Sarah here!! For those who tuned in to our last What’s Happening in Waldo post, you’ll remember that I’ve been laid up for almost two months solid. We established that it was the worst (although sweatpants being socially acceptable wasn’t half bad) and that I had insane guilt, for not being able to partake in the crazy-grueling schedule that is running your own business AND remodeling a home while living in it. That schnoodles is bananas yo. So this time I want to tell the harrowing tale of how we located, bought and installed a reclaimed steel roof for $300 and enslaved my father-in-law in the process. Note: no family members were harmed (more than band-aid level) in the making of this post. Freezing and exhaustion, that’s a different story — so here’s how it went!

When we took over the task that was a full home renovation, we sat down and made a massive list of all the projects that needed to be done house-wide. It was a little scary and was a permanent affirmation that we were about to have zero social lives, money or time. (I say that like we did before this started — psshaw!) When you have that many projects ahead of you it’s no secret what has to be done, and trust me, it’s even more vomit-inducing when words are staring you in the face and outlined before you. We ordered the list by level of immediate need. The kids needed finished bedrooms, the windows had to be replaced to keep heat in and cold out, floors had to be painted *clutches pearls* and cool house numbers had to be acquired — which came in dead last on the list, as only one lone food establishment even delivers to us and friends/family are passing on visiting until our current state of renovation horror has passed. The leaky roof however, was at the tippy-top of this list. Apparently insurance companies take issue with insuring your domicile if the top floor of your house turns into a literal snow globe come winter time. But it’s cool, last winter we just gave the girls Anna and Elsa costumes and reenacted Frozen over and over again. Where are you NOW Jake from State Farm? Huh? HUH?! #likeagoodneighbormybutt!

Lots of smaller projects around the home carried with them the confidence of locating diy and renovation materials as we went. Doors, drywall, fixtures — at any given time those are available on Craigslist within a two hour drive of wherever you are in this country. I promise. Because we are afforded the luxury of driving constantly for the day job, we just pop in here and there to keep an eye out for things. But when it comes to a roof, that’s sort of a different story. You find things for cheap on Craigslist and Facebook for two important reasons: 1) Someone’s wife said it had to get out of the garage and 2) See option one. The hard part is that roofing materials don’t usually fall under that game. Most folks have a bag or two of shingles left over from a project, but when you need a WHOLE roof, then now you’re dealing with someone who had an outbuilding come down and thus, they obviously have land to hold onto it — and will do so to extract every last penny that it’s worth and as well they should!

We searched for steel roofing for just over a year and found nothing at a cost low enough that it warranted the stress of dealing with the reclamation process. We had figured this would be our first project that we had to pay *gasp* retail for. Normal people would save a bit here and there, but when your little bits “here and there” are already going towards drywall and windows…. it feels like an impossible uphill climb. And we’re not talking about the climb where you gain character and learn more about yourself in the process, we’re talking about the kind where water pours in from outside and you literally have no idea where the money is coming from — until you find that one posting. That one posting that tells you that some man 4.5 hours away from you has enough steel roofing to redo our entire home and part of our garage for a small $300. It was 11:00pm when I came across it and there was loud squawking and flailing and panicking (it wasn’t pretty) — can I call someone at 11? Can I text someone at 11? Can I call at 7am? By 7am surely the 900 other people looking for the same thing will have found it and we’ll have lost this amazing deal. SQUAWK! *sends apology text and promises to come pick it up with cash within 24 hours* * gets a text back confirming it’s ours* *FREAKS OUT THAT WE’RE FINALLY GETTING A ROOF!*

We borrowed a trailer the next morning, as this would require a trailer without sides to load and relocate the long, 16′ panels with as little stress on everyone involved as possible. Now here’s the catch, we didn’t have $300 (that’s how real full home renovation is without a loan y’all) and borrowed the money from a family member (which we promptly paid back after a delivery day in Chicago — thank you to whomever purchased furniture that week!) and they were off. Adrian and his Dad set out for the 4.5 hour drive up, the hour load time and the 4.5 hour drive back. Icky. But it’s a $300 roof y’all! Well, sort of. Let’s talk details.

So yes, the initial purchase of the roof was $300, right? Right. But then there’s the other stuff. The stuff you don’t think about costing money, like screws ($200), and paint ($200), and propane ($20), and ridgecaps and trim ($1,200), cleaners such as acetone and paper towels ($30), saw blades for metal ($40), lathe board (which was free to us because Adrian scavenged and tore apart old box springs to cut the wood down from, but would normally run $200), meals out and snacks because he only ate on the way to the hardware store for more supplies ($100). So no — it wasn’t JUST $300, but we will take the $2,000 that we could pay for over the course of a few months, as we needed supplies, versus the $20k-$35k for parts and labor or just $6k if we purchased the materials from a big box hardware store and did it ourselves. Now this obviously doesn’t include the labor hours for two people working for two and a half months (roughly 25 hours a week — 200 hours off and on) to clean, paint and install this sucker. But we were really paying ourselves back in not having to sing LET IT GOOOOOO LET IT GOOOOOO for a second winter season.

Now, you’ll have to bear with me as the explanation of this process is seemingly crude and extremely brief compared to the literal blood sweat and tears (those the boys are pleading the 5th on that one), that truly went into the project. Also, 3 pairs of jeans were also sacrificed in the endeavor. So if anyone that works for Duluth Trading Company is watching and would like to send Adrian some of those super sturdy work pants that we can’t afford (and still buy drywall), that would be super, because it was all I could do to convince him he was not allowed out in public with duct tape butt. If I wrote for my own corner of the internet, I’m sure I could stretch it out all these details into several posts and build the suspense and excitement — and it would be well deserved. But that’s not why you read about what’s happening in Waldo, right? You want to get in for the inspiration and out so you can be glad that’s not you, right? No one really wants 4 posts on a roof. If you need more info — please don’t hesitate to email and we’ll fill you in on more details. We can be found at waldomidcentury at the gmails. Ok, so here’s the condensed version of a long, amazing project that well… here… let me just show you…

So to use reclaimed roofing you have to do a few things. Because it’s not shiny and new, you have to make it look that way before it can go on your roof. The previous owner had used rubber sealant and tape to patch and hold pieces together on their structure. So those pieces had to be removed. Using a sharp blade didn’t do the trick, so out came the solvents. Finally there was a great mixture of acetone and a propane torch from below that helped loosen things so they could be scraped off. Now this is no easy task. My rockstar husband was an apple that didn’t fall far from the family tree as he obviously learned his drive from his amazing father, Jerry.

While Adrian was busy measuring, cutting and laying down lathe, Jerry would daily, make the 20 minute drive to the house (even when we were in Chicago on delivery) and very methodically and diligently prepped each panel before returning home. He cleaned all the muck, and guck, and goo, and rat pee, and leaf stains (from their previous storage) so they were clean as a whistle. It could be raining, it could be 40 degrees, it was sometimes sunny, but Jerry was always there. Always cleaning.

Before anything else could proceed the panels had to be cut to size. Now it’s super fun to use a circular saw on metal because it makes neat sparks – like in the movies, but the bummer is, it leaves the edge a little raw. As much handling is needed to be done with the panels to get them into place, they weren’t exactly safe, even with gloves on. So the dynamic-duo would then file down every exposed edge so they were smooth and snag free. This is where we note, there’s no easy way to do that while retaining the finish of the steel, so everything was done with hand files and a smile. Ok, usually it was just the file, but I tried to pop in with a joke or two to lighten the mood and feel slightly useful.

The panels were then laid out in the yard around the house to dry and to be painted. We didn’t paint the entirety of each panel, but there were still some scuffs and black marks that were a subtraction of the previous paint instead of addition to. Commercial-grade enamel paint took care of the job and the panels re-dried (hopefully without the cats stepping on them). Adrian would then go through and make maps of each piece in the yard. He’d measure where each screw hole was on each panel and record it, then he’d shimmy up a ladder (that’s the whole, you hate that they go but like to watch them leave part right?), onto some scaffolding, onto another ladder and then onto the roof to map out where the lathe board had to be screwed down below. Normally when you start from scratch you’d just drop your boards every X amount of feet and do it all the way across your roof, making the install much, much easier — but it’s not that simple when you’re using previously installed materials! Although it was a complicated process, the view from the top is pretty darn great.

I mean as long as you don’t look down and seriously, barf. Who wouldn’t want to be tied in? Adrian. I’ve tried to tell him that he’s no good to me with broken legs, but it’s ok, he’s nimble and agile like a cat. Did I mention the cats learned to climb the scaffolding too? I mean that’s cool because if another one of them poops in my dracaena I can now send them to the Chinese Circus to do tricks and flips and stuff. Too mean? What were we talking about? Oh that’s right, my heroes *swoon*!

The process that those two went through, the mapping, the cutting the panels to length and angles, the screwing, the hauling up of each panel one by one onto the roof, there aren’t enough homecooked meals and smiles and thank yous to truly express the gratitude I had towards the project. You think you know and then you hobble to the bathroom, hardly able to stand and watch your father-in-law in the rain with a torch or your husband on a ladder at 9pm while wearing a headlamp to see where he’s putting screws and suddenly — you don’t know. Every little part of the process was labor intensive, from breaking down old box springs to use the wood inside (and then cut it to size) for lathe board, to scrubbing for 45 minutes on each panel to make them sparkle. It was torture to be benched from the game.

The act of assembly was no small feat either. Aside from the math whiz and you-sunk-my-battleship-maps that Adrian drew out for lathe board holes, the act of getting these monsterous panels to the roof was crazy pants! Adrian would climb up on the roof and lower down a rope (we’ll take this time to note at no point was he harnessed into the roof as he claimed it a larger hazzard — insert disapproving wife face here). Then if Jerry was there (if not Adrian did this entire process solo with lots of ladder work), he would screw a board to the back of a panel using the pre-existing holes. Next he would tie the rope around the board and Adrian would brace his feet and pull it up. Hand. Over. Hand. It’s like bootcamp, but usually you pay people big money at a gym for such torture. Then once it was on the roof he’d use the rope to help drag it higher on the roof, unscrew the board and screw the panel into place. Are you tired yet? Because it was exhausting to watch from the sidelines, I can’t even imagine the agony that it truly was. I know there is power and blessings behind service and hard work, but there’s a reason people hire this to be done. For most people, this act is a special circle of hell. Right next to the Walmart returns line the day after Christmas. *shudder*

Now, the roof still needs love. It does. But y’all it’s already snowing up here, so the time to finish up some detail work has passed and will have to wait for next spring. For instance, we discovered that we have unusual eaves. Which sounds like a bad pick up line, “Excuse me ma’am, but you have the most unusual eaves, would you like to meet up for some hot chocolate and romantic walk through the park sometime?” So the edge pieces that cover the end panels and exposed view of the old roofing stick out too far to use traditional caps. So we’ll have to retrofit the house next season with thicker wood parts to affix those finishing pieces to. When we venture to do that we’ll also be installing valley covers so you don’t see where the pieces meet and it looks flawless like a couple of professionals did it — and after all this, I think they’ve earned that title and then some.

I watched my own father growing up work tirelessly to repair everything from electronics to cars to garbage disposals, lawn mowers and his own roof. He was the jack-of-all-trades type as well and taught myself and my brother in the process. Sure, I could have spent time with friends, but to Dad it was important that I be able to change a flat tire, in the rain, on the highway, in the middle of the night. And I can and have. Twice. Adrian’s Dad was the same way and we learned the same lessons of self-reliance.

