73. We Do Do Windows!

I thought I'd pick up where I left off - the front step.  I brought these salvaged bricks from home, where I have them all over the place.  This area was one that was prone to washouts, and worse - heavy dog traffic.  It's a narrow spot where Roscoe zooms through during  his 'crazy bouts', and dirt would go flying everywhere.   I knew there was no way to get the grass to grow with that going on.   I've adjusted the grading so when the water splashes off the roof (no gutters) the stones take the brunt and the water flows to the left and out into the yard rather than down the front walkway.  A lot of brutal work in 90 degree weather, but well worth it!

From that view if you look to your left down the fence line this is what you see.  It's not completely finished yet, but lots of stuff has been planted and everything I've put in seems to like it here.  There's been lots of rain and the grass is filling in nicely, things are blooming - tra la!!

Might as well wrap up this part of the report with a picture of the back yard, in which the grass is also growing nicely - it's hard to imagine it was a sandbox only a few months ago.  Kathleen, that vine is the pink trumpet vine you gave me... it's going nuts but no blooms yet at all, I'm hoping for a big surprise next spring.  If you look closely you can see the baby-bed spring that is mounted on the fence as a trellis.  Dave and I picked this out of someone's trash on one of our walks.  Lucky for me he's such a cooperative soul.


When I first bought the house I got a quote on replacing all 26 windows in the house.  It was something in the neighborhood of $17,000 so that idea was quickly discarded.  Early on I finished the one over the kitchen sink (Episode 52 in September) and the one on the porch (Episode 60 in November), which was no easy task.  The rest of them have been covered with visqueen since it got cold last winter because I knew it would be a long long time before I got around to working on them again.  They rattled and when the wind blew the visqueen would "breathe" hot or cold air depending on the season.  Then not long ago, after a very heavy rain and wind event we came to the house to find a puddle on the dining room floor.  At other times we saw puddles in the living room and foyer as well.  Ok, ok.  Time to work on the remaining 24 windows.  

As I mentioned before, we came to the conclusion that the windows on the sides of the house would rarely need to be opened, since the cross breeze from the beach (mmmm it is as sweet as it sounds) goes from front to back.  This simplified the issue, and we decided to make all the side windows fixed in place, caulked up and no more leaky drafty-ness.  Ever.  We began with the two in the dining room, which you already saw.  Then this one, and the one opposite, in the living room.  Only 20 to go!

Our next victim was this cutie on the side of the sunroom.  Now let me say here, I hate to have to close up a groovy old window.  But if you could see how - um - messed up - they are you might understand.  Originally the two panels on either side were fixed, and the center ones slid out to open up.  Fine if you don't have central AC but very hard to get them to slide, never mind seal up against the elements.  Plus there were muttons (cross-bars) broken, and damage where apparently a doggie (not mine) was trapped inside and tried to eat his way out.

I helped a little but Dave and his expertise are really the ones getting this window project finished in fine style.  It starts with taking everything apart and putting back new pieces with the old - here he has fashioned a replacement for a mutton that was half-chewed off.  Another job for his elite coping skills!  One pane of glass got replaced, and I added window glazing caulk on the outside after scraping off any loose old stuff.

Here's what it looked like with a little added trim for pizzazz...  19 to go!

These three are on the second floor - that's the view back over our cute little neighborhood.  In the other direction you can see the ocean between the buildings on A1A.  Over the course of one whole day these windows got disassembled, scraped, put back in place atop a bed of caulk, and expertly trimmed.  You can see the new wood along the edges.  The original charm of the windows is retained, but no more hot breath as you walk by.  The two in the front of the picture are in the guest room and the furthest one is actually in the hallway.

And now for the piece de resistance... the first of the cute cranky windows along the back of the second story.  There are two of these in the laundry room and two in the upstairs bath.  They were in such bad shape because this wall is the one that endured most of the damage as the house sagged way back when.  Take a look at a "before" shot in Episode 51 when I was working on the laundry room if you want to see how kitty wampus they were.  HOWEVER... I was determined to save these because I think they have such appeal and the glass is all original.  I thought I would have to take them out and rebuild the jambs, but Dave knew just how to fix them.  I even kept the original hinges and casement cranks - a little TLC and WD40 and they are as good as new.  The whole thing is weather stripped and tight as a drum now and I love it.  This one window took the better part of a weekend because of the complexity and there are three more just like it! 


There are 15 windows left to deal with which seems like almost nothing at the rate we are going.  Another area that was providing a lot of air leakage was the front door.  Since it's going to be replaced we didn't want to go crazy fixing it but it got a full weather-strip job this weekend.  I am going to start this week refinishing the door that will go in it's place... remember the one that went into the shop many moons ago?  The day that gets installed will be an exciting one and it's not far off.

I found these beautiful little tiles on a recent trip to the Habitat for Humanity ReStore.  There were boxes and boxes in all colors and I was oh-so-tempted just to buy them all!  The boxes say "Made in Morocco" and the glazes are all imperfect and beautiful.  I picked four colors to use in a random pattern on the bar top and the kitchen back splash.  The colored glass tiles I was going to use would have cost twice as much and not been nearly as unique and cool as these are.  And since glass tiles probably wouldn't be a smart thing to put on a bar top I was almost ready to settle for something beige!  So there's another fun project to entertain you in the not-too-distant future.


When we got back from a recent walk to the beach I spotted Roscoe, eagerly awaiting our return.  Fortunately neither one of my dogs has a taste for wooden window sills - they'd rather take naps until there is something more interesting to do.  However he does have a bad habit of jumping up to peek out the glass in the front door, which is really going to be a problem once the new door is in.  Hopefully I can lovingly modify that behavior - or worst case put a chair in front of the door so he can climb up and look out safely.  If only the big goofball wasn't so doggone cute I would spank him!