Selling Old Kitchen Appliances

Last weekend, we continued the demolition of our old kitchen - more details to come in a later blog post. But in the meantime, our old appliances need a new home.

We've found Craigslist to be an invaluable tool for recycling our building materials, so there's no reason to think people won't be interested in our old Kenmore Ultra Wash II dishwasher, 36" Tappan 5-burner stove, or the original cast iron farm sink from Humphrey House. Of course, this caters to Chicago-area residents.

I really like the idea of finding people that can find a way to reuse parts of Humphrey House as we work on it. Not only does this help keep our remodeling "green" by reducing our contributions to the waste stream, it also gives pieces of our house a second life. For example, there was a lady who took a bunch of the old bead-board that made up our original attic walls and told me she was going to make furniture out of it. Or artists that take old windows and turn them into canvases (you'd be surprised how many people use old windows for this purpose). And as a bonus, you can hopefully avoid having to rent a dumpster!

So if you have some old house parts laying around, give it a shot. You may be pleasantly surprised.

Another Eventful Day.

Today was an.. Interesting day. Sometimes, it truly seems that the sagas never end when renovation is going on. Today, in fact, could quite possibly be described as a series of unfortunate events:

a) We found out the window we picked out earlier this week won't work. A window above a bathtub (less than 5' off the ground) must be made of tempered glass (like an auto windshield), so that if you slip and fall when stepping out of the tub, you don't shatter the glass and slice your legs off. Yes, it's part of the building code. Fortunately, our alley-neighbor Mike (who is graciously letting Jay park his truck in one of his spaces) sells Andersen windows. So we put in an order for tempered, obscured glass with a nice Prairie-style grill. Should be here in 3 weeks.

b) After ordering a 4'-wide window, we discovered the contractors had already framed the opening. At 3'-wide. Fortunately, we were able to change our window order.


c) Around 11am, Mike called Jay to tell him the dumpster truck was here to pick up the full dumpster. But Jay's truck (parked in Mike's lot as previously mentioned) was in the way. Jen had to leave work to go move it.

d) Shortly before noon, the contractor's office called Jay to inform him the dumpster had been successfully loaded on the truck. The problem was that now the truck could not leave due to a different car that was in the way. Jay asked which car, but they didn't know, so they gave him the phone number for JL Rolloff.

e) After a few unsuccessful attempts, Jay got a hold of JL Rolloff moments after noon. The dispatcher said, "oh yeah, our driver just left there. It took him awhile but finally he was able to get three other guys (Mike the neighbor + 2 of the carpenters), and they lifted(!) the car in question and pushed it out of the way.

f) Meanwhile, back INSIDE the house, actual work was being accomplished. Specifically, framing the three exterior walls of the dormer. Here's the eye-candy:



g) Apparently, while working on cutting some of the lumber in the backyard, the foreman Arthur, was injured by one of the other workers throwing out pieces of our roof. Jen tried to offer him ibuprofen or something for his apparently broken ankle, but he refused.

h) Arthur did tell Jay as he was leaving that he would return tomorrow morning to frame the roof of the dormer. "On a Saturday?!?" Jay asked. "Why not?" he replied, "But maybe we be a little later, maybe 8 instead of 7 turdy." "Yeah," Jay said. "Sleep in a little - it IS Saturday after all."

Wow. Lately, there has been a lot of discussion about how immigrants "ruin" the availability for jobs for American citizens. From what I've seen this week, legal status isn't what people competing for these jobs should be concerned about. The work ethic of these guys has been amazing. They work from 7:30am to 5:30pm or so every day and only take a 30-minute lunch (sometimes shorter). Hard work and dedication, to me, are the spirit that the American dream was built on. Inpsiring.

So maybe not everything that happened to day was unfortunate. But it certainly was eventful.

Take 2: Demolition Derby - 2nd Floor

After clearing away basement lath and plaster for 4 hours (covering only 150 sq. ft!), Jay emerged from our dusty dungeon to discover what Jen and Ken had done upstairs. Assessing the state of the walls in the de-panelled future bedroom, I got a very creepy feeling. Underneath was a greenish fern/floral print on the ceiling and some kind of wavy yellow-brown organic pattern on the walls. It looked like a nightmare. Frankie later remarked that it looked like someone was trapped or held captive in the room. Remember that movie, People Under the Stairs? Yeah... Not at all encouraging. It begged to be destroyed.

So, late on Sunday night, we did just that. After removing the hideous drywall, we discovered yet another layer... old (and in nice condition) wood wainscotting installed horizontally [View Image]. Maybe this was part of the original attic? If not, someone really liked dark wood. While we won't be keeping this in our future bedroom, perhaps we can salvage it and install in the basement at somepoint (3, 4, 5 years from now...)

A few other interesting discoveries were made up here too. Such as a concealed electrical junction that was probably a light fixture at one time, leaving an eyeball-shaped design. We haven't gotten the circuit tester out to test this yet (project for a rainy day), but tracing the path of these wires will be interesting. We also discovered the remnants of an old closet in this room.