Adrian always says that he married me because I’m the only one who out hustled him and I say the same thing about him. It’s times like these that it’s obvious he wins 100 times over. I hope the children realize that this amazing home they live in (even if they had to eat a few peanut butter sandwiches on scaffolding and help haul lathe board up ladders) is only possible because of the dedication and strength of a few pairs of hands. That it’s provided, not because we want the best house on the block, but for them to have an amazing place to call home and to learn how to do it again someday for their own children. Well, that and never having to have Elsa-sing-a-longs again! ‘Till next time my friends, I hope your holiday season is off to a good start and that you forgive me for making you wait for the final “after” shot of the roof until all the details are in place!

The post How To Install A Steel Roof For $300 & Enslave Your Family In The Process appeared first on Vintage Revivals.

 Sarah here! You GUYS! It’s been FOREVER! Seriously — just look at those capital letters and all those exclamation points!!! It’s been a rough few months up here in Waldo — ok, you could live in Brooklyn and then it would be over in Waldo, but in general most Wisconsinites say they live up north. It’s a thing. So where have we been? I mean obviously, not reading about our home repair fails and mishaps has kept you up at night. Please accept my apology for our absence!

In early September I catered a wedding for a friend (in my laughable spare time) and aggravated a group of muscles in my right shoulder. In addition, the prep work that went into the beautiful event, ended up being the straw that broke the camel’s back. Well, in this case, the camel’s neck. Wait, that means I’m a camel. Are camel’s in this year? I don’t know, our tiny town doesn’t have a Target or a Home Goods. Seriously, how do we even live? Anyway. Where were we? That’s right, my neck. So I hurt it – but not from lifting super heavy pieces of furniture all day or home repair (because that would be a normal by-product and too easy), but from cooking. COOKING PEOPLE. Well, not cooking people, that’s gross. But seriously I just can’t win. Here’s how it went down:

Remember how your parents always told you to sit back from the TV or else you’d go blind? Please tell me that wasn’t just my folks as they also used made up words growing up and I didn’t find out until I used them on a college paper that they weren’t real. It was worse than Santa. Well, anyway, this is sort of like that. So take heed of my injury and don’t repeat it in your own life. In fact, forward this to all your friends and your children and your friend’s children, because this is important. It all started when I thought running a business almost exclusively from my phone was a good idea.

Now, working for yourself is great in regards to balancing home and life events with your work day. It’s made our home renovation, although tedious and not exactly speedy, completely doable ourselves. Now, the flipside to that coin is that you’re usually working longer hours and are always at work, even when you’re not. So for Adrian and I that means that we spend our days seeking out great mid-century and industrial furniture pieces, fixing them up, adding a bit of spit and polish, photographing them and then driving them to Milwaukee and Chicago for resale. Side note: I don’t actually get more laundry done because I work from home — I just sit amongst the piles of baskets hoping they’ll put themselves on hangers because there’s too much to do! I even tried singing a song in hopes that the woodland animals that live outside my door step would come do it for me, but alas, no dancing birds came to tie bows and hang dresses.

Because we’re on the go so gosh-darn much, I tend to run most of our little enterprise from my phone — and why not? Things get photographed, edited and then listed on Instagram. We converse with our buyers through the same system. We post things to Craigslist via the Craigslist Pro app (which is worth every penny of the $.99 price tag) and answer emails and make phone calls. We keep track of our gas, mileage and receipts all from the phone. The only time I really sit down to a computer is talk to you all here! That said, never did I consider the effects my phone useage, was having on my body and I was still pretty sure I used it more sparingly than the average teenager.

TECHNOLOGY IS SO COOL! If I stop to think about it, I’ll feel old. I grew up with a darkroom in my home and my father taught me to hand color negatives to get all those sassy filters kids use for their photos these days. So not only can I take a photo or a chair, edit it, sell it and make delivery arrangements — I can do it all from the palm of my hand. Our children will never know the calmness of not having such a distraction. *sigh*

So, my neck right? I cater this wedding and because I’m a chubby gal, I finish and am exhausted and sore. A few days pass as do multiple rounds of Ibuprofen and something still isn’t right. A few weeks of waiting, multiple visits to the chiropractor’s office, more ice packs than you can fathom and lots of small exercises to strengthen little tiny parts of my spine and hips and I’m officially sitting up right and able to share this woeful little tale. You see, because I spend most of my days working from my phone, my spine had started to revolt and the catering job was the final straw. Strained muscles and a few leaking/pinched/owwwww discs later and I found myself flat on my back unable to move. Or eat. Or dress myself (overrated anyway so that wasn’t a huge loss), or cook, or clean (psssh we’re renovating), or work, or type, or write, or make money or DO ANYTHING AT ALL! YOU GUYS IT WAS THE WORST! I know there’s far more horrible things happening in the world today like politics and the remake of the Toblerone bar and oh yeah…. cancer. But this was wasn’t far off as it had an impact on every single facet of our lives.

Think about all the tiny things you do during the day, no matter how small. Now DON’T do them. When it happens for one day, it’s a “me day”. When that happens for a few days, the kids call it netflix and chill, but when chill turns into Hell freezing over, well Houston we have a problem. It surpasses the times you’re sick and your significant other is forced to do things around the house you’d normally do and ends up doing every last, loving thing.

Normally, this isn’t the end of the world. Injured parties stay home and geek out on new fall television or old movies you can quote by heart. “If peeing your pants is cool, consider me Miles Davis!” The other person goes to work and comes home and helps pick up the slack — but when your day was filled with housework and business work AAAANNNDDD installing a new steel roof on your house, well then things get a little bit more complicated. Normally I run the majority of the back end of the business. I do the photography (which is why I’m never on camera — which I’m ok with) and the locating and selling of the furniture. Adrian is my muscle and my repair guy/craftsman/woodworker/handyman aaaaand the person who has to stand outside in the pouring rain for hours waiting to pick up furniture from auctions that had poorly planned pick up dates. He says I have the hard job and I say the same thing about him. But when winter is coming and you have a house to roof before your girl’s room turns into a literal snow globe — it gets a little dicey.

Enter – the brother-in-law! Seeing a need, Adrian’s sister’s husband (got that?), Gordy quit his job and came to work for us. It’s both equally awesome and terrifying to have a full time employee but it wasn’t a moment too soon as I became quickly incapacitated. He’s helped lighten Adrian’s load of cleaning up furniture and giving things a new shine and has  taken my place as the other half of the muscle on deliveries and pick-ups.

As I slowly have begun to heal (and trying to operate business by only looking at my phone while holding it above my head — seriously, try it — the worst), like most people I’ve tried to take on a little too much too soon. I’m still completely uncomfortable in my skin for any length of time. And per doctor’s orders, I can only sit for more than 15 minutes at a time and have to take extended breaks with exercises between to not regress, so it’s taken me the better part of a day to write this — no really [UPDATE: It’s actually taken a week]. So I wanted to say thank you to our loyal readers who have emailed or made mention when we drop off furniture, about what our next project will be, we missed you too. No really, we did. Because seriously, there’s only so much Grey’s Anatomy to watch.

Up next is how to reclaim a roof with little to money — subtitled how to enslave your husband and father-in-law for the better part of a month (and then some). Sub-subtitled: How to feel guilty for watching Grey’s Anatomy while everyone around you works and you just lay there and the dog stares at all hours of the day. Until then, remember take a break from your phones and tablets. Interact with the real world. Enjoy being able to put on pants with a button or doing laundry, heck, even cleaning out the refrigerator and being mad that you didn’t use up all your parsley — because when you can’t life is miserable and as much as we like interacting with others, real life is always better!

The post The Time My Cell Phone & A Chef’s Knife Left Me Incapacitated appeared first on Vintage Revivals.

 Adrian and I knew from the start that we’d be taking down walls throughout our home to open up the space to make it more functional for our family. Admittedly, I wanted more removed than he did (but I’d also live in a retrofitted airplane hanger if I could), but we knew some had to come out, nonetheless. The bottom floor of our home would have three walls altered, but the top floor, well that thing is a hot mess of old farmhouse tradition and we had to alter 7 walls in total. This is the story of how we did it. Ok, how we’re doing it, because you know that business isn’t finished yet! #reallife

We had been married two months when I came back from a trip to Independence, Missouri to see family. I pulled back in the driveway, having been gone for several days, to see this all white figure darting back and forth with large buckets. Truth be told, it was a little creepy — until I realized it was Adrian. Then it was just scary — what had he done while I was away and what mess was I now in charge of cleaning up?! What could have possibly happened for his appearance to be so bizarre? He was covered literally from head to toe, only leaving his eyeballs clean, in white dust. He was the walking, white version of Peanuts, Pig-Pen. Little clouds came from his feet as he walked and although he extended a hug — I declined. Yes, I’m obviously a jerk, but that was before I realized that if I didn’t hug my husband when covered to toe in plaster dust, well, I wasn’t really ever getting a hug. But I digress.

Bless his heart, he spent our time apart working instead of doing more awesome things. Some girls get jewelry or trinkets, I get walls removed. Want to know the way to a girl’s heart? Get rid of the most ridiculously placed wall on the planet without her having to help. She might have appreciated it if the door to the closet would have been shut, thus negating the need to rewash every item of clothing we own as they were now covered in plaster dust, but that’s neither here nor there. E for effort and Y for “Yeah, I didn’t have to help!” So this wall.

You walked to the top of the stairs and it was placed so close to the top stair, you couldn’t walk up with a laundry basket and turn. Instead, you had to put the basket on the railing to the side, finish walking up the stairs, turn and then pick the basket back up, turning it once more to go through the door. Ahem — homey don’t play that. It drove me CRAZY. And like any good husband, my incessant whining about it drove him crazy, so he eliminated the problem. It also made a room where there didn’t need to be one. Sure, it could have been the guest bedroom for out-of-towners, but how weird is it to walk through your guest bedroom to get to the only bathroom on that floor and your bedroom. Wiggidy wiggidy wack right? So it had to go — and so it did. It seriously caused disharmony inside me every time I went upstairs.

Would a picture help? Have I confused you yet? Here’s my masterfully laid out drawing, which is a horrible representation of size — but is a big step up from the version I sketched on the back of an envelope found in the “important papers” stack on my kitchen table, otherwise known as my office, otherwise known as the only flat surface in our house currently. RIGHT! The picture…

That wall was the start of what would be a year long project — you know, while we had all the other projects happening. Once that wall was gone, it was a breath of fresh air (literally, as now the space had 3 windows) and thinking of it now is almost impossible. That space, also became the landing zone for the rest of the projects on the top floor. We had 3 things to accomplish:

1. Remove stupid wall and closet. 
2. Make two smaller rooms become one.
3. Make a skinny modern staircase to the attic that didn’t pull down and chubby girls could walk up.

Now, most lists in life start out small and simple. Like when you go to the store for cilantro, because you always, ALWAYS forget to pick some up and instead you come home with 3 clearance t-shirts, a bag of dog treats, something made of chocolate and possibly a new pet pony named Charlie. So, obviously, those 3 things evolved and are outlined below:

1. Remove stupid wall and closet.
2. Make two smaller rooms become one.
3. Make a double wide staircase to the attic that chubby girls and a herd of wild animals could ascend.
4. Relocate the girl’s bedroom door.
5. Cut back the flooring to allow for more headspace on the staircase as you descend.
6. Push back a bedroom wall to do #5 & #3
7. Remove all plaster from top floor
8. Rewire all electrical
9. Drywall entire space including stairwell and newly joined/remodeled rooms

Ok fine, the list of 9 things was really 10 since the staircase is part of the upstairs room, we also had to remove all the plaster from the stairs as well as the front entryway as the sledgehammering happening upstairs was starting to remove the lower plaster for us. In addition, to get to the wires and circuits happening upstairs we had to work on the downstairs entryway first. Basically it all looks like a giant weird video game.

