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5/16/2005     One item to note here is that I have no idea how to fix a sagging porch.  It seems to be something that would be logical and simple so I'm fully expecting the porch to not only fall down on me but also to tear away from the house and peel off its front like a grape skin leaving all of the front rooms exposed.
     I just got back from Home Depot where I purchased a 6 ton jack for $20 and two new metal support posts.  Here we go.  This should be fun.
11/19/2005     The first step in this process was to make sure all of the one billion hornets that live in our porch's roof were dead.  I used a common tool called 'frost' to achieve this and got very good results.
     Now that the pests are dead I have to once again face the fact that this will be a trial and error repair.  I've decided to start by removing any damaged areas in order to surmise the situation.  This should leave the porch a virtual skeleton of it's former self and allow me to see not only what needs to be replaced but how stupid I am for taking something like this on.  Naturally, I'll justify the stupidity by trying to calculate what a contractor would have charged and that will be enough to push me forward until it's at least somewhat structurally sound again.
4/25/2006      Almost a year ago I wrote that first entry on this page.  My, how impressively diligent I've been!  Well, the truth of the matter is that I've returned to work and that's eaten up a lot of my time. I've also discovered that due to sheer physical exhaustion I'm not very motivated to do work on the house on my days off, however I've been working on that lately.
     In fact, the first of the new windows have gone in.  Yes, after only two years of being stacked up and ignored in the basement, we now have a living room with a window that actually opens!  Not only do we benefit from having fresh air, we get to hear the fire company's siren at sound levels that dwarf the TH-X announcement at the beginning of movies.
     That said, we'll have to see where this goes.
6/27/2005      And on the second day of rain the front porch did collapse, and it was loud.
7/10/2006      And a contractor did come and fix our porch, and it was expensive:  $2,150.
     And the contractor's name was Gary.  And he did get stung by many hornets.
7/15/2006      And on the fifth day, Gary did rest and apply salve to his hornet stings.
     Okay,. enough with that kind of talk.  Beth and I have decided on colors.  So far we have five with a dark red under consideration to add a subtle contrast and really piss off the neighbors.  Brunswick is a town of black and white houses with just a few people who have been daring enough to try multiple colorations.  Some of these look pretty nice while others are the obvious products of lots of beer and maybe too many drugs at a younger age.  The majority, though, are black and white with a smattering of homes where the owners went out on a limb and used gray.
    Woo-hoo!  There's always one wild heart in the crowd!
    Our choices for the porch are plum, hunter's green, metallic gold, dusty lavender, and a subtle variation of harvest gold.  That gives us five in all, but since the porch floor will be gray and the porch ceiling will be a sky mural of light blue, adding a little red will take us up to a total of eight making our Victorian a true Painted Lady in every sense of the terminology.
     We're both getting inspired and excited but the work is hard and it's been in the mid-nineties lately.  Even though we were ready to drop from the intense heat, we still managed to hit Lowe's this evening where we bought some wood trim and then decided to prime it in the living room while we watched TV.
7/22/2006
    Well, it's at an interesting stage right now.  We just found out that all of the paint under the shingles is called 'milk paint'.  It's this formula they used way back in the old days that basically turns to powder as it gets old, so that means all we have to do is power wash it and it will all come off.  This will take about 6 months of scraping paint off our schedule.
8/10/2006      We've just finished painting the spindles, all 73 of them.  If you really have to paint spindles, then sitting in one's air conditioned living room while watching movies is the way to go!  We've also painted two of the porch posts in a matching color scheme.  So far, it looks really great!
8/20/2006      The first section of railing is up and looks absolutely great!  I stood on it so I know it's strong.  We also primed and painted the big posts, wrapping it up for the day at around 8:00PM.
     Interesting note: We found a name carved into one of the posts: Pearl.  It was buried under layers of paint so there's no telling when Pearl lived there.  It would be fun if Pearl actually showed up one day and saw the house once it's finished just so we could gather more info on its history, but I seriously doubt Pearl is still around.
8/21/2006    It's 11:35 PM and I just finished putting on the first coat of the main exterior color on a few boards: Sweet Shadows from American Traditions.  We both agreed that it will look terrific but the entire time I was applying the paint all I could think about was our neighbor heading out to work tomorrow morning, looking up and muttering, "What the...?!"
     Seriously, the house is going to look fantastic but is Brunswick, Maryland ready for a monster sitting on top of a hill painted with Sweet Shadows purple?  People are bound to say we're uppity.
