The Never Ending Door Project

This week, one of our painters accused me of being a masochist.  And he might not be wrong.  Sigh....

You see, I love old doors.  In Maine they're typically made of Douglas Fir and they're absolutely beautiful if they're not painted.  But every one of ours is painted.  All 15 of them.  Layers and layers of paint over many, many decades. 

I've stripped doors on some other houses and know it's a big job.  But I was up to the task!  I decided to make my life a bit easier and bought a Cobra Speedheater infrared stripper.  It heats the old paint up so you can easily scrape it in long pieces, eliminating lead dust and it doesn't heat hot enough to vaporize the lead paint.

But even with that advantage, it took me over 30 hours to do one side of one door.  And I still needed dental tools to dig out paint in some of the crevices.  Yikes!

The next door I used a combination of the Cobra and a non-toxic paint stripper and that took the time down to about 15 hours.  A huge improvement!  But I wasn't as happy with the finished product.  It's a bit blotchy (and the top rail is pine, which looks odd next to all the Douglas fir).  

And since I have bathrooms to tile and wallpaper to hang - I'm  not going to have time to do all those doors when we move in (or maybe never is what my husband is thinking! 😂). So for now, my painter and I have agreed he will paint the backs of the doors - but the fronts that we see all the time will not be painted and will just wait for me to get to them. 

It's a compromise and will look a bit odd - but it feels like a plan!

 

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The Beauty of Old and New Hardwood Floors

Back in the old days – BC (Before Covid) – there was a logical sequence to the different contractors that renovate a house.  But with the shortage of labor and skilled trades, I’m constantly pivoting the schedule when a trade suddenly becomes available, even if it's not the best timing.  

 

Case in point, the hardwood floors.  We wanted to get the new kitchen flooring installed, sanded and a coat of finish on it before the cabinets got installed.  But we weren’t really ready to have all the floors done.

 

But when our amazing flooring guy called to say they could come the next week to do the whole house – well of course we said yes.  And we pivoted and got everything ready for them (and put everything else on hold).  That's just how it works these days.

 

We could only save the original floors in 2 rooms – the living room and the bedroom at the top of the steps. They stitched in new red oak for the rest of the house and it’s amazingly similar.  Our guess is the floors were done 70 years ago, so I'm still surprised they look so similar!

 

Aren’t the floors gorgeous???  They make the rooms glow, as the early morning sunlight floods the rooms.  

The room we were really curious about was the sunporch.  Part of the room had 5” wide Douglas fir.  The rest of the room had 3” wide fir flooring – except for the section next to the window which was 2 ¼” oak (they used whatever they could find!).  

Sunporch floor 

It didn’t sand up perfectly.  In fact we’re down to the nails in some areas, which means we’re at the tongue (of the tongue and groove) and can’t go any further.  But we’re okay with that.  This is a porch and probably had lots of weather hitting the floor at different times in its history.  We like the character that the floor shows.  One of these days we’ll have to replace it completely, but for now we’re going to celebrate its history.

I immediately covered all the floors, to protect them until we get a bit further along in the project.  So I'm glad you got a peek at them now! 

New Kitchen Floor and doorway to Sun Porch (aptly named, because look at the sun!!)

 

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The Hall Bathroom

Last year we went on a House & Garden tour and I quickly realized I could pinpoint when each bathroom was remodeled, based on the tile they used.  Trends in tile design come and go and what looks great today can look dated in a few years (thanks in large part to social media, which is always touting the latest fad).

For this house, I want to use classic styles that will make it hard to guess when the house was updated.  Sure, we want modern conveniences, but don't want to use the 'it' tile that's so popular this week/month/year.  So for example, we won't use any 12x24" tiles in our house - not because I don't like them, but because they aren't appropriate for an 1898 house.

What does that mean for our tile choices?  Well let's start with the hall bathroom.  Our guess is the bathroom was added to the house in the early 1920's, when the house changed from a cottage to a full time home.  So I wanted to look at styles from that period.  The Standard company (later called American Standard)  introduced the 'Sanitary Bath' - with porcelain, easy to clean fixtures and surfaces.  

I installed a classic marble dog bone basketweave on the floor.  It's a design that's been around for 100+ years and is still a great look for today.
 

The shower walls also got a classic treatment with a timeless subway tile, accented with diagonal 4x4 tiles.

I'm a huge fan of wallpaper and ordered the antique toothbrush wallpaper from the Netherlands that I used in another home several years ago.  I love that paper and can't wait to use it again. 

But the other big change was the sun tunnel.  This bathroom is in the middle of the house with no windows.  And I desperately wanted to get some daylight in there.  So we added a Velux sun tunnel which channels sunlight from the roof to the bathroom.  It's such a great change!  It's so bright, I keep trying to turn off the light as I walk by the room - forgetting that it's natural daylight.  

And last but not least, we want to install marble baseboards in the bathroom.  I've never done this before, but am pretty thrilled with how they look!  I'll seal and grout them tomorrow!

Our painter is hoping to start the 2nd floor this week - I'll post updates soon.  

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Garden Evolution

As it starts to really feel like fall, it seems like a good time to update the garden plan progress.  As a reminder, this is a 5 year plan, so don't expect that it get completed all at once!!!  I would love to spend many, many hours in the garden everyday, but the main house is our primary focus at the moment (because we really would like to move in one of these days!).  However, I did manage to squeeze in a little time to get the garden plan started.

