The Kitchen

Living Room, Kitchen and Pantry + Barn

With the heating system out of the way, we were ready to start the kitchen. We slowly began ripping up the old floor and tearing down walls. We still had two years before our five years were up and so we were really in no hurry. We had also been working on the living room and we got that done to the point of just needing carpet. However, it would be a really bad idea to put carpet down with so many other rooms nearby that still needed drywall and sanding. 

Things with the pandemic were getting better and I was back in school teaching. Although I was very happy with where I was teaching (for the past 20 years), things began changing. Greg is six years older than me and I thought it might be a good idea to start looking near the farm for a teaching position. This would allow me to continue to teach until my retirement, while he retired on the farm. I went on Wecan one night and I was shocked to see an opening in Argyle. I immediately applied. The next shocker was,  I got the job!

Now, the kitchen was on fast track. We spent a week there and ripped everything out, put in the electric, and put up all of the drywall. Most of the work is done after 4:30 PM because Greg is back at work. He works virtually and so for the day time hours he is on the computer. This is when I do the painting of the barn or the mudding of the drywall.

Tomorrow, we go back for another week. It is time to get it mudded, sanded, primed and painted. Thank goodness, I can do most of this myself. I will, however, give Greg the yucky job of sanding. He will have the weekend to get this done. We will also enjoy a family celebration for Greg's birthday. Cabinets have been ordered. It's a good thing we saved so much money on the heating system because we are paying for it now. Wood prices have sky rocketed due to the pandemic and our kitchen cabinets are way more expensive than I ever imagined. 

It will be close getting it finished by the start of the school year due to orders taking a long time to fill (also due to the pandemic). However, we will have a kitchen  and a living room (with carpet) by early fall. 

Our lovely kitchen before new drywall.

After drywall.

                                 

                                                   I have also been painting the barn!

                                                                         Before paint

After paint- with more to do.

Left to Do

We have done an insane amount of work on this house so far, however, there is still much to do. With a kitchen and living room, however, it should be pretty comfortable to live in while we tackle the rest of the house. 

We have one more room upstairs to complete and we have a parlor, dining room, foyer and stairwell to do downstairs.  After that comes, siding and finishing it up by restoring it to its original look and putting a new wrap around porch on it. 

The end is in sight and I think we will make our five-year plan.

The Living Room

                                           

The big project in the living room was tearing down the chimney from other rooms and creating a brick wall on both sides of the chimney in the living room. That was after we uncovered the chimney hidden in plaster. I can't wait to carpet it, put up the drapes and place our furniture (which has been ordered).

3 down, 2 to go!

End of Three

Three years ago today, April 27th, Laurie and I bought the farm.  I told her (and at the time I thought she believed me) that in 5 years we would have it completed.  

 When we first went through the Lewis Road farm, it was clear that we would have to deal with the heating system.  It was a hot water system heated with oil.  The chimney was cut off at the roof when the roof was redone, so we would also have to go with a high efficiency furnace.  The pipes were coated with asbestos, which was dealt with early on, but we held off on the rest of the project because of the cost, and we wanted to complete a few things so it looked a bit more like a home.

In 2019 I got quotes for both a new hot water boiler and repair of radiators and pipes, and for a complete forced air system, including air conditioning.  The totals came in at $20,000 for the boiler, and $27,000 for the forced air.

After a few months of talking, research online, and more talking, we decided on the forced air.  With us being gone much of the winter, and knowing that if the power went out there could be an issue with burst pipes and a flooded house, the forced air seemed to make sense.  The difficulty with air conditioning with hot water heat also played into our decision.

The first part was easy.  Measure all the rooms and windows, estimate the insulation, and send it off to have a company named Ductworks figure out the size of furnace and air conditioner, figure out where all the ducts go, and give me an itemized list of what I need.  I also went to Hvacdirect.com to pick out my furnace and air.

Super!

We are ready!

Maybe not......

I admit, that while the excitement of learning something new, and the tons of money we were going to save (it would cost us about 1/3 of the quoted price), was offset by the huge amount of work that I knew was ahead.  We put it on the back burner and completed other tasks.

The Pandemic (written by Laurie)

In March, 2020, the Pandemic hit. Greg lost his job and I went virtual. Struggling to find something to do, Greg decided to tackle the heating system.  He continued to go up to the farm most weeks with Teddy (our dog), through the rest of the school year into summer and all of winter and worked on it. He connected the furnaces in January 2021.  Amazingly, according to me, just like that, it was done.  I could not and still can not believe it. He had never done anything like this before and now, we had heat. I knew there was a reason why I married this man. He can do anything. 

Now, we can truly move on and do other things - next up... the kitchen.

Little by Little... Things are getting done!

Master bedroom with refinished floors.

Getting Somewhere

We are in our second year now of fixing up our farm house.  I must say, we actually have accomplished a lot. Although, there is much more to do, we are making good progress.

We are now only going to the farm to work on it every other weekend as the weather is getting colder. My goal was to finish the upstairs floors but that might need to be the first thing we do in spring.  They are ready to be finished but the weather might be too cold to varnish. 

Next weekend, I hope to put up ceilings in the new downstairs bathroom and another bedroom upstairs. I have to finish mudding the bathroom and Greg has to finish putting down some cement in the shower. Then we will be able to tile. I also want to put up some wallpaper in the upstairs bedroom. So stay tuned for these pics next post.

