Our Tiny Oak Park Bungalow

Day Seven in the Basement: Inspection

2012-01-11T05:07:00.002-06:00

No, you didn't read the title wrong and I didn't skip a few days. It has been seven days on the project but nothing has happened the past few. Inspection was scheduled for Monday so we had nothing over the weekend and then the inspector didn't show Monday so we had another day off.

Yesterday, the inspector arrived and things can proceed. The huge bonus to this was that they could finally hook up our laundry sink and we can do laundry again. I have to climb over the grand canyon that is our basement floor but after a week without laundry, it is worth it. The timing and inability to do laundry for so long was certainly not in our schedule. Nor was our daughter getting the stomach flu, thus increasing the amount of gross laundry we had to do.

I've been unhappy with the basement progress so I figured I would get something done to make me feel better about things. Well, here's another project that didn't work out as planned. I have all of the new light switches for the main rooms and decided to install them. I have two problems now. The dining room switch will require some additional plaster patching and painting up to the switch. I guess the old plate covered more of the "hole" than the new one. I also now hate how the HVAC controls look on this wall. I believe I can move the humidification controls to the basement but I am not sure what to do with the thermostat.

The switches in the living room didn't fare so well either. The box behind the left switches was installed at a slight angle and not at the same height as the existing box. I am going to have to go back in and fix this or it is apt to drive me crazy. This also means more patching and painting. On the bright side, I love the new switches and they add a lot to the room.

Day Three in the Basement: Finishing the Piping and Installing the Pump

2012-01-05T20:34:00.001-06:00

I figured that since I was spending so much money on this project that a panoramic view of the work was in order. The plumbers finished the plumbing today and everything is awaiting inspection. The inspectors won't arrive until Monday so we won't be able to have the final concrete done until then.

All of the connections are made at the pump side of the basement and things laid out how I thought, though not exactly how they initially planned it. This is a good thing because their initial plan would have called for some demolition within the actual living area and that wouldn't have been a good thing. I think they did a good job laying this out.

As part of the work, we also invested in a high-water alarm. This will tell us if the pump is not working and the basin is full so that we don't make the mistake of running the laundry or any other plumbing fixtures, causing additional problems. We only have a pump for the overhead plumbing system and do not have a sump. I don't believe that our issue has ever been groundwater. It seems to have always been sewer water. Even if you are just a casual visitor to the blog, you would know that we disconnected our downspouts and installed rain barrels years ago, so we are not adding any of our own storm runoff to the home's wastewater system.

I figured that I would add this diagram to explain to folks what everything is. People commonly call this system an "overhead plumbing" system because it puts all of the waste water from the basement into a central area. In this case, it is collected in a basin. The basin has a pump that pumps the water up overhead in a pipe that connects the the gravity-fed wastewater system (the waste stack) from the plumbing upstairs. It is this loop that keeps water from coming into the basement from the municipal sewer. When there is a sewer backup, it can get into this pipe but only travel as high as the surge from outside. The only way it could get in the house is if the water got higher than that loop. In this case, all of Chicagoland would likely be under water and we'd have greater problems than my tiny finished basement.

I've scheduled some additional repairs on my catch basin because of some flooding we had a few weeks ago caused by that. The plumbers also have a few other minor odds and ends to fix up so they will be returning tomorrow. I probably won't post again on the subject until after inspection though.

Over the past couple days, I've thought again and again, "why the hell are we going through this". It has been messy, inconvenient and expensive. I then look at the old photos of all of our stuff in the basement submerged in almost a foot of sewage and it all seems to make sense.

Day Two in the Basement: Laying Pipe

2012-01-04T19:30:00.001-06:00

If I said that I completely understand what is going on in the basement, I would be lying. This isn't good because I am usually adept at these things. I guess the best I can do now is describe what is going on in the pics. The first pic is a view to the south of the basement. Past the water heater is where there will be a connection to our laundry and the vent stack. To the right of the water heater is an existing floor drain.

Below is a detail of the new laundry and vent stack connection. I am guessing that the work on this side of the house would buy us a nice long weekend vacation in Orlando to visit the family.

Directly east is a connection to the area drain in the stairs to the back yard. I've plugged up the hole under the door for the evening but I hope no mice sneak in.

This next pic is a view north, toward the back of our basement bath. This is where all of the action is. The basin and pump are going here. If I am correct, sewage gets pumped up, from the basin, to the open fitting in the big pipe coming down from the bathroom above and the waste exits through the existing drain, out to the street. I believe that the work on this side of the house would afford us a vacation in New York City where we could visit with friends we haven't seen in far too long, eat real pizza, and enjoy a decent pastrami sandwich.

I can't quite tell but I think that all of the plumbing from the bathroom has been routed to the basin and only the plumbing from above stayed in the drain to the street.

Here is our permit and a bunch of pump and fitting supplies. We have an inspection tomorrow and hopefully they will finish up and be out of here by the end of the day. I think the guys did good work today. The place is less dust-ridden, even though they did a little more saw-cutting.

Day One in the Basement: Excavation

2012-01-03T20:22:00.001-06:00

Given what I came home to today, I think it is good that I wasn't around for the first phase of the work. My plumber was nice enough to give me regular e-mail updates: "we're locating the pit in the corner", "we have to replace a pipe because the pitch isn't right", "we have to replace a fitting because it didn't meet code", etc. None of them were the magical, "you know, we don't have to do this work because we found a real easy way to fix everything.

Note: in the above photo, they are just storing the pipes in the trench. They will not be laying nine pipes together in the trench. At least I think they are not...

So the basement is now dug up. They saw-cut a series of trenches and excavated out the dirt where the new plumbing is going. In the process, they changed the location of the pit. It is actually not that bad where it will end up but it still takes up a decent chunk of space.

The architect side of me finds all of this fascinating - particularly how thin the basement slab is. "Hmm, maybe I can break this sucker up and dig down a few inches to get more headroom in here." (wife slaps me across the face). Actually, that didn't happen but the thought did cross my mind for a second. As for the work at hand, I realize that I haven't given a full description of what is going on. I was hoping that once they get the piping in, I can take pics and it will be easier to explain. I guess we'll find that out tomorrow.

It is wild yet disconcerting that you can see the water level as well. It's a couple feet below our slab. Nice thing to have in the back of my mind during the next 100 year flood.

For most of the work, I give the guys an A+. It seems to be going well. For the protection end of it, I give them a C-. They did cover a lot of the delicate electronics and tried to seal off the area where they were doing demo but there is still dust pretty much everywhere in the house. It doesn't help that they are working in the same room as the air handler for the house. I really should have thought better and shut it off for the day. My lack of thinking is what saves them from getting an "F".

The basement looks scary. Not as scary as a foot of sewage but still pretty scary. Hopefully we see things come together quickly tomorrow.

I am not sure if I have mentioned this before but my wife has a weak stomach for renovation projects. She clearly married the wrong guy. She went nuts with the few weeks where I was working on the wood upstairs. I think if there is another day of this, she may end up at a local hotel.

Cleaned and Ready

2012-01-02T14:51:00.000-06:00

The plumbers arrive tomorrow at 8:00am. I've cleaned up a good chunk of the shop and laundry area so hopefully they have enough room to work. Of course, this means that the living area is filled with tools and other crap but I can get to organizing that once the plumbers are done.

I also took a little extra time and put some weather stripping on the basement door. There is a noticeable improvement but I think I need to find an insulation blanket to put over the entire opening.

The First Project of 2012

2012-01-01T10:04:00.000-06:00

Happy New Year everyone. I figure I've already wasted about 10 hours of the New Year so I better get started on my first house project. What better way to start the new year than to dig up portions of the basement slab and have new plumbing and sewer backup mitigation measures put into place?

We have dealt with flooding for two consecutive years now and it is time to do something about it. The down-side is that this will cost an insane amount of money and will have no impact on the overall look of the Tiny Bungalow. Yeah, we won't have sewage in the basement anymore but I can think of about a hundred other places in the house where this kind of investment will make a dramatic improvement.

The project starts with cleaning out the basement and making way for the work. After the last project which, by the way, is not complete, I threw all of my supplies in the basement to make the upstairs presentable for guests. Since before Thanksgiving, there has been little change. I need to clean it up.

I will get the added benefit of having all of my tools put away in the correct spot so that I can start the next project on the right foot. Then again, since I rarely have the tools in their "right spot", it is more likely that I will be even more confused and have a harder time starting a project because I can't find anything.

The plumbers arrive on Tuesday and are supposed to be done by Friday. They have a solid estimate and a defined scope. We'll see how that holds up once they start digging.

Merry Christmas!

2011-12-24T15:58:00.000-06:00

From our bungalow to yours,

a Merry Christmas,

a happy and safe holiday season,

and a prosperous New Year!

The final varnish

2011-12-13T21:04:00.000-06:00

I started putting the final coats of varnish on the doors on the built-in and have the built-in all reassembled. I should be "finished" tomorrow. I've already started playing with pieces of the mural I have been working on. I am plotting out how light or dark it will be and how I will paint the scenes. I hung a chunk of the photoshop image up today and like how it looks. I probably won't tackle that until January as I have a lot of finishing touches to do to the rest of the room before I take on that huge project.

The Dining Room Fixture and Tiffany Shades

2011-12-12T06:04:00.003-06:00

When we first moved into the Tiny Bungalow, this was our dining room light fixture.

I didn't like it from the moment I laid eyes on it and it was one of the many glaring "errors" in the home. The swooping arms, faux frosted candles and a brushed nickel finish that should have been outlawed back in the 1990's were all wrong for this house. It has since found a home, appropriately, in my sister's ca. 1980 suburban ranch. What I always liked and what always seemed right for the room was a fixture that hung low, like one of Stickley's "shower lights". In most versions, the light fixtures hang from a series of chains, just above the surface of the table, lighting the table surface but not so much the room around it. In traditional Craftsman homes, these artistic fixtures that provided concentrated pools of light, leaving many parts of the room in elusive shadow, was a defining characteristic.

Our fixture is a variation on the shower light idea and was manufactured by Rejuvenation. For years, it hung in the dining room, slightly off-kilter with the bubble wrap still protecting the base and finial. It looked ridiculous but still better than the brushed nickel nightmare that was there before. A key element of the fixture has also been missing until now. In Stickley's version, the light shades were typically well crafted min-lanterns or hand blown art glass by a company like Tiffany or Steuben. Ours had $2.59 frosted shades from the Home Depot.

Several months ago, when I started contemplating the dining and living room renovations, I started looking for hand blown shades that would be more appropriate for the room. Many of the light companies these for a small fortune. When it came down to it, I wanted something that was artisan-made, preferably by a local artisan and something that I could afford. Shelling out another $600.00 for shades was not in the cards. I eventually came across Redington Glass Furnaces while looking online. It was perfect. Jay Redington's studio is a short drive north to Wisconsin and from the selection on his website, it seemed that he could do just about anything I wanted.

I was very curious about how the shades were made and Jay was kind enough to let me come up and see his shop and see his work. It was remarkable. In an unassuming shed of a building, just outside a small town in Wisconsin, he creates all sorts of amazing things. The shelves of art glass lamp shades would make anyone with an Arts & Crafts style home drool. He also makes all sorts of tiles, vases and other household items. He learned his trade by working at a local museum. In addition to the objects he makes, he also is commissioned for restoration projects. Notably, he recently manufactured the glass that was installed at the horizontal mortar joints in Frank Lloyd Wright's Park Inn Hotel in Mason City. There are several videos online so you can see Jay in action.

The glass shades that we chose are the blue trumpet shades. I finished installing the fixture yesterday and the final product looks great. The glass is a favrile glass; an iridescent glass invented by Louis Comfort Tiffany. Jay was great to deal with and if you are in the market for shades like these, I couldn't recommend is work more.

As I mentioned earlier, the shades allow a bright concentrated light on the surface of the table but leave a lot of the rest of the room in shadow. Items on the table look great but this has created a sort of dilemma for me. I still want some ambient light in the rest of the room. To accomplish this, hope to install crossbeam lights. For now, we are using area lamps.

The shades are individual works of art so the color and shape have slight variation from light to light. It creates the perfect centerpiece in the room. Once I complete the painting above the picture rail, adding additional glues and golds, I think it will be perfect.

Down the Home Stretch

2011-12-11T06:12:00.000-06:00

I am down to the last bit of refinishing on the buffet and have started working through the finishing touches in the dining room. I am really happy with how the varnish looks on the buffet.

It makes the woodwork look very rich. The only down-side to the glossy surface is that a little bit of the detail is lost in the sheen but overall, I prefer this finish to the previous or a matte one.

I don't like how the second coat of varnish went on. There must have been some additional dust or something in the air as there are many tiny lint or dust bumps in the final surface. I am not sure what to do about it without going over with one more coat. I am not going to touch it for the time being though.

The doors are the last piece of the room to get finished. I worked on these separately. The darker finish actually brings out the detail in the glass quite a bit on these.

The finishing touches will come in the next few days. I have to re-install all the hardware and doors on the buffet. I also have some painting touch up to do. There is work to do on the main dining room light fixture too. I want to re-set or replace the electrical box it hangs from as it hangs too low and there is currently a slight gap between the fixture and the ceiling. I also purchased new cover plates and switches to make them all match. I am now having second thoughts and may purchase the classic-looking two-push button switches instead. I am not sure if these would have been original to the home but I think they would make for a nice detail in the dining and living rooms.

