Beebe -- our 1935 Bungalow on Baker Street.

[Lily left the valley]

Yesterday...Sean was home and quite sick. Either feverish or cold sweating. So I told him to take it easy because he has a lot of work he's scheduled for in the coming weeks.

We knew we'd need to move the stove further down to make room for the fridge. The fridge did arrive on time, but when we saw the box we were terrified. It looked like elephants used it as a rugby ball. By some sheer miracle, only one tiny dent was on a back corner, the rest of the surface was unscathed. One "oops", was I forgot the wall outlet where we were planning to put it was an old two prong. And...if I remember right, may be one of the few old K&T lines. So...it's now in an awkward spot to the only GF plug in that room. I need to check the wiring to see what our short term plug in options are right now.

Speaking of the stove...I did finally talk to the last remaining employee at House of Webster who knows about the stoves they no longer make. Really nice guy, I have to say. I now know the method to get the stove working, but...it didn't. We did some trouble shooting with various bits, and now I have to check all the other connections to make sure none of the wires are lose or outright fried. They did have an electrical manual with the schematics, and I bought one so I'd have it. If I can't find an obvious problem with the stove portion's wiring, the manual may help clear up with the issue is. Not sure how long it will take to get here. The sad thing is they are really trying to get away from telling folks how to make it work and selling parts for such. (Dennis did give me some part #s for some possible issues other than wiring connections which I was so grateful for as well.) I asked why, and he said that was a decision they had made, so as to my suggestion that he should teach someone else there what he knew before he retired, he said there's no plan for such. In fact, they've stopped ordering new replacements for the stoves, and are only selling off what they have in stock.

Speaking of electric...we have the washer, and now we have an appliance extension cord we got from one of our old neighbors at the apartment which may allow me to use it now until we can afford to get an electrician to run the dedicated to code line. I have to check the specs on the washer to make sure the outlet can handle the washer for certain, especially since the sump pump is also plugged into the outlet in question, but from my discussion with the washer guy he thought our washer (dead basic and smaller tub size than some) would be ok on a 15. I'm still going to read the specs on the plate so I know for certain. I just want this for a short term fix if it's safe so I don't have to take laundry back to the apartment. We'll still run the dedicated 20 line later no matter what.

Oh..and kitchen! I almost managed to pull up 1/3 the vinyl before realizing the time yesterday and running to the local electrical and plumbing shop, only to remember as I saw the closed sign that they do close at 4pm, and I arrived at 4:08pm. So I'll be heading back over there in a bit to pick up a longer stove cord so we can move the stove all the way over. I would have pulled up more, but I realized now that I'm past the edges bit, I can pull up chunks that are still in pretty good shape without it breaking up, so I was using wax paper to cover the edges of the adhesive overlay bits. I might be able to Craig's List "free" most of the flooring rather than send it to the dump, which would be great. We also still have one opened box of the planking that was overage, so there's that as well I might be able to pass on to someone who would love it rather than dump it all. The reality of keeping the lino in the kitchen rather than use it to patch in the dining is looking slim. The cloudy spot is quite large, and there is a lot of cracking--even some bits missing from the cracks themselves. Nothing too dangerous trip wise, because that spot is where we put the bee rug in front of the sink, but when I finish removing the rest of the vinyl, we'll be better able to asses its keepability for that room instead of using it as patches.

On the way back from the closed shop, I first went to the building permit folks at City Hall to make sure there really is no code about how close to a window a stove can be. Turns out, there is none for Gardner. So what we want to do is fine code wise. I also talked up the stove a storm to the point that the ladies in the office looked it up and they both love it.

After that, I swung by the apartment to pick up my garden wagon and whatever bits I could fit in there. Oh..silly me....the bag of small landscaping rocks was just a little bit too much. (40 lbs. on top of everything else I had crammed in there.) I may have mentioned this before, but the path from our old apartment to the new old house is all uphill--including the steep driveway at the apartment. By the time I got to the cross street, I was already winded and my thighs complaining, and I knew the worst hill was the last block to the house. I caved, and called Sean asking him to come pick me up. I should probably mention too that the temperature LEAPED to 85°F yesterday. So that wasn't helping either, although it humored me greatly to be maneuvering around the piles of snow still about that were blocking bits of the sidewalks too. That hot...yet there's this mound of snow right in my way. I felt really bad doing it, but he came and got me and then gave me that "no wonder" look when he went to lift the bag of stones. As soon as we took the rocks out, I realized I would have managed just fine if I hadn't been so silly. Poor Sean. He wasn't mad, though. I took extra care to baby him for the rest of the day after that. He seemed better by the time he went to bed, but I don't think he's over it yet.