     JIA sent one of their insurance inspectors out to give us our annual review today.  Beth was here and said the guy seemed genuinely impressed with the ol' girl (the house, that is), but I'm hesitant.  The last time they were here they jacked up our insurance by over $1,200 a year and that person seemed pretty nice, too.  I just hope this guy wasn't a jerk.
9/4/2006      It's Labor Day and I'm about to head off to work because the building at 656 Quince Orchard Road's HVAC system is down and the last thing I need to hear is a bunch of tenants complaining that it's too hot when we reopen tomorrow.  Best to just bite the bullet and go turn the system back on just in case it's a bigger problem than a quick flick of a switch.
     Beth just had surgery on the 31st so she's pretty well out for the count for the next few weeks leaving me to do all the work, which is actually okay with me.  It's kind of fun to go at it for a few hours at a time and then have her step outside and see the progress with me standing there like a ten year-old hoping for much desired praise from a school teacher he has a crush on.  'I made this for you.' 
     The porch is really looking fine.  I've literally been putting every spare minute into it and the time is well spent considering the results.  It's a strange effect to look at it knowing it looks better than it probably ever has, but then you look up at the second floor and it looks like hell.  In fact, it looks worse than ever because of the contrast.
    Up....hell.
    Down...heaven.
    Ironic, yes?
    I have a bit of second coat painting left to do and the fascia running around the porch hasn't yet been touched.  It will no doubt prove to be a huge headache, but will also be the crowning touch.  My to do list is as follows (not in this order):
    1) Design, create, install and paint window trim.
    2) Finish first-coat painting and caulking everything.
    3) Rewire and install new lighting that I haven't yet purchased.
    4) Strip fascia.
    5) Design, create, install and paint fascia moldings.
    6) Install fancy trim work we painted in July/August.
    7) Second coat of paint on walls.
    8) Install new bead board ceiling.
    9) Paint floor.
    Then I move onto the side of the house damaged by the fire.
9/25/2006      The detail work is definitely taking longer than I'd ever expected it to.  Some of this is due to Beth's recuperating, but for the most part it's because it's just so much work with so little time to do it.  We're losing light in the evenings and it's getting colder, too.  When Daylight Savings Time hits and it gets dark at 6:00 P.M. instead of 7:00 I'll either be forced to use lamps or just limit the work to weekends.  I suppose if it comes down to that we'll begin doing inside projects again.  It's always best to put in about an hour a night on something, whether it's just a little detail or a portion of a major step.  Those after-work hours can add up and if you look at what you can do with that much time over the course of a year you get about 6.5 40-hour work weeks of time. 
     That's a serious chunk of time when you think about it.  How would you like it if you received the services of a carpenter for 6 and a half weeks at no charge?
10/12/2006     My job is now taking up so much of my time and energy that I no longer have anything left over for the house.  This problem is compounded by the loss of daylight hours and the onset of colder weather.  The original idea was to get a job where I could work 40 hours and then work on the house.  The job is now consuming up to 70 hours a week with no relief in site.  I wouldn't mind if I were paid enough to hire contractors, but I'm certainly not.  I therefore may have to rethink this entire plan and find something closer to home in a position where I'll only work 50 hours or so.
3/27/2007      Well, that job I wrote about no longer exists.  In fact, the entire division of that company I worked for no longer exists.  Over the winter I was able to renovate our guest room and now the time has come to reclaim my shops and get them in order again before I begin work on the outside.
    I can't stress enough how important it is to do a real cleaning and organizing on one's work shops at least twice a year.  Not only is it a matter of cleanliness and order, but it also puts everything in its place and that can alleviate tons of frustration and even added expense when tools and/or materials aren't where they belong.
4/9/2007     Work has continued on the front porch but an unseasonable blast of cold weather is slowing things to a snail's pace.  We had snow flurries every day during the first week of April with temperatures hovering at the freezing mark making painting impossible.
    An attempt was made to take down the old porch ceiling but years of exposure to the elements from the holes in the roof quickly shot that plan down and it had to be demo'ed.  That's okay, though.  The new bead board ceiling will look better and will hopefully keep the wasp population down since our porch will no longer have the separations between the boards where they enjoyed creating their homes and terrorizing us.  There are several creatures in the world that border on being classified as truly evil, the wasp being among the worst on the list.  There aren't too many animals that know they will die if they sting a person but do it anyway.
     It's interesting to note here that the first entry for this page was made nearly two years ago.  Porches are a big deal as they are the entry place to a home.  You can study old pictures of homes like hours and the two items that have the most work done on them are the porches and the windows.  Everything else is secondary because in the Victorian era making a big splashy impression was important.
