A tree falls in Huntington

Tuesday, July 7th started off like any other day. We got up and took Amy to the train. We arrived back at the house about 5 min. later. I pulled in to the driveway and and took Jake out of the car. I happened to glance over in to the front yard and there it was - our 30 foot apple tree had fallen while we were out. It landed in a perfect spot nowhere near the house and away from any power lines. Talk about luck. It was actually leaning towards the street but still, no damage except to the small area of grass surrounding the trunk - the roots became uprooted and pulled it up.

A few months earlier we had gotten an estimate to take the tree down from some tree guys working at our neighbors. It was great price but we didn't schedule just then as it wasn't a priority at the time. We knew the trunk was rotted and it would need to come down soon but the tree decided to force the issue. Turns out woodpeckers had also their way with it as the trunk was riddled with holes. It was also covered in fungus - it was ready to go.

So we called up the tree company and they arrived first thing in the morning the next day. The whole job - cutting, hauling and stump grinding took all of 40 minutes. They did a fine job and didn't destroy the lawn. We're left with a large mound of mulch for now.

Amy would like to plant another tree. She likes birch. I'm in favor of just grading the area and planting grass. We'll see who wins.

Please enjoy the pics of the carnage and carting below.

APPLE TREE DOWN!












Once vertical, now horizontal.












Thankfully no damage.












Cutting up the carcass.












Grinding the stump.












Remains.

Not much happening lately, 'cept our neighbors cutting down trees.

Well, we have not done a whole lot to the house lately. We've done some more clearing around the yard and I finally cut the grass after about two weeks due to the rain. We got an outdoor set so we can utilize our deck. We've also finally taken the next step towards getting some much-needed electrical work done. We picked a company and after some revisions to the original estimate (read - more $$) we're ready to sign the contract and get things started. And oh, I still need to install the air conditioners - can't believe it's July 1st and we haven't needed them yet.

Our neighbors have been busy though - in the last month or so they've removed two very large trees from their yard. There was one in the front that was wreaking havoc with their driveway - the roots were buckling the pavement. The trunk was also right in the way of a low retaining wall they had planned so out it came. That particular one looked to be at least 75 years old. The second one straddled their backyard and the neighbors behind them. This one looked like it may have even been older than the one in the front. Frankly it was quite sad to see these trees go, almost made no sense. We have all decided jointly to clean out out the space between our garage and their proposed retaining wall which is currently overrun with thick brush and weeds. Can't wait for that! See pics below.

In other news, I am now 'working'. What this means is that I go into the shop on Saturdays from 8 to 1 and on Tuesdays for most of the day. After some initial stumbles and an ensuing crisis of confidence, I've finally started to feel a little more comfortable. I hope to be getting more responsibility in the coming weeks as I get more time under my belt. Truthfully I have never really had to climb out of any sort of hole and make something work like I have when I decided to change careers. Hopefully I can continue on an upward arc and start making some money. I guess when I'm able to bring my tool box in is when I know I'll have achieved my goal.

Hope to have more updates in the coming weeks as the electrical stuff gets done. Though it will not really alter the appearance of the house, it will be a big upgrade and should ultimately increase the value of it down the road. Hooray home improvement!

Neighbor's tree - front 1.

















Neighbor's tree - front 2.












Neighbor's tree - front 3.

















Neighbor's tree - front 4.

















Neighbor's tree - back 1.

















Neighbor's tree - back 2.

















Neighbor's tree - back 3.

















Neighbor's tree - back 4.

More yard work and tree trimming

Amy and I have been doing yard work steadily the last few weekends. We're trying to get things to a 'baseline' where we know what's what and how it grows. We're still cleaning everything up too, there's just not enough time to do it all in one shot. We have a lot of yard to cover but we're making progress.

This weekend's adventure in landscaping mostly involved tree trimming. We finally removed the large, overgrown shrub from the front of the house and cut down the branches to a short stump. Our neighbor lent us his sawzall and it got plenty of use.

We also trimmed a bunch of the low-hanging branches on our pear tree in the front yard. We've debated whether or not to get rid of this tree since it's grown all sorts of willy-nilly - the trunks are growing in all different directions and there's still some branches hanging over the roof. Once again our neighbor Dan came through and loaned us a medieval-looking tool to trim branches while remaining on the ground. It's a curved saw blade that looks like a scythe. It's on the end of a long pole. You reach up over the top of the branch you want to cut and start sawing. It works real well, I was able to cut some pretty thick branches that would normally have been out of reach. The long handle flexes and allows for a fluid motion. Cool!

