Repairing the Soffit and Sill

So while much of the work we needed to do on the house was purely cosmetic, there were some things that did need to be fixed.  Namely the gaping hole towards the roof so all sorts of wildlife could come visit our attic.

Ken's father had come to visit before we had the scissor lift, and the men decided that they could have the soffit (the fancy name for where the hole to my attic is located) fixed in no time.  They borrowed a scaffolding, but then, somewhere along the way, they decided who needs scaffolding, when they can just do acrobatics on a gigantic ladder.

Yup, that's my father-in-law, standing backwards on a ladder, a million feet off the ground.  And yup, that's my husband, not paying any attention to anything his father is doing.  I promise, they really ARE handy around the house, and aren't usually this reckless!  Needless to say, I was very thankful when they decided (while they were still in one piece) to call it a day and wait to fix the soffit for when they had rented the scissor lift.

They decided that while it wasn't a good idea to continue on the soffit (thank goodness), they could work on the sill.  Don't ask me what a sill is.  All I really know is that it's located towards the bottom of the house and that ours was rotten in one spot.  I know.  You are all amazed with my home improvement knowledge.

Halfway fixed Soffit

Completely fixed Sill

Once Ken's father went home and the scissor lift was rented, the holes in the soffit were fixed. 

Soffit fixed

Other section of soffit fixed

Painted!

Besides the sill and soffit to fix, we also needed to fix the boarded up windows at the back of our house.

Boarded up windows at the back of the house

We aren't quite sure what the purpose of these windows were, because these windows aren't visable from the inside of our house.  They are windows to some sort of attic above our kitchen, but there is no access to this attic from inside our house.  Our kitchen was redone in the late 60's or early 70's, so maybe at that time, there was a way into the attic from the kitchen.

When he pulled off the first board, we discovered this lovely nest!  Praise God it wasn't an active nest!!

Ken decided to have the back windows mimic the treatment at the front of the house.  There is one "window" over our front porch that isn't a real window.  We had assumed that the window in the front of the house was at one point a real window, but a neighbor gave us a picture of our house from the 1850's, and it showed the false window during the 1850's.  And since the false window would be the easiest way to fix the windows in the back of the house, and it would match the house in the front, we went with the false window!


Up next - The finished project!

Time to rent a scissor lift!

When Ken had done all he could possibly do with the ladder, he rented the scissor lift.  He gave us all warning that we would not be seeing him as long as the scissor lift was here.  We didn't have the money to be wasting, and so we needed to get the work done as soon as possible.  So we buckled down and got ready to help Ken in any way we could, and Ken got ready to be working his bottom off!!  He would get up at sun up, work outside until it was time to go to work, then spend a full day at work.  When he came home, he would work on the house until the sun started setting. Then we would eat dinner together, get the children ready for bed and then Ken would CRASH.  The next morning, he would get up and start the routine all over again!  On weekends, he would work on the house from sun up to sun down, breaking to eat meals with us and to go to church.  This went on for about two weeks.

Starting work with the lift

Done with the body - on to the trim and chimney.

Trim and Chimney in process

Up next - Repairing the soffit and sill

Painting continues

So Ken worked every weekend to get the house painted, however, our house is a very tall house located on the top of a very windy hill.  So to be 3 stories up a ladder, trying to paint with the wind blowing isn't very fun. And since our friend and neighbor had fallen from the scaffolding while painting this house, the idea of my husband up on scaffolding didn't leave me with a warm fuzzy feeling.

So Ken decided that he would work on the house to the height in which his smaller ladder could reach, and after that, he would rent a scissor lift.

Paint is scraped as high as we can go on a ladder

Ken climbed on the roof and painted what he could reach

The kids were SO eager to help us paint.  We feel strongly about letting the kids help, even at a young age, so they have hands on experience.  There is ALWAYS some job for someone who is willing!

Ainsley Mae

Nathaniel painting the porch

Having the kids work with us makes for good memories all around.  It's a great way to work on work ethic, diligence, attitude and skills that they'll need in the real world and all time spent together is always a blessing, no matter what we are doing!

The work starts

God blessed us with unusually warm and dry weather in April 2012.  Ken was itching to get out there and start working, and so with the very first warm day, he was outside scraping the flaking part of the house.

