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Butler's Pantry Doors

We’ve been working on small projects here and there. Some more pleasant than others. One exciting one was installing the second butler’s pantry door on the bottom. It’s been kind of funny having one attached door and the other one missing. The first one was such a pain that I think we’ve been procrastinating on the second one. To our surprise the second one was soooo much easier! I guess Patrick has become a better chiseler. Additionally he tried out a sanding drill bit to cut out the area more evenly. We still have some adjusting to do, but here are the attached bottom doors. Voila!

Kitchen butler's pantry

In the meanwhile I was running back and forth between the kitchen helping Patrick and working on removing paint in the bathroom. Nothing too exciting to report from the bathroom yet. We’ve just been removing a bit more paint from the built-in and from the door and molding.

Then we’ve done a few more things like hanging up artwork. I know, it’s been like what – a year, year and a half since we’ve moved in? And we’re only now hanging up art? I suppose this is the part where I don’t mention that we have about 10 more pieces stacked in our hallway collecting dust. I don’t know how we do it…every time that hallway is free of crap more stuff seems to appear in its place.

The more unwelcoming house work was a roof leak in the dining room. We had it when we first moved in and we thought it got fixed. Of course after that Atlanta’s been suffering a drought, so if there was a leak it was a bit hard to tell! In any case, the leak came back. It was sometime before Christmas when we actually found it. I guess it’s a bit hard to miss when you suddenly find a huge puddle of water on your floor! Initially I thought I spilled water after watering a plant, but it was too much and of course we soon noticed it dripping from the ceiling. We finally got it repaired and have had a few downpours since. So far so good. *Fingers crossed*

Oh, and in other unwelcoming news – our gas bill! I think some people pay as much for rent as we have for our gas bills. So we started getting attic insulation quotes. One of those boring projects that costs money and doesn’t do anything for us aesthetically!

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Living Room / Guest Room Door

One of the drooling parts about our house has always been the door between the living room and guest bedroom. The design matches the exterior windows, the kitchen butler’s pantry, and the coffered ceilings. And of course beautiful unique window designs like that are hard to come by these days.

Bedroom/Parlor Door

We had worked some on the door in March and April before friends and well as my parents were coming to visit. The fact that there was a door at all was somewhat of a luxury at that point. The fact that the door should be able to close wasn’t even on our minds yet. Well, of course for our visitor’s sake we wish we could have provided a closing door, but we just weren’t at that point yet. We have thought about what to put there since, and for a while were intrigued by the Eastlake door set. Though at $182 after shipping we haven’t exactly jumped on the “deal” and I’ve told Patrick we should ask for it for Christmas or something. The exciting part about the Eastlake set from Rejuvenation was also that they offered it for modern “holed” doors. Though our door is anything but modern it has sadly been badly butchered over the years. When we bought the house someone had removed the original mortise door set and carved out a hole to fit a modern door set in it.

Bedroom/Parlor Door Mortise

When we were in Chicago over the weekend we stayed with a friend in a cute old apartment in Rogers Park. The apartment had some really cool door knobs that we hadn’t seen before, but the design seemed perfect for our door and the style in the remainder of the house. Though the Eastlake design is very cool it also seems to lean towards the late Victorian-era style. The design of our friend’s door handles just seemed to fit better with the lines of the windows in our house. (Just to note: our friend didn’t paint the door.)

Historic Door Handle

We joked with her that she would come back from work one day and she would find a cheap door set on one of her doors. Now that we’re back home we’re on a mission to find this style door knob! The unfortunate part is that we don’t know what the name of the style is – which doesn’t exactly help. I found one style on Rejuvenation that is kind of cool but not really that close: Bevel Edge Plate. Though they don’t offer it as a set so we’d have to piece it together ourselves. After that I finally got a little bit closer to what we’re looking for: the Quincy Set where at least the handle is heading in the right direction, and the Heritage Set that seems to be the closest one yet. It’s close, but not entirely there yet. The line seems to be more defined on the plate of our friend’s door knob than the Heritage knob. I wish I could see the Heritage knob from some different angles so I could better determine the resemblance. So I guess that’s where we’re at with our living room/guest room door knob. If anyone reading this happens to stumble across my friend’s door knob, or perhaps recalls the name of the style please, please, please let us know! We would love to get this style for our door – without having to kidnap our friend’s! ;-) And if someone doesn’t feel comfortable leaving a comment we can also be reached via email – info [at] westviewbungalow.com.