The border around the stone wall got started last fall with some end-of-season perennial bargains I found.  They sprang to life this year and in general, I'm pretty pleased with how it's coming together.  Lots of spring color was replaced with summer blooms and then a bit of fall color.  (I'd like to add some more spring bulbs this fall, to give us an early pop of color!) 

I spent weeks clearing the grass from the lower garden, to start creating the border on that side of the yard.   The border is taking shape.  The centerpiece is this pink blooming crabapple, which is replaced with bronze/green leaves for the rest of the summer.  I also planted a nine bark that's the development from O'Donals - a local nursery.  They've named it Gorham's Gold and I love the pop of color. 

I've tried to include a lot of native plants in this garden design.  I'm still new to the world of natives, but I love the Wentworth Cherry Viburnum and these Rudbeckia that are super tall behind some daylillies I've planted.  

Another key to the garden - we installed a drip irrigation system for the trees and shrubs.  We first experienced drip irrigation when we lived in Phoenix, where they value every drop of water.  It directs water to where it's needed - next to a plant - and doesn't waste it anywhere else. 

The folks from Thirsty Turf installed it in a day and we can control it from our phones or a control panel in the basement.    We did not irrigate the grass.  As long as we have something green growing (weeds are okay) that is grass-like, we're happy.  If it turns brown in mid-summer, that's fine with us.  We don't want to use all the chemicals that typically go with a manicured lawn.

While we were working on the garden plan, we also discovered that the large oak tree in the yard was blocking our water view through the new windows.  We really didn't want to cut down the tree - it's a great anchor for the entire yard and provides some nice shade on a sunny summer day.  So we had it pruned back so we can still see the water, but retain the tree's canopy.

So if this is year one of the 5 year plan - just wait for next year!  So much more to do!

It's cruise ship season..... I keep trying to catch a good photo!

5 year landscape plan

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Creating a Ceiling That Makes a Statement

The odd thing about our house is that every room has a different ceiling height.  When we bought the house, the majority of the rooms had 7' 4" ceilings, so we have done our best to eke out any additional height that we can.  Some had a bit more expansion space, some a bit less.  And we got a bit carried away in the kitchen, where accessing the old attic space provided us with 14 foot ceilings.  This seemed so extreme compared with the rest of the house that we lowered it to a more manageable 11 feet.

As a reminder, here was our starting point in the kitchen.

Original Service Porch - will be eating area & mud bench soon

I do love the tall ceiling.  But even with the reduced height, the kitchen ceiling just seemed like a huge expanse of boring white drywall.  It needs to be more interesting!   So we set out to change it.

Since the original kitchen was covered in beadboard (very typical in old Maine cottages), we wanted to incorporate that original style.  But I have to admit, real beadboard can drive me crazy as it expands and shrinks with the seasons, creating lots of gaps.  My favorite solution is to install beadboard panels, so you only have a seam every 4 feet.  Kyle started with the top of the ceiling and then moved down the angled walls.

He 'picture framed' the edges to provide a finished edge, but also to provide a bit of expansion/shrinkage space for the panels. 

We also wanted to utilize the original joists that came out of the ceiling.  My husband cleaned them up and sealed them.

Original Kitchen Ceiling Joists

Then he held up a sample on the top ceiling, so we could decide if we liked them.  It got an enthusiastic thumbs up! Next step was to figure out the spacing.

The joists had to be carefully cut to exactly fit the angled ceiling.

Don't you love how they add a bit of character to the ceiling?  What a change to a big, boring expanse of white drywall! 

Ultimately the beadboard will all be painted white, in a satin finish.  The beams will get carefully wrapped to keep their original patina.  And the result?  Well, we can't wait to see it!  Pin It

Progress Report

There is so much going on at the house now, it's hard to figure out how to share it all.  So here's a quick update. 

The drywall is done  - woo hoo!  And with the walls in place, you can get a sense of the new spaces.  The living room has a new sliding door that will go to a deck.  And you can see the new exposed beams.

What used to be a service porch is now part of the kitchen.  This will include a banquette under the window and a mud bench next to the door to the sun porch and garage.  We moved the door to the right and now we can see out to the backyard.  I love that extra peek of sunlight!

This bedroom probably doesn't look much different - but we moved the windows to create a bit of symmetry on the front of the house and accommodate some new structural posts on the other wall.

We got skylights!  The kitchen is on the west side of the house and is pretty dark until late afternoon.  With the addition of two skylights, it's a real game changer!  Look at that sunlight coming in!

And my painter has come in and primed everything, painted the ceilings and done a first coat of final paint color on the wall (color - Sherwin Williams White Flour, a warm white).  At long last, we can really see the rooms and it's looking so good!

Sunroom (aptly named - it faces east and gets the morning light!)

Home office

The flooring guys are stitching in new red oak to match the original red oak floors.  My guess is the old floors were installed in the 1940's, yet when we did a test patch to see how well they integrate with the new red oak - we were thrilled at how similar they are. 

The kitchen floor has already been sanded and a coat of sealer applied.  That's so the cabinets can be installed, which will be a really exciting milestone next week. 

A couple of weeks ago it felt like we were stalled - and now suddenly it's full steam ahead!  Stay tuned for even more progress as we move forward.  And as always, thanks for following along on our journey! 

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