One nice thing I had forgotten when grabbing that stuff was the pair of straight shaft Stanley pry bars. Perfect for lifting those concrete slabs. Remember, I had bought and was given a large batch of tools from the folks we bought the stove from, and they went into the garage for the short term, so I haven't burned them into my memory as to what tools I have yet.

One sadness is that I was unfortunately right in that the ridiculous overdosing of herbicide done by the landlady's boyfriend to the perennials I'd planted at the apartment, none of them came back--not even the day lilies. So I kept the garden tools there for a later move over for nothing. I even told him at the time that he was spraying too much, and he seemed annoyed because he thought he was doing me a favor. Yes, spraying so much that there are puddles of it on the beds? I just want to mention that this guy is a landscaper by trade.

Might post more later after I run my afternoon errands. Trying to beat the rain we might get today. Oh, and the temperature turned right around is supposed to hit a high of only 68°F today (although I just checked, and it says it's currently 71). High of 37 tonight, which is a huge drop from last night. It was actually stuffy on the second floor even well past dark last night. I should have cracked a few storms, I think. But the temp isn't supposed to be near as high for over a week again, so

[Lily left the valley]

So when I went to get the cord the other day for the stove, I asked anyway even though I already knew the answer regarding the washer and pump on the same 15 circuit outlet. (FWIW, the washer is only a 10A.) The fella who helped me said that although the appliance extension cord could work, since sumps can surge a bit in amperage when they kick in, there was a high chance that with both going at the same time (washing drains into a dedicated line the sump pumps as well as the well it's in) that it would blow the circuit. Now if our sink wasn't cracked, I could cheat it and have the waste run into a plugged sink, and then drain after...but...cracked sink.

So we are going to have to have someone come in to run the dedicated line as soon as possible. I know June will be a good catch our breath time because it's a three paycheck month. I'm hoping I can find someone who will let me run the rough, and they can check my work and do all the finish stuff the permit needs to be code passable to save on labor costs.

The boiler is still overfilling. I'm not happy about it, but I'm emptying it a bit each day until we can afford to have someone else come trouble shoot it. Because it was so warm the other day, I didn't check the water level because we didn't have any reason for a heat call, and ...water had seeped out the one wet return vent.

I think I found the doorbell problem--the wires were cut before the transformer. I need to take a pic of what I think is the transformer to be sure.

I also found our water cut off, and despite foam wrap, the entire stretch of incoming water pipe was sweating like crazy until it neared the boiler yesterday. The shut off is so rusted, I fear if I try to use it that it may just snap. I need to find my brushes set so I can see how surface the rust is before attempting to use it. I think I still have an old water shut off bar for the city cap if need be if it does break. Or maybe I'm thinking of the gas one I found today. (Looks like a giant hex wrench.) I wonder if I should call them ahead just in case?

I also found, while I was retracing doorbell wire, a very large single decorative tile on top of one of the rotting cabinets in the cellar. I hadn't noticed it before because it was also mostly black (like the cabinet) and was sort of hidden behind the top trim until you drew close to the cabinet. (Did I mention how many cellar lights need to be repaired? There's a reason I have a flashlight right by the cellar door all the time.) I'm going to try to clean it up a bit and post an image. There was so much cellar wall detritus on it that I couldn't see it clearly enough to get a good idea of what it might be. My first thought was it is for a fireplace surround, but that might be all the talk about tile on Phil's fireplace thread. I'll make sure to take measurements so folks clearly understand the scale. I've never seen a single tile this big just sitting around before. I only noticed one edge chip in one corner, but it didn't seem terrible...just...character.

I posted elsewhere about the stove repairs, and also finishing pulling up the vinyl in the kitchen.

