Reality

2/1/17 - Today it became a reality.  The Jerome will soon be inhabited by others than the two of us.  If you could've seen how beautiful the alley building is with the sun coming in the west windows.  I walked to each room and decided I better start coming here as the sun is going down to sit and reflect (with a glass of wine, of course) how fulfilling the last three-and-a-half years have been.    Then I cried--don't know that I'm ready to give it up.  And now that I just wrote this, I realize that I was soooo into that moment that I didn't take a picture!!!  My mind is mush.   Pictures to follow tomorrow.

Holy Guacamole, Batman!!

It is unbelievable what has been accomplished in the past 5 weeks!!  Dale's comment yesterday was, "I want to live here."

So without further comment, it's time to start uploading pics to this blog and comment on each picture.  I don't really even remember what all has happened since mid-December.  I only know what I just saw.  :)

December, 2016

The bathroom floor was prepped for the new tile going in.  I'm so glad that our dear friend, Terry Taberry, could make time in his busy schedule to take on this job.  He's the best! :)

This was the sample we picked for the bathroom floor.

I finally finished stripping the two front doors.  They are SO beautiful!  The outside of the doors were stained something red (probably to match the brick).  So we decided to also stain the outside only.  I picked up the stain today.  Colonial Cherry.  Oooooooo.  The doors and stain are getting delivered to Gallus Painting so Steve can work his magic.  We plan to keep the original hardware on the doors and just add a modern push-plate for unlocking the door.

No clue what kind of wood this is, but it's pretty.  Dale wanted to put a kick-plate on the doors, but I think we should keep them as-is.  They've been this way for over a hundred years--why change them now?

Picking out stain color is so stressful!!!

Another new window installed!!!  Now just imagine the doors that were refinished installed!  They also have a window so there will be tons of light coming in!  On the ceiling, you can see where the really cool light, that still needs to be picked out, will be installed.

Ceiling insulation was blown into the two middle buildings.  As you can see,  half of this hallway needs to have hardwood floors installed.  I still don't understand why Dale had to pull it up, and don't think I'll ask because it might be perceived as a challenge.  Better to leave that one alone.  What I can tell you is that in the room off to the right, Dale has almost enough flooring to take out of there and put back into the hallway.  As if it's not enough to remodel this humungous building, apparently it's necessary to move hardwood floor around.

Picture's a little dark, but here is Terry installing tile on the wall.

This doorway for the lunchroom had to be cut in because it was originally just a window.  That means Dale had to fill in the threshold with hardwood flooring.  Any guess on where he got that from?!?!?

The lunchroom used to be two iddc-biddy bedrooms so once again, more flooring had to be added.  I guess I should be very thankful that I have a 'Dale'...  and he can do it all!

Once a day, he's had to go down to the basement and scoop pail-fulls of water into a big bucket to haul it out of the building because the river has been so high.  It just seems odd that he's doing this in the middle of December!  This man does, on average, 35 flights of stairs a day.  I need to get on that fitness program!

This is the hallway where we always enter the second floor.  It was at one point a bathroom with a very rotted floor.  For the past few months, it's just been plywood.  And now Dale has hand-selected only the perfectly colored boards to be installed. 

And yet another two rooms combined into one.  The floor had to be filled in.  This is the back corner office that overlooks the deck and Dave's Town Club.  It was a kitchen on the left and bedroom on the right.

And the walls are done!

I've been busy (really busy) cleaning trim.  We were so excited to see what it's going to look like that we ran these two pieces upstairs to hold them up and go "oooo, ahhhh".  I better get cracking on cleaning because my procrastinating is catching up to me.  Ugh.  But what a great way to end 2016!

January 7, 2017

As the floors are removed, every piece is cleaned--by an anal German.

This is some of the hardwood flooring that has been uninstalled, numbered, and ready for a new location.... by an anal German.

Anal German hard at work... UNINSTALLING!

And he's so happy!  The man needs his head examined.  

January 12, 2017

Now the hardwood floor has been reinstalled all the way to the door.  Looking good!

Middle building.  Back office still needs a new floor, but there's more insulation ready to be installed and the sound channel (metal strips) have been installed on the walls.

You really need to see these offices in the late afternoon with the sunlight coming in.  The picture just doesn't do it justice.

And the tile is done!!!  Terry did an amazing job, as always!

There was a lump in the floor from all the water damage where the new plywood has been installed.   The flooring was stolen from other spots and a new top-stair piece of wood has been purchased.  Keep in mind, most of these pictures are taken when I get home from work.  So Dale's been working for at least 10 hours and he's still smiling! Crazy!

Different angle of the stair work.

Hallway sound channel (metal strips) are being installed in addition to the wood base strips needed so that there's something to nail the baseboards into.

Construction picture.

 January 14, 2017

Floor done!  Another major item off the list.

And he even cleaned up his mess! 

Construction picture, but all cleaned up.

Where did he learn how to do all these things?!?!?

I'm cleaning trim!  It just doesn't seem like that big of a deal after looking at all of Dale's flooring pictures.    And I have to scrub all of that paint off the trim with Goof-off and steel wool.  

 January 16, 2017

It's happening!!!  Loren Bjornrud (hope I spelled that right) showed up to sand the floors.   First pass, go all around the edges.

Then sand away and then cover areas with filler to be sanded later.

The difference is unbelievable!  He can tell that these floors have NEVER been refinished in 112 years!

Lunchroom looking good!

Loren will come back and finish the middle buildings at a later date.    Just working on the Alley building for now.

January 18, 2017

The floors should be getting the first coat on them tomorrow!  Can't wait to see these finished!  We're really getting closer to having offices ready to be leased!  And an Open House, of course!  :)

Paint... check!