Now that we've removed some of the more unsightly and overgrown vegetation, we've come to the conclusion that we may need to spruce up the outside of the house. The brick is dirty and covered in bird crap and the shingle siding is looking dated. The old landscaping has had it too and could use some serious updating. The azaleas have bare spots and are looking pretty scraggly. The trash alcove looks like and afterthought too. We may look into some new siding and we're likely going to need some new roof trim and definitely a new walk. We'd also like to frame the edge of the yard where it meets the street with some sort of stone perimeter. Perhaps this will all get rolling when the large electrical pole comes down off the peak of the roof. Add it to the list.

As per usual, here are a few pics of the action.

Limbs Be Gone!

















It's raining pear tree branches.












Into the belly of the beast.

















Ye Conqueror of Tree Limbs!












Bloomin' rhododendron












This bud's for you












Bloomin' dogwood

Cleaned out the garage

Last Thursday, our friend Erin came out to babysit Jake for us. This allowed me some time for myself. I made the best of the rare opportunity of free time sans baby and took the first step towards the completion of my garage mahal/man cave - I cleaned everything up. There wasn't too much in there per se, but it was becoming a black hole of disorganization. Things were being set down wherever, tools and other stuff were taken out and never put back etc., etc. The whole thing was starting to become a mess so I made sure that it didn't get away from me.

I basically moved everything out into the driveway, swept all the old leaves and dirt up, then shot some water down along with some cleaner/degreaser. I scrubbed with a stiff broom and pushed it all down the driveway. Once dry, everything made it's way back inside in an orderly fashion.

It's nowhere near any sort of completion at this time. The plan for now is that whoever does eventually re-wire our house, the panel will likely go in the garage. I will have it wired up at that time as well so it doesn't make sense to do too much right now before the wiring goes in. It is giving me something to look forward to though.

Currently, I am debating on whether or not to coat the floor. The images of these products make everything look so clean and sanitary but there's a certain charm to a rough concrete floor. One of the previous owners actually cared enough to put down what looks like some sort of rubberized coating, but it's chipped up pretty bad. There's also a slight downward slope towards the back of the garage which would surely end up in large cracks in the coating. Plus there's many long and large cracks to be filled before anything gets put on top of it. I'm thinking I'd rather be wrenching on the Dart rather than sanding a concrete floor. Floor coatings are also pretty expensive. I suppose as long as the rough floor is relatively clean it should be livable. I have a vision of the ultimate garage and it definitely includes an epoxy-coated floor. We'll see!

All up in your grill

We've purchased a new grill here at 31 Sherman, a Weber Spirit 3 burner. It's killer. Cooks evenly and is a breeze to use. Nice construction and simple controls. Amy also got us some grill tools - a fish/vegetable basket, scraper and a cover to keep it dry. Hopefully it will last a good long time.

My birthday was Saturday May, 2. We had some friends over for a low-key affair. Spag and Myk helped me put the grill together. Well, Myk ended up doing most of it. Took a little under an hour. The kids played in the box afterwords.

Pics below.

Removing parts from box. Master builder Myk on your right, back to camera.













Proud Papa


















Birthday crew, first backyard BBQ at 31 Sherman.













Spag needs a timeout

Happy mowing

Well, I've come full circle. I have not cut the grass for a LONG time, probably somewhere around 13-15 years. Funny how you miss things like that when you live in the city. It was something I'd have to do weekly basically from the time I was about 8 until I moved in my 20's.

I never minded it all that much, there's a certain zen aspect to it. I definitely appreciate a well cared for lawn. We never really had one growing up, it was a never a priority in our house. My mom and dad didn't spend a whole lot of time beautifying the yard since they didn't really like being around each other much. I guess maybe that's where I found I could do my part. Leave it to my parents who couldn't care less about yard work to somehow foster in me a sense of pride about my grass.

The lawn at our house will be a work in progress. It appears to have been mildly neglected over the years. It's really not all that bad but it needed to be cleaned up and needs some turfbuilder. It was difficult to get all the old debris and dead grass up. I did what I could with a rake, but I'm not happy with the results. I wanted to get a motorized de-thatcher to get rid of all that stuff but I never got to it. It seems to be growing OK though. The first mow was a little off the top, just to trim down the new growth. You don't want to go too low the first few times. Hopefully i can ghet some Scotts down before the end of the week.

Funny thing about the picture here. jake had been giving me a hard time all day with eating - he's basically refusing to eat what's being offered to him while thropwing tantrums and making a huge mess. Typicall one-year old stuff, but not what I want to be doing with myself all day. It was making me mniserable. Unfortunately, I took it out on Amy when she got home. We had a spat and she sent me away to go walk around or something. I decided it was time to mow. About halfway through, I catch a glimpse of her leaning out the office window taking pictures of me. She kind of made me laugh, but I was still pouting. She yelled something at me like "I saw you smile you jerk". Guess she got me.