My handsome hubby working on the house

Scraping the exterior Kitchen wall

The previous owners had painted 3 sides of the main part of the house, and if we lived on a road where the road went straight by our house, half done job wouldn't have been such an eye sore.  But we live almost on a peninsula of land where the road curves around our house, letting you see it from all angles except from the very back.  So no matter which direction you came from, you saw half a house painted.  Quite the eyesore!  While it wouldn't have been the first thing on our list to get done, I was glad it was getting done!

Once the one side of the kitchen wall was scraped, we decided to paint it, in order to make sure that we loved to color.  We saw a house in a nearby town that had a similar design to ours, and we fell in love with the color scheme.

Inspiration House

We were too embarrassed to just walk up and say, "Hey, we love your paint colors.  Do you know the names of them?", so instead we took a million pictures of the house, took a million paint chips for Home Depot and Lowes and set to work trying to match the colors.  I'd say we came pretty close!!

Finding our home

So about 10 years ago, my husband and I moved our family of 3(myself, my husband and our son) from our childhood home of Long Island to upstate New York.  We were looking for a quieter and slower pace of life, along with somewhere cheaper to live.  And so we packed up and moved to a quaint little New York town that we have fallen in love with.

We did not see it then, but the Lord was the One orchestrating our move, for a purpose much greater than a different change of pace.  He placed us in a rental home, where our plan was to live for a year or two and then buy a home.

Shortly after we moved into our short term rental, my husband and I turned our lives over to Jesus.  Best decision we have ever made!  However, very quickly, the Lord changed many of the plans we had made for ourselves, and showed us the plans He had for us.

 "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways," declares the LORD." Isaiah 55:8

So 8 years and 3 kids later, the Lord finally provided a home for us far beyond anything we could have ever imagined!

Our new home

It was a foreclosure on 11 acres of land, and although the house needed a lot of love and updating, all the major things were recently taken care of - new roof, new septic tank, new furnace, and supporting beams placed in the basement.

The exterior of our 1820's farmhouse had been partially painted in 2005.  It was painted halfway because the neighbor who had helped the home owner paint the house fell off the scaffolding and shattered his leg.  (He's fine now!)  After that, painting was stopped.


When we bought the house, no mortgage company would touch this house with a ten foot pole.  So we offered to pay cash if the selling bank would work with us.  After some hemming and hawing on their part, they finally agreed to drop the price.  The Lord allowed us to get a house that the bank owed $124,000 on and buy it for $70,000.  A local bank worked with us the whole way, we took out a personal loan, and after 7 long months of waiting on the Lord, the house He intended for us was finally ours!

Our local bank that we had secured the personal loan through had a must-do list for us to accomplish in order to switch from a personal loan to a home equity loan.  I don't know if anyone has done a personal loan before, but the interest is quite high!  The personal loan had an interest rate of 14%, where as our home equity loan interest rate is about 3%.  That makes a BIG difference in a monthly payment!!  Especially when the goal is to pay off the debt in 7 years!  (After reading through Leviticus together, we really feel led that this is what the Lord would have us do.)

And so, all other work for the house was put on hold while we worked on the bank's Honey-do list!  We had to fix the sill and the soffit, fix the boarded up kitchen windows, and repaint the house.  They were very reasonable with their list, and most of it were things that were on our own list as well.  It was all outside work that we needed to do, and since it was a week before Christmas when we moved in, we had to sit tight and wait for warm weather to appear!

In the meantime, that gave us a few months to unpack, settle in, and make it as homey as possible!

First Christmas in the new house

Christmas Eve in the new house

Family gathering in the new house

Christmas decorations are up in record time!

Under construction...

So, while stuck on bed rest until further notice, I have been able to do some things that normally I do not get to indulge in.  I have read book upon book, something I don't have time for as a homeschooling Mama to 4!  I read tons of books during the day, but they revolve around what my children need and want to learn, not necessarily what I want to! I'm currently re-reading Jane Eyre and loving every minute of it!

Besides reading, I also got to start up this blog!  I've wanted to for a while - a place to record down our travels, our home renovations, our homeschooling days, special moments with the kids that I may remember for a while, but ultimately forget.  But I never had time to learn to set one up.  So God gave me a double blessing!  A new baby on the way and ample time to spend some time pursuing things I enjoy! 

So please pardon the blank look of my blog as I set things up.  :)