The House, The Mouse, The Kids

Well, it has been quite a while since I've posted. Some updates from the last month:

The House:
Let's see - we've passed the electrical and plumbing inspections - yea! and Pete finished tiling and grouting the floor of the upstairs bathroom. I got pretty excited when I heard that Chad was coming over to set the toilet upstairs now that the tiling was done. If you remember the downstairs toilet requires a bucket of water for flushing. I did not realize that we were not setting the tank (need to wait until the walls and trim are done.) So - still using the bucket. But Chad did hook up a hose so we don't have to run two floors down to the basement to fill the bucket.

The big project this week was hanging drywall. My job was the "getter". I would get the tool belt, get the light or get a pop for Pete. After a while I was promoted to assistant driller. Luckily Pete is pretty smart and knew about a critical tool called a drywall jack (yellow thing in the first picture). I did not realize just how heavy sheets of drywall are. And with 13' ceilings in the dining room, I don't know how we would have done it without the jack.

On Friday I spent a good chunk of the day scraping wallpaper since Pete's dad was helping with drywall in the dining room. We are down to the original plaster in some parts of the hallway - Pete was the first to uncover this cool paint/stenciling detail. We thought for a minute about repeating it when we paint. But we decided against it.

So still more drywall to do. then we will hire someone to mud and tape. The we will be painting 'till the end of time. We also have the kitchen floor to tile, cabinets/doors to sand and paint, doors and trim to sand and paint and figure out if we will refinish the hardwood or carpet the living/dining room. It will probably come down to how much cash we have left. We are hopeful that it can be available for rent on May 1. If we keep things moving along, we might be able to start listing it in early March. We'll see....

The Mouse

Good news here. There was a showdown a few weeks ago. Pete went into the bathroom before bed one night and I heard what I can only describe as a ruckus. Apparently he had the mouse cornered and was able to "exterminate" the little guy with the Clorox wipes container (and then the wipes came in handy for clean up.) So we have not seen another mouse since this incident. So either there was only one (not likely) or word got out about the mouse hunter....

The Kids

Christmas was great at our house. The threat of Santa only bringing toys to good girls was lost on Wynne. She told me that "Santa brings toys to all the PRETTY girls, mom!" Apparently this is line from the Charlie Brown Christmas. Kind of sad - she is only four and has figured out that you don't have to be good, just pretty, and you will still get what you want. We did get her the Play Dough Ice Cream Shop. We broke it out and I was the assistant ice cream maker. I had some questions about what kind of sprinkles to make and Wynne said "less talking, more selling, mom". It is kind of hard to correct sassy behavior when you are trying not to laugh.

Emmett's love for food has expanded. He is now demanding pizza (PEEE-TA!) and has figured out how to climb on the kitchen chairs to swipe food from the table. I expect he will soon climb out of his crib to fix himself some eggs in the morning. That will make things a lot easier on us. Emmett is also very sweet and loving. He is very generous with the open-mouthed, drooly baby kisses and almost never bites you now (before it was hit or miss - sometimes you would get a kiss - sometimes a chunk of your face was gone.) He also loves to give hugs and will hug any baby or dog that he can get his hands on.

CSI: Saint Paul

It is never good to pull up to your house to see a bunch of people standing around, looking quizzically at your garage.

But that is just what happened today.



Someone left a little treat for us -- a dead, gutted deer. Gross.

This is the city. Discovering a dead person "Law and Order" style is one thing. A giant animal in your yard - totally unexpected.

I am very confused as to why someone would go through the trouble of gutting a deer and then dump it. Now you may ask how I know it was gutted -- I did not conduct the crime scene investigation myself. Luckily my neighbor was on site to declare that it had been gutted, share cause of death (arrow) and time of death (two days ago).

The neighbor said he called the police. Not sure what they'll do - maybe release the deer into his custody?