Nothing like a good mow to get yer ya ya's out.

Yard work and electrical estimates

Not much going on at the homestead recently. Just doing some clean up work around the yard as the weather allows. The previous owner was an elderly lady who must have had a hard time keeping up with yard maintenance. We did learn from neighbors she was outside doing stuff and that she had landscapers come every now and again but most everything is overgrown and unkempt. The beds look like there are a few years of leaves in them, the bushes and shrubs were out of control and the fence between the front and back yard needs some serious help. We've already described the ivy removal in detail in a previous post.

I raked the lawn as best I could to try and get some of the dead grass and debris up to aerate the soil. We need to get some fertilizer and seed down to thicken and green it up. The lawn's actually not too bad but could be better. When I look at our neighbor's yards, I get a little sad since theirs are all so suburban-lawn perfect.What I'd really like to do is put that spreader that we haggled over at the house closing to use one of these days...

I'm also sorry to say there are no pics. Didn't think to break out the camera for such mundane activities and there's really no discernible difference in the appearance of the yard at this point.

In other news, we have now obtained three estimates for electrical work. We have been advised by my dad to get a fourth one since there was such disparity between all of them. Hopefully we can get all this ironed out soon so I can start fixing up the garage.

Hang in there for the next update, hopefully that one will be a little more exciting.

Hole in the ceiling

The day after the tank abandonment was March 28. We had a big one-year-old birthday party for Jake. All our friends came by and we had a regular rip roar.

Beforehand though, I needed to remedy the large-hole-in-the-ceiling-situation before guests began arriving. I managed to finish it up with a little help from Amy. We basically recycled an older fixture we had from our apartment in Brooklyn which we took with us when we moved. It's from Ikea but definitely fits our mid-century style well with it's perforated edge and diffused light.

Note final result below.

Oil Tank abandonment

Out here in the suburbs, we have to deal with all manner of irritating and costly renovations. When we bought our house, our inspector had informed us that we would be inheriting a 1,000 gallon in-ground oil tank. Now, this normally wouldn't be an issue (I could give a rat's ass where the tank is myself) except when the EPA reaches their greasy little paws into your business. If and when we decide to sell the house, the future owners may opt to have the soil around the tank tested by the EPA for contamination due to a leaky tank. If the soil is found to be contaminated, all the tainted dirt surrounding the tank will be dug up, put into 55 gallon drums and trucked off somewhere down south. Once there, apparently there's an environmental plant that burns the contaminants out of the soil. Then, the dirt is put BACK IN to the drums, trucked back to your house and put right back where it came from. Whoever is the current owner of the house (namely US) will incur ANY AND ALL COSTS associated with such an operation which can be upwards of $75-100,000 when all is said and done. No thanks!

An oil tank abandonment is basically just that - you're abandoning your in-ground tank for a new one either above ground or in your basement which by doing so basically absolves you from any future testing. During the negotiations to purchase the house, we were able to obtain a credit on the final price since we knew this was something that we were going to have to do. We could have asked for the soil to be tested, but we took the credit instead and went ahead and did the abandonment. We now also have a certificate of abandonment to show anyone who asks. They'd really only have to look in the basement at the new tank to figure it out, but it's cheap insurance against the enviro-nazis

Basically what happens is this: a crew comes to your house. They find your tank's filler tube and dig until they hit the top of the tank. Then, they cut the top off of it and fill it with sand. The old, now sand-filled tank is resealed and the dirt is back filled. The last step is to locate and install a new tank and hook it up to your current heating system. The whole thing took about 5-6 hours, almost two of which were spent waiting for the sand truck to arrive.

The crew that came to do the job were swell enough to allow me to take some pictures while it was all going on. They must have thought I was a little kooky until I explained to the head guy what I was doing. He seemed to understand, which made me feel a little less awkward.

If you've never seen what a tank abandonment looks like or had no idea that this type of thing is even done, today is your lucky day. I've provided a bunch of photos of the process to once again enlighten and entertain our readers. Cheers.

Removing remaining oil in original tank.












Digging around the filler neck. Bye bye Packasandra.













Locating and drilling hole in block for new filler tube.













Thar She blows!













Filling the old girl full of sand.













Action shot of sand filling. Note depth and scope of hole.












Brand-new 275 gallon tank in our basement, plumbed and ready for years of service. Note old, inaccurate fuel level gauge on the wall above the tank, now just for show.