Next came the removal of the walls around the teeny-tiny bedroom and the cutting into the floor joists to push back the floor 12″ so humans above the 5 foot mark could walk down the stairs without ducking. This is what I fondly like to call the “hanging electrical” phase or, “duck so you don’t get electrocuted” phase. Obviously we had tons of company inviting themselves over left and right for dinner dates. That’s what adult play dates are called right? Because heavens to Betsy we just say kids went to go play at someone’s house. It has to be a little date. I digress. Again. Surely you’re used to it by now.

 Adrian per usual, was cool with leaving items where they were and worked around them. In his defense, when the entire floor is under construction and will be for the next year, you can’t exactly tell the kids to camp on the sofa for a night. Once the lathe board came down (oh the bonfires we had!) parts of the interior of the floor were exposed. Now, obviously the floor is just that. The floor. There’s nothing inside it, but saying the space between the floor and the ceiling sounds like a John Malkovich movie. This was also the the part we titled, “Has anyone seen the cat lately? Something’s meowing?” “Milly?” “Molly?” Want to know what’s terrifying? Waking up to go to the little girls room in the middle of the night and seeing the shadow of a cat popping up through the floor boards like a little dust zombie. Uncool kitties, uncool.

You can see in this shot how far back the flooring was cut to make extra space for un-shrimpy humans. a few inches makes all the difference in the world. That’s what she said. I’m sorry — I couldn’t not. 2×4’s were salvaged out of the wall and used in different locations wherever possible and all deconstruction was done piece by piece in order to reuse because we love the environment. And money in our pockets.

Then stuff got serious. I had been out an an auction bidding on ridiculous things like taxidermied animals and vintage punching bags (no seriously) and came home after a long day of standing and listening to “4 biddy biddy biddy 5! Who will give me 5!?” and noticed that the ceiling was missing. No, not just the plaster, but the whole freaking ceiling. I’m not to be left alone at auctions as I come home with wildlife and bowling lanes and Adrian isn’t to be left alone as there are suddenly 6′ holes in the ceiling. The cats were thankful for their new tree house (minus the tree) and took every chance to divebomb those who forgot to look up before walking down the hallway.

Now, the hole was placed there with the best of intentions. See, I asked for a skinny, modern staircase. Something that was unobtrusive to the eye, was just over 3 feet as rarely are both feet on the same step at once. Adrian wasn’t having any of that, as his amazingly awesome, talented and stunningly beautiful wife should be able to walk up the stairs with a large tote and to do so safely. Those were his words. Pinky swear. So a full, 6′ wide staircase was born. Now Adrian isn’t the man who goes to Home Depot and buys stair risers, instead, he’s the one who calculates the height and depth and makes his own. He’s smart and thrifty — AND DOES DISHES. Seriously, I’m a lucky girl. Someday down the road, I’ll tell  you all about how he made it open from below with a winch and a car battery.

Want to know what happens when you try to Photoshop when you’re laced with Hydrocodone because your back is out and all you want to be able to do is put on a bra and your slippers without crying? This. This is what happens. But the colors are pretty and dots! THERE’S DOTS!

I tried my best to show you where the wall had originally been when that nook simply held the girl’s bedroom door on the left and a wall on the right. The old staircase to the attic pulled down in that location. Since Adrian’s giant stair project was taking over, we needed to move that wall back in order to give the stairs proper space.

Adrian worked tirelessly to get things reframed and ready to go. Want to know what date night in our household looks like? This. But I’m sort of ok with butts in the air and the smell of sawdust. (for some people it’s candles and flowers, I guess I’m really Ron Swanson at heart) This was date night for the better part of eight months. Yes, there’s inexpensive things you can do to date as a couple on a budget, but it isn’t just money that’s short with this renovation it’s also time. With the oncoming winter (this project started last fall), walls had to be up, plastic had to be up, insulation had to be up, drywall had to be up, our home had to be secure from Wisconsin winter. So I make do with butts in the air.

Working over the stairs wasn’t an easy task. They make expensive thing-a-majigs to to this work, but in true Adrian style — he made his own. He promised me it was safe. I 42% believed him but all turned out well in the end.

The main room received drywall after what felt like centuries. Seriously. We had grey hair. Wait, that’s just plaster and old age. Bummer. But it was just the best feeling in the world. Still on the agenda is rectifying the floor grate that needs to be replaced when the ceiling in the dining room happens this winter.

All in all there were 7 walls that were either removed or majorly altered to fit our family’s needs. That’s no small amount of drywall and engineering. I’d go to sleep to the sound of his sandpaper and wake up early to tear out something else before I had to shower and get to the real job (see: income). We’ll share more on the individual rooms as soon as we can, but for now, I wanted to mention that if you’re thinking about removing a wall — do it! Contact a knowledgeable husband/friend/contractor before doing so to make sure your home can support the alteration. Once they give you the go-ahead, get to it! In your mind if you’re dreaming of the extra space, I promise you’ll never be happy until it happens!

The post The Time We Altered 7 Walls On The Top Floor appeared first on Vintage Revivals.

THINGS THAT ARE DIFFICULT IN LIFE: realizing that adults have to wear pants 99% of the time, figuring out how to get stains out of kid’s clothing, finding the remote after someone other than you used it, and balancing post-school activities for multiple kids while still getting in homework and a dinner that doesn’t come from a drive through window. Know what’s worse? (well lots of stuff, but bear with me) Calling your husband to tell him you purchased an entire bowling alley lane — and that he gets the honor of helping you install it. Man, he was so excited he was just speechless!

The day started out like most of our weekends do. We both had separate auctions to attend in order to stock up on awesome goodies for our day job over at Waldomidcentury. Adrian was headed up north to dig through a series of barns that hadn’t been cleaned out in over 3 decades (!!!) and I was headed down south to claim dibs on furniture from a school that had closed and the contents were being sold. He was going to discover dusty, forgotten treasures and I was stoked to gather as many vintage school chairs and table legs as my little arms could carry!

My alarm went off at the horrible hour of 4:40am — and I did the same thing that everyone else would have done and said, “nope” and hit snooze on the alarm. When it went off again, I double checked the auction page to acquire the address for Google Maps, in order to determine how much longer I could sleep in. The page loaded and in large letters it read: AUCTION CANCELLED! I was heartbroken. There were Heywood Wakefields with my name on them! Quickly, I searched for another location to pillage and attending the auction of a bowling alley out in the far western sticks sounded appealing — plus, I could sleep in for another hour. Yussss.

The day was rainy and the two hour drive to get to this small-town alley seemed to take forever. The establishment was packed, dimly lit (because it’s a bowling alley – duh) and the auctioneer was slow. Painfully slow. Some are fun and fast and feel like they do on TV, but I was hanging on for inexpensive lockers and so I endured the turtle-paced torture for 7 long hours. The outcome? Lockers (yusss) and a bowling alley lane (whaaaaa!?). Like the thing you throw balls down (that’s what she said). We had been actively casing the wood from other people’s lane-removals on Craigslist for the better part of 6 months and although they were more reasonably priced than buying new countertops, they were still enough to make me cry and worry about how I was going to keep the lights on. So when in Rome (and by Rome I mean a bowling alley auction), you buy your very own lane!

The easy part was bidding in. The hard part was calling the husband to let him know. He wasn’t exactly shocked (he knows me well), but the impending removal process all seemed a little daunting with our extremely tight schedule for the furniture stuffs. Like any good first time project-doer we Googled what we’d need before we went. This is one of those rare times that the internet is a dirty, dirty liar. There is little information available and what is there really only applies to lanes that have been installed in the last few years. There were, however, videos that showed folks using tractors to haul lanes out, but that just wasn’t in the cards. (But seriously though, who is that really in the cards for?)

Now, I had several older gentlemen (who appeared to be expert lane extractors) try to fill me in on what I needed to bring back with me. I played the girl card and asked what I’d need to tell my husband to bring and they were more than happy to make me a list 100 pieces long. I came home, relayed the crazy-long list to the hubster and he whittled it down to what seemed like the necessities. For those interested, you will need a Sawsall, circular saw with 4-8 carbide blades (seriously), 48″ level and several hand clamps, eight 2×4’s for leverage, furniture dolly and long pry bars to have on standby and a plethora of extension cords. If you’re removing the pin deck or approach you’ll also need a large standard screw driver, impact wrench with variable speeds, a hammer, several large drill bits and pointy-stabby thingys to get glue out of a screw head that’s recessed inside a hole. Got all that?

So off we went with the help of four of our friends and family members. Everyone was excited to help as they know what having a kitchen that functions means to us — and for that we’re eternally grateful. We borrowed a flat bed trailer from a family member as bowling lane isn’t lightweight in the slightest! The 6 of us arrived at the lane at 9:30am and set to work (and didn’t leave until almost 4:30pm). Lucky for us, the gutters had already been removed and we could see down to the floor and ball return below (which we had to be careful to not damage or cut the wires too as someone else had purchased that separately).

The owner of the alley was on hand to give us all sorts of awesome stories about the parties and benefits and events that his venue used to hold. In a small town, a place of refuge that isn’t the grocery store or someplace that is a straight up bar is golden. This space had seen it all over the years and listening to him share his past with us was heartbreaking, knowing that it sold for pennies on the dollar and was gutted piece-by-piece. It fostered many amazing memories and hopefully my countertops can do it justice! We learned that the lanes originally came from Japan, that the market for bowling used to be HUGE in the 40’s and 50’s and then suddenly it crashed and all the alleys were gutted and the lanes were shipped to America for cheap and that’s why bowling became so huge in the 60’s and 70’s here. #themoreyouknow Really, it just means I can tell people that I have imported Japanese countertops, but somehow it doesn’t sound as good as saying you have a reclaimed bowling alley!

I won’t lie, we all had out happy faces on and knew this task would be daunting, but worried that it could become complicated. It would be easy for accidents and injuries to happen, it could take longer than the time allotted, something with the substructure that we couldn’t see could cause complications — we just didn’t know. So like anyone would, we jumped right in. We used the level to make a straight line across the lane and clamped it down. The saw cuts easily where the hardwood and softwood meet as there are no nails, but every other cut was torture on the blades as it met roungly 20-30 nails. Because of this, a single blade on the saw was really only good for a few cuts.

The Sawzall was used to separate the substructure from the lane itself. Next, we used the 2×4’s to pry up the individual lane sections and pop them loose. We used them like oars and rowed the lane down a few inches so it was as close to the dolly as possible before lifting.

Lifting the alley sections from that position was the most tricky as one person had to be “in the pit” while the others were lifting a solid 500-600lbs from their ankles. I can hear chiropractors everywhere cringing and my trainer telling me to lift with my knees. Likewise, I can also hear my knees telling me to shove off and filing a request to do something normal for a change.

Each piece was rolled down the lane and onto the landing a few inches below, where you sit and keep score. Our new found giant skateboard slid with ease and the small step down wasn’t horrible. The challenge, however, was figuring out how to lift it up the small set of stairs that led to the upper bar and dining area, while simultaneously turning it on it’s side to fit through the ball holders. Please note, I’m sure there’s a less kinky sounding phrase for that, so I apologize to alley owners everywhere for not knowing, but I’m hoping know what I mean. The area where you go select a ball and wonder how anyone has such misshapen fingers and what happens if you actually get your digits stuck inside a ball while trying them on. Yes, that area.

It was awkward and a little scary as two people had to essentially “catch” the weight as it’s center of gravity changed and was pushed up the stairs. To make things trickier, the dolly had to be relocated up the stairs and as close to the edge as possible without rolling backwards as the lane section was lowered down onto it.