4/11/2007      The new ceiling is mostly up.  I bought one panel too few but I'll rectify that in short order.  Most of the day was spent loading my neighbor's pick-up trucks with various debris from other renovations on the house and the bulk of it was about 30 bags of wet shingles from when we stripped the side of the house.  The entire day cost us around $200 in dumping fees and fuel.  It's a necessary evil but an evil just the same and my 47 year-old body is really feeling the punishment this morning.
4/28/2007      The ceiling went up without a hitch and is beautiful.  Since I'm doing everything backwards I decided that putting the lattice in below the porch should be next.  The area below the porch houses our oil tanks so it must be enclosed to fight the occasional sub-zero temperatures of winter when the oil can turn to gel causing us to lose heat.  The original protection was built in a haphazard fashion so I had to rip out the framing and the plywood sheets.  It was actually more of a windbreaker than anything else.  Very ugly.
    Once I was able to rebuild the framing and lock it into the concrete sill at ground level so it would remain stationary, I used decking 'grabber' screws to force the potato chip-like plywood sheets back into a flat surface, primed and painted them plum.  No one liked that move so I painted them the new yellow color and there was much applause and cheering.
5/1/2007      I'm still battling with the lattice but it should be okay pretty soon.  I can't wait until I can get up on top of the porch to get started on the upper front of the house. When you come into Maryland from the bridge our porch looks great but the rest of the house looks pretty bad.
5/2/2007     I started removing shingles off the house above the porch today.  They practically fall off by themselves due to the breakdown from sun and rain and the house looks to be in decent condition underneath.  The framing around all four windows is completely rotted, though.  They'll all need to be replaced.
     I'm not sure what it is about our home that attracts various sorts of bees.  I saw many carpenter bumblebees, two wasps and one monstrous thing that looked like a 4" yellow jacket.   If that guy keeps coming around I think I'm going to have to kill him.  He looks like he'd have quite the stinger on him.
5/10/2007

Two words:  Carpenter bees.  

 
5/17/2007      I haven't slacked off.  I just haven't written because I have been very tired and couldn't manage the time or strength to sit and type every night.  The bees are now all but gone and the house's front is completely primed and partially painted.  Truth be told, it's looking pretty good.  I even replaced the broken window.
     An interesting thing recently happened.  I got back in touch with a friend of mine from the old days and he went through my site.  He's a good writer and pointed out that there's more than enough material on this website to put together a book.  Personally, I'd do it in a heartbeat once this is all finished but I'm not much of a writer and even less of a promoter so if www.ourvictorian.com ® is ever to generate a book I'd need a lot of help.
     Interesting idea, though.  It might make a decent coffee table book.
5/23/2007    While we're getting very close to completing the front it is still taking much longer than anticipated.  The characteristics of the old wood doesn't allow for smooth, easy strokes and ever inch has to be lathered in paint and then smoothed so that nothing is left exposed to any further damage from UV rays, rain and the air itself.  We can stop time, but we can't reverse it.  The general idea is to preserve her with as little repair work as possible.
     Our own  feelings of pride are definitely growing.  People have all but stopped telling us we're nuts and there's an obvious wind of change in how our neighbors view the house.  I was very pleased just the other day when some hillbilly girl was strolling down the street with her kids and shouted, "We really like what you're doing with the house."
    The only other thing I'll mention is that I have become the Babe Ruth of swatting carpenter bees.  When I'm painting I now keep a good sized club near me and as soon as I hear that familiar droning sound I go into action.  The trick is to purposely miss them with a slow, awkward swing.  They tend to back off a few feet and then come right back into their hovering position, usually right where they just were.  That's when you nail 'em.
5/30/2007      We took a few days off from everything but now it's time to get back to work.  The second floor shutters have been painted and will be put on today, something that will really give the place a nicer look but are completely useless despite their heavy cost.  In my 47 years on Earth I have never once seen a home where the shutters were closed.  I mean, think about it: People started to first use them to keep the elements out, but this was before the invention of glass. I'm guessing that they were next used to protect the glass itself, but after a while people probably started noticing that the glass panes were tough enough to withstand a little rain and word probably got around that shutters weren't all that necessary anymore but we kept right on hanging them.
     So, today I will be hanging what they call 'plastic vanity shutters'.  They come in many sizes and colors but the ones we use are paintable and come in a basic gray tone.  You can't buy these at Lowe's, only at Home Depot and I strongly suggest you call in advance to see which one in your region even carries them at all.  Smaller Home Depots do not stock them and the clerks will whine like babies if you even suggest that they do a store-to-store transfer.