New Additions

After being a staging area for painting supplies and equipment, the living room is finally taking shape. Last week our fancy modern furniture arrived by truck. The table came at 6:30 am. I was still in bed when the doorbell rang, I was all groggy and half-awake and here comes our table. I had never experienced anything like that before, very strange to get a delivery of anything so early in the morning. The couch is covered in plastic right now in an attempt to ward off our scratch-happy cats. I'd like to keep it claw-mark free for a few days at least though the cover will have to come off at some point. We hope they don't tear it to shreds.

But anyway, who knew I'd become such a design/furniture nerd? It's in my blood somehow, probably handed down by my parents. I grew up with a Knoll/Saarinen table and tulip chairs and all sorts of modern furniture in our house. I never gave it a second thought until a few years ago. Mostly, I just like the way it looks as opposed to things you get from your generic home furnishing stores like Pottery Barn etc. But I do enjoy reading about it and learning about where the ideas come from and the impact it had on design as a whole. Definitely fits with my idea of re-thinking basic items and giving them a unique twist. Plus, modern design is just plain cool when you take the time to think about it.

Thankfully, Amy and I seem to like the same types of things, so she is willing to go along with my design-snob ideas.

You'll also notice that she put away a good portion of her books into the glass cabinets, a fairly large and time-consuming undertaking in itself. I think she did a great job.

Anyway, here it is.

Out with the old

We are continuing to remove all the remnants of old-lady accouterments. The fireplace used to be home to a fugly, pseudo-baroque mantel piece that neither Amy nor I liked in any way, shape or form. We planned to get rid of it early on and we've gotten to getting to it. We needed to take care of it because we need to finish up painting. The plan was to re-paint the fireplace so down it came and went out with the next day's trash.

The fireplace is also getting a new treatment. Whoever painted the house last must have really got a good deal on the antique white paint because everything including the fireplace was coated with this paint. The brick wasn't actually 'painted' per se, more like washed over. Not sure if it was a lame attempt at some sort of style or just a half-assed job but in any event it looked like crap. Covering up the hack job required a coat of primer and two coats of semi-gloss white.

After two months, the painting is finally nearing completion. Really, there's only the dining room, doors and the trim in the office left to do. There's also the two bathrooms but we haven't taken down the wallpaper in there so they don't count just yet. I'm too lazy to take on the office right now, I can only hope it gets done sometime this year. The dining room should be finished relatively soon.

Enjoy the photos of the fireplace transformation below.

Ye olde 'before' shot













Fugly mantelpiece













4 screws and it's gone













The Great 31 Sherman Cover-Up 0f 2009


















Best looking painter ever

Ivy menace

It's still the dead of winter but Amy and I decided that we needed to begin tackling some of our outdoor 'issues'. Amy's parents were in town and her dad brought his power warsher (Pittsburghese) so we could clean up the dirty brick. Unfortunately we never got to it because of the cold but we did manage to eradicate the ivy menace from the outside of the house.

Since we don't live at Wrigley field, we're still scratching our heads as to why someone actually planted ivy behind the house because it basically had overgrown everything within it's reach. Ivy is evil, hardy and strong. The roots were everywhere - all along the foundation, up the brick (stuck to it like glue), under the siding, up under the roof overhang and probably into the attic. The downright evil weed was choking the azaleas. Worst of all it was covering up our living room window. There was also a bunch growing up the front of the house too. Ridiculous.

So we had at it. We tore it up from the ground, cut, pulled, ripped and hacked it all to bits. We filled 11 contractor bags with all the stuff we yanked out. It took hours and we just finished before dark. See the pics below.

Am I Evil? Yes I Am!


















Weeds B. Gone!












Room With A View












Room With A Better View

I've seen the light

... and it's ugly.

We have begun to tackle the lighting in the house. I removed the hallway light fixture to reveal a large, gaping hole. Whoever installed the previous fixture had cut a very large opening around the electrical box and covered it with the base of the fixture, a kind of non-descript brass n' glass thing from the cheap rack at Ye Olde Big Box Home Store.

So now I get to make a trip back to said Big Box Home Store to get materials to patch the hole and install our modern Ikea fixture we took from our apartment.

I would like to get a set of the Cove from Satellite Modern Lighting, but cost may put them on hold for a bit until we're more flush with cash.

Cove




















Original crappy hall fixture.












Hole left by original crappy fixtue

Painting continues

We have decided on Valspar Woodlawn Silver brook for our main color throughout a good portion of the house. It's not quite silver in the traditional sense, but has more of a blue tint to it. It's a lovely hue. It will be complemented on the opposite wall by another Valspar color called Nostalgia, a kind of slate blue.

Here I am painting the back wall of the living room. Yes, I am wearing rubber gloves and yes, I used tape to mark the edges so I get a nice crisp line.