When I went to Chairtown Lumber, our supermarket guy was there, and now I have a name--and it was one of the ones that I thought might be it. Hooray brain. We talked about a few things house repair wise, and of course replacing the threshold came up. He asked if I had a picture on me, which I didn't, but...I said...can you go online? There's one there. He wasn't familiar with this site, but he is now! He did show me an oak variant they have for exterior doors. It's out of our budget right now, but definitely the direction I want to go in when I can. We also talked about the porch related issues for the water intrusion, and even the layers of siding came up when he noticed how deep the framing was.

One thing they didn't have, which I was surprised by because they sell the rakes is replacement tines (? word choice) for the wood rake I got from the 2nd hand shop. I mentioned my older house book and the repair method they mentioned with something other than bamboo, but couldn't remember what it was, so I had to look it up when I got home--strips of hardwood, bent with a screwdriver after being boiled to shape the grab edge. So next time I'll know what to ask for! The rake overall is in good shape, but I think there's two that are broken.

When I posted in our recipe spot, I realized just how much baking I've done since we've moved more kitchen stuff over--and all of it in our toaster oven. So far between Sean and I myself (sometimes together), we've made oatmeal chocolate chip & walnut cookies, banana bread, Peace Cake and just recently, chewy cocoa brownies, with walnuts on my side. (Sean doesn't mind them, but doesn't like them as much as I do.) The last, I meant to make molasses cookies, but I remembered he doesn't like those as much as I do. So we tried the brownie recipe, which I'd meant to before, but never got around to it. So next time I make cookies, I'll make molasses for me, and Boston cookies for him. I'm hoping the temp fix I did to our stove holds, and maybe I can bake a little more typical sized batches now that we're not limited to only certain baking dishes because the toaster oven isn't tiny, but it's not super big either. When the kitchen is finally cleaned up in full (and I'm getting closer), I hope to finally tackle a soft pretzel recipe I found, and I'd like to make some bread because I haven't baked a non quick bread in a very long time.

I meant to go back to my favorite second hand store, but the temperature had dropped down again and the wind was cutting a bit too much. Good thing I waited, because it took me a while to fiddle with the stove.

It's supposed to be a bit warmer today, so I'm hoping to at least rake up the front portion of the lawn. I have to adjust some rain gutter rocks I put in place because the downspouts are completely missing, so we're losing dirt on the driveway side like crazy. One poor plant (maybe a hosta?) is barely not sliding along down the riverlet. (We had a steady rain the other day.)

I need to take a picture of them now that the snow is gone, but it seems Beebe used to have a very different porch with cut stone stairs. Many of them are still present at the base of the porch. There is something defiantly growing behind (against the foundation) and in the cracks of them, but I don't know what for sure yet. Might be daffodils. The leaves are a bit long for crocus. I might--later--see if I can move those stones to make steps from the driveway to the front walk. Not sure if we'll have enough, but time will tell on that.

After I get the raking done--it'll be back to cleaning up the kitchen. I do have some seeds for flowers somewhere, but they can wait. Temps are still dropping to freezing for a bit, so no rush on those.

If I can swing it time wise, I might head to the 2nd hand store to look for a few things, and hopefully grab a few bits at the apartment I missed when I went to grab my gardening stuff on the way back. (No kneeler=wet knees)

[Lily left the valley]

I realized I never named my favorite 2nd hand shop, and the name is shorter than typing that all out every time. It's called PYCA, and since Sean got home early from work, we headed on over as the tail end of a round of local errands.

Oh...speaking of errands, I don't know how I forgot Easter is this Sunday. One of our stops was to the local candy shop, Priscilla's. Sean likes their orange slices and we were getting low. (It's one of our indulgences.) Not surprisingly, the place was packed. I'm hoping maybe some chocolate eggs are on after holiday sale next week.

Back to PYCA, although I remembered my cloth tape measure today, which let me know a bamboo shade I'd been eyeing for our bedroom was just a bit too narrow, I had forgotten to measure out the base of the wood slat basket I have, as it needs a new bottom. Currently, it's a lousy plastic one, and I was hoping to find a mis-matched layer cake pan around the same size. No measurement, not even worth eyeballing and hoping to find a match.

We did pick up an amazingly rust free metal hand crank mixer with a wood piece in the hand hold and a fun carry case to put things in complete with webbed buckle tension straps. Sean will likely use it for his miniatures. There was another of a similar type, but we were already buying one thing that wasn't a pressing need. So we left it to fate if we'll get it later. I used to have another crank mixer, but neither of us has any idea where it got off to or even when. It's probably in the same place my old sifter is. I do have an electric hand mixer, but sometimes you just need something with a bit more umph than a whisk for a quick mix, and pulling out all the bits for the electric seems so silly. (Ok, ok, it's also loads of fun to crank those too if the parts are in smooth working order. I admit it.)