The painting is complete!  On Tuesday, Steve Fisher and Dale painted the alley building.  Twenty five gallons in one day.  Steve sprayed and Dale rolled.  That doesn't sound right, but you know what I mean. :)

Now that it's painted, can't wait to see the wood trim cleaned up and installed around the window and door frame.

What amazes me is how bright it is.  When the walls went up, we knew it would get darker, but this picture was taken yesterday around 4:15 in the afternoon.  All the windows are covered in plastic including the skylights and there isn't one light on.  

The unveiling of the stair post.  I haven't seen this in well over a year.

Now waiting for the floors to get refinished.

Lots of plastic to be removed from the walls and floor.

Now the lights are on.  All of these lights by the doors will be those little black "hat" lights you generally see on the outside of commercial buildings.  They'll remain on 24/7 so people will never come into a dark building.  Now we have to figure out what the suite number signs will look like.

This is really becoming a reality!  The hardest part of walking into the building today was the smell.  All of our homes have their unique smell and The Jerome is no different.  Granted, it was an old smell and not pleasant to most, but when you've spent as much time as we have there, it became a very familiar and comforting smell to me.  Now it smells like a brand new home.

On the positive side, I can still open the door to get into the unfinished area and still smell "home".

It's happening!

I can't believe it.  It's really starting to come together.  And much faster than I ever expected!!

So we need to bring everyone up to speed on what's been going on the past six weeks, because it'll be tough to keep up with Dale from here on out!

November 1, 2016 - Sound channel is up and ready for insulation.  Dale was so proud of "how everything always works out".  He was glad the sheet rock was delivered because it became is new workbench!  Gotta love it.

The metal strips (sound channel) have been installed on the walls.  The sheetrock will attach to the sound channel so you can't hear what's going on in the office next to you.  The comes the insulation.  Notice that it's not pink?  I thought all insulation was pink.  But this is environment friendly stuff and doesn't have formaldehyde in it!  

So the process begins.  Open the plastic wrap on the make-shift workbench.

Line up the edge to the black line because then all pieces will be the right side.

Lay the board down in the designated area and insert the knife in the slot to cut.

Cut, cut, cut with the old kitchen knife salvaged from a previous move.

Throw the cut piece into the room and repeat.

Install the insulation into the walls.

Add additional Sound Channel once the insulation is installed.

November 4, 2016 - The ceiling is insulated!  They had to 'bag' the ceiling in order to blow in the insulation since the sheetrock hadn't been installed yet.  I don't remember why it was done in this order, but you know Dale had a reason.  So if you really want to know, ask Dale the next time you see him.

November 5, 2016 - baseboard strips and stairway insulated.

See the narrow wood strips that are coming up about 12 inches from the floor?  Those had to be installed on EVERY stud in EVERY room.  Why you may ask.  Because you need to attach the baseboard to them.  Can you imagine this job?!?!  Cutting all those little pieces, bending down on the floor and nailing them into the wall.  In every room.  He never complained.  Maybe he really is losing his mind!!!

Thank goodness for help from very special friends (Neil, Donna, Larry and Chris) to prep this stairway.  It's insulated!

November 10, 2016 - Sheet rocking!!!!

Bathroom subfloor repaired and ready for tile.

Still can't get over the transformation!

November 13, 2016 - Sorting trim

Today was spent moving trim around so that it's bundled by room and I can begin the cleanup effort.  We moved some of the new boards over here.  Dale is making sure the boards are all perfectly aligned.  He has issues.

November 26, 2016 - doors stripped and alley building sectioned off.

Finally finished door number 1!  Still another door to go and then Gallus Painting will take over on staining and varnishing.  Need to leave that to the professionals. :)

This is the first of cleaning trim.  First of 20+ doors.  And this is one side.  So basically over 40 frames to clean.  Good winter project!

Above is after and before cleaning.  In the picture it looks fine, but the piece on the right is darker because of years of smoke and grease.  Ewwwww.

Electrical wiring is starting on the other two buildings.  Like I said, it's getting hard to keep up with everyone!  Thanks Don's Electric!!!

This is the temporary barrier created to keep the cold out.  Picture was taken looking into the newly finished area and you can kind of make out the stairway post on the right (just beyond the poly).

Now standing on the other side, we can use the door to an office to get into that side of the building.  So the best part is that Dale didn't have to build a temporary door like we thought he would have to!  Again, amazing how things work out.

Woo hoo!  Sheet rock and an exposed stairway!!!

Dale's temporary workbench is gone and now installed on the walls!

November 230, 2016 - covering floors to get ready for spraying ceilings

Look what they have to work on to work over a stairway.  Yikes.  And black tarps on the floor to protect the hardwood floors from spraying the ceiling.  For those that care, we're going with an orange-peel ceiling.

So we need to cover floors.  And to buy tarps or anything else would cost a lot of unnecessary money.  So what do you do?  You go green and recycle.  Once again, timing is everything.  The tarps on the roof of the little building have worn out and no longer keep water out.  So Dale climbed up on that roof, pulled the tarps off of it, hauled them over to the Jerome, and here they lie. 

More tarps

December 3, 2016 - selecting finishes.  This is weird to be sharing what we're picking out for the building instead of what is being demolished!

Potential bathroom flooring.  Or something similar.  The tile should be installed in the next couple of weeks which is a really good thing.  You see, once it's installed, we can get a toilet upstairs.  Not only is that convenient, but coming at a really good time because our only toilet on the main floor is getting ready to fall through to the basement!  It's not a good idea to put all your weight on the seat right now.  TMI?

December 6, 2016 - I hear they're painting tomorrow!!!!  So excited!!!  Can't wait to see it!