Porch in Progress...

Aaron is working on the porch trim right now. I'm writing between helping him, actually! Here was the progress as of a few minutes ago. It's slow and steady. I can't imagine how the original builders did this without power tools!

I just thought that I'd post a total front exterior shot- to quote Aaron "It really looks like a Nightmare now!"

You can't get the full effect from a photo, but the painter has stripped almost all the windows and doors on the house to bare wood, which looks pretty ugly. (Yes, we decided to pay a fortune- $320/window to save what we had. And then we added the door frames- $400/each. I wish we had the time and patience to do this ourselves, but with me back in school this semester- (I'm trying the Ph.D. program again- this time at the University of Maryland. I'm starting out by taking solid state physics. I'm clearly insane.) The gutters are down and they've left gorgeous rust stains behind on the fascia boards. The painter sent the gutter people away after they took the gutters down and replaced the fascia so that he could work on the fascia boards, but he's still been working on the windows. We trust him, and he's a great guy, but the gutter people said that it would be an extra charge if they came out twice. Since we didn't tell them to come out twice, the painter did, hopefully we won't get charged the extra fee, but I seriously doubt it.

Oh, here is a good PO story. The painter is also going to reglaze all of the windows, fix the broken pieces of glass, etc. Most of the window glazing comes right out b/c it's very old and brittle. HOWEVER, the PO (DDP, if you recall from earlier posts) thought that window glazing was for suckas, and he thought that caulk, his very absolute most favorite compound in ever the history of remodeling (useful for filling holes in walls, grouting tile, etc. etc.) would be an excellent choice for you got it, reglazing windows (at least just in our bedroom). The painter said that he would try to make it look a little better but there was no getting it out. Thanks DDP!

Gotta go sand more blocks for the trim- like I told Aaron- thank goodness the house was built in the Arts and Crafts period, with its nice simple trim. Our newbie carpenter skills would have not held up to one of those ornate Victorians with the complex trim!