The Ceiling I wanted to reuse the original ceiling boards in the house.  The ceiling boards were fragile and the rooms needed lighting.  We addressed the boards first.  They were fragile and needed more care than I anticipated.  We also had to make decisions about lighting in the old house that would make it functional without changing it too much.  We were tightrope walking again. The ceiling boards had been covered with sheet rock and wallpaper.   We had the pleasure of knowing that they needed to be cleaned, de-nailed, and repainted.  Did we want to do this on a ladder?  No, we did not.  Still, standing on a ladder working…

We Begin on the South The small pen on the south side of the house would be our daughter’s bedroom when she came home to visit with her family.  It adjoins the room where she bravely had her wedding pictures taken.  When finished, the idea was for her to have a small bedroom, a sitting room and a private bath. This room would be the first we tackled, but not because it belonged to daughter.  We always started on the south side of the house.  It didn’t matter the project.  We emptied the south side first.  We removed the sheet rock in the south side first.  One reason for this…

Rebuilding the Room By this time, we had ripped up the flooring and torn down the ceiling.  We had removed the clapboard siding and could see daylight under the walls.  This did make it easier to level the room  as we could walk around unimpeded.  However, it was time to put this room back together.  The room was aching for a new floor, windows and maybe even some fresh paint. Floors First The floor in the kitchen/bedroom was a total loss.  When we removed the linoleum, there was plywood covering most of the floor, with little hardwood remaining.  It looked as if there had been a water leak.  We were…

Assessing the Structural Issues Once the room was gutted,  structural repairs had to be made before this kitchen could make progress towards becoming a guest bedroom we would feel comfortable putting a guest in.  The termite damaged wall would have to be replaced.  That wall was supporting the weight of the ceiling in the kitchen and also in the large north pen.  Supports for the roof were also resting on this wall.  I need to remind you that this wall was a series of 1″ thick planks nailed to the sill log at the bottom and to boards in the attic.  The boards were bowing under the weight. To complicate…

The Condition of the Kitchen Our plan was to gently use the old house.  The small pens on the north and south would serve as guest bedrooms.  The small pen on the northwest corner of the house had been converted into a kitchen.  The previous owners removed the door between the kitchen and the large north pen.  They had installed a bank of cabinets along one wall.  When they did this, they replaced a long window with a shorter one that fit above the sink on the north wall.  Sheet rock was installed on the walls and ceiling.  Aluminum windows had replaced the original wooden ones.  We really were focusing…

Is There Any Hope? I thought there was tremendous hope for the house.  Otherwise, I wouldn’t have bought it.  There may have been some hope, but there was absolutely no curb appeal to the yard.  The yard was in bad shape…just like the house.  When we bought it, there were two cars and a truck parked in the yard.  The truck had a tree growing through the bed.  In the back yard, a lawn chair had turned over and been left for so long that a tree had grown through the arms, lifting it three feet off the ground.  On the back edge of the yard, we found the plow…