After two long days of work though, our mission was accomplished: We had completely filled a 10 cubic yard dumpster. Extra thanks to our Demo Team helpers, Ken and Frankie! Obviously, since it took 2 weeks to put these posts up, we took some much deserved rest. :)

Take 2: Demolition Derby - Kitchen

It's been awhile since an update here, but I wanted to wait until we got some photos developed. I know, I know. How can someone with a blog not have a digital camera, right? Well, we are accepting donations if you're interested.

Anyway, after pleading with friends and family, we got some volunteers to help us do as much as possible to fill the dumpster we rented before they took it away. Kenny came up from Peoria, and helped us set to work on dismantling the kitchen and master bedroom, while Jay planned to finish tearing down the rest of the basement ceiling.

We found out that people can hide a lot of things with paneling! Once the paneling came off in the kitchen, we discovered that the standard 1920's subway tile we were hoping to find underneath had been removed in the past. Too bad. :( In the breakfast nook (behind Ken), we did find covered up electrical outlets (how safe!), and discovered that the nook was probably not an add-on as we originally suspected but original. The construction of this was lath and plaster, which wasn't used after the War (WWII).

Also, when taking out the paneling behind the stove, Ken and Jen discovered an old flue for the the original stove that was tied into the chimney. When replacing the stove and paneling over this, someone had deftly covered this up with a.. Paint Can Lid! [View Closeup image]

Definitely going to keep the Paint Can Lid in our souvenirs box. :) Too bad it didn't have a Mfr or date stamped on it. I doubt we'll be able to use the flue for our new stove based on our plans, but it's good to know we have the option if we need it!

The Trash Man Cometh!

O Crap!

We gotta get busy this weekend. The dumpster guy called me yesterday and said he was planning to pick up our (mostly empty) dumpster today! After much begging and grovelling I convinced him to delay this until Monday.

So, now it will be a mad dash to fill it up as much as possible by Sunday evening. I may need to call in some backup support for demolition!

Oh, and, anybody need to throw something away? :)

Demolition Derby

Fear of mixing alcohol and power tools prevented us from having the demolition derby on New Years Eve as promised. Or perhaps the alcohol just prevented it from coming up in our minds. In any case, today was the rescheduled date, and Scott and Sara helped us set to work on destroying the basement's original wood lathe and plaster ceiling.





This was harder than it first seemed. Not because of strenth required, but because:
a) it was overhead
b) all electrical was attached to this (we had to remove and reattach to joists)
c) decades and decades of FILTH

We were outfitted well with safety gear - gloves, goggles, masks all around - but it was no match for the decades of dirt collecting above. Shortly after the first swings the air was laden with a gray hue of plaster and dirt. Within an hour, all of our masks, originally white, appeared as if they were dipped in charcoal. Opening the windows and door and turning on a high powered blower had only a mediocre effect. There was nothing we could do but grin and bear it.



We ended up working hard from about noon until 5 and got 2/3 of the basement done. The other part is the tool room / utility area, and we need to wait to move stuff out before doing that area.

One thing we did discover to our delight was that the dumpster has a door that opens! Allowing us to just walk in and load it up. Yay! Lots of buckets were emptied there today.. it's probably 1/4 full already.

After the dust settled, we could see that the first floor wall that is under part of the master bedroom (thus carrying a lot of the weight) was resting on a floor joist over the main beam that had been CUT OUT. Not a little, but a lot. Some Prev.Owner had destroyed all but 2 inches of the 2x8 joist to add a heating duct in the wall above. Doh!

No wonder the floors sag so much! We'll definitely be turning that wall vent into a floor vent and fixing that hole (more sistering).

After working, we all broke in the shower and tried to wash off the grime from every crevice. It was moderately sucessful. I still showered at the condo later though. :)

Thanks for your helps Scott and Sara!!

The Trash Man Cometh!

Jay arranged to have a dumpster unloaded in our backyard today, and elected me to let the guy in and pay him. We have a 10 cubic yard dumpster for as long as we need to fill it up for $275. Probably won't take long though once we get all that ugly panelling removed. Lookit this ugliness in what will be our office:


Interestingly, you can see in this picture that some Previous Owner's love of arches. These things get carried throughout the whole downstairs area - to the point that they even built one in front of this door frame, so when the door is closed, you see an arch from the dining room!

Heat Wave at the perfect time

Since we just got our house, we've been doing numerous neglected maintenance issues to the place. Fixing doors, windows, securing the place better, weatherstripping (this is Chicago for christsake!), repairing lightbulbs / broken fixtures, etc. Lots of minor things just to make the place a little more livable and prepare for the changes we want to make. Jay has been making lots of little trips back and forth from our condo loading the Scort with tools, basic needs, and other odds and ends. Good thing our condo is only 3 blocks away!

But today we got a pleasant surprise... It is nearly 60 degrees out today - two days before January in Chicago!! Unbelievable! It couldn't have come at a better time as Jay took care of some much needed outdoor maintenance this week. Garage gutters were cleaned out after 8 inches of solid silt, twigs, and leaves were removed from the downspouts. Yech!

AND... it was a perfect time to remove the pile of garbage the Previous Owners (PO's) had left in front of our (at least) 50 year-old fence next to the garage. We need to remove this section to a) create parking space for NYE, and b) make room for a rolloff dumpster. Jay had to excavate quite a bit of dirt, but the fence came out with one strategically placed hammer blow.. Not much security there so we don't feel we'll be missing much.