Light Issues Continued

2011-12-05T19:33:00.000-06:00

I can't stop thinking about the lights for the dining room but am still being patient. In the meantime, I have put together a fixture on Rejuvenation that I can live with. I have to have another go around with them to see if it works but it seems okay. I've gotten alot of great advice on this subject and it seems that I should hold out for smaller older fixtures that are less obtrusive. The alternative of living with the dark corners and buying beautiful Van Erps to lighten those small spaces up is probably out of the question also.

I decided to consider the new fixture more seriously. In order to get an idea of how it would look in the room, I decided to do a mock up. It's not quite accurate but it does the trick. The neck is a little long and it is kinda crooked but it conveys the idea. Actually, I like the mock up so well, that I think I'll be making about a hundred of these for the ceiling for my next party.

I don't think it will look original to the home but that isn't too much of a concern. My big concern is to get light in the space, to have it look cool, and to compliment the rest of the room.

I am still concerned about how deep this canopy size is but I do like that it uses the same metal piece for the canopy that is used for the bottom finial on our main lighting fixture. I think it won't look bad at all with the other fixtures in the room. I also intend on using an old-looking exposed filament bulb so hopefully that will add to the interest of the fixture.

Then again, I still don't feel right about it all so for now, I will remain patient. Once I start painting the mural, the lack of light in the room will surely overcome me.

Deck the Halls

2011-12-04T20:09:00.000-06:00

Taking a hiatus from stripping until after the holidays

2011-12-04T06:54:00.000-06:00

The final piece of work in the living and dining room that was left undone before thatnksgiving was stripping anad refinishing the built-in. This week I took it apart and began that work. I finished the stripping yesterday and am "done" with that aspect of the work in the two rooms. Now that I've perfected my method, I will pick up on finishing the two hallways early next year.

The built-in was more difficult than other parts of the room because there is a lot of detail to it and it has a lot of moving parts. I had to take off the art glass doors, clean up the capitals, and also remove the drawers so they could be done.

After one coat of stain, it looks pretty good. I should be able to finish a second coat later today.

Working so closely on the wood in the house, I have found tons of mistakes made by the original carpenters and POs. The hatchet job the PO did on removing all of the trim, "stripping" it and then bashing it back into place left many broken and splintered pieces of trim. I spent about two hours fixing one small section and wish I had the patience to do the entire house but it probably would extend this project to a 12 month project as opposed to a one month one. The glass doors to the cabinets were installed wrong - or better, they were each installed differently: one with the trim facing the inside of the cabinet and one facing outside. I never noticed this before so doubt others would as well. There are also some water stains here and there that I couldn't get out of the wood, no matter how much I bleached or sanded them.

The drawer hardware is my latest beef. It is a minor issue but one that will gnaw at me. The PO installed new hardware that was different from the original rectangular-stock hardware. You can still see the ghost of the original hardware on the drawers (below). The new hardware has a round escutcheon behind each pull post. Also, the new hardware has mounting screws that are closer together than the original so a new hole had to be drilled for them. Of course, the PO couldn't drill them neatly and evenly so they are all over the place. Or, God forbid, find some hardware that matched the original mounting holes. I don't hate the the new reproduction hardware enough to remove it but I don't love it either and would like something simpler and I wish I knew what was originally on the buffet. For now, I am going to live with it.

I should be wrapping this project up this week. It will be finished except for the mural I will be painting above the high dado. I'll post on that separately. Now that it is almost done, it is hard to remember how bad the wood originally was. I bet most folks that come to the house will say, "I thought it looked fine before, what changed?" As a reminder, I feel like printing and framing the photo below and hanging it in my dining room so that folks can be reminded of how bad it used to be.

Looking for some lighting advice

2011-11-30T05:03:00.000-06:00

I have some lighting issues. When I installed the new light shades, I never anticipated how dark this would make the dining room. I really like them and don't want to change them but need more light in the dining room. There is a pretty simple solution: in keeping with traditional lighting in other bungalows, I could add exposed bulb fixtures for ambient lighting at the intersections of all of the beams in the room. The folks over at Laurelhurst did this in their bungalow with new fixtures to great effect.

For the past several days, the folks at Rejuvenation have been diligently trying to help me out in this respect. Unfortunately, the only thing we can come up with is a variation of their Kellogg fixture. It would be nice but my concern is that since my beam ceiling is relatively small, the fixtures would seem quite large. The Kellogg would completely cover the intersection of the beams.

What I was hoping for was something more modest, that would sit within the intersection. A new brass fixture with a maximum diameter of 3 3/4" would be ideal. The Kellogg is a 4 1/2" diameter fixture. The issue is that most modern manufacturers create fixtures sized for standard electrical boxes. Smaller boxes are made but not smaller fixtures. At least that's what I have found so far.

Does anyone out there know of any additional period lighting resources that may help. I've looked at all of the usual suspects: Brass Light Gallery, Schoolhouse Electric and Rejuvenation and have found the same at all places. I'd appreciate any leads you might have.

Something tells me I just planted 200 pieces of squirrel food in my yard

2011-11-26T08:59:00.001-06:00

I love working in the yard this time of year. I don't know if it is the smells in the air, the cool weather or just the dark look of all of the dried plants. Unfortunately, I have been preoccupied with work on the inside so I haven't done my ritual fall "plant moving". Most of the plants have died and gone to seed but the pansies that I put in about a month ago give a nice splash of color to the garden.

I purchased a bunch of bulbs last month. I used to live on a brick-paved street near the University in Buffalo where most of the yards were covered with crocuses in the spring. It was always a dramatic sight and I always thought it would be a cool thing to try and do the same thing at my home some day. I about 150 crocus and squill bulbs scattered around the lawn this morning. We'll see if we have any success with anything growing come spring.

I also put in about 40 cloves of garlic in the garden. It never seems like we plant enough but unless I was going to give the garden completely over to garlic, which isn't the worst idea in the world, I will have to make due with the limited number of heads we get each year.

Happy Thanksgiving

2011-11-25T06:17:00.000-06:00

The Deadline is Here

2011-11-24T06:28:00.000-06:00

We had family arriving yesterday for Thanksgiving so I had a sort of deadline to get as much completed on the rooms as possible. I got up at my usual early hour and started the last round of painting. I finished the painting about noon and then spent the next couple hours moving furniture back into the house.

I am happy with how the colors look and love the new light shades on the fixture in the dining room. I'll have to devote an entirely separate post to those. The only problem, one that I didn't account for, is that with the darker wall colors, we'll need additional light sources in the room. This really shouldn't have surprised me. All of the images I see of Stickley's Craftsman Farms are full of shadows with several sources of glowing light from mica lamps are scattered around the rooms. I may need to add additional lighting at the beams in the dining room. I've already contacted Rejuvenation about possible fixtures. We'll see how that goes.

The nicest part of the day in the house has always been just before sunset. It is the only time that light streams into the home as all of our major windows face west. With the new paint colors, it looks even nicer.

For now, I am going to enjoy the hard work and take time with the family. On Sunday, I have to pick up again as I have a large list of items that are still incomplete on the project: a second coat of varnish on the dining room wood, strip and stain and varnish the built-in, strip and paint the air registers, replace and fix all of the outlets and switchplates with brass ones, and paint the mural or stencil above the picture rail in the dining room . If I do the new dining room lighting, that needs to be added to the list also. I almost forgot about the shades too. When they arrive, I'll have to install the historic-looking linen roll-shades. With any luck, I'll be able to complete a majority of this by Christmas!

Color!

2011-11-22T05:28:00.000-06:00

Finally, after weeks of stripping and cleaning and staining and varnishing, the fun part is here. I finally get to put some color on the walls! Everything looked really good primed but given my aversion to white, I couldn't wait to get it painted.

The color we chose is "Acorn". It is an orange/squash sort of color. It is not for the faint of heart but we like it. The color choice was tough. There are some deep golds and greens I liked very much also. I guess I can always change the wall color next year if I get bored with this one.

We used Behr paints from Home Depot. Everyone has their favorite paints. I don't. I have used Benjamin Moore, Valspar and Behr on the house. A word to the wise though: if you are going with Behr and doing a deep color, only use their "Ultra" product. Their regular paint sucks ass and it will take you several coats to cover the wall.

For the color above the high dado and picture rail, I screwed up. I rarely... ...actually, I've NEVER been so off in my color choice before in my life. I originally chose what I thought was a nice mellow yellow color. Instead, it looked like a clown to a leak on my ceiling - the place looked like some sort of demented circus and it made the orange look really weird.

Yesterday morning, I ran out, trying to rectify things with a new color. I found a "Pyramid Gold" that I liked a lot and mellowed out the orange the way that I initially intended.

I am really happy with the outcome and can't wait to get the furniture back in the house.

I should note that during this project, I made the best investment I've made in my DIY life so far: movable scaffolding. I got this for just under a hundred bucks at Home Depot. I love it so much that I may just keep it up and use it as a piece of furniture - it goes so well with quarter-sawn oak! If you don't like the look of it as much as I do, it folds up to 2'x4'x8" so it is not too tough to store. It really came in handy and beat the crap out of working off of a ladder. It is seriously worth checking out.

Now I can't wait to get at the dining room. The staining and varnish in that room has worked out well. The ceiling was a total bitch but it looks awesome. I have a lot of issues with the wood up there because the PO beat the hell out of it when they stripped it but the stain is pretty dark and hides many of the past errors. I may blog on this later because I think it will make a great "what not to do to your woodwork" post.

We have family coming for Thanksgiving so I am stopping the project for a few days, leaving the built-in for finishing later. I hope to pick it up again and finish the buffet by early next week. It would be nice to call this project "complete" in another week.

A few photos that don't really communicate how much progress I've made...

2011-11-20T07:07:00.000-06:00

...but I'll post the anyway. I am well into stripping and refinishing the dining room woodwork. I've decided to save refinishing the built-in until after Thanksgiving. It is going to be a chore and I want to get the room back together before Thanksgiving as we are hosting dinner at the house. I have all but three sections of ceiling stripped. The entire room except these three sections have their first coat of stain.

The improvement is noticable now. I also started putting things in the garbage this week. I am shocked at how much material and how many trips to the hardware store I've made in the past three weeks of this project. I've gone through at least 12 rolls of paper towels, over 100 pairs of disposable gloves, 30 brass-bristle scrubbing brushes, 5 packages of steel wool, 3 gallons of de-natured alcohol and I believe I will finish the job with the single container of varnish and three cans of stain. Oh, and a container of hand moisturizer. I am a big pussy when it comes to this stuff and am thankful every day that my day job doesn't involve any sort of manual labor. No matter how protected I've kept my hands, they are a mess: dried and numb.

We started priming the living room yesterday as well. It is looking pretty good. My friend John, who has some sort of fetish when it comes to painting plaster white, would consider the job finished at this point but we'll be performing an act of herecy and adding some very deep colors.

I almost forgot to mention: I picked up the shades for the dining room light fixture on Friday. I'll blog an entire entry on that expedition. It was pretty awesome. Unfortunately, I don't have too many pics but it was cool none the less. Can't wait to get these things up on the light in the dining room.

Finally, did I mention the family is coming over for Thanksgiving? I hope they like Boston Market...

Stripping ceiling beams sucks...

2011-11-13T18:16:00.000-06:00

...thank God they were never painted. I feel like I've gotten nowhere. I've spent over 13 hours on the ceiling and am about half done. It is going to be an ugly week if I hope to complete it all by the weekend.

The "work" that was previously done on the woodwork at the ceiling is probably the worst in the room. It seems to make sense: it is not easy to get at and it has a lot of compound pieces so it is a bitch to work on. Below is an image of, on the right: a piece I already cleaned and stripped and on the left: a piece I haven't worked on. The difference is more remarkable than the cleaned wood in the living room.

Meanwhile, we've moved the dining table into the living room. I like the change so far.

The "First Coat"

2011-11-13T07:22:00.000-06:00

I started applying the final finish the other morning and then quickly realized that things weren't quite right. I didn't like the color. It still seemed a little light so I quickly stripped the small section of wood that I started finishing and quickly applied an additional coat of stain to the entire room. This added a little more time to the project but I think it was worth it. When I put on the final coat, a linseed oil based varnish, it seemed to lighten to wood a bit and it needed a little more color depth.

So far, I am happy with the look. It is VERY glossy and the wood looks good. I will be adding one more coat of varnish and then, depending on how things look, I may wait a couple weeks and then knock down the sheen with some steel wool.

For the final finish, my woodworking guru, Jeff at Oak Brothers, gave me several suggestions. One seemed interesting to me because it was touted for its "green-ness". It is a varnish called "Le Tonkinois". I believe it was formulated for boats so I am sure it will last a long time. I put it on with a sponge brush and am really happy with it. Besides tung oil, it may be the nicest stuff I've worked with. It takes a good 24 hours to dry so the finish ends up being very even and it is not prone to dripping. Any noticeable dripping can be easily re-touched even an hour or so after you apply it. It supposedly contains no VOC's. This should not be confused with it not having an odor because the stuff is actually pretty strong, odor-wise. I also chose the gloss version as I was unsure of how I wanted the final finish to look. The original finish had a bit of gloss to it so I figured I would start there and manipulate it later if I needed. Once the finish is done, I would have put three coats of stain and two coats of varnish on the wood.