Time has gotten away from me and this was a draft post that never got published last fall.

Here are some before and after photos of work done so far. The after pics are current and from this spring/summer.

Studio - Before

Studio after the wood floors were refinished (two views).

Bedroom - Before

Bedroom - After

Another view of the Master bedroom.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bedroom - Before

Upstairs Bathroom - Before

Bathroom - After

Upstairs hallway - Before & After - minus the floors.

                                                                                                

We finally got to the floors this summer. Most of the the hallway is completely finished now except for the area in front of the stairs. We will do that when the stairs get refinished (putting in a whole new staircase). One more bedroom will be finished when we go up next week. We opted to do carpeting in that room because we ran out of time with renting the sanders.

Our new downstairs bathroom created from a room. We love having this shower. It is our sanity after a hard days work.

We are using part of the room as a bathroom and the other part as a hallway to the bathroom.

The duct work is in place here and so we put up the drywall for the hallway. I hope to finish mudding it next week, then sand it and paint it. We will be putting a door on the back wall to lead to the outside for our hot tub.

Painting the barn door for the bathroom. I am currently standing in what will be our living room at some point. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is our third year that we have owned this farm and I am still amazed at the beauty of the land as I mow it. I thought I would share some of that beauty with you too.

Our corn field.

Our corn crib, silo and roof top of the house.

Some of our mowed paths.

The rolling hills that surround the property, and Teddy!

Teddy waits for me to catch up.

Progress, Plans, and Ponderings

A bit more than a week ago, a surgeon redesigned the layout of my internal organs.  He removed some original equipment, so there is a fear my resale value has fallen.

But I hired him for the remodel, and agreed with the plan.  I do not plan to sell myself anytime soon anyway.

But sitting at home, giving my body time to heal, gives me time to look at some of the progress we have made recently, look at the plans for the rest of the year, and just let my mind wander about this farm house, the land, and our responsibilities as current owners.  This most likely will stretch out over a few posts (not sure how many yet), so stay tuned!

                                                                    My Biggest Issue

When we first toured the house before purchase, as we looked at all the water damage, the destroyed walls and ceilings, and the old plumbing and heating system, there was one item that really bothered me.  The whole house was original wood work, except for a doorway added to the top of the stairs.

 

I hated that door.  And after thinking about it for a bit, I also realized that the plywood above the stairs was out of place. I needed to take it out.  So as we are fixing up the upper hallway, I was finally able to get rid of that evil door.

Yes, that is the original post where the banister used to end.  It is now missing about 6 inches, and is also missing the top.  But we can deal with this.  The whole stairway has a less cramped feeling now that we have opened it up.  This should increase a bit as we take out the old plaster, which as you can all see, has a few problems, and replace it with thinner drywall. 

Fourth of July Weekend - 2019

Holidays & Birthdays

It has been beautiful summer weather here on the farm.  The biggest news is Liz has arrived, and will be spending the summer, and maybe more at the farm.  As a result, we have added a phone, and yes, even a mailbox.

Mailbox time!

The lettering was done by Laurie.

The Pledl Farm en Plein Air is officially back on the map!

We also spent the first part of the weekend working on the upstairs hallway.  There is a lot of water damage to the plaster, so it was decided to cover it all with drywall.  We stripped off all the moldings and pulled out all the nails to prepare it for new walls.

Prepping the upstairs hallway.

Waiting for the new drywall.  But it will have to wait.... guests have arrived.

To help celebrate Bill's (Greg's Father) 87th birthday, the family arrived on the farm with a tour of the farm and a trip to Monroe for lunch at Bumgardners. We had 12 family members present and the weather was gorgeous. It took away from getting things done, but was worth it. After everyone left, Greg, Liz, and I took a nap. Then, we got down to business.

 As I (Laurie) began putting another layer of joint compound down on the drywall in my studio,

 Greg started yelling my name and asking for some help. Liz stumbled across our visitor, the bat. While Greg tried to stir up the bat Liz knew was in a corner by all of our electrical supplies, Liz and I held up two quilts to block the entrance to the upstairs. No bat emerged. Liz kept hearing it in that same corner and Greg slowly put each item from that corner into bags and boxes to take outside. Eventually, Greg and Liz found the bat hiding in an empty light bulb box and set it out over by the silo. 

After that everyone was very productive and we got about half of the upstairs hallway covered in drywall.

Measuring time!

All done, for today anyway.

It's Spring!

Spring is Finally Here!

Well, we survived the winter. We have been going back to the farm mostly to cut the grass, which takes about 2 hours on a riding mower.  However, I have also been planting and digging up weeds. 

It's great to be back at work on the farm!

I remember when this was nothing but long weeds.

Wildflowers starting in front of the brick wall. Sunflowers growing in the planter.

 This weekend we actually got some work done inside as well. We took out a wall and a window to build a hallway that will lead to a downstairs bathroom. We also built the new frame for the new wall and boarded up the window that we took out. This was a big project, and was the first real "remodel".  The past tasks were just fixing up rooms that needed repair.

You will enter the bathroom through a small hallway (on the left).

This will become our downstairs bathroom.

 With the continued work inside, and the increased gardening outside, this farm is slowly becoming our home.  It is hard to believe that we have only owned it a year, and the amazing progress we have made in that time.

 Memories

This is the upstairs bath we remodeled last year.