Once down, the lane was then left vertical and small nails that stuck out everywhere were hammered down so we didn’t have to question when our last tetanus shot was. It took one person on each side to literally ride it like a skateboard to keep it from fishtailing to either side and slamming into walls. The others guided the front and pushed from behind. Out the front door she went and we then stacked them onto the trailer with 2×4’s in between so the gnarly nails and metal bars didn’t scrape the surface they were to rest upon.

Rinse. Lather. Repeat. One by one until each section was removed and the wood underneath that created the substructure had also been harvested. The alley came out in 6 long sections and unfortunately we had to leave the pin deck (where the pin setter puts the pins down at the end of the alley) and the approach as time ran short and those sections involved more tools and patience than we came with.

I inquired about the galvanized pipe that the bowling balls sat on. The balls had all been sold at auction and taken that day. The pipe, however, remained. He said it was all ours if we wanted to uninstall it and I’m not kidding, I think my heart literally skipped a beat — or 6. For those who remember from our kitchen demolition (not by choice) post, I mentioned that I’d like to have exposed cabinets that are more like a commercial kitchen and are really just open shelves rather than cabinets. Although it has to be dusted, I hate cabinets more than I hate black licorice and that’s saying something. That said, I didn’t know how I was going to be able to afford the pipe to make my “close-to-ideal-as-budget-currently-allows” kitchen possible. We had drawn up plans the cost of pipe alone was somewhere around the $400 mark – EXCLUDING fittings, which are rouhgly $3-$5 each. EACH! In the back of my head, I was expecting to admit defeat and pick up free cabinets on Craigslist and just tell myself I’d get that kitchen someday. Well this day. someday became TODAY! Tears welled and Adrian raced to uninstall the long lengths.

It was time to pack up the tools and thank the owner for his kindness (did I mention he even bought us lunch?) and wish him the best in life and get some straps on the trailer and head home. Adrian made an impromptu safety device to ensure the poles stayed on the trailer and didn’t launch through a driver’s windshield on the way home. He’s a handy little McGyver like that.

We all slunk into our cars and headed home. We didn’t have enough juice left in our muscles to unload things that night and in the morning we cleared space in our storage unit and offloaded them onto the dolly and slid them into place. We had never been so exhausted. We slept for 12 hours straight!

Here they sit, waiting for their time to shine. The clock is ticking, as winters in Wisconsin aren’t exactly known to be dry or warm (go figure), so as soon as our roof installation is done (watch for that post next week), we’re going to be on it like two coats of paint!

We’ll need to rent a floor sander cut things to size before the weather turns bad. Before we can even think of counters there’s floors and tile to deal with and I just can’t hardly wait! It’s funny how the smallest bit of hope can change your disposition towards something. You guys — we might have a kitchen by Christmas! Can Santa put a new refrigerator in my stocking? Is that a thing?

The post The Day I Bought A Bowling Alley & There Was Much Rejoicing appeared first on Vintage Revivals.

 Writing for online content is a world of amazing disillusion. You get this Cliff’s Notes version of a project. You see the finished item, show them all of our supplies lined up all nice and neat and then feature an in progress shot so everyone can see what it looks like in the trenches. It doesn’t matter if you write for a shelter, food or lifestyle blog — the process is the same. There are, of course, others who speak to us more rationally and we see them painting without makeup at 2am in a time-lapse video, but the truth of the matter is, the nitty-gritty of life isn’t pretty. How that translates to those of us at home, is this crazy void that’s filled with dissatisfaction about our progress on a project when it can’t be finished in wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am style! Myself included. So here’s a story about a bathroom that is half done, sticks out like a sore thumb and drives me crazy every. single. day. Yes it’s better than before and yes, I might have to pee with my eyes closed to quell the rage. Is that too much information? Yup.

Our house contains two bathrooms, one on the main floor and one upstairs near the bedrooms. The one located downstairs is off the kitchen on the back wall of our mudroom. It’s in an awkward spot, but I’ll take it any day over those that reside near the main living area where it’s hard for what’s happening behind that closed door to be kept a surprise.

SIDEABAR: It was at this time I turned to my family and asked them for a politically correct way to talk about feeling like you should high-five people after they leave the bathroom in close proximity to the main living area because you know they had a good poo. These are apparently things only I think about as I was instructed that such thoughts aren’t normal. I of course tossed that notion right out the window and turned to Google (and then the online slang dictionary) which has given me quite a list of alternate ways to talk about poop. A few of my new favorites include: drop some wolf bait, free the turtles, stock the lake with brown trout, take the Browns to the Superbowl and release the chocolate hostage — none of which seemed like they would explain my point without raising more questions, so instead you get this long winded diversion from a story about how we remodeled a bathroom and got sort-of-finished. Sheesh. You should really keep me on track.

So our awkwardly-placed bathroom. Right. It had a few flaws. For starters it had faux-tile paneling that had prairie grass/country scenes on it (so gross), it was half pink — like Calamine lotion pink and it had a ridiculously deep cabinet shoved behind a door that was so big it was impossible to store things in without forgetting what’s in there. The toilet had a busted seal, the electrical had some issues and the outside wall to the shower stuck out into the room too far. Meaning- folks with junk in the trunk had to do a weird shimmy to get by the sink. It was super confidence-building, let me tell you.

There was also a medicine cabinet without a mirror that the kids were always scaling the countertop to get into. We knew that no matter what room renovation came down the pipeline over the next few years, we’d all have to use the bathroom — so it’s where we started first. Did I mention this story is in no way chronological?

This space was the first time I had the chance to design something from the ground up. I could choose anything and everything (as long as it fit my budget). That said, we had leftover tile from another project and it was the perfect amount to do this room. So black-ish/brown-ish tile was on the agenda. Free trumps design agency every. single. time.

Now, this awkwardly placed bathroom was located next to a “dark terra cotta” painted mudroom and was DYING for something with an impact (which it’s current color next to the terra cotta is even worse truth be told, but that’s a different story). I went with a bright grass green that would look great with mixed metals, woods and plants of all sorts. Plan acquired!

Demo is always the easiest. The giant cabinet came out with a few colorful words and phrases, the medicine cabinet came off the wall, the trim was removed, the toilet was taken out and the wall that stuck out away from the tub was cut back. It was exhilarating!

We laid in a subfloor for the tile, patched holes in the walls and dealt with the electrical. Even in its bare-bones state it looked 100 times better than it had previously. Now, during this project we had three auctions to attend to along with some presentations for schools (that’s a story for a different time) and were rarely home.

So although the bulk of the demo was done, getting everything installed seemed to be painfully slow. In fact, I’m pretty sure we had this simple outline/cut in around our shower for a week. So depressing. I mean it’s not, because it’s awesome to see your projects in action, but sometimes you just need a toilet ya know? Especially when your previous one is sitting in the middle of the mudroom while the cats use it for their own personal lounge chair. Weird.

We were doing good if we were home for a hot second to shower and sleep, let alone mud and tape and be annoyed that a previous owner had put a slight texture on the wall so none of our patching did any good. It was so fine, I hoped that a fluffy roller and some thick paint would cover it. I was wrong.

The largest remodeling challenge was to figure out how to cap the end of the wall where we had pushed it back to sit flush with the shower. We weren’t able to push the wall back past the end of the shower, otherwise it wouldn’t have had support. Most finishing options were meant to sit flush and that just couldn’t happen, so we needed to find an option that could stick out a bit and feel intentional.

It wasn’t really a spot we could drywall with ease and since I had this Hollywood Glam end game in my head, we decided to mix and match our own moldings to create our own 7.5″ wide statement piece. They don’t sell such things and assembling it in place involved far too much caulking and paint thinner, but it came together beautifully. It’s screaming for an Anthropologie-esque shower curtain at some point in time once the drywall dust has settled.

The space behind the door is huge and will require custom shelving without the ability to anchor anything into a stud. It’s been a point of contention between Adrian and I, as I was originally going for an all glam look, that now, might have to have some rustic elements brought into it to make the shelf building process a little easier. I had planned to stay far away from “rustic-barn-wood-diy” look as we live in Wisconsin and everywhere you turn there’s a bear statue holding a toilet paper roll or an iron moose fireplace grate. They’re all fun and kitschy in their own right, they’re just not my thing in my everyday home design.

We splurged and purchased new trim for the ceiling and floor. This is one of those magic underlying costs that they don’t tell you about in home repair. Sure a stick of it is only $4, but then there’s 40 sticks and it’s $200 with tax and paint. Just for some stupid wood. The financing of little things is exhausting to my brain. I do much better with the price points of sofas and chairs than I do a renovation as I tend to get mad when little silly sticks of wood have the cost they do.

The room has two light switches and two ceiling fixtures. Although we are able to combine them, I didn’t want a light strictly over the toilet or mirror and putting one in the center of the room was weird because of the partition between the shower and the shelves that have yet to be installed. So we’ve left them for now and we’ll see where the tide takes us down the road when I have the mental capacity to deal with such things. Dualing fixtures gets a little sketchy as no matter what you do they end up looking like eyes or boobs. Usually boobs.

Previous owners had epoxied the screws for the outlet into the box, so out came the grinder in order to replace the face plates. In hindsight this should have been done before we painted as a grinder wheel isn’t exactly tiny and when you’re hoarding renovation supplies in your basement, finding your Dremel isn’t easy either.

To help make up the cost of the molding, we managed to pick up a new sink for less than $10 at our local Habitat for Humanity ReStore, so that was a total win. I wanted to make sure this space had as much room as possible in it. Who know’s when you’ll need to have a dance party in there?

The hardest part of the entire bathroom overhaul, however, is currently happening. We were forced to move on to other things in the home. The whole mold in the kitchen thing happened and after that we we had to get crackin’ on the upstairs bedrooms so the kids had a place to sleep. So this room sits in waiting until we’re able to make a triumphant return to finish her up. We installed a few towel bars from IKEA for (go figure) towels and even threw up 5 shiny gold frames to get the artwork vibe started. They’re beautiful vintage frames that are currently out on loan for a photoshoot in Chicago. That’s normal right? Renting your bathroom artwork? #totallyathing The door needs to be painted, the trim needs to be sealed, the vanity lights need to go up, the shelves need to go in. There is no triumphant after photo. It creates a bit of anxiety in me.

We have a painted room with weird wall textures, that I know I should completely sand off or cover over, or light on fire…. that needs another week’s worth of work — when we can afford it. But that’s just how it is. I have a toilet, a shower, a floor that holds up to water and a place to soak my plants when they’ve been neglected — I mean a place for folks to wash their hands. There’s this dread in the back of my mind that I might not get back to it and we live with the imperfections and frustrations of it daily. That’s just life. It’s a half finished, yet functioning bathroom, that will someday be a little less John Deere and a little more on fleek. Maybe with some teak. Don’t worry, I’ll let you take a peek — down the road, in a little more than a week. Man I’m a geek (for James Van Der Beek). Thank you and goodnight.

The post The Great Green Bathroom & Being OK With Half Finished Projects appeared first on Vintage Revivals.

Hey everyone! Sarah here! This past week, even though we had an office and hallway that are in desperate need of paint, a dryer that needs to have a gas line run and shelves in our laundry room installed, we had to attend to some basic needs first. Bills. Man, can you just imagine how great life would be if we didn’t have bills? I’m not even talking about rollin’ in a Lambo (that’s still cool right?), I’m just talking about buying the expensive shampoo at the store instead of the least-obnoxious-smelling bottom-dollar variety (that I’m sure my hairdresser will yell at me later for using). I’m a simple lady.