I've sent Pete out to check if the deer is still there. If no one takes it I guess we'll have to get rid of it. Maybe I will tie it to my car and run some errands....Never a dull moment.

Turkey Day

We had a great Thanksgiving weekend (as evidenced by this photo of Wynne in her turkey hat)

We stayed in town and spent Thursday with Pete's family. I made Pete's favorite White Castle stuffing. Yup - made with white castle burgers. If you're interested in making some for your Christmas gathering, the recipe is posted on the company's web site, along with many other creations you can make with these burgers.

Pete spent most of the weekend at the new house. Lots of odds and ends to work on. He bought a bunch of drywall, finished scraping wallpaper from one of the walls downstairs and wrapped up some projects to get ready for the electrician. The electrician was supposed to come out today but did not make it. Hopefully he'll get out there tomorrow. Once that is done we get it inspected, insulate the walls and we can close them up. Note to Pete -- don't forget to call the drywall guy!!

Meanwhile, Christmas is a hot topic at our house. I asked Wynne what she thought Emmett would like for Christmas. She thought for a while and then said that "Emmett would like some doll house furniture. And he can keep it in my room." what a sweet kid.

I asked her what she would like. Aside from everything that is advertised on TV, Wynne said she wants "everything that Andrew has that I don't have".

She also told me that what she really wants is an elf. Smart girl. Why limit yourself to toys on one day when you can get your own personal toy maker...

Emmett, on the other hand, is still learning to talk. He has a few words down though he calls everyone "da-dee".

He is also in maximum attention seeking mode. He waits until you are watching him and then grabs the Christmas tree or stove and runs. And then does it over and over again. I couldn't even take the cinnamon rolls out of the oven yesterday because he kept charging the stove yelling "HOT!". What a knob.

And if you are keeping track, the score at our house is:

Mouse - 2

Riemenschneiders - 0

Somehow Emmett also got stuck in a glue trap. And I spotted the mouse again yesterday. I can't believe we can't fix this problem.....

The Jen Trap

So we have a mouse (hoping just one) in our "real" house, not the rehab. This guy has evaded us for weeks. He first showed his pointy little nose a few weeks ago. (On a side note, this may explain Wynne's complaints about a gopher in her room. Maybe it wasn't a dream....)

Anyway, we set out snap traps with peanut butter. No luck (had to get up early every morning and collect the traps so the kids did not get caught.) We still have not found a nest or any mouse nuggets but we've seen him in the kitchen near the dishwasher. So we decided to try glue traps. We put them out at night, pick them up in the morning, put them out before work, pick them up when we get home. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. No mouse.

Today after work I did not pick them up since I put Emmett right into his booster for dinner. Figured he would not get trapped so no reason -- wrong!

While making dinner, I stepped right into the trap and was...trapped! I COULD NOT separate my sock from this thing. Wynne, ever the cool head, instructed me to take my sock off. Good thing it had a hole in it anyway.

So if you are keeping score:

Mouse - 1
Jen - 0

Stabbed!

Just a quick update and reminder to always keep sharp objects away from babies.....Earlier this week Pete was loading the dishwasher and Emmett came up and grabbed a butter knife from the silverware basket. Pete picked him up and Emmett knifed him right in the face!!!! No need for stitches but he did get quite a puncture would. Glad it was not a steak knife. This kid is dangerous....

Back at the house

Finally had a day that I could dedicate to working on the house. It got old really quickly.

We started off the day doing a project for work - we have an employee giving campaign - if everyone gives we all get a free day off. So we are doing a You Tube campaign talking about what we would do with our free day off.

Mine is below but this was actually round two. We shot the first one and I went back to our house to pee and upload the video and realized that I had to re-shoot. If you ever want to get really depressed, shoot a video of yourself with no makeup on. I am not usually that vain but this was AWFUL. So I had to put on makeup and try again.