The difference between the finished and unfinished parts of the rooms is remarkable. Now that I have the finish on, I can start on the next room.

The dining room, with its beamed ceiling and huge built-in, is probably going to take a bit more time than the living room. I got to work on the ceiling beams yesterday and it is taking quite a bit of time. These were not stripped as well as any other parts of the house so there is a lot of shellac to take off. The edges of the cove molding, at the ceiling, have also been painted over about a hundred times so I am scraping all of the old paint to create a crisp an edge as possible within each ceiling section. Not fun.

With any luck. I will be putting stain on the ceiling in a couple days. This will make the schedule for painting to likely start on Saturday or Sunday. I also hadn't mentioned: the glass shades that I ordered for the dining room light fixture are ready. I am going to be traveling to the artist's studio, in Wisconsin, next week to pick them up. I'll reserve a special blog entry for this one.

A Bit More Than I Expected

2011-11-09T21:06:00.002-06:00

I've been at the stripping and cleaning and re-staining thing for about two (long) weeks now and I will be putting the final coat of stain on the windows and window trim tomorrow morning. There is a noticeable difference from where I started and I am glad I took this on. I am not sure that I am doing the "best" job possible but I am happy with the outcome so far.

I don't think I was prepared for how time-consuming this would be. In addition to at least 6 hours a day on weekends, I spend about an hour and a half in the morning and then another two hours each night working on it. The windows were certainly the worst part. I re-stripped all of the frames and most of the tracks and stops (as best I could). Luckily I have help on the weekends or I'd be woefully behind. Now that I have the hang of it, I hope the dining room goes more quickly. The photos don't really show what you see in person but they give a decent impression of how it is coming out.

Here are a couple "update shots" of the completed staining in the living room:

Second Coat of Stain

2011-11-07T07:26:00.000-06:00

I did a second coat of stain on the woodwork this morning. I used only the Red Mahogany for this second coat. I m really happy and think I am going to stop here with the color and darkness. It is pretty darn close to what I wanted so I'd rather not fool with it anymore. I should be done with the living room cleaning and staining and started the final finish by tomorrow night.

As a comparison, the above pic is from this morning, with the second coat and the bottom pic is from yesterday, with only one coat.

Staining in the main rooms

2011-11-06T19:44:00.000-06:00

I finished enough of the cleaning of the trim in the living room where I could start staining. I taped off some areas and put down drop cloths but still made a total mess. I painted the stain on with a sponge brush and then let it sit for about 5 minutes and then wiped it down.

I am mixing two colors to get an approximation of what was initially there. After one coat, I am going to do a second and may go heavier on the red mahogany in the second round.

I think that the extra time cleaning was worth it. I probably should have spent even more time but I am just not sure how many times I can go over a single piece of wood without going insane. I knew that the PO did a shitty job stripping the wood but I never realized how much dirt and paint and other crap was on the wood. The difference between the cleaned and finished wood in the living room and the untreated wood in the dining room is remarkable.

UNCLEANED WOOD IN THE DINING ROOM

WOOD CLEANED AND WITH THE FIRST COAT OF STAIN IN THE LIVING ROOM

I've set a schedule to try and complete a good portion of this for the holidays. I'll now alternate between cleaning, staining and applying the final finish to areas until I am done. I hope to start painting in the living room next week. We are hosting Thanksgiving Dinner at our house and it would be nice if folks didn't have to eat in a construction zone.

Shady Decisions

2011-10-31T05:39:00.003-05:00

A package arrived the other day from The Handwerk Shade Shop. I contacted them after deciding that in lieu of any curtains, I wanted to have plain roller shades on all of the windows. This would be the best way to have a period-appropriate shade that looks right in the house while also allowing the refinished wood window trim to show. They sent along shade material and fringe samples as well as some photos and info about their company. Earlier in the week, they sent along a pull selection that I liked.

I like how they look and I like the ecru cotton cloth sample she sent. When I looked closer at this option, I kept thinking how odd it was that I couldn't find a local maker/distributor that did the same sort of thing. I remembered that a friend had the same shades so I went to his house and checked them out.

At their home, the look is just what I wanted; though their woodwork is much nicer and far more elaborate than mine. Their shades also appear to be linen/cotton. He couldn't recall who did them but mentioned that the same company that did these did the historic-looking shades on the landmark Monadnock Building. When you see photos of this amazing structure, the shades and interior light are a big part of the architecture.

I have yet to contact the managers at the Monadnock to see who made their shades but after a little more persistence, I did locate a Chicago company that makes such shades. The Zwick Company is a family owned business that has been making them since 1930. They seem to have a decent website but I will have to contact them to see if I can get a sample of their material to see which one I like best. They seem to be slightly more expensive though.

So I have a decision to make: I know I am going to install the shades myself but I am not sure where to order them from. Part of me says to go local - but that would mean a little more footwork and maybe more cost. Another part of me appreciates the responsiveness I've already gotten from the folks on the west coast and thinks I should go with them. I have a third route that I never would have considered had I not seen in on a fellow blogger's site. The folks at Laurelhurst Craftsman Restoration is actually toying with making a DIY out of the shade dilemma. Given the stripping and refinishing and painting ahead of me, I don't think this is an option though. I guess I have a little time so I can sort through it but hopefully I can come to a decision in a couple days.

Here We Go Again?

2011-10-30T08:55:00.005-05:00

For about a month, I’ve been meaning to address an issue that came up in the OP. Unfortunately plaster and wood and other things around the house have gotten in the way. Last month, the Village Board voted to purchase a building in downtown Oak Park. Much to my dismay and confusion, this is a common occurrence.

I wrote about one debacle involving the Village’s foray into development in 2008, when the Village became embroiled in a mess involving the demolition of the Colt Building. In that blog entry, I noted several structures adjacent to the Colt that would NOT be demolished. Well, fast forward three years and it looks like I may have to take back this assertion.

View of Westgate towards Marion Street. This small shopping area would be much better if it weren't for all of those small old buildings.

In an op ed piece in the local paper, about a month ago, Village Trustee, Ray Johnson, defended the board’s decision to purchase 1133 Westgate Street. In his essay, he elaborated on how this was a necessary step on the part of the village to insure that they could control the type of development that would occur there. The village wants to assemble a property that would entice developers and also have a hand in shaping what that development is.

1133 Westgate. Obviously, it has outlived its usefulness.

In acting this way, the OP is choosing to be part of a game where developers leverage communities to invest in, give tax breaks to, and assemble properties for development. It is a smart business move on the part of developers and almost every municipality has gotten into the game. Instead of spending their own money and valuable time assembling properties when market conditions aren't quite right, developers look to communities like the OP to do this work for them. In the meantime, properties are taken off the tax rolls until the right time (or deal) comes along for a developer.

It’s a messy business and unless they are looking for a job in this line of work after they retire from public office, I always find it odd that local officials want to play this game. My only guess as to why this happens is that that they feel pressured to increase a comminty's tax base. Perhaps they see this as a way that their overpriced “urban” communities with little excess land and dense infrastructure can compete with their land-wealthy suburban counterparts. Land acquisition is the tip of the iceberg though. Add to this the odd funding mechanisms and a typically covert local governance that are required to support such a system and it isn’t surprising that the Village Board would come under some well-warranted criticisms.

The south side of Westgate.

Though I find all of the above very dismaying, my immediate concern is more concrete. What bothers me most about the latest purchase is that they are taking what could be one of the most unique development opportunities that we have and very likely squandering it by taking this first step and labeling it as an integral part of a super-block development. The OP is just not very good at this game. Our track record with the Colt, at Lake & Forest, with Whiteco and the RSC Buildings shows that this first step usually results, at least in recent past, in sub-standard architecture and vacant lots. I can’t help but be concerned with the result. It seems that if you are going to compete with Oakbrook, Dundee and Schaumburg, it’s a good chance that your physical environment will soon begin looking as banal as those places as well. One would think you could expect a little more, particularly from a place like Oak Park.

The structure just east of 1133 Westgate. What a waste of perfectly good real estate.

The purchased structure is one half of Westgate, a small street that terminates at our “newly” developed Marion Street. The Westgate structures are easily the most interesting commercial structures in the village. A mix of English revival styles and arranged in a mews-like configuration, they create their own unique mixed-use development. The first domino fell years ago when the Colt building came down. I don’t believe that it is out of the realm of imagination that the next dominoes to fall are the rest of these Westgate structures. The reason: the super block idea seems to be in direct conflict with the small scale infrastructure that exists on Westgate. Labeling this area as a “super block” development seems misguided at best but worse, it seems to seal the fate of all of the buildings in the district.

View at Westgate facing west. 1133 Westgate is the last building on the left.

A Target would look great there, huh?

One of the arguments for doing what the Village did in purchasing the structure is that “we” asked for it during our “community participation” in the Greater Downtown Master Plan of Oak Park. Maybe this is the wrong plan or maybe I must be reading it incorrectly but I don’t see a call for a super block anywhere in it's pages. Then again, even after spending many years authoring such plans, I’ve never really understood them.

The building that currently stands facing 1133 Westgate. If there is an architecture that says "roadblock to development", this is it.

There doesn’t seem to be too much excitement about this subject at the moment. Who knows, maybe I am off base and the Village Board is more nuanced and insightful when it comes to development than I give them credit for. Perhaps they do see the potential for a unique pedestrian-oriented shopping area that links a new railroad station, Lake Street and Marion street with rehabilitated buildings along Westgate as a vital part of it. Maybe it won’t suffer the same fate as the Colt. The Colt was hardly an architectural masterpiece but I guess I am strange and find this small, run-down, stone-clad façade with the potential for redevelopment a better alternative to an open parking lot. I am also wondering how many weeks will pass before the Village produces a report that 1133 Westgate is dilapidated beyond repair and must be demolished…

The "Colt Parking Lot" with the Whiteco Building (far distance left) and majestic RSC Building. I am so proud to live in a village with such "beautiful" architecture.

An addition to the family

2011-10-28T05:51:00.000-05:00

Meet MiMi, the newest member of our family. She is ridiculous in every way. We've always had cats in our household, except for when we moved to the OP. On one hand, I was emotionally drained after caring for (and putting to sleep) two very sick cats years ago. On the other hand, I was getting used to life without stepping in tracks of kitty litter and God knows what else that found it's way via the cat to the floor. In this decision, I was out-voted 2 to 1 by my wife and 7 year old daughter but I guess I'll live with it. She is a cutie and it does give me a little company when I am plugging away at the computer in the early hours of the morning.

The Living Room Light

2011-10-24T05:13:00.001-05:00

It didn't turn out exactly like I thought but I am happy with it anyway. I was able to purchase new light hooks, made of brass, from Antique Lamp Supply. I opened up the existing chain link and wrapped it through the hole in the new hanger.

The new hangers hold the light in place with screws, not with the (broken) springs like the last set of clips had. It was a trick finding the right size (length) bolt but that wasn't too tough.

The bowl was also initially pretty dirty. It is a mix of a sort of milky and glass and where there was dirt on the frosted design, it looked pretty bad. I guess cleaning frosted glass can be a tough. A quick internet search yielded many folks that had similar problems. One woman's cleaning story had he washing the thing in dish soap, bleach and all sorts of other things when she finally came upon Simple Green that took all the dirt off. I was fortunate and started with the Simple Green and it worked magic. The light shade came clean and looks pretty good.

It really is the prefect style of fixture for the room. It will be very different from the dining room that has mostly directional downlight. A lot of the light goes up to the ceiling and I have it on a dimmer so it can be lowered to a nice soothing glow. Time to enjoy the light and concentrate on the wood restoration and painting.

I just realized, I don't think I have any pictures of the old track lighting. I think the only one I could find is one taken by my daughter when she was about three years old. Maybe its just her photographic composition but I think I like the new fixture a lot more.

Refinishing the woodwork Part 1

2011-10-22T20:41:00.001-05:00

I mentioned in a previous blog that while at an opening reception for a restored room at a local historic home, I started discussing my DIY work on the Tiny Bungalow with a wood restoration expert. Earlier this week, the gentleman I was writing about, Jeff Ediger of Oak Brothers, wrote me a description of what he would recommend for restoring my woodwork. It was eye opening. He treated this subject with such a particular and detailed point of view, I figured it was well worth taking his advice.

My intent is to end up with woodwork that is a close approximation of what might have been in the home originally. Without going through the painstaking effort of restoring the original shellac, I am going to do something a little different but hopefully just as beautiful.

Jeff's first recommendation was to get the wood as clean as possible. His directions were very specific: the brand of denatured alcohol, the brand of brass brushes and even the brand of paper towels. "They must be Bounty". I like how this guy thinks and it is not unlike my own way of dealing with my design detailing, my cooking, and my selection of beer. I completely understand that when someone with this level of knowledge presents "the only way" to do something, it is probably best to follow every detail.