In the mid-century furniture world, sometimes you’re buying furniture and sometimes your selling. It all depends on what you can find. This week happened to be the buying sort of week which means we still needed to find some spare change for “the man” so it was time for the Great Waldo Garage Sale. Now in the process of picking up vintage goodies across the midwest, we also end up with other “stuff” by proxy. All it takes is one auctioneer to find out you’re there for a certain style and suddenly he’s thrown  an ugly velvet Jesus painting into the lot as well. Often we donate items, bequeath them upon friends and family, but sometimes they end up collecting in our garage/attic and then come Spring we host a big sale.

Now, we’re not Hoarder Sale levels of huge, but we do usually attract folks from 3 different states and up to 150 miles away — which means I’ve reached celebrity status in my own mind (which is a dark and scary place) and I will now only be requesting green M&M’s in the bowl in my dressing room. They will of course have been licked by the dog and have sticky kid prints on them, but that’s just how we roll in Waldo. So today, I’m taking a break from home repair antics and sharing a few tricks of our trade and how we bring people from all over just by utilizing Facebook and Craigslist.

It sounds like we’re bragging.

“Like, totally ohemgee you guys, we’re like so cool and above everyone else, because we like, are totally rollin in the b’s, g’s and any other letter that sounds like money and gets an apostrophe so folks know what we’re talking about but don’t really need them. Now let’s go get a salad. A cobb salad.”

That isn’t it at all. Garage saleing. saling. sailing (where’s the boat emoji?). Hosting a garage sale is part necessity, because who doesn’t need to get rid of a few things? Likewise, it’s also part gluttonous as we sit outside (not taking items to be donated) while we demand people flock to us and bring us money. Man, if only that worked for cookies. BRING ME ALL YOUR DOUBLESTUFF and take my old toddler clothes. I could totally get behind that business model. But the biggest part of any garage sale is to market it. What makes me flock to Target (besides clearance)? Clever ads I can’t get out of my head. What makes me shop at Home Depot? Well placed end caps of merchandise that make me wonder how I ever lived without such a thing before. Maybe I worked in retail too long, but the long and the short of any good sale is marketing! Here’s a few basics for those looking to beef up their bank account and turn your sale into the event of the neighborhood!

The other important thing to note about our sales is that we don’t do clothing. Yes, we have it and yes, it could sell, but because we DON’T put it out we attract a different kind of folk. We even say in our listing that we don’t have clothes and it’s all “good stuff”. You’re of course welcome to do what you want, that’s just something we do.

4 THINGS TO DO BEFORE THE SALE

ORGANIZE, ORGANIZE, ORGANIZE

There are several bonuses to separating things out into like piles before a sale. Yes, it means it will be all over your house and garage, but it means you’re able to take things outside in like-piles, making set up easier as all items should always be grouped by type (camping gear together, fishing gear together, old toys kids don’t play with any longer and you spent millions of dollars on — together!)

PHOTOGRAPH, PHOTOGRAPH, PHOTOGRAPH

Yes, people can read a posting and discern what’s for sale. But if it simply says “old dresser” or even “mid-century dresser” I’m personally, more likely to go to the sale with photos that shows me the condition and wear of items. That’s a sure sale instead of a surprise. Market your sale to vendors and collectors that will be coming for specific items.

GET MORE STUFF – NO REALLY

Ok, so it seems contradictory to acquire more stuff when you’re trying to get rid of items you already feel suffocated by, but the more stuff you can possibly pack into a space the better! The key is making sure people can SEE all the stuff from their car. That probably means only tall stuff on tables and other stuff should be displayed on boards on cement blocks on the ground. That way you can tell you have 9,000 items and folks would be CRAZY not to stop! Likewise, the goal is to entertain children so parents can buy as much as they’re little arms can carry. If there’s something for everyone, then no one gets bored and antsy to leave!

Having a few name brand items that are priced lower than your local antique stores will help draw folks in. Make sure you’ve done your homework and know what they’re actually selling for (check out the completed sales section on eBay when you’re refining a search so you can see what valuables have sold for — not just what you feel they’re worth because that’s what you’ve paid for them previously).

Maybe that means you need to have all of your local family and friends selling with you at the same time, or maybe you go to an auction or two ahead of time and buy up all the dollar tables. (Side note: at the end of housewares auctions most auctioneers will let you buy everything left on the table, or TWO tables for less than $5) Our usual rule of thumb is needing around 1,500 items that could all sell for at least $0.50-$1.00. Assume only 2/3 of it will sell and that 3/4 of that 1,500 will sell for $3-$5. You’re welcome to do the math on that, it melts my brain (especially if you use that new-fangled math system the kids use these days), but either way, it equals at least $1,000 without any large ticket items being counted. Baller status yo.

ADVERTISE

For us that means making a killer ad on Craigslist and adding that listing to all the local groups on Facebook that sell things. There are a few key things to remember when making a successful Craigslist post.

1. BE SPECIFIC: Remember that not everyone reads every garage sale ad. Folks who make a living picking up antiques or specialty items are usually running searches on specific key words through apps and different platforms. List all furniture pieces by type and name if they have one, even if that means you have 500 different things listed – do it!
2. USE TAGS: At the end of your post, make a big line and then below it write the word tags: mid century, midcentury, mid-century, furniture…. etc. List things like 60’s, 70’s, 80’s or the words of places people who might like the things you have to offer shop: Restoration Hardware, CB2, Crate and Barrel. Make sure you use multiple names for things so if someone is looking for a sofa, couch, divan or settee then they’re all listed and you haven’t left anyone out. Remember that some folks say antique, some say vintage, some say retro and some just say old. Put them all in!
3. MAKE IT FUNNY: My husband is always impressed (because he doesn’t think I’m funny when obviously I’m hysterical) at how many people come up and say they enjoyed our listing. Folks even email us to say how funny it is. INJECT HUMOR! If you want people to suffer through this oppressive ad with a million words (reading is tough work people), you have to reward them with a dose of comedy.
4. GIVE THEM A NEED TO SUPPORT: So yes, I’m telling you to turn your garage sale into a Kickstarter of sorts, but in reality, giving people some reason to buy things from you (even if they don’t need anything) helps 100 times over! Our first sale together, Adrian and I put up a giant sign that talked about needing a honeymoon! It sounds romantic, but really we just used the cash to fly to Vegas for a few nights to get married. Boom. Done. The next sale we asked folks to help support putting a new roof on the house, as we also did the next. Roofing is EXPENSIVE and you suddenly have pity from any person who has put on a new roof or been broke when they got married. We even have people give us donations at our sales to help us out. Free money people! It doesn’t get any better than that! Maybe it’s a sign that says, “Wife wants my man-cave out so we can have a rec-room the kids will never use and always pit out. Help a brother out!” Whatever it is — people relate!

There are basic things to remember such as getting enough sleep the night before, acquiring enough tables to hold all your loot (concrete blocks and old doors or plywood work perfectly), the more the merrier so you can look like you have ALL THE THINGS. You should also grocery shop so there’s snacks that are easy to grab, as sending someone for fast food isn’t always easy (especially when you don’t have fast food in your town — unless you’re chasing a cow and then it’s fast food — get it? — not funny? –moving on). So what should do you the day of the sale?

5 THINGS TO DO ON THE DAY OF YOUR SALE

SIGNS SIGNS SIGNS

We’ve all had that moment where you drive past a garage sale sign and are like should I stop? I don’t know…. ah, dang, we passed it. Whatever. Don’t let the whatever moment happen to you! Sign your house. Sign it in both directions for traffic. Sign it at the end of the block. And the block after that. And all major intersections for a half mile. No really. Leave no corner naked. Think about people that don’t live in your neighborhood coming to your sale. Are they coming from the next town/city/state over? Sign it accordingly so there’s no question where you’re located. Make them funny, make them SIMPLE and make them LARGE! Check with your local piano retailers. They ALWAYS have large cardboard that can be folded around poles so they don’t blow over and zip tied together. If you have a cause, put that on there. It makes people stop even if they didn’t intend to otherwise! Guilt them into stopping. Yes, I understand I have no shame. I can also pay my electric bill on short notice if needed. So there’s that.

SET IT OUT FIRST, PRICE IT LATER

Folks can’t buy what they can’t see. It’s more important that it’s all set out than it’s priced. That said, walk through the big ticket items with friends and family that might be in attendance so you’re all on the same page for a few ballpark prices. Make sure to arrange items in like things, tallest items in the back so they can be seen easily from the street. In addition, try to bag smaller items together. It’ll save you from the hassle of making smaller change and folks always feel like they’re getting more when it’s in a bag. Glass markers (we like the ones from Crayola) work beautifully on anything made of metal, glass, plastic and wood. Save the tape and stickers for someone with more patience.

SEND THE KIDS TO GRANDMA’S HOUSE, LET THE DOGS OUT AND BE CHATTY

It’s hard to be chatty and focus on 20 different people roaming through your yard if you’re making sure your youngest isn’t painting the dog or shoving the hose inside your dryer vent instead of being cute and playing in the sprinkler. Sometimes as a parent it’s easier to eliminate a stress so you can focus on being “on.” Talk to folks about the quality of items, where they came from, tell them the stories that make them want to buy your stuff. It’s easier to do with kids away. I know that homemade cookie stand or lemonade stand is cute, but for those that aren’t into kid antics, it will actually deter them for visiting items in the proximity — and in some places you need a license these days to do so.

Likewise, if you’re able, let your pets roam around. You’d be SHOCKED how many people stay for additional chunks of time just to talk to you about your pets. About their pets. About the pets they want and suddenly they see another shiny thing that they simply must own. You also appear more human and personable with an animal around. People won’t ask you if a toaster works, but they’ll talk to you about your cats. Then they’ll talk to you about the toaster. Also, I may or may not have worn a bunny hat for an entire sale (honestly, I couldn’t find a beanie in the remodel and it’s still cold here in April) — so being (more) weird can also be a good ice breaker!

OPEN EARLY AND STAY OPEN LATE

Be ready for early birds and stay until the sun sets. Folks that saw your sale on the way to work will surely stop on their way home when they see your still there. We all have stuff to attend, meetings, practices and have commitments — don’t have a sale those days. Will you always be selling? Nope. Take that time to post to individual Facebook selling groups or re-comment to your original post. Make sure folks know what’s still available. Even if your self promoting and you just say, “Desk and Dresser are gone, tons of housewares and toddler clothes still available. All must go, making deals on it all!” Sure, you’re having a conversation with yourself, but it’s popping your sale back into people’s Facebook feeds and how many times a day do you check that? Lots. Same for everyone else. If you get a chance, take a few new photos as the day goes and post them as well. If you’re too busy, no worries (heck, most of THESE photos are over a year and a half old as we’re too busy too!), but any publicity is good publicity!

DON’T MAKE DEALS UNTIL AFTER NOON THE FIRST DAY

The goal is to sell everything. Obviously that doesn’t always happen, but if you sell all your large ticket items within the first hour or two, there’s less incentive for folks to pull over. Vendors, collectors and resellers will also try to haggle you as much as possible. Don’t waiver unless they’re buying many items and are making it worth your time to reduce a price. Likewise, don’t hold out on prices past noon on the first day. 70% of your sales will be in the first few hours and after that you’ll make significantly less, so as long as you have enough stuff to sell, get it out the door  (but not to jerks or people wearing socks and sandals — you still have to have standards) .

This all sounds super serious right? Well as far as I can figure, sitting outside all day isn’t worth my time if I’m only making a few hundred dollars (or less). Sure, stuff is out of your house and to a good family in need, BUT, spending 2 days with your family or even just yourself is far more valuable than a few hundred bucks. Make sense? Anything worth doing is worth doing right and always worth doing better than everyone around you. Next week I promise I’ll be back with the horror story of that one time I broke down and cried in Menards (like Lowes/Home Depot) when the paint person asked me if I needed any help. It wasn’t pretty. Until then…

Do you have any tricks or tips that are specific to your area? For instance, there’s a neighborhood nearby us that doesn’t allow signs in yards or on poles, so folks park their car on the street and put signs in the window. Genius. Share your garage sale horror stories and successes in the comments below!

