I am happy to report that after what has felt like a long hiatus, the house is back under hammer and crow bar. Kyle spent a couple of days this week removing the banister from the stairs and clearing out more wood and debris from the bathroom and bedrooms. Now, the upper storey feels very much like an airy loft. The upstairs floor has also been stripped down to its original boards. These are mismatched in length and thickness, making for a slightly sketchy looking floor. That said, we have decided that we will replace them, especially those that are to hold heavy fixtures, like the bath tub. I do not want to take a bubble bath and end up in the kitchen! While removing some copper piping from one of the kitchen walls, Kyle discovered that the whole wall was filled with saw dust. We have decided on two plausible reasons for this: either the people building the house were super lazy and dumped all of the debris into the wall to avoid lugging it out of the house. OR, it could have acted as makeshift insulation. Whatever the reason for the debris in the wall, we spent a good chunk of time shovelling, bagging, and removing all of it. After the saw dust was cleaned up, I swept out the ancient cobwebs draped through the roof rafters and removed a decomposing bee hive that was somehow created inside one of the library walls. One of the highlights of our work days at the house? Visits from our sweet, short-legged, partly blind neighbour cat, Gracie. Gracie was the first creature to welcome us to the street. On the night that we took ownership of the house, we left the front door open as we explored all of the rooms. Later, while having a pizza picnic in the front foyer, Gracie welcomed herself in, immediately making herself at home. She has been a constant at 212 ever since. Next up for 212? Laying plywood down in the foyer and kitchen and rebuilding the more precarious sections of the floor upstairs.
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About MeKyle and I just became new homeowners. The house we purchased is not what one would classify as "move in ready"; in fact, it is quite the opposite. Built at the turn of the 20th century, our Victorian style house is both beautiful and terrifying in its ancient status and will be a project in renovation. This is a documentation of our triumphs and lessons learned, as we deconstruct and reconstruct this house. The end result? A space that we can proudly say we created. Archives
December 2016
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