaned and checked out tomorrow. Hopefully all is well with it! I'll continue with a few more basement questions later, so stay tuned.

Yard Luxuries

Today I came home to find that Jake had installed some lovely additions to our yard. Jake had set up a few of the solar-powered lights that we bought at Costco today. They're quite lovely:

The tulips have been popping up like mad, as have the other flowers. Such nice surprises. We have a bunch more of the lamps (15 total) to put all over the place.
He also hung the hammock (from Target) under the deck. It's an awesome spot:

Of course, a photo of an empty hammock doesn't really show the tremendous joy that such a thing brings. For that, I give you Carter in the hammock:

One Victory, One Defeat

Regular readers will recall my recent post asking for help with a basement lighting fixture. Shannon's brother Johnny gave us a ton of information and suggestions, but in the end, we relied on Jake's Dad, John, and went with the quick and easy fix. Since the light was (luckily!) in the "on" position, I bought and screwed in another pull-string fixture right into the socket. Voila! A new light for separating darks from lights in the landry room!
A nice, easy fix, woo hoo!

And then, the agony of defeat: the basement window off the driveway continues to plague me. Today I bought an off-the-shelf window well cover. Unfortunately, our window well is unique (like everything at 83 Durant) and the cover doesn't completely cover the well.



And of course, the window well cover would only solve the problem of water falling from above; it still doesn't solve the problem of the water leaking in from the driveway. Sigh. So it's back to the previous temporary solution. This involves a liner of plastic sheeting attatched to the window and concrete with duct tape, then filled part way with spray foam, and then surrounded with bricks. On top of this mess I've put a piece of plastic that the previous owners left. Unfortunately, during the snow this past weekend, Carter stood on top of the plastic, leaving it in its current state:




It's not ideal, but it does seem to be keeping some of the water out, which is better than than leaving it completely open to a waterfall.

Thanks to all our helpful readers for their expertise and advice!

More Infrared Images

In reponse to popular request, and because I just think these images are really cool, I'm including a few more images from our Infrared photo report. You should be able to click on the images to see bigger, full-page versions.

This first one is from our bedroom, and it does a nice job of showing the contrast between an insulated and an uninsulated area of the wall:

This is the outside wall in the upstairs bathroom. Said bathroom does not have a radiator in it (though it does have that mysterious hole in the floor). It also has a non-functioning electric heating element under the sink cabinet. We have hooked up a small electric radiator in this room, but the corner pictured here is rather far away from that heater.


Perhaps the most serious problem that the photos uncovered is the place where the one-story flat roof on the back of the house meets the side wall of the back of the house. The pictures below are from the pink room. The very cold spots on the ceiling and at the top of the wall are at the spot where the flat roof meets the exterior wall. There's also an uninsulated bay in there between the room and a closet.


So it seems that the flashing where the flat roof meets the house has some gaps, or is uninsulated. Interestingly, the bathroom that was the victim of frozen pipes earlier this season is DIRECTLY ABOVE this area of the house. This would seem to explain the freezing.

We also have another cry for help to our readers. We thank all of you who made suggestions to our previous issue (the basement window well). Here's a photo:



This is in the ceiling in the basement laundry room. I know, I know, it's a light socket. That much is clear to me. The problem is, as you may be able to see, the pull-chain that is supposed to turn it on and off is completely missing. It would be very handy to have this bulb operational, to provide more light in the laundry room. Any suggestions on what to do about this?

Small projects; Small Dogs

It was a rather uneventful weekend, but we did manage to get a few things done. Jake fixed the broken utensil drawer in the kitchen using the saw and some scrap wood from our local Ace hardware. I fixed the wiring on an old lamp so that it works (and, at least as far as I know, no longer poses a fire hazard). Looks like seventh grade electrical shop class has finally paid off! Check it out:


In other news, we found last week that Carter was having a hard time with the snow -- it got in between his toe pads, and seemed to be causing him some pain, resulting in pathetic, raised-paw pauses during walks. Here he is, a few days ago, less than pleased about the snow in the back yard:













And here he is, only slightly less pleased today, after I put on his brand new doggie booties. He looked so sad that I didn't even try to put the ones on his back feet.