There was a fun ceramic pie keeper we both liked that looks like a pie, but...not pressing although sometimes the sole display stand/baked goods keeper (which converts to a punch bowl!) we have is not enough if I get on a baking spree.

I did spy a one sided mirrored brass peephole, complete with the cover for the inside. Apparently it was a sales sample, which explained the mounting piece. Left that to fate, as right now we can't use it, but when we replace that side door..you bet we'll get it if it's still there.

She did have a table mount grinder, but the housing was a lighter plastic, so I'm going to hold out until I can find one with metal housing.

She also had a Mahjong set that was in beautiful shape, but way out of our budget and, again, not pressing need.

I did find two doorbells, one school style and the other a small bell. Tucked both into my memory banks for later if our bell is just dead after I can figure out what's going on with the wires.

Sean did bring some interesting news home, seems one of the FT carriers is looking to transfer to a PO closer to her home, so he might yet get a FT route this year afterall. Time will tell.

Oh, and whatever he had cold wise, I have. My feet were dragging all day and I didn't get half the stuff done I'd hoped to. The weather will be warming up progressively until their predicted 81°F on Sunday. So I'm sure I'll get to that raking soon enough.

I also need to look at the three immediate drip issues with the plumbing: both traps in the bathroom sinks and the big dial style on/off (can't think of the name) for the shower. I really don't like that style, but..as long as it's just in need of a washer, that's all I get at the plumbing store next week. Not sure if it's the same with the P traps--I'm hoping so.

It's hard to believe our first mortgage payment is mere weeks away. Time is whizzing by, and that's much better than, say, a portion of our gutter whizzing by.

[Lily left the valley]

So Sean's cold got passed along to me, and I've been pretty sluggy the last few days. He just got home from work a bit ago, and after he's had a chance to sit a bit, hopefully we'll move the curb find he brought home yesterday that is currently still sitting in the dining room until we can move some stuff around to get it to its home.

The snow is pretty much gone now, and all the neighbors are starting yard cleanup, and I need to get on that as we still have a lot of leaves and such. The grass is starting to green up a bit here and there, and I'm hoping with a good raking, that will help fluff up the tufts so it will be easier to do a first mow to at least knock down the tufts for now.

The kitchen clean up feels like it's taking ridiculously long, but the lifting of the floor did eat some time up, and wow the kitchen really isn't clean at all. I think I've 1/4 filled a medium garbage bag just with crumbs and dry goods I've swept up from under the sink and in all the cabinets.

Oh, and green related, apparently someone in the past kept food coloring on the topmost shelf, and it spilled or froze and leaked at some point--not sure which. The lino shelving cover was drenched in it, as it seeped through the unfinished side and got soaked up from the paper base. So much water trying to rinse that out. I still don't think I got it all, because I dried it on top of paper towels and sure enough...still bleeding out. I won't be putting anything wet up there, so I figured it's good enough for now.

I'm a bit frustrated in how dirty filthy the kitchen was. It really needs a deeper clean than I have time to spare right now. I'm trying to live with surface cleaning and some scrubbing in seams for now, but I know I'll be coming back to several places later.

The shelving paper on the metal cabinet under the sink has also been taking a bit longer to remove than I original thought it would. That in part was due to the fact that there is some surface rust, and contrary to what I'd thought (the rust would help the paper come off easier), instead the adhesive worked into every last rusty surface and clings for dear life. Thankfully, I have a small hand steamer, so that's been helping. Just took me a while to find the right box where it had been packed.

Since the rust isn't awful, I'm going to just surface clean it for now, and with the kitchen in general, we're going to keep living with what's there until we figure out what needs doing. I think I mentioned before that the metal has been painted at least twice before on top of the original white, so we're not sure whether to get it done right once, and if so, back to the original, or wait until we decide what to do color wise in there. If we do pick a non white, it will be period for that room, we're still not sure what color due to the flooring wait out.

Lots of little bits, as moving in always is, and I keep feeling the tug of the lawn/gardens outside. I'm going to try to get some done out there today if I can because we're due for a few days of rain, but we'll see how things go with Sean's curb find getting moved today.