The post What’s Happening In Waldo: How To Make Cees Not Bees At Your Next Garage Sale appeared first on Vintage Revivals.

So here’s the thing about describing your remodel after major parts of it have already transpired — as we’ve been working we didn’t exactly take photos to show how painful each step was so we could document it for folks later on. Having taken a step back from writing for daily online content, it’s been nice to not have to photograph my dinner before I can eat it or clean my living room strictly so I can take a picture of it for a post or write up. So I’ve documented it, but not DOCUMENTED IT.

Since it’s still in my nature to snap shots of life as it unfolds, I planned on eventually making our remodel photos into books (Chatbooks anyone?) . The idea of kicking back and flipping through those painful memories of dicey words over wall removal, what colors floors should be and the dust — oh the dust — it would all be so beautiful in photo form when we weren’t living among the chaos. So it’s been a challenge to tell a story after something has occurred without having as many step-by-step photos as I’d like. Although, I can craft the tale, let’s face it, the reason we all read design blogs is for inspiration and excess words after paragraph 3 are all blah blah blaaaaaaah and you find yourself quickly scrolling to find the next photo to refresh your attention span. I am no different. In fact, I already flipped back to Mandi’s recent, amazing slatted headboard DIY for inspiration in my own bedroom — twice — while writing this. I wish I was kidding. What were we talking about?

PHOTOS! YES! PHOTOS! So bear with me if this post in particular contains more words than photographs, but due to the circumstances we were just working as feverishly as possible.I’ll do my best to make it worth your time — which makes me sound like I solicit humor the way creepy people lure kids into vans with candy. So have no fear, I promise that if you hang in there with me on this you won’t find yourself in a pastel room loaded with stuffed animals. SARAH YOU’RE CREEPING PEOPLE OUT. JUST GET ON WITH IT! So our kitchen… do you need a snack first? Some sweat pants? We’ll wait…

Ok. The kitchen. Oh that rascally kitchen. *sigh* I could really just repeat the words “that kitchen” with increasing levels of despair in my voice and magnifying amounts of head shaking and it would be much faster, but then there’s no meat to the story. Every story has to have a beginning, middle and end. Until we were all in highschool and then the English teachers started using the word climax instead of middle and we all giggled. Or maybe that was just me? Moving on. So in the beginning, although, we knew our kitchen was less than desirable and was a total hot mess, it was still functioning, unlike other parts of our home. So our “plan” was to make do until everything else was done and tackle it last and make it all perfect and stuffs. Man, plans are great things. Do you know how many “plans” I’ve actually followed through on without altering (Adrian just yelled from the bathroom NONE because I talk out loud when I write… which he may or may not be wrong about, but I told him it’s not nice to yell while going pee. #boyswillbeboys)? This “plan” was no different.

Now don’t get me wrong, it was ugly yet picturesque — it had already had the ceiling torn into in order to run plumbing for the upstairs bathroom and large chunks of drywall removed to do so. You’d think that whatever is above your head isn’t really noticeable until your cat learns to jump onto your counter, onto the refrigerator and then into the ceiling. Do you know how terrifying it is to feel like someone is staring at you and to look around and not see anyone… and then see the cat who’s eyes at that angle always look like they’re doing the reflective demon thing? Heart attack levels of horrible I tell you! So it wasn’t perfect, but it was slightly tolerable when we told ourselves it would be better soon — like Saturday Night Live between 2010-2014.

It all started one morning when the teenager was in the kitchen rummaging for breakfast. You know the thing that they do where they claim there’s no food even though there’s roughly 10+ different breakfast options at their fingertips but all of them appear too healthy or like something they’ll actually have to make? Yes. That. That was happening. As I stood watching the self-pity-party over the lack of frozen waffles and sugar laden cereal, that’s when I saw it. As most teens are at 14, they’ve suddenly grown 40 feet taller and nothing fits, so there he was in short pajama bottoms hanging on the tops of the cabinet doors when the cabinet started to pull away from the wall. All panic was had and I informed Adrian that our daily plans simply must be changed, that this was a safety thing and whatever he had planned was put on hold. It wasn’t a lovey dovey moment, persay, as Adrian is pretty set in his daily plans since he has so much to accomplish around this place, but he loves me and set aside his own agenda to remedy this issue. How long could it really take? “It’s just a single cabinet,” I said!

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Man. I wish that was true. It’s never true. In my head it’s all, oh we’ll have this thing down and whisked away in time for me to make lunch and take the dog to the park and the kids to the pool and then the universe slaps you back into reality. It’s a big hairy jerk-face like that.

So here’s how it went. Instead of taking off the top cabinet we decided that the bottom cabinet should just come off too as it was really only being used to store stuff we didn’t need any longer. So to the donate pile it went and that bottom cabinet unscrewed easy as pie. If pie had screws. I digress. Upon the bottom cabinet’s removal, we noticed that there was something funny with the hideous-but-tolerable (if your blind) design choice that was the faux wood paneling behind the cupboards. It was a little… floppy? So we said, “What the hey we’ll pull it out too,” and BOOM that’s when it hit us.

As that paneling pulled away our throats literally closed and we had a hard time breathing. I fled like a big baby (but we established that I’m a wuss in the previous post) and my husband inspected what was happening. It was quickly made known to us that an issue from the previous owner (who was forced to leave the house on foreclosure gave a big finger [no not your pinky] to the bank and on the way out the door, left the water running upstairs. Adrian had remedied the removal of said water and had dealt with some remnant damage leftover from it previously and we thought we were hunky dory. But we were wrong. We were 12 shades of black and red swirly mold wrong. The children were immediately sent outside and then later to Grandma and Grandpa’s. We wrangled in our trusty friend to help demo, put the neighbors on standby for another possible ER trip and got to work. All plans for the day were officially cancelled.

There were respirators involved, masks, bandannas and never ending mold. The first layer of paneling came down, then the rest of the cabinets had to be emptied of their food and dishware.

Then the drywall came down, then the vinyl flooring (I wasn’t exactly sad to see that go), then the lathe board (and some plaster), then the insulation and then the studs themselves were scrubbed with bleach over and over (and over) until we were 400% positive that the environment was safe again. The mold was on every level and because of such, all the materials went straight to the burn pile and did not pass go. The flames from it all got a little Harry Potter on us and whipped and curled and made neat colors. Devil mold does that I guess.

I wish I could be even slightly comedic about this issue. Where’s your funny story now Smith? Huh? But there wasn’t anything funny. It was crazy scary and it took us the better part of 48 hours of almost continuous work by 3 people to be sure that our home was safe again. Because it had traveled up between the studs it could be anywhere. We had to check between floors, under the floorboards upstairs, in air vents — you know how there’s place you always sort of ignore in the kitchen? Like, if you don’t look under the refrigerator the dust bunnies and milk tabs that the cat bounced under there don’t exist until you check it every 6 months? This was worse. We couldn’t leave a single space without examination.

So in a quick span of a few days our kitchen went from being ugly to being crazy ugly and hostile. When they say it was the best of times it was the worst of times, this was that time(s). As much as I’d like to say the silver lining is that we were able to protect our family and our animals from the scary things lurking in the walls, it’s made the last year more than difficult.

Adrian still (not so secretly), is frustrated we had to take it out early — heck, we both are. It’s caused nothing but contention between us and all the things that happen daily in a kitchen. Preparing food is stupid-tricky without countertops y’all. We rigged up one small section that was salvageable to hold the sink and dishwasher but it doesn’t really leave us much space to deal with kitchen life. We brought in a folding table and it’s been holding basic pantry supplies and all other meal prep items were banished to the mud room (along with the cat apparently).

There’s lots of “woe is us” stories that we can elaborate on, that pertain to this quick-change-of-plans-turned-two-day-horror-story, but in short, let’s just say the kitchen isn’t the heart of the home and it’s a daily reminder that we’re not millionaires (heck, I’d settle for being several hundred-dollar-aires at this point), and that we must find the joy in life while working in the trenches.

Folks tell us that someday we’ll look back on this and smile, but I don’t think I’ll have many fond memories about doing all my meal prep on the dining room table or dishes in the bathtub while plumbing had to be disconnected. I’m not sure either of us will smile at having a floor that we can only sweep and not mop. (We’re just choosing to think of ourselves as pioneers with a dirt floor and it helps keep the insanity at bay — for about 12 seconds.) Home repair gurus tend to wear their battle stories on their sleeve as a badge of honor, like a DIY Boy Scout of sorts. But rarely are they elated (even in hindsight) to have such a rough turn of events.

There were good things that came from the demolition — like the ability to better see the kitchen for the space it really is and have the opportunity to design it from the ground up. We knocked out a wall (or two) and added a sliding glass door (more on all that later). But in short, the moral of the story is sometimes the things we have to do are super sucky. Sometimes you live without a kitchen for an entire year (going on two) and don’t have a single place to set anything down or use a cutting board. Sometimes that’s just the way the cookie crumbles.

The reward for our hard work is so far off currently, in regards to the completion of this project, that we’ve have to let go of those superficial ideas that make us feel worse about it. Will I be able to host Christmas? Not beautifully. Will it be shiny and amazing in the end? Sure, but I don’t know when that is, so holding onto that idea jabs deeper. Let it go. (Let it gooooooooooooooooo) Do we wish it was a better space for the children? Always, but they’re cool. They know food is made with love and are also ok with a little more Taco Bell than they should probably consume.

So what’s the key to continuing on? Love. Having someone by your side who knows exactly what you’re going through and faces the same struggles with you. I know. Barf. Get a room right? We aren’t the first couple to face hardships while renovating, I think that’s a given for most folks, but the endurance process while it’s accomplished slower than many isn’t anything I’d want to face with anyone else. If we talk to you in person about these blessed few days, I’m pretty sure that there’s large flailing arm movements and a bit of hostility towards the situation, but you know what? It is what it is and I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else. Wait, unless there’s a pool — or a built in pebble ice machine. *sigh* A girl can dream.

The post The Time Our Kitchen Almost Killed Us appeared first on Vintage Revivals.

What up party people? Does anyone still say that or is it just me? Wait, don’t answer that. This is Sarah again from WALDOMIDCENTURY and I’m so grateful that y’all are following along the path of home repair with us up here in Wisconsin. If you missed the first few posts, check out the first, second and third ones here. Now, let’s get down to business shall we?

They say titles of posts should be entertaining and real. They should be attention grabbing and honest so they strike a chord with folks and allow them to identify with the writer before you ever begin. With this in mind, I had a hard time choosing between what’s above and the alternate version, “The Time The Neighbors Across The Street Pulled Out Lawn Chairs and Snacks and Watched Us For Two Hours Like We’re an Episode of Family Comedy T.V.” But somehow, it just didn’t roll off the tongue as well, but it’s equally true. This week I’d like to chat a bit about the lessons that we learn in life the hard way like: touching a hot burner or thinking you can leave the house without a bra on just to run to the store for a few things, because it won’t matter you won’t see anyone you know (wrong. so very. very. wrong. you’ll see all the people. ALL THE PEOPLE!). For us, one of the hardest lessons we’ve ever learned took place quite literally one year ago yesterday — aww, the anniversary of when we should have known better to install windows on a limited time schedule and on a day that’s expecting rain and major thunderstorms.