A Few More Little Things

We continued with the hanging efforts this afternoon. We put up two old maps from Jake's grandfather in the front hallway. There was a bit of trickiness with making them level, but I think they work here!
(I also think the shadows from the lighting fixtures in this picture look really wacky. Note to self: we want new hallway lighting fixtures.)



And I am THRILLED to report that we have finally hung my mirror. It has actually been sitting around, wrapped in a blanket and leaning against the wall ever since we moved from Northampton! It was once attached to the vanity, but after a few moves, the screws that attached it actually broke, so we decided it would be best to hang it. It's a rather heavy mirror, so we never got around to getting appropriate hanging materials. Finally, oh joy, we did it today! The mirror, vanity, and bed, are a matching set that my parents bought at an auction when I was 10; they refinished them in the backyard. I like them quite a lot.

Incidentally, if you look very closely at this picture, you will notice a previously blogged "WHHHHHAAAAAT?" element: the wallpaper in this room is lovely and stripey, with the stripes impressively straight and matched, especially considering the lack of level or straight corners anywhere, and the rather uneven plaster. Despite this great attention to detail on the part of the paperhanger, one step was neglected: PRIMER. This room, at some point in its history, was the same HOT PINK as the main room downstairs. This pink now bleeds through in patches all over the walls. If you look at the picture, you can see some of it. When you're in the room, it sorta seems like maybe your eyes are playing tricks, but no, there are pale pink bleed-throughs all over the place.

Non-Rodent-Related Updates

I promised pictures of the new dining room curtains, so here you go:

We get a nice sunset in the dining room. I ordered new sheers for the pink room, but they're not long enough (sigh). Those are some tall windows. We're also trying to figure out curtains for the front room (currently some hand-me-downs from one of my mom's neighbors) and for our bedroom (very old and faded lavender ones that don't really fit or look right). I hate shopping for curtains. They are never in the right size for our windows.

In lighting news, I recently discovered that the non-functioning light in the laundry room basement isn't a light at all: it's a heater. It is still inoperable (I can't figure out how the switch works) but we're one step closer, I suppose.

It's a "Fostoria" (that name is on it so I looked it up on the internet) and it's mounted on the ceiling, right beside a fluorescent lighbulb fixture. It seems to be some kind of infrared quartz heater. It looks like the one pictured here:
http://www.infraredheaters.com/och.htm
but I don't see anything that looks like the switch box, which looks like this:

It's not clear how this box could turn the thing on or off, so I don't know if works, or if it has a burnt-out heating element, or if it's a fire hazard waiting to happen. For now we just don't touch it. But I guess it's just another one of those WHHHHHHAAAT spots in the house.

let there be light!

Oh how I love the cordless drill. This evening I put up a little halogen light fixture that we bought at Home Despot last week. It has two light settings, which is nice. The counter area under the cabinet, beside the fridge was a little dark. There was already a light under the cabinets on the other side. Unlike some other projects, this one was OK to take on at 9:30 at night. I did manage to drop one of the screws behind the refrigerator, which meant pulling out the fridge (and then cleaning behind it) which slightly lengthened the project. But not too much. And now, light! See how it shines on my cordless drill?

Minor Project Updates

We've been busy with school and Halloween lately, so not much time for projects. We've done a few small things, like putting up lightswitch and outlet covers in the basement. We also put up a nice paper lantern in the kitchen. The photo shows it here attached to the ceiling fan in the kitchen. You can also see our lovely pressed tin ceiling and cheerful kitchen curtain on the window over the sink.

I also did a bunch of weatherizing, including the gaps in the door to the pink room. But that's not really photo-worthy.

The painters are all finished with the outside. We're pleased with how it looks, but a bit frustrated with the contractor. We have paint chips and paint drips everywhere. Time to bust out the shop-vac. The painting contractor is supposed to put up gutters for us, but we haven't heard from him in a while. We are learning that it's hard to get house jobs done. Sigh.