As far as actual work goes -- it was kitchen cabinet day. We removed the (33!!) cabinet doors and sanded the gunk and grime off of them. Our contractor suggested an easier way to clean the doors -- we used a chemical to strip the gunk and varnish.

That worked for the moderately dirty doors but I had to go back to the belt sander for the really bad ones. (Note to self - pay more attention to the cabinet doors in our kitchen - I usually only wipe them when I spill something. Really don't want to have to use a machine to clean them.)



The plumbing inspection was supposed to be today but they were too busy so maybe next week. If you watched the video you will see the fancy way we flush the toilet. Luckily the house is only a few blocks away from our house because I still drove home to use the facilities. It is weird enough with no door -- has to be a pretty big emergency to use the bucket/flush method.

I also scraped a part of a wall (many many layers of wallpaper) while I was waiting for Pete to deliver the chemicals. I think it will take another solid week of just scraping wallpaper.

I am realizing that home improvement projects are like the snow. When it first snows - you want to play in it, don't mind shoveling it and are generally pretty excited about it. Then it keeps coming. And coming and just starts taking over. OK - not really that overwhelmed by the house just yet but I am lucky that Pete is doing most of the work and does not seem to get tired of tedious work.

What a difference a month makes

Yesterday marked one month since we bought the house. It has come so far (yet so much more to do...) The outside of the house looks so great. Pete was able to put the railing back on the front steps (one side rusted off and was laying the front yard). This involved using a grinder, new footings and other things that sound really difficult. Wynne noted that he painted the numbers on the house and said that was her favorite part...

Pete has spent a total of about a zillion hours bagging leaves. We have three giant trees and they keep dumping leaves. One half of a tree is left so the end is in sight.

Most of the "in wall" plumbing is done - just waiting for inspection. I have not worked at the house in weeks. Looking forward to having more time for that in November.

The second half of October was just crazy at work. I had three out-of-town trips in two weeks (one over a weekend), lots of presentations and I helped to organize a meeting for 35 people (much harder than I thought it would be). Add in two birthday parties for Wynne and you have a recipe for exhaustion. I probably got about five hours of sleep per night for the last few weeks. I realized just how tired I was when on Friday I looked at myself at the end of the day and thought my shirt looked funny. well of course it did - it was on inside out. Not a good look. Luckily I worked from home and only left the house for bit.

Got caught up on some sleep this weekend (no sleeping in with kids).

Two weeks between posts...

I can't believe it has been two weeks since I've posted. We've been so busy I have not had any spare time. I had a trip to Milwaukee and a separate trip to Madison within the same week. A few more trips coming up (one night in Chicago this week and two nights in Fargo the week of Nov. 10) Hopefully I can stick close to home after that.

We also celebrated Wynne's b-day with not one but two parties. One for "family" and one for "friends". Considering that most of Wynne's "friends" are family this was a bit silly. But we did have fun and she got lots of great presents so she is pretty psyched. She is covered in bruises thanks to her new bike so hopefully her doc won't call CPS after her 4-year-old check up tomorrow.

Oh - and the house-- that is going well too. Pete was able to work non-stop last weekend since I took Wynne and Emmett with me to Milwaukee and other than coming home for meals and helping to prep for and attend Wynne's party, he was also at the house this weekend. We're finally "legal" now that the bank paid the vacant building fee and we were able to get a permit. Chad the Plumber will come out tomorrow to get that going and we will be having the electricians out after that.

Pete got some painting done on the outside of the house-- it looks a million times better. Some of the shakes were not the right size and also not painted so they looked awful. Pete got some that are the correct sizes and painted them. Unfortunately the paint we bought ($42!!!!) did not match exactly but it still looks great. He spent yesterday doing lots of things that he won't be able to do once the ground freezes --

Sunday and Monday

Pete spent all day Sunday at the new house - doing more to get the house ready to be painted, buying and putting in storm windows and breaking up what he originally thought was just a small sidewalk. It ended up being many inches thick and was a much more difficult job than he thought. He was hoping to stuff the giant dumpster will all possible debris. But he ended up practically killing himself. He was noodle-like when he came home. I thought I was going to have to carry him to bed.