     Long, hot day today, well into the mid-90's judging by my sweat-o-meter.  The shutters are all hung.  Looks great!  I think I breathed in several gnats and I feel weak as a kitten from dehydration despite my drinking huge amounts of water throughout the day.  I don't care, really.  The place is looking fantastic.
5/31/2007    For some odd reason a ton of work was done on the lower area and then I felt I had to get through the upper area while it was still cool.  I abandoned the lower area while following this course of logic and completely forgot to do the ends of the porch.  See the idiotic result here and note the walls outside the railings.
     The truth of the matter is that I stopped seeing the problem after a while.  I walk by those areas a dozen times a day, every day, and after an alarmingly short period of time I guess those decrepit old boards just started looking kinda homey.
    Beware.  This is apathy of the worst kind, a seductive force in our very nature which causes us to become friendly with flaws.  It's a danger sign when we see something that needs fixing and instead of taking care of the problem... well, it becomes our buddy.  It may be a loose porch fixture or just an area that needs a little more paint, but it slowly becomes a familiar face.  Remember these words: Every run down, junked up, faded, moldy, weed-covered, rusted roof hillbilly house you've ever seen all have one thing in common:  At one time they were all brand new.
      To punish myself, I spent the entire day fixing the situation in some fairly unseasonable heat..  The high point of this endeavor would be repairing the 25' vertical cedar molding on the right end.  It was shattered and blah blah blah, why go into it?  Here's the Reader's Digest version:  Gorilla Glue.
      By 6:00pm I had both areas repaired, plugged, and primed.  I really didn't expect much of a change however when I finally stepped back into the street I was amazed at how differently the entire house looked.  I'm looking forward to painting it tomorrow.  The front is basically finished other than a few tweaks and second coats of paint here and there, mostly the plum color.
6/9/2007      I'm finally getting the sides of the porch done.  They've been ignored in favor of more necessary moves up until now so the overall look has been severely lacking.  Yesterday I spent pretty much all day  in the sweltering heat on ladders as I glued the rest of the dental molding blocks into place and even found the time to prime one side.
    On a side note, the house on the other side of the Darr lot now has new occupants.  It seems to be a couple but we're not sure yet.  We had an absolutely wicked thunder storm in the early evening hours so we and other neighbors found ourselves on our porches watching both the storm and the new neighbors moving in.  No one offered to help because no one ever does around here.  Sure, we loan one another our tools and make suggestions on how a project might be better handled but that's about it. 
      Self reliance is a natural part of living in this region.  It's not that the people are selfish or lazy.  It's just that the thought of doing someone else's work never occurs to us.
6/12/2007      Is it possible?  Will the last of the gingerbread really be going up on the porch today?  Yesterday I was able to do most of the final trim painting so all that has to now be worked out is the angle of the porch just to be sure the trim will be level.  After that the last two things will be the attic window and framing the doors.  Believe me, I am more than ready to move on.
6/15/2007      Between continuing to get the cellars organized and cleaned up and other normal daily life routines (yes, some portions of our lives are actually normal) the progress on the front is slow.  The good news is that the last of the trim on the porch is finally up and I've contacted a contractor to pop the attic window into place.  It's too much for one person and I really don't have anyone I could ask for help so the $60 he asked will be worth having it done right.
6/21/2007    Inserted breather panels into the porch's soffet.
   Primed the last of the moldings.
   Worked on my Dremmel.  It's dead.
   Ripped 45 feet of one-by into 1.5 inch strips to frame the window ornament framing.
   Sounds as though my table saw may also be on its last leg.  Two months until my birthday and I already know what I want.
   Laundry.
   Banking run.
   Grocery store.
   Made dinner.
   Spring has come and gone and the porch still isn't 100%.
6/25/2007     If I want to be honest, yes: Our house looks better than it has in many decades.
    No, I haven't been totally and completely thrilled with the look.
    The problem is that while I can tell from the nail holes that there was at one time lots of gingerbread trimmings on the house, however the stuff we've put up is probably better than what was originally hanging.  That in and of itself isn't a big deal.  The problem is that up until today it's looked fake, like....well, like something purchased at Lowes.  It's pretty, but it didn't have that historic look that the original craftsman of our region applied.
    To solve this, I spent almost all day putting together a window treatment that, while basic, looks anything but store bought.  Beth's been using the word 'pop' to describe a situation where a person does something to make the decor work.  This made the house pop.  It won't be all that hard to execute, either.