After assembling the supplies, I began by applying the denatured alcohol to the wood and brushing it to remove any remaining shellac. Jeff mentioned that this helps to remove some of the original analine dye that was originally applied to the wood almost 100 years ago also. When I did this, some of the residue wiped off with a paper towel but a lot of it also fell off, in crumbs onto the floor.

I've spent about three hours so far and have only completed two baseboards but there is a noticeable improvement. The result is a more homogeneous finish and no more "shiny spots" where the PO didn't complete the shellac removal. There are still a lot of small dents and imperfections in the wood but since the pieces have the wear and tear of 100 years on them, I guess that's to be expected.

BEFORE (ABOVE)

AFTER (BELOW)

I am going to spend the next day continuing this process. I am also going to take a step that Jeff did not suggest but that I figure may help. I am going to go over everything once more with some steel wool soaked in denatured alcohol. I think this will help as a final cleaning before I begin the staining. I will feature the next step (staining) in a subsequent blog.

The saga of the living room light continues

2011-10-20T20:28:00.000-05:00

The new light shade hooks arrived today. They are not as decorative as the ones currently on the fixture but it looks like they will work and they still look nice. More to come.

The saga of the living room light comes to an end

2011-10-16T17:56:00.000-05:00

See, the light looks great. It's perfect for the room and the mottled finish really doesn't bother me at all.

There's only one small problem.

In order to hold the bowl shade in place, I have to use rubber bands. My previous idea of using some wire doesn't work because the rim of the bowl gets in the way.

It's not that I don't think that the blue rubber rings that hold my broccoli together are aesthetically pleasing. They just might not be the right thing for this particular room.

I think I am going to have to chalk this one up to a learning experience and move on.

So, where can I get an inexpensive fixture to hang my bowl from???

Colors and Finishes for the Dining Room

2011-10-15T06:41:00.001-05:00

I posted this pic a while back, showing how I hope the dining room will look once I am finished. The main art piece is the mural above the high dado. That will come later. The new colors of the room are fall-like and relate to the mural work.

We've chosen the colors for the walls and caeiling. The main walls will be painted "Acorn". The color seems perfect and the name also seems to fit the town we live in. The ceiling will be a pale gold. There is a color I like but I think I am going to try and simplify things and look for the same or similar color in a Behr paint so that I have all the same manufacturer.

Before I start painting, I want to get the woodwork in order. The current woodwork has a dull brown finish. I believe that a PO stripped the original finish and never quite figured out what to do next. Additionally, when the walls were hastily painted to ready the house for sale, white paint was splashed all over. I have to go through carefully and remove all of that paint and clean the woodwork before I can do much of anything.

Luckily, in their stripping frenzy, they missed the backs of the built-in doors. The finish was very dark and had a slight sheen to it. I hope to do something close to this for my final finish.

I started experimenting with some finishes in the hallway: polyshades, varnish & stain combinations and stain & tung oil combinations. I believe that the one that looks most like the the back of the door was a satin finish polyshade called "Mission Oak".

You would think I had all my decisions made and I was ready to move forward, until last night. Last night I went to a remarkable event at Glessner House. If you are in Chicago and haven't been, you must go. It is a great house and possibly the most remarkable home in the city. In a place like Chicago, this is saying a lot. Anyway, they just completed their Parlor restoration and had a grand opening of the parlor and lecture on one of the designers of the room, William Pretyman. The lecture by John Waters was great and the room is breathtaking but the best part of the evening was meeting one of the restorers of the room. While explaining to him my own restoration project and mentioning that I was going to use Polyshades, the gentleman winced. I am guessing it is the same look that I give clients when they tell me that they want to use vinyl windows or siding. I guess this is clue number one that I should probably re-think my decision.

Until I can get more information on the finish, I will put that part on hold but will begin cleaning and prepping all of the wood areas. I will also finish the light. There will obviously much more to this story as I try and re-create the original wood color and finish.

Smooth Finish

2011-10-09T20:14:00.001-05:00

I am pretty excited. The plaster work came out great. In the small before and after pics below, you get an idea of the dramatic change that has happened in just a couple days.

BEFORE

AFTER

It is hard to depict how smooth the new plaster is. I asked the guy if I needed to sand it and he looked at me funny - as if I just called his mother a dirty name or something. But now that I am looking at it closely, the walls are like glass. Very smooth and almost shiny. It is difficult to capture on camera.

I can't wait to start cleaning and finishing the wood so that I can paint. I have three finishes I am going to try out and then move from there. I know the original finish had a dark, almost reddish, tint to it and a pretty high sheen. This isn't typical of most Arts & Crafts bungalows but it seemed like it would have been typical in a place like ours. A less expensive wood, birch, was used on all of the woodwork and the finish would have tried to approximate the look of mahogany or some other expensive finish.

A light is just a light... ...or is it?

2011-10-08T22:28:00.003-05:00

So I am trolling Craigslist the other day and knowing that I am taking on my plastering project and that I will need a new living room light, I was searching for antique fixtures. I knew what I wanted: a Classical Revival style fixture to go with some of the transitional detailing in the house yet a globe simple enough to seem almost as if it were in the Arts & Crafts style. To my surprise, I come across the above pic.

Now, I like old houses and taking on big projects but any projects with any level of intricacy are my Achilles' heal. Since the price wasn't so high, I figured, "what the heck", and against my better judgement, I contacted the seller and drove a couple towns over and purchased it.

I started by taking it apart and trying to clean it as best I could. It did not come as clean as I wanted but I figure, I could live with it. I hoped to learn more about the manufacturer so I began a Google Patent search looking for the fixture. I had no luck but found a lot of other cool stuff. So I went back to cleaning.

After careful examination of one of the parts, I found a patent number and date. The number didn't help at all with finding the item but the date worked wonders. To my surprise, a patent was taken by H. A. Framburg in 1917 for an electric light fixture. It is certainly not the item I purchased but I am sure they used this particular hook piece on several items. What is coolest is that the hole that is in the middle of the anthemion form should have held another arm to a light globe that extended from the main light bowl. I bet it was pretty cool.

What is more interestingng is that I recognized the company name immediately. Framburg is still around and the company has an interesting history.

As I mentioned, I cleaned the item up a little but not as much as I had hoped. I have been going back and forth in my mind to either abandon this project or embrace it and live with a VERY antique-looking fixture. I decided to hang the bowl from the hooks and see what it looked like.

I actually don't mind the mottled finish and think that it can still look good. Except for one problem: I just realized that almost all of the hooks I have are broken. There is a spring on each on that is supposed to clasp around the rim of the bowl and hold it into place. Without the spring, the bowl easily falls off.

So now I am at another impasse: try and learn how to manufacture my7 own springs or give up. If anyone has any thoughts, I'd love to hear them. Part of me wants to contact Framburg and see if they can help. I bet they'd laugh at me. I guess I need to sleep on it.

By the way, if you are the tinkering type and get into a project like this, a patent search is a pretty great thing. I discovered all sorts of cool lights while doing this. Below is a design for a light fob. This would have been a decorative piece that would attach to receptor holes on the globe/bowl hook. It might have come in handy for people that purchased this original Framburg fixture but didn't want the side arms.

The multi-light notion seemed very popular: a bowl light to provide ambient lighting and then single bulbs pointing down within shades to provide task or directional lighting.

Finally, my favorite: a light with an integral planter in the bowl. I would love to see one of these in action. If anyone ever finds a picture, please let me know.

Scratch Coat

2011-10-08T21:01:00.001-05:00

The plaster guys spent the fist couple hours masking all of the woodwork and removing any previous patches and skim coats.

They then applied a primer to the walls and began applying a scratch coat over the existing plaster. They will end up finishing this new skim coat with one more finish layer.

For the most part, the plaster is in good shape so there was not a lot of removal or re-adhering. Except for one area, where there used to be a wing wall between the living room and dining room (this was long before we moved in. They decided to demo this area so that it could be smoothed out.

It wasn't a messy process but I can see a few areas where the plaster got on the wood so I will have some cleanup to do as I am refinishing the wood. Overall, I am happy with things though. It is a remarkablee improvement already. I will never understand why folks remove their plaster and put up drywall. The cost difference is negligible in this part of the country and the quality of the final product just can't be compared.

We also started looking at colors today. I received several hearty "NO"s to any of the oranges that I proposed. I am color blind after all so maybe they are a little harsh to someone without my genes. So how does "acorn" sound?

We're Moving

2011-10-07T21:26:00.001-05:00

No, much to my wife's dismay, we are not leaving the Tiny Bungalow. Instead, we had to move all of the furniture out of the living and dining rooms because the guys come tomorrow to fix all of the plaster.

This means that I will be very busy the next few weeks working on woodwork and painting.

We sure are going to miss the Tuscan restaurant feel of the dining room though.

As if I didn't have enough to do, I found these fixtures on Craigslist and am going to rehab one for the living room. I also ordered the hand made art glass globes for the dining room fixture. There are going to be a lot of changes around here and a lot of activity for once.

A Stopping Point?

2011-09-24T12:16:00.001-05:00

I think I hit a stopping point on the garage today. I rounded the corner and the tile mosaic now goes from the door jamb completely around one side. I think that I will grout this can consider it done for the season. If I get some nice weather, I will do more but as it stands now, I am not counting on it. When I do the grouting, I'll give a complete technical description of everything I did, just in case there are other insane people out there that want to try a similar project.

I changed the detail at the corner. If you look at previous posts, I had wood trim at the corner. I think it looks nicer with the tile wrapping around though. I really like the look of things and am not happy that I may end up leaving the rest of the project until next spring.

It is interesting to compare what the garage looked like after my first improvement project several years ago and what it looks like today.

Rounding the Corner

2011-09-18T06:05:00.002-05:00

Yesterday I finished the first side of the garage. Special thanks to my friend Dave for helping me out with this. It is amazing what another set of hands and and some decent beer can help you accomplish. This side of the garage is pretty much the only side that matters because it faces the patio but I hope to begin attacking side two today and maybe start some grouting. I also may change my corner detail so that the tile turns the corner instead of having the yellow trim pieces there. Hope to have another update tomorrow.

Too tired to write...

2011-09-11T20:29:00.001-05:00

...so I am just going to post a few pics of what I've been up to. I am starting to think that I am going to be at this until Christmas.

More from Last Weekend

2011-09-07T19:53:00.000-05:00

This is usually the time of year that the goldfinches are going crazy. The sunflowers and cone flowers are going to seed and these little guys are going nuts. I wish I could capture them on video because sometimes there are 6 or 7 at a time swarming around the flowers and it looks pretty cool..

Elsewhere in the yard, we have our first Rose of Sharon bloom. I picked these seeds from my mom's plants a few years ago, at Christmas and they've finally matured on their own. So far, I have some white ones. I hope to have some purple also.

Finally, over the weekend, I was able to get the second side of the garage painted. The mosaic work is lagging but I have a little time before the snow starts to fly.

Under-cabinet Lighting

2011-09-05T20:44:00.000-05:00

Our kitchen sucks. I can't think of anything redeeming about it. From the spectacular appliances, to the spacious vinyl cupboards, to the shimmering faux marble counters, it is a wall to wall playground for any epicurean. Wait, I do like our maple floors. Floors aside, the kitchen is the one room in the house that could really use a massive make-over. This weekend, I decided to do a small project to perk this space up a bit. I installed under-cabinet lighting.

I purchased two sets of Ikea's Inreda system of LED lights. The good thing about Ikea is that it is cheap and any moron can put their stuff together. The bad thing about Ikea is that they are cheap and though any moron can put their stuff together, you have to be slightly above moron in order to make sure you leave the store with all of the items you need to assemble the product you think you just purchased.

The system is simple. It is a plug-in set of four lights with a switch. Two strings of four lights can be connected to one "system". The first problem I encountered, after I mounted the lights, was that I realized the chord to connect the two sets of lights together is sold separately. So back to Ikea I go...

After my second trip to Ikea, things came together nicely.

The next challenge is getting the wires connected to the bottom of the cabinets so they are out of the way and you can't see them. I chose to use tie-wraps and adhesive tie-wrap connectors. This seems to work okay but I am having issues keeping them stuck under the cabinet.

I am happy with the final result. I do wish I could get these hard-wired to a switch instead of the awkward plug-in switch. I also don't want to have to continually re-adhere the wires to the bottom of the cabinets so I may get some sort of mechanically fastened raceway to keep them up there. Regardless, it is a big difference.

Look, now you can see all of that artificial printed veining on that spectacular formica counter!

A Productive Weekend

2011-08-28T16:20:00.001-05:00

I did a little more work on the mosaic this weekend but more importantly I finally got around to cleaning out the garden and installing the hardi-backer on the south side of the garage. The project went a little quicker than the last side I did because the side is smaller and I am starting to get the hang of the work.

Instead of painting all the wood in place, as I did last time, I opted for painting it and then hanging it up. This worked out well but I have a little touching up to do on the "stucco" paint as I didn't cover all of the areas properly.

The project is starting to shape up and I even rounded the corner at the back of the garage. I am well over half done with the cladding. The next spectacular Sunday, I should be able to finish that part of the job. As for the mosaic...

This would have made a great time-lapse film

2011-08-21T22:13:00.000-05:00

I always think of these things too late. I am progressing about three feet a week on this thing so I am realistically assuming I will complete it the first week in October.