We headed back to work on Monday. Our contractor was at the house this afternoon to get started on some of the projects we can't do ourselves. When Wynne, Emmett and I were pulling up to the house after work Pete was headed out. He had the new backdoor sticking out of his car so he was either on his way to get that installed or he is running away to someplace in need of a door. I will keep you posted.

I gave Wynne my old jewelry box so she would have a place to keep her jewels and hair decor. She decided to deck out her hair and is trying to figure out a Halloween costume that will allow her to wear lots of clips in her hair. Here is one of her favorite 'dos.

At dinner Emmett decided that he wanted my apple - I offered it to him thinking that he would take a bite or two and get bored - but he ate almost the whole thing (including the stem - ugh)

Paint chips and other snacks

So Pete spent most of the day at the house -- power washing the deck, gutters and house. He also scraped the lead paint off of some of the old windows (more things checked off the "code compliance" list.) Our inspector actually said that lead paint chips taste sweet so that is why the kids like to eat them. Yum.

Speaking of kids. I spent the day with my two. We had a good time though Wynne was on a roll this afternoon. She started off the streak of naughtiness by secretly eating candy that had been in a treasure box she made for Pete years ago. I did not even know it was there (or I would have eaten it long ago...) Then, as I was cooking I heard "Help me" coming from Emmett's room. She was straddled over the crib, one leg in , one leg out. Then she settled down to do some art projects. I was still cooking (making dinners for next week) and she proudly showed me her masterpiece -- she cut pictures of herself and Emmett that I was planning to send to my mom and glued them to construction paper. Good thing she is so cute.

More Demo

Friday was a great day at the house -- we had a "crew" to finish up our demolition. Bob (Pete's dad) and Al (our brother-in-law) came by for the day.

One of the best surprises was upstairs. When we removed the carpet we found some really beautiful floors. Don't think we'll have to do anything other than clean them - finally - something easy!

We also finished the upstairs bathroom - all the walls are off and ready for the new plumbing. I learned a few things about working with a face mask on.

When wearing a face mask you should not:

chew gum and blow bubbles

have anything smelly for lunch

have a runny nose

smile at someone 'cause they can't see your mouth anyway...

We also took full advantage of the dumpster and piled in all the junk in and around the house.

Demo

Our giant dumpster arrived on Wednesday so Pete was able to start demolition. I had to work, but he was able to remove all of the random walls in the basement (not sure what there were used for, but lots of "grow lights" in one room (and no garden in the yard) leads us to one conclusion....



He also took the cabinets out of the downstairs bathroom and ordered replacement glass for the windows that needed to be repaired.



I came by at the end of the day on Thursday to help with the demo. My job was to pry the tiles off the wall in the upstairs bathroom. (The very same bathroom I cleaned just a few days ago. I suspect I am being assigned "busy work".) I carefully removed the tiles so as not to damage the walls. Then we took down the walls. Hmmmmm. OK, not all of the walls. Guess I did not need to be so careful. But tearing down the walls was fun. I was a bit more tentative than Pete (tapping against the wall vs. smashing the wall) but it is done.

Time to scrape the walls...

Our giant dumpster did not arrive as expected today so we had to put off the demolition for another day. We decided to start the looooong process of getting rid of the wallpaper. There were many layers of wallpaper, paint, lemon creme, more paper, etc. The dining room was actually not that bad despite four hours of spray, spray, scrape, scrape. repeat.

The living room is proving to be more difficult. We only got part of one wall done before we had to call it quits. I did get a tip for a special "recipe" that involves downy fabric softener to remove paper. Will try that the next time. Have to go back to work tomorrow so Pete will get to start demo on his own.