Pic later, just not sure when. It's just one of those days.

[Lily left the valley]

So the drizzle started early, and that's when Sean was all, "oh, I picked up the art and the card table set at the apartment today. So that all had to come out of the PT. Then it was dinner time, and then rearranging the office. Sean inherited my hodge podge desk; I got my "good enuff for now" folding "dining" table back so we actually have one in the dining room again; and this is what he found curbside and gave me as a belated birthday present.


He knows I love steel desks. He spotted this when he was out doing his route, and the couple that were curbing it were closing up their workshop. This was one of the last bits to go, and fortunately it wasn't out there too long so it was fairly clean, despite both being in a shop and outside for that day only.

There's no maker's mark, so no idea who made it or when. We had to get the legs off to fit it down the hallway, which was no easy task as the bolts were shallow cheap slotted metal and just wanted to staaaay put or strip--and not because of rust, they were simply overtightened soft metal bolt heads.

For now, this is wonderful and I am very happy. Who knows when later, I'll build our desks for in here, and this will go in the workshop that still only exists in my mind and sketchbook.

In case anyone wonders, the blanket on my chair was made by my grandmom for my dad when he was at LaSalle.

Kira's looking uptight because she was not happy with all the moving around. She spends most of the time in the office, so I think she considers it her room, so how dare we move stuff around just when she was getting used to it?

[awomanwithahammer]

Lily, for some reason, we're not authorized to view the picture!

What a great find, though. We found a wonderful couch on the curb while out biking. I couldn't get home fast enough to get the truck and go back to get it! Almost brand new, with denim slip covers. Later that evening, I found where they had put a CL "curbside alert" on it.

I can identify with the cat's territory. My daughter just had a baby; they have only two bedrooms and the teenager wasn't willing to give up her bedroom. They also have one of those funky rooms that's connected to the kitchen and to the hall that they use as a den. One of the cats has claimed that room as her own, so instead of closing it up for a nursery, we actually closed up the (unused, except as an office) dining room temporarily for the baby's room. You'd think it was the baby that ruled the roost, but no, it's the cats.

[Lily left the valley]

Lily, for some reason, we're not authorized to view the picture!

What a great find, though. We found a wonderful couch on the curb while out biking. I couldn't get home fast enough to get the truck and go back to get it! Almost brand new, with denim slip covers. Later that evening, I found where they had put a CL "curbside alert" on it.

I can identify with the cat's territory. My daughter just had a baby; they have only two bedrooms and the teenager wasn't willing to give up her bedroom. They also have one of those funky rooms that's connected to the kitchen and to the hall that they use as a den. One of the cats has claimed that room as her own, so instead of closing it up for a nursery, we actually closed up the (unused, except as an office) dining room temporarily for the baby's room. You'd think it was the baby that ruled the roost, but no, it's the cats.

Oops! I think I edited it wrong when I was changing the link from mini to source. It should work now. Please let me know if it doesn't. (I could see the image, but when I clicked on it, I was getting an error.)

I love curb finds. We'll actually be going to pick up two freebie rocking chairs from CL today. The poster had mislisted them on CL, so I think that's why no one had picked them up prior. The picture of them wasn't great, but I figure at worst, I can fix them up and put them on the porch which is looking woefully bare right now.

Interesting that you mention denim, as one of my projects is to use some old jeans to do some recovering. The project got waylaid a bit with the other pressing house stuff, but we also have a neat rug we picked up that is made of jean pockets overlapping like scales. It's fun and I love it.

[Lily left the valley]

Birds are tweeting as I write this, reminding me it's time to go to bed.

I finally managed to get outside a bit yesterday to start cleaning up the front yard. Realized when I was taking my first break from it that I forgot to take a before picture. So I guess when I pick back up with it (weather and time willing), I'll do an "in progress" at least.

I don't know when they stopped mowing last year, but it was long enough that the front slope has all sorts of wonderful moss bits growing underneath. It's the north facing side, so I'm not sure how much of that moss will survive once the dead grass I removed by raking, and then the new grass gets mowed so the sun will hit the slope stronger. Time will tell.