By the way, check out the awesome Mackintosh-inspired Arts & Crafts tile that Bangor Bungalow sent me (below). I didn't have the heart to break it up in the mosaic because it was so cool. Because she is completely taken with it, I let my daughter choose the perfect spot for it and I will work the other tile around it. I have a few sculptural pieces I want to incorporate as well. Those will be a little trickier.

After a few hours of tiling and a nice meal, we spent the cool night under the pergola. It really is one of the nicest things about the Tiny Bungalow.

More Progress

2011-08-15T20:32:00.000-05:00

It's amazing what you can accomplish when you take the day off of work and have nothing else to do. I didn't make a lot more progress on the mosaic but I did get one side of the garage painted. I am still fussing over a piece of "chocolate cherry" trim that I intended on putting inside each yellow-trimmed panel and am waiting to see how the rest turns out before I proceed with it.

The look is pretty much what I anticipated. I painted the Hardi-backer with Thorocoat, a textured coating that I had hoped would make the hard-backer look like stucco. If you look really close, you can see some of the "patter" from the Hardi-backer telegraph through but I don't think I am going to worry about it all that much.

I got the Thorocoat from Jay over at Humphrey House. I like the color and think it looks good. I may even use the rest on my front columns, once I get around to fixing them up.

In other garden news, the pergola looks great with all of the hops on it. They really went crazy this year and it is getting time to harvest them. I hope to give them to friends that will use them in some homebrew.

Everything has survived the storms and heat we have had over the past few weeks. It may be the best the garden has ever looked at this time of year. I am sort of regretting not putting in a vegetable garden.

Slow going

2011-08-15T06:05:00.000-05:00

If we keep getting rain every weekend, I don't think I'll ever be done with this project. The next few days are supposed to remain clear. There's still a lot more tiling, then painting, and then grouting to do. I typically am not very productive during the week but I think I'll need to be this week... ...weather permiting.

More Action After the Flood

2011-08-08T20:35:00.006-05:00

So what are your choices when you want to try and combat a chronic flooding problem? Last year, we chose to try and live with the inevitability of flooding. Unfortunately, we did not plan on this becoming a yearly occurrence. It can't possibly happen three years in a row, right? Well, I'm not willing to take that chance so I've started to look into various mitigation procedures.

Option A: A Sump
A sump is a pit that is dug into the basement of your home, at a low point, where a pump is installed. When the pit fills with water during a flood, the pump turns on and the water is pumped into the yard or back into the stormwater system. Option A is not good for us because, as you can see by the diagram, the only aim of a sump is to resolve storm runoff and groundwater issues, not sewer backup.

Our flooding is caused by sewer backup, not by stormwater from our downspouts and draintile outside. Sewer backup is when the sewer system becomes over-taxed as stormwater is combined into the system during storms. The system can't flush to the proper location (in our case south to a major sewer line) and it backs up into the low points of the system. In our case, it's the basements of our homes in the Northeast corner of the OP. All a sump will do is put water back into the system, then back into our house. Also, in order for the backup to reach a sump, it would have to flow from our drains, across the basement floor to a low point where the sump is located, creating a mess along the way. It is also very unlikely that any pump can keep up with the kind of overflow that these storms have produced.

Option B: A Backflow Preventer or Check Valve
This is a device that is put onto your sewer line that allows waste to leave the home but in the case of a sewer backup, it does not allow waste to flow back into the home. This is a slightly more expensive option as it requires a valve to be put on your sewer line. In our case, this would also incur a cost of connecting all of the sewer lines at one place as they leave the home. This would also be a problem at our home because we have exterior storm drains (from the roof) that drain into sub-grade tile that enter our sewer system. These too would have to be somehow tied in as they are another point of sewer entry. Finally, this valve should be checked and cleaned periodically to insure that it "seats" correctly, sealing the home in case of a backflow event. This is yet one more additional cost. This might be an option for us but if I am going to dig everything up anyway, perhaps there is something better.

Option C: Overhead Plumbing
In our home, there is a basement bathroom and laundry tub. Also, two floor drains, one interior and one exterior, connect at the basement level. The rest of our plumbing, from the kitchen and bathrooms, connects upstairs. If all of the plumbing were located at the upper level, above the height of the sewer backflow, then we wouldn't have this problem. There are a number of ways to accomplish this. At our home, we would likely have to collect everything to a pump pit at the basement level. This includes floor drains, exterior drains, basement fixtures and upstairs fixtures so that's a lot of excavating and work. From there, a pipe would run up, to the height of our ceiling of the basement and back down to the height of the sewer line. A pump would be installed at the pit to allow for the waste from the home to be ejected out. This "loop" up to the ceiling line is what is critical. As long as the exterior flood line stays below the top of that loop, there will be no backup in the basement. This prevents sewage from running back into the house. See the diagram below if you still don't understand:

"Option C" is currently the option we are looking at. It is a "Cadillac" of systems and the most expensive but it also seems to be the most reliable. I just wonder if we can afford it. I am an architect practicing during one of the worst economic downturns the country has known. I am hardly at the top of the economic food chain so this could be tricky. I knew my straits were dire so I even looked to public sources for help. Many local municipalities allow for grants for mitigation practices so what about the OP? I wrote to Ron Davis, our State Hazard Mitigation officer and, unfortunately, this is the response I got:

The short answer is that we won’t be able to provide funds for your work. The primary reason is that we have determined that the methods you described are successful in keeping water out of that basement; it moves the water down line to the next basement that lacks backup prevention methods. We did not feel that this was a good use for taxpayer dollars, but it is a good mitigation measure.

There are a couple of other issues with providing funds to Oak Park: they don’t belong to the National Flood Insurance Program and they don’t have a mitigation plan. They will be working with Cook County to develop a plan, but that will probably take a year to complete. Both are prerequisites to funding.

I’m sorry we are not able to provide assistance.

I didn't really expect a very different answer because I understood the issues at stake here. This was not a national disaster and Cook County and Oak Park do not have emergency plans in place. There are currently a group of folks in my community that are working on this issue and hopefully I will be able to assist in some way with those efforts but for the foreseeable future, we are S.O.L. I guess the only part of the letter I find a bit annoying is the subtext. First, it seems to recognize the fact that Oak Park and Cook County see my basement as part of a stormwater retention system and it is fine to keep it that way. Second, it insinuates (much like a neighbor did while we were at a community meeting last week) that I am a "bad neighbor" if I take such steps to protect my home from damage because it affects those that will not or cannot do the same.

In the meantime, we had a plumber that is a business associate of my wife's out last week to look at the house. We are holding our collective breath for the estimate because whether or not my neighbors think I am being neighborly by installing the overhead plumbing, I am not sure I care. I'd take anything over the need to clean someone elses shit out of my basement once more.

On another note, we got some serious rains yesterday. No flooding but the rainbow was beautiful.

Note: Above is a less than scientific analysis of all of the issues that involve residential plumbing and flooding so these situations and systems may not pertain to your home. I'd love to hear any comments or corrections but if you are having similar problems, I strongly suggest you discuss the issue with a couple plumbers.

I'm taking a break

2011-08-06T20:49:00.002-05:00

I'm taking a break from dealing with flood stuff and from working on other people's houses to finish a project at my own. When I last posted about the latest project I started, it looked something like this:

We have lived with the crappy rotting siding on our garage one year too long and as it started to fall off, I figured it was time to help it along. Since then, I've started adding new siding to the garage. Actually, to half the garage, since half was not rotted. I am using Hardi-backer and intend on painting it to look like stucco with board trim. Once finished, I am also going to paint the entire garage the green color that I used on the back-side a couple years ago. Progress went pretty good the past couple weekends.

When I started planning this project, I got an idea about how to make the garage and garden very unique. For those that followed the blog several years ago, you may remember this post asking for random tile. I got a great response and folks delivered and sent me tile to do a floor in the basement. At least two bloggers: Humphrey House and Bungalowtastic sent me some great stuff from their places. Well, a 50yr and 100yr storm in the same year later, this project doesn't seem as "fun" as it once did. But wouldn't it be cool to incorporate the tile into a frieze on the garage? Today I got to work on that. I had dreams of hordes of child-labor here to help me out but that hasn't been the case. I still think it is going pretty well. It just may take a little time.

I am sure it looks like I am meticulously placing each one but really, I am flying by the seat of my pants. It is fun and I think it will be great once the rest of the garage is painted. I'll post about the technical aspects of this once I am finished. Again, I am flying by the seat of my pants, so don't expect too much.

Hopefully this project doesn't go too long - not sure doing exterior tile mosaic is good during the winter months.

I'll end tonight's blog with a non-sequitur: The sunflowers look great this year:

Action After the Flood

2011-08-03T08:24:00.000-05:00

What a difference a year makes. It is not new news that last year, we were devastated by a flooded basement. In the scheme of things, since we were safe, the home didn't fall down, and our monetary losses were not crippling, it was not the worst thing that has happened to us but it was bad none the less. We cleaned up, I spent many weekends re-finishing the basement, and we got over it. When I woke up last week at 4:00am to the sound of a belaboring fan from the air conditioner in the basement, the feeling of dread came rushing back. This flooding was not as bad as last years because we were more prepared but it was just as upsetting.

This week, the flurry of activity in the wake of the flooding has been very different than last. Since our cleanup went rather quickly, I had time to collect signatures for a petition to the Village to have some action on the issue. In speaking with my neighbors, it became apparent that pretty much everyone on our street was affected and some were even more pissed off than myself. I also took the time to attend a Village board meeting where people from the neighborhood voiced their concern, anger and dismay with how the issue of flooding has been handled in the OP. The Village line has been "it's a historic storm, there is nothing we can do about it". In case you are wondering what kind of rain we got, the State of Illinois has a neat chart here. On July 24th, last year, Oak Park recorded 7.85 inches within a 24 hour period. That's a 100 year storm or a storm that occurs once in a hundred years. On July 23rd of this year, O'Hare recorded 6.91 inches. That's just over a 50 year storm. In the OP, we got 4.81 inches in 4 hours, a 50 year storm. The response that some people have come up with is that given the fact that we've been affected by a 100 year storm and a 50 year storm and the third largest blizzard within a one-year period, perhaps the word "historic" no longer has the teeth that is used to.

Another reason for the lack of "reaction" is that people themselves may have become complacent with it all. After getting bombarded two-years in a row, perhaps folks feel "beat" and aren't reacting in a big way. Heck, there were really only a handful of people at the public meeting held in the OP this week and though the few that spoke were understandably and visibly annoyed, it was hardly the outpouring of anger and disgust that I would have assumed. At the meeting, it seemed that the Village had a rough estimate of about 150 to 200 flooded homes. From my experience, on my street alone, there are about twenty homes. If you do quick math and multiply that by the same number as there are streets east of mine, in the OP, that comes to at least 400 homes. In the northeast quadrant of the village, the worst-affected area, there are another 4 or 5 blocks north of mine. I would not be shocked if most of these and many, many more were flooded. If this is the case, then people really need to speak up.

In the process of researching, I've come to realize how important those state and federal declarations of "Disaster Areas" actually are. With these declarations, come the possibility of funds for cleanup and mitigation practices. Unfortunately, no disaster has been declared in the wake of last week's storm. Perhaps people's assumptions are correct and a 50 year storm is just not that big a deal. I think people just haven't spoken up or been heard. Our Village Clerk, on one local blog, noted how important this assessment effort is and what you can do to participate. Hopefully many are filling out the proper forms and getting them back to the village because I believe this is an issue that is worthy of attention.

With the absence of a disaster declaration, there seems to be no direct route to funding at the moment. I still took the time to write a letter to our State Hazard Mitigation Officer, Ron Davis. Hopefully he can help. I am also trying to decipher the programs that stems from FEMA's Hazard Mitigation Grant Program on my own. The hope is that I can get reimbursed for any extraordinary steps I may take at my home. This will likely take the form of an overhead plumbing system for the Tiny Bungalow. Given the complexity of those topics, I will be writing more about grants and the overhead plumbing separately. Obviously, this is a subject that will probably consume me and this blog for the next several weeks, at least. I'd love to hear how other folks have dealt with similar issues and hopefully others can learn from my experience.

Spider flowers

2011-07-27T07:27:00.000-05:00

I love when nice stuff pops up in the garden when I didn't even plant it. Better yet, there were six more small plants just like it around the base of this one. I transplanted them to another area and am looking forward to what they will look like once blooming.

Always Look on the Bright Side of Life

2011-07-23T15:22:00.000-05:00

One year ago today, the Tiny Bungalow had a little bit of a setback. Over nine inches of rain fell in our neighborhood over a 2-day period and it left our basement a little less than hospitable. This morning, we woke up to an odd grinding noise from our air conditioning. I walked down stairs and, thinking about the storms we were having, started to have a sinking feeling. When I got to the bottom of the basement stairs, my fears were realized. We were flooded. Again. Precisely one year after being flooded the first time. This time, a seven inch rainfall in a single day, a record for Chicagoland, was the culprit. We were lucky though. Due to our major re-design and some vigilance about keeping things off the ground downstairs, we actually fared pretty well. The Flor is soaked and we lost a handful of toys and our hot water heater is out but otherwise, we only have a mess to clean. This is a major improvement over last year.

