Today Amber introduced me to north eastern Pennsylvania's most competitive sport: ESTATE SALES! I never imagined they were such an important part of the local economy and boy are they competitive. In search of cool things for Project Hillside Amber came up with several estate sales for us to visit. I must admit, it's a little creepy and a little sad at the same time. For any family reading this, when I die, don't ever sale my stuff at an estate sale, please, just take it, put it in storage and let it collect dust. I don't want vultures in my house trying to pay pennies for my belongings. After learning you must get to these things at 8:00am we had an early morning, starting around 7:00am. After my morning southern style chicken sandwich I was set and off we went in the BURB, hoping to find treasures. The first house was huge with tons of good stuff and equally as much creepy and junky stuff. I was sad to see this dead persons high school and college diploma's for sale - at a whooping $3. Doesn't anyone in the family want these? We spent $8 and I got a miniature wooden globe for my desk and Amber got some 30 year old jig-saw puzzles that we think will be neat on the coffee table.

The next stop was the mother load. Initially, it seemed like all junk. A house on about 5 ares of land, very rural, and a muddy driveway. Amber's sensors went off, she detected a treasure inside. Sure enough we found a mint condition Victorian style sofa with 3 very nice chairs. This will be PERFECT in the sunroom. Like Rocky climbing the steps and jumping for victory I fired the Suburban up, hit the muddy slope, making old ladies dodge out of the way, whipped it around throwing mud everywhere, and backed it up. We proudly loaded up the treasure and off we went, even $100 less than they wanted. BINGO!

Here is one piece, we'll post more photos later.

In Virginia I used my Silverado for just about everything when I was doing the work on Blue Mountain Oasis (http://www.BlueMountainOasis.com). When Amber started looking for her home my first thought was, "Oh no! I don't have a truck up here!" After a 500 mile drive to Glen Allen, Virginia, I was able to pickup a 1996 Chevrolet Suburban. It's been a life saver. I've hauled over 400LB's of mulch, a couch and love seats, plaster materials, and all my supplies. It has tons of space and the BURB is one of the most important "tools" in my toolbag! While looking at photos taken last weekend at our cookout it seemed to make it's way in several photos, in all her glory, in the background! I cropped this one :)

I never thought going to my office job would feel like a vacation! I was so happy to step into the office today and sit in my climate controlled cubicle with my two monitors and no bugs, dust, or power tools. :)

Jason may have now caught on that I will come up with any excuse to go shopping to avoid work. This will explain why we went to Lowe's 3 times in two days. Lots of big purchases! We now have a shiny new commercial grade grill, lawnmower, weed eater and patio set.

I also reaffirmed that I do not like bugs. I had to make two trips to get proper bug spray for my family cookout. Gnats are the worst, especially when you are sitting in the grass putting together a grill for almost 4 hours. I think whoever wrote those directions gave up halfway through! But if you ever need someone to put together a grill or any item from IKEA, I consider myself an expert and am very reasonably priced.

Ripping out the kitchen floor was a lot of fun. People are right when they say that demolition is a good stress reliever. I can't wait to take a sledge hammer to those yucky cabinets.

Now I am thinking about paint colors for the walls downstairs and what should be on the task list for this weekend. A poll may be coming soon to vote for the sunroom colors, stay tuned.

What a busy and productive labor day weekend. We managed to get the kitchen floor ripped out, clean more grime in the kitchen, put together our new commercial grade grill, put together patio furniture, finish the ceiling cracks in the sunroom and living room, apply 2 coats of Kilz primer, and host a labor day party! I'll make some posts about my battle of the plaster ceiling (details on what I did for the aspiring plaster ceiling repairmen) and some thoughts on Kilz primer. Since Amber seems to have the writing skills I'll go ahead and give you a link right to the new photos: http://www.projecthillside.com/node/13

If you read my post a week or so ago you will know about my fight for the cracked ceiling in the sunroom and living room. Everyone is an "expert" and wants you to do it their way. Contract it out to a pro, use a special formula, drywall it, etc. After a lot of research I decided to make things interesting and do it myself and create my own special formula. I knew the key was to stabilize the plaster that was loose to the wood lathe behind it. I also knew it was important to clear the crack out, like cleaning out a cut on your body, to ensure the loose plaster doesn't prevent your new plaster from adhering. In some cases, it would mean opening it up a little wider, initially making the roof look even worse. Here is my process which I think is great if you want to save money, do it yourself, and while you'll have a few areas that aren't perfect, hey, it's an 80 year old home! Keep your plaster ceiling, don't drywall it. Even if the cracks come back over time the way I figured it over 80 years only this many appeared, I'll let someone else worry about fixing my work in 80 years :)

1. Roll painters paper over the entire floor and tape it down

2. Seal off any exterior entrances to rooms with tarp

3. Take your scraper and scrape the excess paint from all areas of the ceiling that it is peeling/chipping from. If you don't, you WILL notice this when you paint over it

4. Use your scraper to open up the cracks. Put it inside the crack and pull it the length of the crack. Get all the loose stuff out and it will wider a big but don't worry. Try not to make any areas chip away from the edges. Click Here - Read More

I am putting Jason to work again this weekend. I just e-mailed him the list of things I want to accomplish during the 3-day weekend.

I will be:
Planting daffodil and tulip bulbs
Cleaning the kitchen
Ripping out the hideous linoleum
Getting some kind of curtains or shades for the rooms with furniture
Buying a grill and spending some time outside with family and friends

Jason will be:
Tackling the parlor ceiling
Putting down some kind of temporary kitchen floor to make it liveable
Installing landscape edging

Seems that Jason's list is much shorter but will probably take him the whole weekend. I will just keep supplying him with diet cokes! Fair deal, no?

Oh what to do .. hairline cracks seem to be everywhere in the plaster. If you speak to 5 people each will give you a way to fix it, each claiming it is the best way. I've spent quite some time speaking with people and researching various solutions. All and all, the cracks aren't terrible, but certainly noticeable. They are confined, for the most part, to the ceiling. Our goal is to fix the sun room and living room as soon as possible, so we can put the furniture in and have a place to relax while other parts of the house are repaired. Earlier this week I had a quote from the plaster guy we used to fix the larger holes in the ceiling, hoping he could potentially fix all the cracks. The quote came in around $2,000 with no guarantee he could get to all of them and they wouldn't crack again. This only included the living room and sun room. Based on our budget, this is out of the question.

Another suggestion was to put drywall on the ceilings, covering the plaster. While it seems like a solution and would result in a perfect ceiling, we are concerned with taking away the "old feeling" of the home.

We've decided to do this work ourselves, on the lower level of the house. I am using a special plaster/filler that had decent reviews. The concern is:

1. The compound won't last over the years
2. Cracks will reappear
3. Once primed/painted, you will notice it

Even with the points mentioned above, we are moving forward with this. I'll take photos when they are filled, primed, and the ceiling is painted. This is a major goal of the upcoming weekend.