On a side note, and perhaps reflecting back to my previous entry, we had a great time in Chicago. One thing we were bummed about was that we figured out that we would miss the “Historic Chicago Bungalow Expo” this coming up weekend. (Maybe we could have found our door knob there!) Bungalows aside, one of the first things I noticed was the amazing lawns from the airplane. Then arriving at our friend’s house and walking around town I was only reaffirmed how amazing these lawns were. Growing up as a child in Germany I remember these lush, green, soft lawns. With the Atlanta summer heat the common grass varieties are Zoysia and Bermuda, both of which have never felt as inviting and soft to me. I was starting to think my childhood memories were just false illusions until I saw my dream lawns up in Chicago. How I envy thee! And to answer some Oak Park questions – yes, it was a very friendly and inviting neighborhood. The lady at Caribou was very bubbly and friendly, as was everyone else we encountered there (so don’t let my grouchy tour lady story hold anyone back from visiting). The neighborhood was beautiful and the houses are so huge! We’re definitely looking forward to visiting again sometime (perhaps for next year’s Expo?), and when we do we’ll have to see about getting together with some of you Chicago house bloggers so you can show us what your town is all about! And perhaps share some more funny renovation stories… :)

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More Progress

Exterior:

Our little “garden bed” by the stairs had been overtaken by weeds (all that rain doesn’t only help the wanted plants after all!). A short while ago we had to remove the lavenders because they were drowning in that location. Lavender likes a dry, sunny location and based on the flooding in that area the earth was generally very moist. At first it flourished, then it wasn’t doing to well, so we moved it. In place the weeds grew ever so quickly…

Fountain grass

Since we knew better than to place dry-loving plants back into that spot we went on a hunt for moist-loving plants. We found a variety of Hostas and covered the general area with mulch…in hopes to keep some of those weeds from coming back so quickly.

Fountain grass

In the meanwhile we have also harvested our first batch of home grown veggies- all of two squashes and one green bell pepper! We proudly cooked a veggie pasta dish for one of our friends (with the aide of a store bough red bell pepper and zucchini).

Harvesting

Another area we tackled was by the shed. While purchasing the Hostas Patrick discovered another ornamental grass that he had to have.

Daylilly

So we moved what we assume to be wildly growing lilies (they never bloomed this year, so we’re not 100% sure) and extended the rose bed. In the fall (or spring?) I’d like to plant a few more roses to fill the open spaces.

Shed foundation planting

Interior:

In the meanwhile we’ve also gotten around to a little bit more interior work…

The kitchen built-in started looking out something like this…

Butler's Pantry Door

…progressed with the comfort of the dining room floor, starting out with the scraper/razor blade, getting frustrated and moving to the heat gun (which is dangerous in itself because it can make the glass break, but broken glass is easier to replace than damaged wood)…

Butler's Pantry Door

…and ending with something like this (for the moment).

Butler's Pantry Door

We then worked a little bit more on the dining room door. This is where we had left off January 6th. Wow, look at that floor too! Not quite refinished yet.

Dining room door

And this is where we got rid of the majority of the remaining paint. We are still struggling to find the best solution of getting the paint off the detail work – anybody have any suggestions? Pleeeeaaaase? :)

Dining room door

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Bathroom Door

Hallelujah, the bathroom door latches! Since we moved into the house there has not been 100% privacy in the bathroom. We’ve had guests over for dinner, a housewarming party, a number of vacationing guests – and they’ve all had to use the bathroom with the door leaning shut, but not fully closed. The latch was not lined up with the hole for some reason (actually, that seems to be the case with about 80% of our doors) and therefore the door could never be fully closed. When my dad was staying with us he suggested chiseling a piece away so that the strike plate could be repositioned to line up with the latch. Patrick and I (or was it maybe just me?) cringed at the thought of having to chisel away wood from the door. So now a few months later we decided to give in and Patrick got out the chisel…

Chisel bathroom latch

…and voilĂ ! We have a closing bathroom door. Our guests can now have some privacy! “Some” being the keyword as the closing door doesn’t mean a locking door. Right now we’re trying to decide whether or not to buy a new mortise lock set. None of our doors came with a key, so it would be kind of nice to at least be able to lock the bathroom. We’ve been eyeing some that have the thumbturn on the inside and a key for the outside. In the meanwhile I’ve been in the process of scrubbing away at the old glass door knob and mortise set to get the paint off with the help of some Goof Off 2. So at least while we decide we can have some nicer looking (unpainted) handles.

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Past Two Weeks

We finished putting up all the blinds in the guest bedroom! So our guest can actually have some privacy…

Guest bedroom blinds

…well, except for the glass door to the living room…

Guest bedroom door

…which we finally hung back up! Not finished like we hoped – one step at a time, I guess.

And cleaning it up a little for our guests that will soon be here.

Guest bedroom door

The 60-Day Curse?

We heard a sudden noise. It turns out the noise was the range hood vent falling down!! The screws were ripped right out from the cabinet on the left side.

Hood vent

Because we were afraid the right side would not hold much longer we found a temporary solution to prop up the vent hood until the contractors were able to come by the next day.

Hood vent

And then we also noticed the base cap molding coming off by the butler’s pantry. What is this? The 60-day curse?

Base cap molding

After a crazy/busy weekend we decided to tackle some more paint scraping and got busy with a butler’s pantry drawer and door today.

Paint stripping

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