I didn't take any pictures this year. The water came to the same height. There was less debris and we have a long road of cleaning ahead but I figured that I'd rather not dwell on any of that. Instead, I am looking on the bright side of it all. Instead of flood pics, I figured I'd showcase the fact that the storm did NOT destroy the sunflowers that have started blooming. They are beauties too! I think I will be investing in the red sunflower seeds every year now.

We also have a very interesting volunteer this year. I had nothing to do with planting it but a very showy spider flower is about to bloom. I have to figure out how to propagate this sucker. If it got here on its own, it can't be that hard, right?

Stay tuned for the next project at the Tiny Bungalow: How to Install a Sump.

I always feel that this is about as good as it gets

2011-07-04T19:25:00.000-05:00

Hope everyone had a great 4th of July. Every walk through the garden at this time of year seems to be great. All of the flowers have not bloomed but most of them are still standing upright and nothing has started to wither too badly. It always seems that the heat and strong storms that the next few weeks brings takes its toll on the garden. Until then, I'll savor what we have right now.

It's really so easy

2011-07-03T21:47:00.001-05:00

The simplest things we grow in the garden is garlic. I think it is the most worthwhile as well. You take a single clove and put it in a hole in November and this is what you pull out in July. We use red garlic and the taste is awesome also.

We had a huge crop of raspberries so far also. These are only slightly more work. I made jelly tonight so that the four quarts I picked this morning wouldn't go to waste. Curious: why do classic recipes make such a huge deal about the foam? Am I barbaric for not needing a perfectly clear and clean jelly surface?

Sunday In the Park Tour

2011-06-21T07:17:00.000-05:00

If you are looking for something to do this Sunday and are a lover of gardens and architecture, I strongly recommend you come to Lincoln Park. I will be giving a tour at the Lincoln Park Conservatory and other architects and docents will be talking about their work in the Park. Even if you've been to Lincoln Park a hundred times, you've ever seen it like this.

Sunday in the Park: A Lincoln Park Field Trip

Sunday, June 26, 2011

10:00 a.m.

The Pleasant Home Foundation invites you to join a Sunday field trip in Lincoln Park on June 26. During the walk, architect Christopher Payne will discuss the Lincoln Park Conservatory (J. L. Silsbee, 1890 - 1895); the Lincoln Park Conservancy will lead tours of the Lily Pool (Alfred Caldwell, 1936 - 1938); Paul Steinbrecher, AIA, Interactive Design/Eight Architects, will describe the Comfort Station/Carlson Cottage (J. L. Silsbee, 1888) restoration project (2008); and Harry Soenksen, AIA, Studio Gang, will interpret the Nature Boardwalk (2010).

This walking tour is a benefit for the Pleasant Home Foundation that operates the George W. Maher-designed John Farson House in Oak Park as a house museum. The group will gather at the entrance to the Lincoln Park Conservatory at 10 a.m. and end around 1 p.m. at Cafe Brauer. This walking tour will be held rain or shine (no refunds).

Cost is $25 per person. Space is limited and advanced reservations are required.

Call Pleasant Home Foundation at 708-383-2654.

Firsts of the Year

2011-06-21T05:06:00.000-05:00

The past few days we saw a transformation at the Tiny Bungalow.

We had our first butterfly of the season.

We had our first raspberry from our own bushes.

We made our first container of pesto from the basil in the garden.

Summer is certainly upon us.

What's going on?

2011-06-17T20:47:00.002-05:00

Maybe it is better if you didn't ask.

Props to the garden

2011-06-14T09:28:00.000-05:00

No, I didn’t win any awards or anything like that. Instead, the props I am referring to are to shore up my tall plants after a rainstorm. It has been raining pretty hard for the past two weeks and though it has done wonders for the growth of my garden, the flowers are looking a bit droopy.

To prop them up, I spend time in the garden with a small bag of twist-ties, my clippers, and some bamboo sticks. I like using the bamboo because it is sturdy and because it blends in with many of the stalky plants. From the street, you can’t even tell that everything is tied up.

The twist ties are convenient and easy to move and remove. With the flowers getting bigger, this becomes a daily activity: propping up the plants so they don't look like a steam roller just went over my yard. I wish there were ties that were made of a material that just decomposed in the garden. I don't like using string and cloth because you can't adjust them over time and they are a bit more obtrusive.

If anyone has other ideas for tying up the perennials, I’d love to hear them.

[insert cliche garden photo here]

2011-06-07T20:53:00.000-05:00

I do this about four or five times a year. I can't help it, I love my flowers. At the very least, this becomes a good almanac, chronicling when the flowers bloomed each year at the Tiny Bungalow. Last year, the blooms came about a week or two earlier. Things look good so far.

Sweet William, or dianthus barbatus, really is an under-rated flower. It is very showy, it smells great and any moron can grow it. I have tons of it that came from a wildflower seed blend I cast in the yard years ago. I am starting to spread it around with the seeds from last year's flowers. I have about eight different colors of these so far and there seem to be new colors popping up throughout the season.

The penstemon digitalis is another beauty this time of year. I was lucky enough for the goldfinches to spread around a little seed and I now have new ones popping up around the yard.

My foxgloves, the digitalis purpurea pink, is looking good this time of year as well. It started flowering today. These too are now being spread around the yard and if all goes well, I should have about 8 or nine decent clumps of these next year. They really have the coolest flower.

A weekend to relax. Well, sort of.

2011-06-05T17:08:00.001-05:00

It was my birthday this weekend so I didn't do too much around the house. I have a three week plan to "finishing" the yard. This week is the herb garden, which I finished. We put in curry, rosemary, basil and already had lavender, oregano and two types of thyme.

My daughter got into the gardening act, insisting that we have a strawberry plant. She also got a begonia and a small flower from our visit to Day in Our Village. The next two weeks will be spent finishing the baskets and then planting the vegetable garden.

There is a bit of action in the garden. We got some dark red sunflower seeds and scattered them around. They are coming up and should be a nice addition to the back yard.

I plant the wash tub with marigold seeds every year. I then transplant these up front, once they are more mature. They are all sprouting and looking good also.

Since it was my birthday, I was able to get myself a gift from my mom and dad. I made an addition to the back yard. I got a hammock that now suspends between the two posts of the pergola. You have to move the table out of the way to use it but that's fine with me. It will keep others out of the back yard when I am trying to relax.

The view is pretty great too as I can sit and watch the hops grow.

The Island of Misfit Plants

2011-06-01T07:37:00.001-05:00

I've got an addiction. Well, I actually have two addictions. First, I like moving plants. I am not sure what my problem is but I can't help myself from finding a "better spot" for my plants. I usually curb this activity from July through August but for most of the rest of the non-winter months, I move. My second addiction is "salvaging" plants. I can not walk into Lowe's without walking through the distressed plant area and buying something. This isn't so good because, despite increasing my planting area into the parkway this year, I have pretty limited space for plants.

This past weekend, we got a lot of rain: perfect moving weather. I planted up some of the pots in the yard and then started moving and salvaging. I got these two plants below from a client's house. I have no idea what they are but they have pretty pink and white flowers. Hopefully they are not too invasive.

I also moved around some of the scattered seedlings from the foxglove seeds I planted. If even a small fraction of these make it, I should have awesome looking foxgloves all over on corner of my yard next year.

Below is a salvaged hydrangea. I got it from a landscape company that was getting rid of all of it's damaged stock. When I got it, two years ago, it was nothing but a twig and a couple ruffled green leaves. It looks like it might actually flower this year.

Below are my latest buys. On the left is the double-file vibernum that I got last year. It is doing well despite my trampling of it while installing holiday decorations. Just to the right of it is the latest buy, a sad looking columbine. My wife likes columbine and I told her if I see one in the dying plants area, I'll rescue it for her.

The back yard is doing pretty good so far. The hops have taken over a chunk of the pergola. I imagine it will be completely taken over in a couple more weeks.

The garlic and herbs are doing well. I just need to put in some basil and rosemary for this year.

The hostas are doing well also. These were just tiny stumps last year so I am glad they perked up. I decided to put the hostas, trilium and some lily of the valley together in the back corner of the yard. It is different from other portions of the yard and being near the patio, I thought it looked nice. By the way, I also have several Rose of Sharon plants in here - I grew them from seeds from my mom's front yard. If anyone wants one, let me know as I will have to dig up and discard about six of them.

We put in peas this year also. They seem to be doing well. Maybe, if I can keep myself from moving things around up front, I'll get to planting the rest of the garden before July.

3rd Annual Bungalow Blog Tour

2011-05-14T10:23:00.002-05:00

What is a Bungalow?

Welcome to the 2011 version of the Annual "Virtual" Bungalow tour. You should be arriving after just visiting Stucco House. For this year's tour, I thought it would be good to explain what a bungalow is and show some of the characteristics of my place that make it a bungalow. When I typically tell people that I have a bungalow, I usually get the question, "what is a bungalow?" Everyone has seen this type of house but fewer could describe it if asked.

The primary characteristic of every bungalow is that it is a one-story structure or all of the main living areas of the home are on one story. Some people have an attic space or bedroom on a second floor but to be called a bungalow, the exterior wall of that room would not be exposed on the exterior of the home. Instead, it would be under the roof. Bungalows typically have large low-slung roofs with wide eaves that give them a horizontal character.

Above is a pic of our home when we bought it. It is a small single-story home. I believe we've added to the bungalow character by introducing a garden of wildflowers in lieu of the large yews that used the grace the front.

Most bungalows have little ornament and when they have ornament, it is usually geometric in nature. We have a geometric arrangement of simple wood trim on the front porch piers. Something that is less characteristic of typical bungalows is the complex molding we have at the crown of each pier.

The windows on the front porch also have a simple geometric pattern created by wood mullions. Most bungalows have extensive exterior spaces like our front porch or large windows that allow plenty of fresh light and air. Our tiny bungalow, on an urban lot has few of these features.

A bungalow is not complete with at least some interior woodwork and built-ins. In Arts & Crafts style bungalows, this woodwork is very simple. In our bungalow, we have fairly elaborate trim with moldings. We also have some Classical Revival detailing in our woodwork. Because of this mixture of styles, our bungalow would be considered "Transitional".

I think we are very fortunate that our woodwork is in tact and un-painted. One of these days I'll get to re-finishing it so that it looks even nicer.

Most bungalows have other ornamental elements as well. These can include art pottery tiles or art glass. The bungalow is typically a showcase of various Arts & Crafts works in a variety of material. We are fortunate to have some art glass in the doors of our dining room built-in. Sadly, we have no Arts & Crafts tiles.

In addition to the traditional Arts & Crafts detailing, the home has many of the original "off the shelf" fixtures. These are typical Victorian era designs but are not seen in all bungalows.

As I mentioned, we don't have extensive porches and exterior spaces attached to the home but we do Have a nice outdoor patio with an Arts & Crafts style pergola.

I hope you enjoyed the tour. Check out the next stop on the tour at:

The Bungalow Chronicles

Jumping the Shark

2011-04-24T17:46:00.001-05:00

I am all about baby steps. For years, I have slowly been growing my front yard. I first cut down the bushes. A year later, I planted some wildflower seeds, and the beds grew from there. The current planting area is more than 2/3 the front yard and this weekend, I jumped the shark. Actually, I jumped the sidewalk. I just don't know where it is going to end though.

I am happy with it but I am one of two people that have landscaped their parkway. Mine is more tentative than his. I think he even fired a landscape architect.

I moved over some hostas, some tiger lilies, some cone flower and brown eyed susan and some St. John's wort. I threw down a bunch of sweet william and maltese cross seed. We'll see what happens.

The border of the planting bed in the parkway follows the curve of the front. Eventually, it might be cool to wrap it all the way around the tree in a sort of mirror of the front yard so that the sidewalk feels like its part of the yard space. I guess we'll see how this stuff grows first though.

In other yard news, the hops came back with a vengeance. The couple tiny stalks have each sprouted no less than ten new stalks. I am guessing the entire pergola will be covered this year.

By the way, the daffodils look great out front. I think I'll move the rest this fall. Hope everyone had a nice Easter.

What an Awesome Day

2011-04-09T20:49:00.000-05:00

Since we moved in, this giant plastic piece of crap has been the bane of my existence. Many children have enjoyed it but it has also killed many patches of lawn and has not been a friend to my back as I have moved it from one part of the yard to the other about a thousand times.

It is a great day today because this is the last time I'll be moving it. It has outgrown the children that come to the house and play. Last summer, I even thought we were going to be rushing a car-load of kids to the hospital as the thing almost tipped over.

It now sits, in pieces, in our alley. Hopefully the scrappers will make off with it by morning. If not, maybe I'll put a note on Craigslist. If worse comes to worst, maybe I'll just get the garbage men to take it away.

The ideas of a yard redoux are already brewing in my head. Look at all that open space!

In other yard news, the garlic is coming up and I need to start working on the herb garden. The thyme and oregano also came in from last year.

I transplanted the clematis to the front yard. I am not sure I'll love the dark color up there but at this point, I just wanted them out of the back yard. I hope they take.

The coolest thing out front are the trillium plants coming up. I put them in last year and they did nothing. Let's hope they flower. They look a little stunted but hopefully some nice weather will help them perk up.