Towards the tail end of my work, I started finding the edges of our front walkway. The turf overgrowth apparently was not new, as when I found the edge and cut back to it, the concrete had been given a new coating that stopped at the turf outgrowth line. The walk overall has a lot of issues with edges and sometimes worse cracks and bits missing. It's still safe to walk on, but it's also something we'll be looking at making better this year. Oh, and I figured out what happened to the one handrail...hopefully it was just someone leaning against it too hard, and the post at the top isn't rotted. I will be testing that theory out later today with some new screws to try to secure it again.

We're trying to figure out how to fix some erosion that happened when the downspout disappeared (since the street view in '11). One plant is clinging for dear life, and that's where I had moved some larger rocks the other day to try to keep the water running down from eroding the dirt further. I took my bin of turf I had just cut back and filled as much as I could between the rocks and the plant for now. I would have done more on the front walk, but Sean had made dinner, clouds were rolling in, and I had to call it a day. I think if I keep doing that, and figure a way to build up the rest of that bit of slope, once I cover with mulch (and leave the water bearing rocks for the short term), it may help that area recover a bit.

That side is definitely moist. Besides the mosses, there were many baby ferns peeping out as well. I tried my best when raking to not dig up too much. I know from the street view image that there used to be a lot of plants out there, and many of them are making their way back out, though many are choked (on the front walk area specifically) down by the overgrown grass. I hope to finish the front clean up this week. If not today, then tomorrow I'll be putting together our "never out of the box" reel mower we bought at PYCA and giving that a run across the front as well. With all the rain we have, what was not too long ago white quickly went from wet tanny brown to now green emerging through.

The back yard still has barely been touched, but I figured best to get the front looking better to keep the neighbors happy. Many have been doing their own after winter clean ups, and I don't want us to be the last on the block. Even though the backyard isn't terribly big, there is a lot of neglect, trash and broken glass. My plan is to do 1' by 1' squares at a time, and just start at the back of the house and move towards the rear of the property. There's too much chance of wrecking our mower if I just try to mow, so if worse comes to worse, I'll see if I can get a grass whip to help with height management if the going is slow (as I suspect it will be.) I've done the "cut the lawn with edging shears" before, and....too much work!

I've been slowing trying to figure out what is growing where, with little luck so far. When some bits flower (and some might not this year having not been divided for a long time, and are choking themselves), I should have a better idea of what's what out there. I have a few guesses, and the street view may yet be useful in that sense too. I'm fairly certain the Japanese Maple that got moved (per street view) is dead as a doornail. Lots of buds on other bushes and trees, but not that one. I'm not in a rush to rip it out, but I am kind of sad, as I would like to keep it if it's not ready to go on the cart.

Inside is...chaotic. Trying to go through boxes that have been moved and stored too long to find needed bits rather than go out and buy replacements takes time and makes a mess. We did pick up a lovely little cart for the printer in the office, so we're one step closer to getting the step table Kira's bed is on closer to being with the other MCM furnishings.

Oh, and the two rockers we got free from CL are on the front porch. I'll try to take a picture later. I should probably give them a good once over, but after our first blowsy misty day, they didn't seem to have any obvious "wood getting saturated" spots, so the finish for now seems sound.

I've been spending time looking up more info about our lino, and...I think it's not lino. I think it's one of the other variants that Congoleum made at the time. We don't have funds yet to send a sample to test for asbestos, which I definitely want to do now because the backing seems definitely black, not jute. Inspectepedia says that's more likely to be not what I was hoping. I'm still trying to find a better place to check the bottom, but all signs point to possible asbestos which is bad in the kitchen because of how much of it is cracked, broken and crumbly dusty around those bits.

I'm still trying to make time to start sewing better fitting curtains, but it's been low priority still, although some windows are starting to get on my nerves with the "throw anything that works" in them.

The drip in the tub is getting worse, and it seems it's only the hot that's dripping. I'm hoping it's just a washer and not a failed valve--or worse, long term deterioration as the plumbing there is older. Not sure when I'm going to be able to take that apart to get a better look.

Speaking of pipes, I finally shone a flashlight down the full bath sink, only to immediately grab needle nose vicegrips. Sure enough, wood screws, inside the drain. No wonder they never put the stopper back. I thought maybe the mechnism had bent badly or broken off, and was thinking to fix it when I address the leak in the trap below. (Said trap, by the way, sprung a leak at the bottom. Not at the joints. So I'm wondering if maybe that trap will be full of screws and they rusted and that caused the leak to form, with the rust from the inside accelerating damage to make the base leak.)

