3 years!...

Happy Anniversary! Our third year in the house!

Here's a picture of our house in the Village of Romeo during this past Spring.

It's a 1949 Colonial Revival - very young house in comparison to what else resides here in the Village.

We moved in June of 2005 and since we've been here we've done mostly cosmetic work on it; removing old carpet, wallpaper, etc. and sanding floors and repainting walls. Our Spring project (which will likely take all spring, summer and autumn long) was to be to continue working on the windows. Free them from where they had been painted in place, stripping off the paint, sanding, removing the glazing and replacing it with molding and finally repainting.

What we've also done:
Removed carpet and wallpaper in basement and up the staircase – painted and re-carpeted
Removed wallpaper in kitchen – painted and replaced hardware
Replaced chimney damper and sweep – repaired top of chimney and added a sill
We had water coming in from three places in the basement: the coal chute, one of the window wells and the cellar. Removed and bricked up the coal chute. Built up the surround for the window well and dug all the way down to the bottom of the porch/cellar and tarred. Rebuilt (bricked) porch.
Stripped and re-sodded the “upper” garden
Replaced the gutters and added two collection boxes (for esthetics)
Repainted almost every room and decorated (still working on…)
Changed out all switches and outlets to rocker rather than toggle – fixed some mixed up electric lines
Repaired front entry door and replaced side lights and added threshold
Installed storm door
Sanded, filled, stained and poly’d the hardwood floors in dining room, living room and one of the bedrooms
Changed out the doorknobs
Replaced the utility tub and tiled the laundry closet
Replaced the vanity in the ½ bath
Built shelves in “coal room” for storage and under the stairs
Replaced AC condenser with Carrier Energy Star & installed humidifier
We have energy leaks all over the house: Replaced basement windows, installed sill at back door. Still need to build new storm windows
Painted all the outdoor lighting, doors, trim, shutters

Still would like to:
Finish the mantel area in the living room (finished March 2, 2009)
Rebuild the garage (finished October 2009 - well, we still have some things to do but the garage is rebuilt and usable)
Rebuild the pond in the “upper” garden with the addition of a waterfall
Remodel the master bathroom
Remodel the kitchen


As far as stories about this house. We were told recently that the Mayor of Romeo used to live in it - but we don't have any evidence to prove that out. Also the owners before the previous owners were a little on the shady side. He owned some sort of toxic waste dump somewhere and had some enemies, it seems. There is a bullet hole in our front door from a "drive-by" that happened while this man lived in the house. He also had the whole house and garage rigged up with security alarms and there is a camera (with an indoor monitor) on the back of the house that points to the garage. Apparently, he owned some kind of foreign sports car and he wanted to keep an eye on it. I can't remember if it was a Ferrari or a Lamborghini.

I would like to do the whole background history of the house and eventually get one of those Historic Plaques. I think that would be pretty cool.

Comments

Popular Posts