All of the lilacs look great too. Hopefully they all flower this year also. The numerous buds seem promising.

The Defibrillator

2011-04-01T07:01:00.000-05:00

I feel like I was on a Food TV show yesterday. You know, one of those shows that features an overweight guy trying to jam a thousand pound sausage or three foot wide pizza or gallon-ice cream sundae into his gut in ten minutes. My episode happened at my cousin's restaurant in the Finger Lakes Region of New York State. Dugan's Country Grill is a diner/greasy spoon type place with above average food and personality and this was my first time visiting it. I wasn't there when they were serving their famous fish fry or prime rib dinner but I couldn't resist ordering something from the menu called the "Defibrillator". To call it a "burger" is one of the biggest understatements there is.

The "sandwich" is two beef patties, four slices of cheese, bacon and eggs served on grilled sourdough bread. You can get it with a side of fries or macaroni salad. I got the macaroni salad but only ate a few spoon-fulls. It wasn't that it didn't taste good but after finishing the awesome burger, there just wasn't any room. The defibrillator was awesome and spending time with my cousin Michael was an added bonus. I strongly recommend the place to anyone that is in the area and has a taste for home-cooking on a grand scale. I can't wait to get back when they introduce their heart-stopping milkshake, "the Stint".

Figure Drawing at OPAL

2011-03-28T05:42:00.001-05:00

Yesterday, I finally got to do something that I've been meaning to do for a long time. I dusted off my art supplies, purchased some new paper and went to the weekly figure drawing session at the Oak Park Art League.

The Oak Park Art League or OPAL is located in an old carriage house designed by local architect E. E. Roberts. It is a neat little unassuming building just up the street from Frank Lloyd Wright's Home and Studio. Oak Park has many artistic outlets like this gem of a place and it is unfortunate that I don't seem to have the time to get out enjoy them.

OPAL runs these sessions weekly on Sundays from 1 to 4. The session starts with many quick two-minute poses and slows to a final hour-long pose. For those of you that have taken figure drawing as a class, you'll recognize that it is a pretty standard format. I don't believe that I have been to a figure drawing session in over twenty years and my skills are pretty rusty. I still had a lot of fun and hope to make this a regular thing. I could use a little additional creativity in my life and the ability to see and draw is always useful.

Basement 3 of 3 - Entertainment/Living Area

2011-03-05T06:31:00.000-06:00

This is the final installment of our completed basement project. I am surprised I don't have any pics of what the entertainment area looked like before the flood but the space where we moved it to used to be occupied by the play area. The TV viewing area was dominated by a giant Sauder entertainment center and a huge couch. Both were great when we had a huge apartment on the north side but they never quite fit in at the bungalow.

The new area has a different style. We wanted to go a little more minimal and in keeping with our theme of getting as much stuff "on legs" and off the ground as possible, a more modern look seemed appropriate.

The television stand is the same cabinet that I hung over my desk. It is Ikea and outfitted with drawers instead of doors and has open shelving for the cable box and other devices. I also added legs to it. We never had a place to display family pics so we put some picture ledges from Ikea on one wall and arranged them there.

The big purchase was a new couch. We got a sectional from Macy's. It took almost four months for it to arrive but Macy's was very nice about it, gave us some discounts, and we are happy with the purchase. I don't love the light-colored Flor I chose for this area. The color matches some of the flecks in the floor and it was intended to brighten up the space but I think it is a bit much. Don't be surprised if it gets moved to another area of the house and I replace it with something different.

At some point, we'd like to replace the butterfly chair in the corner with something a bit more comfortable. For now, it is fine. We mostly use it to hold clean laundry anyway.

I already blogged about my mother in law's table that I refinished. I think it works well in the room and am happy with how it turned out. I should get another coat of oil on it though.

A final touch was a storage area for my boards. I thought they looked nice enough to have up as sort of art pieces so I mounted them on cleats on the wall at the bottom of the stairs. The six year old boy from across the street saw them and lit up saying they were "the coolest thing I've ever seen". Even though it isn't coming from the most discerning critic, I'll take the compliments when I can get them.

The Big Thaw

2011-02-13T13:29:00.000-06:00

We're over 40 today. Degrees, that is. The thaw has started.

And the award goes to...

2011-02-12T07:38:00.001-06:00

It's always fun when someone notices and appreciates the work you do. Even if the work is hardly work at all and is more of a hobby than anything else. Our Tiny Oak Park Bungalow was presented the "Stylish Blogger" award by is it a house yet , another Chicagoland bungalow blogger. This leaves me the responsibility to pass it on the a few of the blogs that I like and follow. When they accept the award, they have to "pay it foward" as well. Hopefully you enjoy these blogs as much as I do.

I am awarding the Stylish Blogger Award to:

Gemmifer

Jenn is a friend of mine from art school. She is very talented, makes some beautiful stuff and posts lots of her own inspiring pics as well as ideas from others.

Humphrey House

If you want to learn something about green living or how to go over the top with your Halloween decorating, this is the blog to check out.

This is Julie

A stay at home mom that makes the most of her "free time". Lots of great home-making and design ideas.

Faux Fashionista

Nicole can tell a story with a sense of humor like no one else I know. My only criticism is that her posts are few and far between. She is a newbie to blogging but hopefully this award will light a fire under her to do more.

Champagne Liberal

The musings on an array of topics of an British expat living in Northern Indiana. Dom is a newbie blogger as well and hopefully he'll find the time to keep up with this promising blog.

Live Here Oak Park

Easily, this is the most comprehensive online network for Oak Parkers. With 411 blog posts by Becca to date and countless more by others, this relatively new site has so much activity, you'd think it has been around for ages.

Designslinger
By far, the best archi-porn site out there. If you love buildings or Chicago or history, you'll probably like this site as much as I do.

Winter Wonderland

2011-02-02T06:23:00.003-06:00

We got a little snow last night. I think it is the first, maybe second, respectable snowfall I've seen in the Chicago area since moving here and I am sure it is one for their history books. I won't have the six or seven foot piles that are common in the town where I grew up but there should be plenty of snow for forts and sledding and snowmen and all that other good stuff. By the way, watch out Syracuse, I think this one is headed your way. I went out last night, after about 6 hours of snow and snapped some pictures. It was beautiful.

I also went out this morning and took a few more. A little snow is still coming down but mostly the fallen snow is blowing around and making some awesome shapes and drifts around the neighborhood. Traffic is moving so I should probably finish my coffee and try to clean a path so I can get out of the house. I am sure there will be more photos to come as people begin to shovel out from this. I am glad I kept my Christmas lights up until now. They certainly keep things festive.

Here are a few more after shoveling out.

We had a little lul and then round two started hitting as I left for work. I took my camera to work so I got a few more neat shots.

Basement 2 of 3 - The Play Area

2011-01-28T14:40:00.002-06:00

The second and perhaps most important part of the basement is the play area. Our rooms on the main floor of the house are pretty small so it is nice to have a place for our daughter to have all of her "stuff". Before the flood, it was at the bottom of the basement stair and it kind of took over the entire space.

The first thing I wanted to do was to move the play area to the "back" of the basement. The hope is that toys wouldn't migrate and take over the entire basement as easily as they used to.

We know we wanted ample storage and organizing furniture but we let our daughter decide what she wanted in her area. She chose her own Flor tiles and color. She also chose how she wanted toys stored and after she saw that I had a nifty magnet board she absolutely had to have one too.

Like the furniture in the other areas, we got it from Ikea and put it up on legs so that any flooding in the future will hopefully not get to any of the goodies. We like these cabinets because it is easy to take toys in and out of and the top makes a perfect play surface. The entire thing also sits below the back of the couch so it is not so obtrusive when viewed from the living/entertainment area.

We have additional toy storage in small plastic movable bins and also utilize the built-in shelf that I built when I renovated the basement the first time around.

Basement 1 of 3 - The Office

2011-01-20T07:27:00.002-06:00

Oh crap, I still have this blog, don't I. With all of the other Housebloggers starting in on their New Year's resolutions and plans, I figured I better get off my butt and do something. I actually haven't done too much on the house but I realized at the end of last year, I completed work on the basement and never really blogged what I did. So, before I start going on with plans for the New Year, I figured I'd bring the blog up to speed. A good place to start is the flood. If you don't read the blog often, last summer we had some serious floods that ruined the basement. Since we use it for living room, play room, and home office, it was devastating. It is all cleaned and re-finished. This is the office area during the flood (and after I rifled through everything, trying to salvage any valuables. I was never happy with the work area. It didn't "work" and it didn't look so great. On the bright side, the flood gave me the opportunity to fix this area.

This is the work area now: new desk and cart, new book case, new floor covering, new cabinet and lighting. The chair and filing cabinets are old and made it through the flood with no damage. One key to the new design was to get everything off the floor. Everything in the basement is up on feet now. If a flood occurs again, it may mess up the space but hopefully less "stuff" gets ruined.

There are a few new features that make the space "work" as well. I put in new task lighting under the cabinets to light the desk. We have 2x4 flourescent lighting in the area but it is ugly and it sucks so this is a big improvement. I mounted an Ikea cabinet above the desk for additional storage. I chose an Ikea bookcase and another cabinet in the same finish for other areas of the basement so the furniture no longer has a haphazard appearance. Below that I now have a tack board to put up important business cards, ongoing projects, etc. I also have the desk and table, from CB2, on casters so they are easy to move around.

The casters are great because, since I often need to spread out design drawings, I can bring it to the side and create a nice work area. The cart also helps hold all of the crap that I used to have stacked on the floor next to the old desk.

The tack board is a metal magnet board from Ikea. I put up two of them and got some funky magnets at the local office supply store. By the way, I was surprised at how cool magnets are these days. I also now have a place to put all of my magnetic poetry for some added inspiration.

Opposite the desk, behind the couch, I put a new bookcase. It is a sort of console as seen from the living area and acts as a room divider. I can easily access books and supplies from the office area so it serves well for additional storage.

I chose a series of random black, black & white, and striped magazine holders to make it look a little neater, hiding some of the less attractive stuff I store there.

I am really happy with the new space except for a couple of minor things. CHORDS! I have worked very hard to organize and hide chords in the new basement. There are a couple areas that I have just given up on though. The chord to the transformer for the over-desk lighiting is one area. I love that Ikea makes this stuff so it is "typical" and can easily be installed anywhere but it is all a bit bulky and hard to hide. Short of hard-wiring it, there isn't much I can do so I guess I'll live with it.

Another thing is the Flor. I love the Flor carpet tile. I like how it looks and wears. What I don't like is where the casters of the chair run over it, the tiles separate. I have tried to re-glue these with more tape and stickers but they keep coming apart. I may have to flip the sucker over and duct tape the suckers.

In the next few days, I'll hopefully get around to blogging about the living/entertainment area and the play area. At that point, my procrastination will be complete and I'll have to start attacking some wood upstairs.

Merry Christmas

2010-12-25T09:31:00.000-06:00

We woke up to several inches of snow in the OP this year. It was nothing short of magical.

From our bungalow to yours, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Flor installed in the play area

2010-12-19T08:51:00.000-06:00

Since she picked them out, my daughter insisted on organizing and arranging the Flor for her play area. I think she did a pretty good job. Much to her chagrin, I put on all of the "stickers" that hold the tiles together after she went to bed. I have patience but I don't think I have the kind of patience to walk a six year old with a sticker fetish through that process.

More Flor

2010-12-13T12:18:00.000-06:00

When I got the Flor tiles for the basement, I left two areas un-carpeted. One of these was my daughter's play area. The other day, she decided to stage a strike of sorts. She said that she refuses to play in the new "play area" because it is too cold and will only play there if she gets a rug too. No problem. I would have gotten her something for the floor there to start off with but I know how picky she can get about color, etc. Yesterday, we took her to the Flor store, where she picked out her own Flor tiles in the colors she wanted. Actually, I should correct this. She WANTED to get a fairly bright striped rainbow-colored tile with matching plain primary colored tiles. We don't have a problem with rainbows per se but we thought it best not to go too crazy and so we persuaded her to choose something else. Instead, she went for a composition of all blues.

It doesn't looks so bad but I have to admit that I am glad you can't see the carpet from any place in the room EXCEPT when you are in the play area. The actual tile should arrive in a couple days; just in time for her to have friends over this weekend.

Trimming the Tree

2010-12-10T17:37:00.000-06:00

We started to get in the holiday spirit at the Tiny Bungalow this week. It began with our ritual trip to the Home Depot to pick out the tree. I am not sure if I have mentioned it before but several years ago, I was in a hurry and pulled out a tree that hadn't been unwrapped yet. I bought it sight-unseen and only was able to judge the height. It ended up being the best tree we had gotten to that date. Since then, I continue this ritual. I have been pretty happy every year and this year is no exception.

I finished putting up the lights out front today. We got a new critter for the front yard this year; a sitting dog. Hint: if you want to get the attention of every school kid riding by on the local buses, wear a Santa hat while you decorate. I got a lot of funny comments. Some sort of mean but still pretty funny.

The entire street looks a bit more festive than usual this year and I have a feeling that folks will be adding on in a sort of "Griswold Competition" between now and the big day. I think the dog is it for me. Maybe next year, I'll spring for the pair of deer or maybe go crazy and stick something on the roof.