Run, Winnie, Run

Wynne took part in the "Toddler Trot" at the Medtronic Family Days, which is the race packet pick-up and family fun day for the Twin Cities Marathon. We went because the AHA was there doing healthy family activities (and also a good reason to get out of the house.) Wynne managed to spill chocolate milk all over this shirt so I'm glad I got a picture of it before it was ruined in case the Oxyclean does not work. They grouped toddlers by age to run 50 yards. It was pretty cute. They also had a diaper dash which is basically a turtle race with babies. They plop them in the middle of a circle and the one who crawls out first wins. Most just cried until their parents came and rescued them.

Killing the fence to nowhere

Today was another good day at the house. We spent another day outside -- pulled up the chain link fence "to nowhere". Basically this is the beginning of a fence that partially blocks the yard. Only a very lazy (or very dim) kid or dog would not be able to figure out how to get out of the yard. It looked like it was going to be a daunting job but the first pole came out easily. That was the end of easy street. But Pete finally figured it out -- the key to pulling up an eight-foot pole (why such a long pole!?!?!) is banging the pole with another pole to let the "vibrations" loosen it (according to Pete) and also soak the ground.

We also finished "operation rock relocation" and added mulch and edging in front of the house. We did some more general yard clean up, including trimming the weeds along with edge of the yard. You might wonder why we would not pull them up -- well -- they actually look like bushes (from far away at least) and we won't be tackling this project until Spring at the earliest. Pete finished cleaning and repairing the gutters and adding gutter guards.

We are going to have to make a better plan for eating during this project. Yesterday it was Taco Bell for lunch and today Dominoes delivered. I was thinking that all of this manual labor would burn calories to make the meals a wash. Then it occurred to me that when you take a look at a construction site most of the guys are not in tip-top share. So we'll have to work on that.

After working on the house all day, Wynne and I headed to the Y for our new favorite class. Family Drums Alive - it is super fun. Picture exercise balls held in place with the square step risers. Add a pair of drum sticks and some fun music and you have a great time....Well not so much this week. There are two instructors and they alternate weeks. Today's teacher was not so good and Wynne was bored really quickly. She sat on the sidelines and watched -- only coming back to ask if she could have a snack because "watching people exercise makes her hungry". that's my gal...

Link to photos of the house

Want to see the "before" pictures? Follow this link:

http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=a50pu45r.9hjvzjgz&x=0&y=bysb5p&localeid=en_US

Day One -- New House

I am exhausted.

So Pete and I decided that we don't have enough to do so we bought a foreclosed house. We are going to fix it up for rental property.

There is a LOT to do so we started with the basics - cleaning the bathrooms. It was gross. Had my face mask and even some goggles, though I don't think I used the goggles correctly.

They kept fogging up - maybe the face mask acted as a funnel to trap my breath in the goggles....I literally could not see. I hope they are defective because if I just used them incorrectly I am not sure what that says about me. Both bathrooms look much better and are company-ready! (If company likes using a bathroom with no door).

PS - C.L.R. is THE BEST thing to use on rust stains in a toilet. Two words - sparkling clean.

After making our facilities usable, it was time for landscaping. I learned how to use a pick ax -- really thought I was going to plunge the blunt end into my head as I was trying to loosen errant trees, but luck was on my side.

Pete and I "fixed" some unfinished landscaping projects which involved picking up random piles of rocks throughout the yard and so much raking I am almost getting a blister.

I even crawled under the deck to clear out some rocks, leaves and other junk. I was on a roll. Very glad that I did not meet up with any snakes or other creepy crawlies.

Pete re-keyed the locks, put a new door on the garage (impressive), crawled up on the roof to clean the bushes out of the gutters and gave me helpful hints (don't leave the rake tines up in the yard or you will end up as a tragic comedy.) I'm embarrassed that I even needed to be told that.

More landscaping tomorrow and Pete will put gutter guards up -- back on the roof again. We'll see if I am able to move after all of that fun.