Stairs as promised

As promised, we have some photos to share of our wonderful new stairs, that now allow even Scott to walk throughout the house without worrying about head clearance! Seriously, they have really opened up the house a lot, and are quite spacious! Jay's grandpa Don did all the design, layout, and led the construction. Along the way Jay, his brother Rob pitched in. And Kenny came up TWICE and took time off his vacation to help out, making several trips to the hardware store, adding new doors and all sorts of miscellaneous things. When it was all said and done, it added up to give us this:


The photo above was taken from the top of the second floor. In the photo at left, you can see we ended up getting a lot more light in the house as well - The windows above the stairs are the only ones we have that face south with full sun all day long. Just look how the sunlight floods through the stairs going up! And the stairs going down to the basement (on the right) will have loads of headroom, and an access door for storage under the other set of stairs.

Now we can start planning for upstairs as we work on finishing off the basement. Thanks to everyone for their help, but especially Grandpa! :) Now we just need to do something nice to thank him for his hard work. Any creative ideas are welcome :)

It's been awhile ...

... and we've accomplished quite a bit! We were able to manage to go on an actual vacation - albeit an abbreviated one - and spend some time not thinking about the house (too much, anyway). Then we came home a few days earlier and got to work in earnest.

Most people know the basement has been a bit of a BYOB project - that is, Build Your Own Bedroom (Scott's got his ready!) But it's really starting to near completion now. I spent the other day painting the office in the basement a mixture of yellow and peach. It looks pretty cool. I also finished the ceiling in the b/room, and Jason and I picked out colors for the main room. Right now, we're just waiting for the stairs to get finished (hopefully by next week, Grandpa Duck is volunteering his time and energy out of the sweetness of his heart) and once that's done, we can get moving on the basement - FULL SPEED AHEAD.

Jason's grandfather has been busy like a bee on our stairwell. He and Jason tore out the stairs completely (photos to come in next post) and designed the new ones. My dad took a day off of his own vacation to spend helping them get started on the actual construction. Jason's brother also has come by to lend a hand. Muchas gracias!

That's all for now. Will be posting some of the more acrobatic photos this weekend. Ever wanted to see Jason walk a tightrope?

Getting By With A Little Help From Our Friends

Sometimes Jay and I just sit and marvel at the willingness of our friends to help us on Humphrey House. It's really amazing. You know you have the best friends and family you could ever want when everyone is ready to pitch in like this. I'm more than a little moved by their generosity and goodwill, if you can tell.

Either that, or everybody just wants that trip to Jamaica REAL BAD. :) Seriously, tho, this weekend we had just an amazing WEEKEND WARRIOR TEAM.

Jason's maternal grandpa, "Grandpa Duck," is a tough old guy who runs a handyman business in the city. He came out to assist in some serious window construction, and will be guiding us (who am I kidding, he'll be building it) in the reconstruction of a new stairwell. Grampa Duck rules, and guess what kids, he does one helluva mean "Donald Duck."

Props to Marsha for making the five hour train ride (10 roundtrip) from Carbondale to refinish our front door (among other things). She's my soulsisterfriend from WAY back - the person I've known longest in my life! - and a bit of a slavedriver to boot. It was 97 degrees in the shade, and this girl was outside, in full sun, with JEANS ON, slathering stripper on our new front door (which we discovered had been painted tan, yellow, burnt orange and fugly babyshit yellow before you got down to the beautiful oak [?] beneath) for over FOUR HOURS. Actually, I lost count after that. But it looks AMAZING.

Scott continued working on his "dirtiest guy in da house" reputation by removing the remaining plaster and lathe walls around the staircase, thereby making it the most dangerous space in the house! Scott was, as usual, covered head to toe in black soot. I think I'll start calling Scott "Burt" ... I think that was Ms. Poppin's boyfriend's name in "Mary Poppins." You know, the chimney sweep? :)

It's a long fall from the 2nd floor to the basement ... it's so creepy now walking upstairs and seeing the floor of the basement with every step you take. I think we're making a ban on treks upstairs till further notice. At least until we get that waiver Julie was talking about....

My brother Matt & his fiance Erika also came up and joined in the fun this past weekend. Matt worked on installing the windows, while Erika (a self-proclaimed victim of "project add (attention deficit disorder)" took on a few jobs in the course of the day: stripping with Marsha (woo-howdy!), then stripping the table with me, then peeling off the hideous great-great-grandma-died-in-her-sleep-in-this-bedroom-20-years-ago-and-we've-never-touched-the-room-since blue wallpaper in the bedroom/family room area.


All in all, an incredibly productive weekend. THANKS TO YOU ALL - we'd still be running in circles in a panic in the basement without your help.

SEE THE PHOTOS FROM THE WEEKEND HERE!