Some New Doors

2010-12-05T07:01:00.000-06:00

My daughter always wants to help with the projects around the house. She's given a hand moving things, painting and sanding. Now she's taken on a project of her own. She felt it was absolutely necessary that people know which bathroom is for the boys and which one is for the girls so she devised her own label system, colored and cut out, and then mounted them on each bathroom door all by herself. I don't know if I want the answers to the questions of her motives here.

I took on a door project of my own. After having the hardware fall off and a giant hole eat it's way through it, I figured it was finally time to replace and put working hardware on the garage door. I generously got an old door from Humphrey House which is perfect for the location. It worked out well because it re-purposes something they weren't using and it keeps me from needing to purchase on of my own. I cut it down a little and then mounted it and added hardware. When I get to the garage project, in the spring, I can finish painting it.

I am almost embarrassed to say that our garage has been without a locking door for a couple years now. We've been fortunate that no one has "broken in" looking to steal anything. Not that there is all that much to steal anyway. Regardless, it will be nice to not have a pile of snow inside the garage when I wake up on snowy mornings this winter.

Thanksgiving with a deep fried turkey

2010-11-27T13:22:00.000-06:00

Nope, we didn't plant palm trees behind the Tiny Bungalow, we spent the Thanksgiving away from home this year and opted for a warmer location with family in Florida. We were all up for a change of pace, food-wise, as well so we thought we'd try a deep fried turkey. It was a relatively easy process and not quite as dangerous as most people would have you think. It is also convenient as all of the items you need are now available at your local hardware store and the cooking time is very fast.

We did a small bird this year and I injected it with an herb and wine mixture of my own making. You heat the oil (measured to the perfect amount to cover the bird) to 350 and then SLOWLY lower the DRY and DEFROSTED bird into the hot oil. I have a feeling that this is where most morons screw up and drop the sucker in, sending oil and fire everywhere.

The wire hanger was a much needed part of the process. I was going to opt for the entourage of two or four people lowering it in on a giant spit-like contraption but the bird seemed a little small for all of that.

The only thing that is a small pain is that you have to watch the thing vigilantly, keeping the temperature regulated between 325 and 350 degrees. This really isn't such a big deal since the entire cooking process takes all of 45 minutes. I thought this was the best part. Well, next to the crispy skin, it's the best part.

Pulling the turkey out of the oil seemed like another place where most morons, after polishing off a six-pack while waiting the 45 minutes for the bird to cook, could screw up. The bird came out great. Now that we've done it once, I think I would have cooked it for a little less time but otherwise, the deep fried turkey was a huge hit.

The only down-side to the whole operation is that I like the turkey stuffed with stuffing and the gravy that comes from the drippings in the pan. Sadly, there is no way to replicate these with a deep fried turkey. This might be why, upon returning home to the Tiny Bungalow, I went out and got a turkey today and am roasting it in the oven.

A little self-promotion

2010-10-27T09:29:00.002-05:00

Actually, this is a note promoting one of my other blogs. One year ago, I started blogging one of my hobbies: my research on the architect J. L. Silsbee. It isn’t a subject that grabs visitors the way that picture rail, paint stripping or rain barrels do but I think that if you are a fan of art, old buildings and local history, it is something that might appeal to you.

I became interested in Silsbee while living in Buffalo, N.Y., when I found a series of buildings there designed by an architect from my hometown, Syracuse, N.Y. Moving to Chicago, I completed a sort of “Silsbee pilgrimage” by living in each of the cities where he had an office.

With the help of many others, I have uncovered over four hundred fifty works by Silsbee scattered across the country. One of these days I hope to publish some of this research but that seems more and more unlikely as my free time is not as plentiful as when I started this hobby and my past attempts for grants and publishing have been met with nothing but rejection. In the meantime, my sole publishing outlet is through the blog. So far, I have blogged forty-two of Silsbee's works. At that rate, I will have blogged all of his known works in about ten years; if I don’t “discover” any more. This is unlikely, as new works seem to come up on a regular basis.

I hope you take the time to go and check out the other blog. The works are organized by building type and year they were designed. There are a lot of nice pictures and there is even a map locating all of the structures I have blogged. Hope you enjoy it.

-Chris

Pizza fritte

2010-10-17T20:51:00.000-05:00

If you are in Central New York, you call it "pizza fritte". If you are in the greater New York City area, you call them "zeppole". I haven't seen on in Chicago yet so I don't know what they call them here. Regardless, it is the easiest treat to make and fits in well with a cool fall night so we decided to make some tonight.

Any moron can make them. You fry dough and sprinkle whatever you like on it. To keep the recipe REALLY simple, you can buy the dough. If I were in my hometown, Syracuse, this would be preferred and I would get the dough from Columbus Bakery. In Chicago, I think we have the next best thing in the prepared dough you can get at Caputo's Market. Make any form you want. My daughter insisted on "O"s and "D"s - though I can hardly tell the difference. I made some smaller balls and some logs (for lack of a better term) as well. It only needs to fry a couple minutes on each side and once it is done, you sprinkle it with sugar, cinnamon and sugar, keep it plain, put ice cream on it, jelly is good too. Whatever you do, you have to eat them quickly because they are only good warm.

Be careful not to burn your mouth though...

Basement is Finished

2010-10-17T07:36:00.001-05:00

I put some of the finishing touches on the basement this weekend. The major piece was to assemble the Flor carpeting system. I chose two different types of tiles for the basement. At the office area, I chose a series of colors in the "Feelin' Groovy" pattern to harmonize with the colors in the chips in the epoxy floor. I don't think it came out too bad for a guy is genetically disposed to color-blindness.

The Flor system is pretty simple to assemble. I did it a little different than they suggest though. They have you lay out the floor and then lift up corners and use their "stickers" to hold things together by placing them under where you lift up. It was a bit more cumbersome but I was able to achieve a tighter fit of tiles by assembling the entire rug upside down and adhering stickers on the back. Some of it comes loose when you flip it over but I still think the results were better. It was a little trickier with the carpet I chose for the TV area. There, I used a higher pile and the pile is prone to getting stuck between the two tile's backing, making a small gap. With a little patience, I was able to get rid of this though.

Of course, the final installation is not how I planned so now I need to order one more tile for it to be finished. We are keeping the saw-tooth look at the bathroom end but want to square it off at the closet side.

Another project was organizing the myriad of wires in the basement. When we had the gigantic entertainment center, this was not an issue as it could all just be stuffed in the back and nothing was seen. Now we have a smaller TV stand and I used plastic conduit to organize the chords. I may end up painting it to match the walls. You can still see it but it is not as annoying as having a sea of worms along the walls and floor.

The only thing missing is the couch. We ordered a sectional from Macy's and are waiting until November for its delivery. You would think they could build us a whole new house by then. We'd also like to find a way to put some photos up. Perhaps a picture shelf or some similar device.

This is not a project we chose to take on but we are pretty happy with the results. We have a little organizing to do in the office area and there is some re-finishing I'd like to do at the soffit at the stairs but otherwise, I consider this project complete.

Blog Action Day - Water

2010-10-16T07:04:00.000-05:00

For the annual Blog Action Day post, the subject is water once more. A couple years ago, I wrote about our experiences in China and how that seemed to highlight the issue of clean water. I have also mentioned on this blog, more than a few times, some of the things that we do at the Tiny Bungalow to help conserve water.

Living in the Great Lakes Region, it is very easy to take water for granted. It is all around us and on a daily basis, we are inundated with news of invasive species that may harm the local fishing economy, industrial pollutants that can harm our water supply and municipal pollutants that disrupt our recreation activities. Each of these issues points to ways that large groups of us need to come together to solve these problems. They are city-wide, state-wide and sometimes international. To some people's dismay, this means that we are responsible.

Given the current political cries against government intervention in everything from banking to education, it is easy to see how public necessities like water treatment and supply are on the table for privatization discussion. In many ways, in a free market, this is the easy solution. We don't really have to think about the problem at all. As long as we, as consumers, continue to insist on clean water, industry can step in and provide us with what we want. Some may call the privatization of water ridiculous and say that it "can't happen here". Other's may dismiss the notion with stories of the worst case scenarios of what happens when unbridled industry has it's way

(insert photo of Bhopal, Copiapo, the Gulf of Mexico, etc. here).

As individuals, there are small things that we can do every day to conserve our natural resources but these actions alone do nothing if larger entities like businesses and governments work against these goals. I don't have any big answers but think that its worthwhile to consider this when exercising one of our most important rights this November. Also, it is worth checking out what others have to say about the issue at the Blog Action Day website.

"Make sure you use the right bathroom"...

2010-10-08T20:27:00.000-05:00

...were the words my daughter said after she posted these "signs". I guess there is a certain 6 year old that is very concerned about where the boys go and where the girls go in this household. I guess I better keep any guests informed on the situation as well. I'd hate to see what happens if someone uses the wrong room.

Garage Sale Purchase

2010-09-24T17:00:00.001-05:00

The basement progress has slowed to a snail's pace as we are waiting for our floor covering and furniture shipments. When it seems that there is nothing else to blog about, the latest garage sale purchase all of a sudden seems newsworthy. This is the kind of purchase my wife hates. Stuff we don't really need yet I think would look cool in a bungalow. It is a small low-grade Craftsman Style bookcase made out of redwood. It appears to have been made for the tourist trade in California over 50 years ago. It still has the original "official redwood" sticker on it - very cool graphic. For twenty bucks, it seemed perfect for the Tiny Bungalow and looks great in the dining room. Most importantly, I finally have a place to showcase my favorite Twilight series books.

Pleasant Homes Arts & Crafts Home Tour

2010-09-17T19:05:00.001-05:00

This year is shaping up to be a great tour for our annual Pleasant Home fundraiser. Registration is now open for an interior house tour of six Arts & Crafts beauties in the OP. In addition, tours of George Maher's Pleasant Home as well as his James Hall Taylor House (Unity Church) will also be included as part of the admission price.

Yours truly will be at the Taylor House (pictured above) in the morning helping to point out some of Maher's design genius there. To register, call Pleasant Home at 708 383 2654 or download a registration form here and fax, e-mail or drop it off.

Back in the basement

2010-09-12T20:45:00.001-05:00

It's been six weeks since I woke up to water in the basement and with the assistance of some hired help the past few weeks, I finally got the room in livable condition and put all of the trim up. I have some painting to do but otherwise, I have started moving stuff back into the basement. Too bad my camera is sucking right now or I'd have a better pic up here.

I went out today and got a new desk and computer cart from CB2 and we went to Ikea and bought a few other things yesterday (note the many boxes of items "to be assembled". One cool thing is that Ikea had their birch-looking "Lack" shelf back in stock so I can also complete the bathroom.

There are still no rugs so it feels a bit cold down here. It doesn't matter as long as we can reclaim our dining room and I can begin setting up the home office again. I am very disorganized these days and behind on many many things. Hopefully, now that I am up and running again in a "permanent" spot, I can start to catch up.

Hoppy times in the back yard

2010-09-11T05:59:00.003-05:00

It's been a while since I posted anything about the yard. The reason is that not much is happening there since I have been preoccupied with the basement and all. One nice thing that is going on is the hops that have grown over the pergola. I hope they have no problem coming back next year because I like the look and am still holding out hope that one day I can make a batch of brew with them.

Also, I don't think I mentioned but I added another line of slats to the pergola. It seemed a bit too open and I like the new look of it. I still hope to tackle de-uglying the garage this year and then doing a better blog entry on the pergola construction.

Just Like New

2010-09-10T13:36:00.001-05:00

So there was this table. We are going to use it as our coffee table in the basement. The issue was whether or not to refinish it. After spending a couple hours in the basement today relocating lighting and readying things for re-installing the baseboard, I decided to get outside and take on a small project.

The cigarette and glass mark stains have to go.

After an hour or so of elbow grease, a few pads of sandpaper, and then a coat of tung oil, the table is looking pretty good.

It still has some very faint scratches if you look very close. Hopefully they will make my wife happy as I think they give the piece a little character - just not as much as it had before. I think its going to look great in the rehabbed basement.

Shiny New Floor

2010-09-06T08:33:00.002-05:00

After letting the base coat dry overnight, I mixed the top coat and rolled that on. The milky consistency made it easy to make sure that I covered the entire area.

It took a night to dry and when it was finished, I was left with a very shiny new floor. It looks pretty good and I am happy with hit. It feels pretty solid as well.

There are a couple things to note about this system. I got the water based, low VOC formula and it is great in that respect. I was prepared for a major home ventilation to keep it from smelling like a paint factory. But though it smells a bit when you first put it down,by the end of the day you can walk around the room and not even know that you did any painting/sealing in it. This was the case for both the base coat and the top coat.

Also, there are tons of warnings in the literature about how slippery the final surface is and it makes recommendations all over to add a sand or traction element to the final coat. I didn't do this because I didn't want the rough surface. I don;t have second thoughts about that but the surface is VERY slick. If it weren't for the imperfections in the concrete, the final coat makes this thing look like there is a sheet of clear ice over it. It behaves that way as well. Fun for little kids in socks, not so much for someone that slips and falls. I think that if I used this in a garage, I would add the grit to the finish.

Now it's time to get the trim up and finish patching and painting.