Yeah, I KNOW… when you say it like that, it’s OBVIOUS right? Like, who installs windows when the words tornado and hail are being thrown around? That’s just cuckoo-banana-crackers right? And like all well laid plans and ideas, they’re flawless, until the moment they aren’t — and you find yourself with a bleeding hand, a broken nose and rain shooting into your front room at ghastly, gushing rates until you can muster the courage to stand outside on a ladder in the middle of a lightning storm to plastic up the gaping hole. Did I mention the dog peed on the plastic 30 minutes later? Well of course he did. Why would he not?! Ok, here’s how it started…

Remember back at the beginning of this series when I mentioned that we’ve installed all new windows in our home over the last year? Well the short of that story is that my husband had been asked by friend who rent out storage units to remove all the items left after a tenant didn’t pay their bill. He could keep whatever treasures he wanted as long as he found a way to dispose of the rest. Challenge accepted! Most was trash, trucker logs, furniture and housewares that were so cootie-rific that they walked themselves to the curb/burn pile — but at the back of this particular locker were 14-20 white, double-hung windows and their screens. Hellooooooo nurse! And by nurse I mean gold. And by gold I mean windows. You get the idea.

The windows weren’t the exact size as the ones they’d be replacing, but they were free and kept the cold Wisconsin winters out better than the ones that were currently installed. Even if it meant we’d be replacing them a few years down the road, that’s a few years that I don’t freeze my bahooty off when it drops to 30 below or sweating my booblets off in summer as NONE of our existing windows were able to be opened due to their geriatric age and condition. Even though the summers are relatively mild here up north, it’s like a hot dog in a small car in the sun when none of your windows open!

Adrian spent the better part of two weeks replacing single windows throughout the house in rapid succession. He was a window installing machine. It was terrifying really, I’d make a run to the store for typical groceries or hardware store needs and I’d come home and we’d have a new window where an old one once lived. It was akin to going to summer camp as a kid and having your mom clean your room while you were away. You’d come home and it would be miraculous! (Though in this story insulation from the walls littered the floors and it wasn’t as tidy, but miraculous none the less!)

He installed the majority of the smaller windows and then came time for the big boys! We had two, triple sets of windows that were going to replace 4 single windows. They’d take 3.5 adults who weren’t afraid of heights. Adrian and myself rounded up a good friend of the family, our trusty neighbor on occasion to ensure we had a ride to the emergency room, and also enlisted the oldest son who was both excited to help use intense power tools and saddened that the weekend was in no way shape, or form going to involve video games.

Now, the basics behind installing a window are easy and can be broken down into these simple steps.

1. Remove previous window sill and trim.
2. Remove window.
3. Alter size of window hole to accommodate new window.
4. Place new window in hole and secure with screws (that’s what she said!)
5. Fill the cracks and add your trim.
6. Do a happy dance and partake in a delicious iced beverage.

See simple right? Right. It’s totally that easy. And although that’s 80% sarcasm, truth be told, installing a window isn’t as difficult as it seems. It’s one of those scary things that you think you’re not equipped to do because that’s “real” construction and not repainting a dresser, but trust me once you price the cost of having them installed for you and then watch a few YouTube videos, there isn’t much you can’t do! Installation quotes are a great source of courage and DIY spirit!

We decided to do the top windows first as they’d be the most difficult windows being installed (or so we thought) as they’re heavy and would involve rope, gross amounts of caffeine and working above your head on a ladder.

The process took us two days. We’d tackle the top floor first and the main floor windows the next. To start on things upstairs, we busted a giant hole in the wall, pushed the old windows to their death on the ground below (it’s like knocking over perfectly stacked boxes of Jello or cereal boxes at the store — weirdly cathartic. What? I can’t be the only one who does that?) and slid the new larger window up dualing ladders and into place. Trim was cut to fit, painted and we called it a night.

Exhausted and exhilarated that we didn’t screw it up, we took a look at the forecast for the next day and although it was supposed to storm later on (after 8pm), the rest of the day was supposed to be stupid muggy, but clear and so we made plans to start early and get things knocked out.

Feeling a bit professional (there may or may not have been strutting), at this point in time, we started in on the lower floor and the removal of its existing two windows. The previous day’s window took us roughly 6 hours to install, including making and painting our own trim. So, rightfully so, we assumed that this one would take less as we didn’t have as much ladder work and not working above our heads seemed 100% easier.

As we started to remove the glass from the existing windows, Adrian busted out the Sawzall and started cutting a larger hole around the windows. We were installing 3 where 2 once lived, and thus, we had to cut the existing wall back to the next stud on each side.

Now, for those who have never decided that it’s a good idea to CUT INTO THE WALLS OF YOUR HOME WITH A GIANT SAW…. rest assured, I can confirm for you that it falls into the category of cool on the outside and freaking out on the inside. Example:

External dialog: My husband is cutting into the wall now. There he goes, he cut into the wall. Cool, cool. We’re such awesome homeowners. He’s amazing and I trust him 100%! Isn’t marriage swell?

Internal dialog: HE’S CUTTING INTO THE FREAKING WALL YOU GUYS IS ANYONE ELSE SEEING THIS! THAT’S THE OUTSIDE WORLD RIGHT THERE! WHAT IF THIS DOESN’T WORK? WHAT IF…. BIRD! THERE’S A BIRD! A BIRD OUTSIDE MY WINDOW THAT’S NOT THERE BECAUSE WE CUT INTO OUR HOUSE LIKE IT’S HAVING ITS APPENDIX OUT! (apparently I yell a lot in my head)

Truthfully, there isn’t anything you can’t fix, but it’s still scary as you quickly realize that the things that surround your precious family and vintage camera collection are just some boards, a little plastic and um, that’s it. They aren’t 4 feet thick, they’re just a few inches and when you’re staring at your lilac bush 3 small inches from your library, it’s this weird adult moment where you’re so very grateful for the safety from the elements that this home, no matter what condition provides!

Story. Seriously people! You have to keep me on track here. So, I’m moving things out of the way to make sure the saw and the cords have proper clearance, when all of a sudden, my super hero husband drops the saw and grabs his hand. The saw hits the ground with a thud and we all freeze. Now, Adrian is the sort of guy that could be attacked by a great white shark and just put a little spit and superglue in it and call it good while carrying on with his day. So when he yelps or hollers, something is GENUINELY hurt. He calls for gauze, tape, steri strips and a pain reliever. That’s a lie, he’d never ask for the pain reliever, but I added that in along with all the neosporin our first aid kit could muster. He then told me that I was overreacting and took the smallest bandaid possible. You know the one I’m talking about, they’re the size of a Tic Tac and I’m pretty sure they only put them in the first aid kit for kid’s pretend ouchies. The saw had bounced and in an attempt to catch it and keep it in it’s groove in the wall, he caught the end with teeth. Ouch. Luckily it didn’t cause any nerve or muscle damage, but had ripped a large slash down most of his dominant hand. He let me use larger bandages but nothing fancy. That’s when I realized that by default, this project was now up to me. Insert comedic, nervous laughing here.

I put on my big girl pants and was like y’all — we got a window to take out, we can do this! Honey, you supervise from afar — we got this yo! One of us started sawing where he left off, I started popping out nails from a stud that would need to be removed and the other started pulling back lathe to expose the space for the new window. Now, in my adventures of nail removal, I learned a very valuable lesson this day: One should not EVER use a pry bar in front of our face. It’s obviously easier to see, but as that nail pops out, so does the pry bar and then CRACK! I smacked myself square in the nose with it all. My glasses smashed back against my face, everything got hot and hurt and I sort of fell into a pile on the ground. TKO goes to the pry bar. Ding ding!

I laid on the floor with a bag of whatever frozen vegetable looked like it had been in the freezer the longest, sobbing and sniffling, I took deep breaths, trying to count the revolutions on the ceiling fan in order to distract myself from the swelling. I swore I broke my nose. Surely, I broke my nose and judging by the pain it obviously must be gushing blood and turning black and blue, but alas, after mustering the will power to stand, I checked the mirror it was none of those things.

Deduction: I am obviously a giant, dramatic baby. Nothing appeared to have happened. I then convinced myself that I couldn’t be that hurt and my job of project motivator and coordinator must carry on! I rallied the troops while I changed my shirt as it was dripping in melted stir-fry vegetable juice (ew gross) and took a selfie like any respecting human. Instagram or it didn’t happen.

Adrian of course wasn’t staying away from the action and we all rallied and popped that window right. There we stood, feeling all triumphant, gazing out over the hole that was left in it’s place. That’s when there was a collective breath gasp as we realized that the storm that wasn’t coming in 8 hours time. It was coming now. Like, in 20 minutes now, now. Like PANIC NOW! During the multiple rounds of commotion we hadn’t realized that the front had shifted directions and that doom, gloom and all sorts of horrible things were about to rain down upon us! MOVE PEOPLE!

Scrambling started happening as we had a 7′ hole in our house that wasn’t protected in any way, shape or form. We ran for the garage (something I usually reserve only for being chased), grabbed a giant roll of plastic sheeting, dualing ladders, and a tack hammer. With two folks on the inside and two on the outside trying to maneuver the plastic, the rain started to pour. It was that insulting kind of rain that is fast and furious and leaves you marveling at how sharp raindrops can actually feel!

We hadn’t had time to level the ladders, things were slippery and rocky and thus we ended up letting the inside folks take care of hanging out the hole (giggle) and tacking in the plastic at the top while we finished up the bottom on the outside. Was it pretty? No. Was it effective? Sorta? It was better than nothing and we all sat there wet, wounded, some of us had fuzzy vision puffy cheeks that smelled of year old freezer veggies — we were exhausted, wounded and all of the wind has been sucked from our sails. The boys went to the next room to collapse on the sofas while I stood there wondering if this is what adult life is like? And as if by cue, the dog enters the room, sniffs this foreign plastic material, shrugs his shoulders and has himself a little sprinkle tinkle. Can you see me making unimpressed face? Because I’m totally making it right now.

The rains cleared and we finished the window install by the light of the moon as we made memories of mopping floors and looking past the superficial (like the part where none of the lights in the room worked making it crazy frustrating to see what one was doing) because nothing could stop us now. Not wind, not rain, not disobedient dogs or stupid pry bars — this is the story of real life. I wanted to make sure I shared it as not much can be worse than this series of unfortunate events in conjuction with one another, which should make any window replacing job you tackle seem extra easy. You’re welcome. Oh, did I mention that 8 months later once I got in to see a doctor that wasn’t in the Urgent Care center she asked when I broke my nose and why I never had it reset and because of it I have to perpetually take allergy meds so I can breathe? I’m secretly hoping I’ll be the first female Darth Vader. Luuuuke, I am your lesson learned the hard way!

The post The Time He Cut His Hand Open & I Broke My Nose appeared first on Vintage Revivals.

Like many homes built in this era and area (say that five times fast), our 1920’s home is tall, narrow and full of lots of small rooms. It’s perfect if you have a dozen kids that all need their own space (or need to house your ever growing lone chair collection– leave no chair behind!), but not so great if you want an entire family to have a meal together in the same place. See this is what she looks like from the outside. We also have a killer hill for a front yard that makes our big beast appear a little more spooky than she really is.

Today I wanted to dish about a wall removal that happened between our kitchen and dining room. Now, to start, let the record state that our dining room held our family of 5 just fine, but it wasn’t large enough to hold our local extended family for a holiday or big event — nor were any of their homes for the same reason. This of course makes the pressure (which is obviously self-inflicted — like any good over-thinker), to create a room that will house such an activity, immense. I come from a family that no matter how big it grew, we all dined in the same area, while wearing our un-ironic (at the time) Christmas sweaters, and thus I have every intention of putting my beloved family through the same torture. Somehow large gatherings are cool when Pokemon are involved, but less cool when it involves putting a napkin in your lap! *sigh* Kids these days.

