Bit by Bit

Finally, the foyer is pretty well complete. After purchasing a wet saw, putting down the ceramic tile was less than a day-long job. We still need to touch up some paint, finish some small electrical items, put down thresholds, and trim a couple places. But we’re moving on to other areas for the time-being and will finish those punch list things as they are convenient.

We’re going to try to get the rest of the upstairs patched this week and recruit some help to paint on Saturday. The goal is to get the remainder of the upstairs painted (lofty goal at the rate we move but….)

Right on Schedule!!

We’re right on schedule for the week. Monday and Tuesday we’re spent finishing the painting, molding, and electrical as planned. We also spent some time figuring out how to cut the pews down. In order to sell them, I think we need them around that 6-7 foot mark; the smaller ones are completely sold out and we ran a classified ad for this weekend…eek!!!
Last night we took down the scaffolding and started back in on the floor. After a little debating, we decided to put down cement board before we lay the ceramic tile (Sherry’s wisdom and patience won the debate J). It took the entire evening, but at least it will be done right. We’re hoping to get the tile laid tonight, grout tomorrow, and just let it set up over the weekend. There will be a few minor punch list items to take care of next week, but for the most part, we should be done with the foyer by Saturday.
On a slightly different note, the neighbors are coming by and introducing themselves. We must be somewhat of an enigma to them...more like the talk of the town. One lady stopped by this week saying she finally got the courage to come over. From the sounds of it, she belongs to a church that split from the Brethren Church in town, and I think she was trying to get up the courage to invite us to church. It gave us a small window to at least let her know we’re believers and where we worship.
The people across the street are a fun bunch. They must have a couple of acres and refer to it as “The Compound.” There are about five houses, a trailer, and an occupied barn with people all of the same family living there. Tom and Karen live in the main house; the rest are kids and parents and grandparents. Last night Tom came over offering us a plate of freshly fried “chicken.” As Sherry was about to take the first bite, Tom confessed she was about to chew on some snapping turtle. The look on her face was priceless, but she eventually took a bite. As the cliché goes, it tastes like chicken and we ate the whole plate. Shortly thereafter the girls from the compound came over with, literally, a buffet of desserts. Tom says they were just being nosey and wanted to see what we’re doing…but who cares??? With that kind of service, they can see what we’re doing anytime.

Our Fantastic Foyer and More!

So…things always take longer and cost more than we think they should…we’re taking it in stride and watching God’s hand at work. (Psalm 127:1)

We picked up some ceramic tile for the foyer floor on sale on Friday, enjoyed some fun in the sun and fellowship at the lake on Saturday, and got back to work on Sunday. We’ve had a lot of people out over the weekend purchasing everything you can imagine and some stuff we couldn’t imagine. I think that’s part of the reason we aren’t moving real fast, but we’re just trying to squeeze in some painting here and hammering there between guests. Selling some of the stuff is proving to be a huge blessing, though. Not only are we helping to offset some of the costs, but we’ve also met some special people and learned some history about the church from former members and pastors.

As far as work goes, yesterday we got most of the second coat of paint applied, although I managed to miss a couple of rather large sections somehow. We also got about ¾ of the crown molding done and a good portion of the electrical conduit.

Our schedule for this week basically amounts to finishing the foyer. We went to Menard’s and think we’ve finished purchasing about everything we need. We’ll probably spend a night finishing the painting, molding, and electrical. And we’re figuring probably 3-4 nights on the new ceramic tile.

More Pictures

AFTER we painted BEFORE we painted

Some renovations

Well this past weekend we started in on doing some renovations. We decided to start with the foyer because it is the smallest room (you know 11 x 11) :) so we could get an idea of what amount of time - money -materials and effort it would be to do some of the other rooms. Plus it would give us some sense of accomplishment.
We started by taking everything off the walls - the nail and screw anchors are all so old that they were made of wood - (they looked like corks for bottles) and they left HUGE holes. So we filled all the holes and Troy had also pulled all the electrical away from the wall (the wiring is all outside the walls due to the age of the house and make). So we filled that area as well to make the wall more even. We then took the crown molding (really just thin wood trim) down from the ceiling and took the nasty flourescent light down - we filled in more holes and then painted the entire celing. We let the spackling dry and then sanded it and reapplied a second coat to the really big holes. We then primed those areas before we painted the entire room a gorgeous color. It is called sauteed mushroom. Kinda a khaki - brownish color. While the walls were finishing up drying we got our new crown molding out - so it is ready to be cut and painted and then we started in on the floor. In one of the other rooms there is this fun green carpet but we pulled up a corner and there was beautiful carpet underneath. Not the case in the foyer....we pulled the carpet up to find - carpet pad and SECURELY placed carpet trim. Then as we pulled up that we found that they had layed vinyl tile over the hardwood floors. LET me rephrase they had GLUED vinyl tile over the hardwood floors. So we spent the next two hours pulling - jamming scrapers and putty knives - kicking them. Quite strenous and probably entertaining to watch. We have most of them up and will try and get the rest of the glue up tonight - put some crown molding up and maybe the second coat of paint. FUN FUN!!

WEEKEND WARRIORS !!

6/01/06

We invited my parents out last night and wandered aimlessly about amazed at everything that was left behind. There are two copiers, multiple desks and tables, two pianos and an organ, a fully stocked double kitchen, a Sunday school room packed full of supplies, books, Bibles, and hymnals galore. The A/C units and other major appliances all seem to be in working order.

Next on the agenda is to have an open house tomorrow night for anybody interested in seeing the place as we purchased it, develop a schedule for the next six months, get an idea of what we can sell for operating cash, and start clearing out the main level this weekend.

6/05/06

Friday night was the open house, and we had over 30 people show up. A few good ideas came out of the night, like a round fireplace in the middle of the living room, but mostly people just showed up out of curiosity I think. But, we were both excited because one of the main reasons we want such a large open space is to be able to have outreach, fellowship, and ministry opportunities with large groups of people…and Friday night was the beginning.

Saturday was a botched up day. We spent the morning scrambling to find a lawn mower because the lawn needed some major attention. Eventually we got it taken care of, but the morning was shot. We had a wedding to attend in the middle of the day and made it back out to the house for the evening. Fortunately, Lee and Jared showed up to save the day. Those two guys helped Sherry and me knock out several days worth of moving and packing in a couple of hours.
Between Saturday night and Sunday afternoon, we were able to get most of the sanctuary and upstairs rooms completely cleared. We moved things around downstairs in the basement…stuff we want to keep one side, stuff we wouldn’t mind selling on the other side. There were also some people who showed up to inventory our items in the interest of auctioning it. If we can agree on a price, they will come in and remove everything for us and pay one lump sum. It may not be as much as we could get doing it ourselves, but the time savings and lump sum would be nice :)
Posted by Troy