A Growing Season

The blog has been a little quiet because my to-do list is singing lately. Every weekend we make more progress on my house and it feels a little more like home. I say "we" because Mom and Dad have been a HUGE help. Huge.  I figure I'll use this post to catch y'all up and let you see what we've been up to.

My house is made by a company called Deer Valley and while there's nothing all that special about the floorplan, and the exterior looks pretty much like any other mobile home, there are details I really appreciate that you don't find with every manufacturer.  Better building materials, energy efficiency, etc.  That said, they run a little higher than average for mobile, so I bought a model.

Home

 

I figured the only thing that would have really gotten worn during the time on display at the lot would be the flooring, so I thought it would be worth it.  (Because I would be replacing the flooring at my earliest opportunity anyway, since I'm not a carpet fan.) I got a great deal by going with the model, and I am so glad I did. One thing I didn't think about, though, is that they've improved the way they texture their ceilings since my home was built.  The older style really bothered me, and that's what I ended up with. Not popcorn - there were strange goopy-looking globs of texture hanging like stalagtites from the ceiling... yuck. 

So first order of business was knocking off some of the texture. Dad did most of the work while Mom and I moved tarps under him and vacuumed up what missed the tarp. He just ran a floor scraper lightly over the ceiling and the gloopies came right off.  We managed to get the whole house done in one day with Dad manning the scraper.  Had I been doing this myself, it would have easily taken several days, and my arms would likely have fallen completely off.

Dad being a really good sport and scraping the ceiling for me.

 

Before & After.  Not easy to see in 2D pictures, but trust me, it's much better.

Once that was done and the mess contained, we started painting.  The walls were beige just like my last house, and I wanted something different to start my new life.   Home Depot has a Zero VOC paint (Behr Premium Plus, and their tints are also VOC free!) that is self-priming, so I had them match some Benjamin Moore colors for me in the healthier paint, and it was on rebate, even. Heck yeah. I chose to paint almost everything Revere Pewter, with the exception of the bathrooms (both Palladian Blue) and my bedroom (TBD).

 Revere Pewter

Palladian Blue

We used EZ Twist Paint Rollers which I think are worth their weight in gold and cost less than $30. They worked great and made things go so much faster. My only complaint is that the nozzle to load the paint into the roller doesn't work well near the bottom of a 5 gallon bucket. We made it work by tipping the bucket, but refilling the rollers became a 2 person job once the bucket was half empty.

Painting finished, we started bringing over loads of my stuff. Heavens, I have so much stuff.  I had stuff stored at my parents house, at the barn, in the neighbour's basement... basically spread out all over. So collecting it all and moving in was quite the experience. Once again, I'm really grateful to my folks for their help. I ended up hiring someone to just bring the heaviest things over (washer and dryer, couch, etc) because we had no other volunteers, and there are limits to what an out of shape 32 year old woman and her middle-aged parents can handle without injury.

After we got everything in, Dad replaced & moved a ton of light fixtures for me. I have nothing against the lights that were in the house... but they were fairly standard, builder-grade, cookie cutter lights and I just wanted the place to feel like it was mine (which means it's got to be a little quirky!). So I got new fans for my room and the living room, a new dining room light, island light, and vanity lights for the master bath. (Thankfully I got all of them on sale or clearance!) I moved the existing fans into the guest rooms, and one of the existing vanity lights from the master into the hall bath, to replace the fixture with the giant exposed bulbs (a la 1980). I also found some battery operated under-cabinet lights at Sam's for a very reasonable price and we installed those to give me more task lighting in the kitchen.

 The new island light (I love the Edison bulbs!)

 

 New light for over the dining room table

(must buy dimmer - 18 bulbs is bright)

(no that's not my house, this is a stock picture)

 

 New vanity lights for the master. 

Then came the furniture.  My ex got the dining room set in the divorce, so I had to buy a new table and chairs. "Some assembly required." Short of cutting down the trees and weaving the upholstery ourselves, ALL assembly was required.  Maybe that's an exaggeration, but seriously it was a big job.  It took up most of a weekend, assembling the table, 8 chairs and fighting to cover them with the tightest slipcovers imaginable.

Once the house was livable and the necessities were unpacked and/or built, we built a ramp for Esme the wonder-doxie to get to a pen I set up in the back for her. The pen is temporary until I can put up a fence, but the ramp is a permanent fixture that will be accessible by the doggie-door (coming soon). Is she spoiled? Well... maybe a little. ha.

Yeah, Mom is badass.

Other than that, my free time has mostly been spent unpacking and organizing. This weekend I worked on organizing my business supplies in my craft room.  Permanent shelving is the plan, but for now the utility shelving works just fine.  Next weekend I'll add peg-board beside the shelves to store my actual Paparazzi inventory - for now it's all packed away in the closet.

 

Also organized the utility closet - my folks helped me hang brackets for shelving, where I'm storing Esme's things, and on the other wall I put in lightweight plastic shelves for cleaning supplies, that can be removed when access is needed to the water heater behind.  Not bad for a coat closet.

Esme's corner of the utility closet.

 

...aaaaand I just realized I didn't paint the inside of the closet.  Ugh.

Not important, right?

 

The more I get done, the more it feels like home. It's still not quite finished, and until the boxes are gone I refuse to share "after" pictures... but they'll be coming soon. In the meantime, this post is plenty long enough!