Our dining room is a funny space. It houses an extra-wide doorway to the living room (unseen as it’s on the left wall in the photo above) and traditional doorways to the kitchen and front hall. There’s also a door that’s been removed that used to lead to the deck. Wait a minute — have we acknowledged the hideous paint in this room? Sure, sure it doesn’t look too bad from this shot, but the white ceiling trim has this, not-always-consistently-dark-green paint all over it. Although, it could have been all moody and on fleek (can we use that word when talking about decor or just our eyebrows?), but it was wrecked by bad application and lack of anything bright to make it NOT resemble a Hobbit hole. Move over Frodo, we’re movin’ in!

It also contained a sweet, built-in china cabinet with sliding doors and enough storage to conceal all drama pertaining to Taylor Swift and Kanye West inside — until I came along. Having lived in several open concept warehouse spaces in the past, I’ve come to love their floor plans as they tend to challenge our ways of thinking on how we use space and what things we can eliminate when we don’t have as many walls to keep stuff on. They’re freeing! Although it means you can’t hide your dirty dishes after dinner, it does mean you’re able to impart guilt on your guests to come help you tidy afterwards — and that’s what family events are for right? Guilt? (sorry not sorry Mom if you’re reading this).

Alas, with this structure, that wasn’t in the cards as our balloon-frame abode just won’t tolerate such stress without pricey, supplemental support and so I’ve settled for more of an “open as I can get” space. This of course means, that beautiful china cabinet had to go. We had grand plans to simply un-house it from the wall and build a frame for it and use it in our decor upstairs until we started in on the project. The cabinet had been built from scraps and was quite literally one with the wall so first things first, we removed the plaster on the dining room side of the wall and then started the demolition of the cabinet.

Now. normally, folks who undergo a renovation or repair on a certain part of their home tend to take a few precautionary measures before starting. They remove all furniture and accessories and decorative items and wrap in plastic or a tarp those that can not be removed. They might plastic off the area from falling debris or cover vents and open windows. Then — then there’s my husband. All of these seemingly large things are just too much when you’re SO EXCITED to tear something out. His love of getting a project started is not unlike a kid in a candy store or a 7 year old on Christmas morning. Truth be told, when every part of your home has renovation going on in it, there’s little place to actually move things too, but I felt as though I needed a disclaimer as to why our tables and other areas are all seemingly still full of stuff (and weird stuff too!) Remember this is real, real life!

So this is when I pause because y’all– removing entire walls from your home is TERRIFYING. It doesn’t matter how many times you’ve done it, there’s still this insane fear that the house will come crashing in on you. No seriously. It doesn’t matter how much physics is up in your head, that all goes out the window when you start removing studs. I’m O.K. with this guttural reaction as I’m the type of person who will go all Fried Green Tomatoes on a wall and yell, ” TO WANDA!” and demo things just because I can. So it’s probably best that my brain comes pre-wired to keep me safe. Moving on…

Piece by piece (you collected me) it slowly came down. Now, we should probably note that this wasn’t our first project in the home and obviously isn’t the last, but it WAS the first time I’d seen my husband with a rather cautious look to him. I found out later, he actually WAS worried about the ceiling caving in and although he added additional header support to help hold things in place he couldn’t be positive that this wouldn’t yield in disaster. When I was younger I thought I’d be living on the edge by now. I guess this is as edgy as Wisconsin gets.

As we removed the cabinet we uncovered all sorts of treasures that were built inside. For instance, there was a newspaper from 1957 that is packed with amazing line art illustrations and job listings for both women and men — because of course they can’t have the same job! Why I never! We found a shot glass, two feathers and a some coins along with a whole host of dead spiders. Ew. Gross.

Once the main support for the wall had been removed there was this tension in the air. We had reached the point of no return and no matter what happened — this cabinet was coming out! It was akin to the suffering that plagues you the instant you realize you want to take your bra off for the night,  and then realize you can’t because you still have to walk the dog or take the neighbors brownies and you’re instantly annoyed. Aaaaaaand by annoyed I mean grateful for the opportunity to provide service to your family and to others — no wait, I really just mean annoyed. There were 5,000+ nails holding this sucker in place and it seemed it would never break free, but once it had been pushed off its axis it felt as though it needed to have been removed like yesterday and so piece by piece (he restored my faith) out it came!

Two sawzall blades later it was on it’s way to heading out the door. We took every last bit outside to our burn pile. For most folks, a fire in your backyard is held in a cute, controlled, little fire pit and you roast a marshmallow every once in awhile. In our home, our fire pit is the fastest way to get rid of wooden building material that can no longer be reused. First we strip reusable wood pieces and hardware from the debris and sort it out by like size and material. It’s sent off to find homes in the garage or out back in what we affectionately call “the lumber garden” (more on that later).

The rest, finds it’s way to the burn pile to die a fiery death, where it then turns to ash. It’s the cleanest way to remove old debris that can’t be salvaged or reused in any way, shape, or form. The ashes are then dug out every few weeks and we start all over again.

As an added bonus, letting your oldest tend to a 15′ materials bon fire in your backyard wins you serious cool points. It should also be noted that we live within a holler (see: yell, shout, scream) of the 3 firemen for our village and our children were trained in fire safety before they could ride bikes.

Now the space between the two rooms awaits its final treatments. The headers are in and we no longer worry that the sky is falling. We have a few ideas rolling around but as is the nature with working with found materials, you often work with what you stumble upon and not what you plan for! One thing we know for sure is this wall that leads into the kitchen will be covered in black pallet wood to help blend our homemade pipe kitchen shelving as we won’t be reinstalling cabinets, but I’ll save that story for another day! Thanks for tuning into our little “What’s Happening in Waldo” corner! Have you ever torn out walls? What sort of problems or things did you learn along the way? Let us know in the comments below!

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Hey y’all, this is Sarah Smith and I’m back (if you missed last week’s intro post, check it out here)! See, I get to say y’all even though I live in Wisconsin because originally, I hail from Kansas City (Missouri not Kansas and yes, there’s a difference) and although we’re very midwestern, and will never claim to be southern, there’s this weird rash of folks who “warsh” their clothes when they’re dirty and carry that southern dialect a little further north than you’d expect. Which, is obviously fabulous and super sexy when mixed with Wisconsin’s tendencies to confuse their vowel sounds. Example: “Let me put on my boooooooots so I can help you bring in your paper begs from the store.” So between adding additional consonants from my upbringing and switching up vowels in my adult years, it’s pretty safe to say that I should never be given a speaking outlet, but here I am! So hey y’all let’s get to it, eh!

I have so many stories and crazy happenings that I’m ridiculously excited to share over the coming weeks, but I felt as though before I really got started I should clarify a few things that suck about renovating an entire home and the unexpected costs as budget (or lack there of) plays a very, very large part in how we do things. Make no never mind, we are not professionals at our craft, but my DIY-guru of a husband has a solid knowledge of the basics of construction and home repair. So, luckily, things like electrical, plumbing and the demolition of walls don’t scare him. Did I mention he has dreamy blue eyes and is the hardest worker in the history of ever? Here let me show you:

Seriously guys. *swoon*

Plus as an added bonus, he also allows me to “use his body as size reference so I can remember the size of something when I get home.” I mean — make him wear the world’s largest lampshade in a store while I giggle and take pictures to post on the internet later. What? You’d totally do it too.

Now, even though I’m married to a rockstar construction guy (who has learned most of what he knows by watching others and Googling it — so don’t think you’re unable to DIY if you’re new to it), no matter how much he knows about re-framing a wall and rerunning new electrical over every. last. outlet. and. fixture. in our entire home, some things that you think might not have a heavy cost to them — will. So, today, I wanted to preface my still-to-come-crazy-misadventures with a few of the ways we get the job done along the way without skipping meals — because we’re already at ramen level here, so starvation (I mean “new weight loss plan”) is really the next step down and homegirl likes her snacks y’all! *nom nom nom*

So without further ado, I give you 3 things no one told you would cost your soul when rehabbing a home. They make it look so easy on TV. Magic numbers suddenly pop on screen and even though we’ve seen folks exhausted and dirty, they never really show where the money comes from — it just appears. Like from the tooth fairy — and we all know who pays for that! Here’s 3 things that are still crazy expensive and how we’ve worked around the expense in recent months. (spoiler alert, it involves ditching expectations and getting creative)

1. Drywall

Yes, I know it’s roughly $7-$10 a sheet. Yes, I know that isn’t that expensive. Yes, a movie ticket on a Friday night costs more than that — I know. But when you have 40 different walls and ceilings that will require, roughly (very roughly), 300 sheets of drywall, suddenly $7-10 is a legit (2 quit) expense. Sure, we watch for sales, but we’ve also tried to purchase things when stores have deep rebates so there’s money coming back and kept an eye on our town as well as surrounding cities via Craigslist for the remains of other people’s projects. Often, folks over-buy building materials and just want them out of their garage and are willing to let them go for free or at next to nothing prices. We’ve totally driven 3 hours just to pick up a trailer full of drywall for $5. $60 in gas is well worth the $500 savings!

2. Windows

For most folks, the idea of replacing every window in your home isn’t a pretty one. 9/10 it will involve a loan unless you have rockin’ savings and didn’t spend all the money on your youth on back and forth plane tickets to Alaska because you thought you were in love with a boy — but I digress. Windows, seriously folks, are crazy expensive and holy-expletive-expensive when you actually want to replace them with ones that are the same size! Crazy right? For those with savings the size of the sum total of change found in your couch cushion, there’s a few options. The most accessible for many is your local ReStore from Habitat for Humanity. They’re an excellent resource and you can find an array of windows in all different sizes. We have 10+ ReStores within a 3 hour drive from us and we make that entire 3 hour drive in all directions usually once a month. Several of our windows came from said ReStore adventures, but the majority came from a storage unit auction. That’s right, we paid $5 for 90% of the windows in our home. Were they the same size? Absolutely not, but I’ll happily make my dining room windows 7″ shorter for an $800 per window discount! Did I have dreams of thin metal framed modern windows for my modern-farm-dream-house? Sure. But I also have dreams of being Beyonce and honey, that just ain’t in the cards.

3. Trim Work

Sarah — this isn’t a photo of trim work, or anything that could even be remotely considered trim work. Yes, yes, I know! But this is a trailer full of workbenches and cabinets we pulled out of a garage in Sister Bay, Wisconsin which is up on the thumb of the mitten (Wisconsin and Michigan are both shaped like mittens and folks who live there will tell outsiders where they lived by pointing at their hand — like it makes any sense outsiders, but that’s just the way they roll). It was far and the load was heavy, but for the cost of gas and $20 in overhead money, we were able to give these pieces new homes and pay for the trim and finishing work for the entire top floor of our home. We’re talking outlets, lighting, actual wood trim and more! The small details kill ya and likewise, make all the difference in the design of your space. They can make it chunky or bulky or light and free — but no matter what zen feeling they give you, it isn’t cheap! Make sure to remember to turn to your local, or not so local Craigslist for deals you just can’t pass up to sell to someone else who didn’t want to drive 4 hours each way to get them. #hustlebaby!

So hopefully this gives you a tiny insight on how we do our work. It isn’t often we walk into a big box retailer and purchase something outright. We’re always digging and scrounging while we’re out and about to acquire the pieces we need, even if we have to adjust our construction plans to fit them. Sweat and time is less expensive than retail pricing! What items are you having a hard time finding for less? Let me know in the comments below and I’ll help source them for y’all down the road! Have you had an amazing Craigslist or ReStore steal that you couldn’t pass up? Share your treasures so we can all be jelly (sidenote: It makes me cringe when people can’t be bothered to use the entire word jealous, but then again I say y’all because that extra syllable would be too much work!).

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