Also, I'm not sure if I mentioned the clusterfudge under the full bath that you can see looking up from the cellar--pvc with some red tape trying to stop a leak where a seam isn't sound. The good news is at least the slow leak is waste from the bath/sink and not the john at that junction. I really hate working with PVC (I know, most folks think I'm insane in this regard), and it's poorly connected to some older piping, so I'm not sure how I'm going to handle that.

As hard as it is to me to believe, I am still not done cleaning the kitchen. I could have gotten more done yesterday, but with all the rain they're predicting this week, I wanted to take advantage of what time I could in the sun trying to get the lawn more neighbor friendly. Still, there has been a lot of progress, despite the fact that dry goods seem to keep showing up from under the sink still. Oh, and found some dog food this time too--so the dog house did indeed have a dog that came into the house at some point.

I did finally get a chance to look at the stairwell light situation between the first and second floor. At some point, someone put in two brand new switches, but for some odd reason, only one of them is a proper 3 way. I bought another 3 way Friday, so I should have that fixed proper tomorrow at the latest. Of course...cloth wires and no markings, so I get to test hot to find which of the two currently attached to the same screw is the actual hot. Wheeee.

We're getting closer to two months of closing on Beebe, and it still hasn't sunk in that this is our house yet. Maybe it's all the folks who joked that we just traded a rental payment for a mortgage payment, maybe it's just that we've both moved so much in the last 20+ years...I really don't know. Yet when Sean was rattling off our address over the phone yesterday, that's when I had one of those "Oh, we have a house and this will be our address for a long time" moments--it's still not quite settled in our brains yet.

There's probably a bunch of other little stuff I've been remiss in mentioning, but that's what's on my mind at the moment.

Sean's awake now, and I'm heading off to bed. Probably for the best, as he actually has off today, and this way he can relax for a bit without me trying to get him to help with the things I will be doing so with later.

[Lily left the valley]

Today was a putter around and find things day. Did some reading up for putting the mower together. Pretty straightforward, thankfully.

Speaking of reading up, did I mention I did get our copy of the wiring diagrams for the Country Home stove in the mail? So happy to have managed to get that. It's even one of the nice ones, that has the 3 holes for a binder already cut, and the pages were spaced in such a way so that nothing was lost due to the holes. I love a good set of documentation, I really do.

I did actually start re-organizing my tools a wee bit. I should still have a full set of wrenches, but I kept finding singletons of all sorts and sizes. Even some very wee ones. I was also surprised at how many different brands I seem to have out of the handful I did unearth. Fortunately, I found the one I needed to put the mower together. Didn't quite get to that, given all the sorting.

I finally fixed the three way switch for the stairwell between the first and second. It really seems so minor, but it was one of the first things I'd wanted to fix after closing when we discovered the issue. I was rather relieved, once again, to see actual boxes in the wall for the switches. The doubling of the wires made it so fun to decipher which one was which. I still find it curious that despite the box, the Drunken Weasel who did the work felt the need to wrap electrical tape all around the sides several times, as if they thought the wires might pop out somehow. Silly, because they had way overtightened them, and I almost stripped the set bolts trying to get them loose enough to work the wiring proper.

What would we do without Drunken Weasels, really? I was a bit nervous, because I hadn't dealt with labeling wiring in a while, and thanks to the Weasel, I felt much more confident the more goofs I found.

I forget where we found it once in another building, but one of the outlets had no box--the lathe and plaster had simply been carved a bit wider than the outlet, and a metal bar had been affixed behind same so the outlet had some place to be secured to to prevent wiggle.

The weather should be good tomorrow. More yard time-woo!

[Texas_Ranger]

Apparently the Australians never use boxes and the country hasn't burned down yet. From a European perspective it feels just as crazy as from an American one though.

Our kitchen light switch didn't have a box either. Originally it was surface-mounted and when they tiled the wall with an inch of concrete instead of the original very thin plaster they simply left a hole for a flush-mounted switch. The whole thing looked a bit crazy as the tile was flush with the door casings! Oh and although there was proper conduit in the wall they didn't use that when they added a socket next to the switch but instead ran a piece of zip cord(!) behind the tiles.