my job as a stripper

WALLPAPER stripper, that is ;)

Note: I forgot to follow up on my last post. Pedro (and my realtor/cousin) kicked butt at cleaning the place. All is good, ready to rock!

So...back from Peru. I jumped into the house immediately. While overseas, I thought of the house a fair bit and realized that it was such an unhappy home. It has been neglected for years, maybe decades. It needs a lot of love and happiness. I want to make that happen, so I grew anxious and could not wait to get back and dive in head first. And that I did...head first into chandeliers, corners, you name it. My head looks and feels like a bruised melon. Talk about investing blood, sweat, and tears...well, no tears. YET.

First things first: Remove ugly-as-all-hell wallpaper from the living room and two downstairs bedrooms. Unfortunately, a former resident painted over the wallpaper a long time ago, so it is essentially latex. I had to go about removing in two steps: 1) peel off the "latex" (which in the living room was a horrid bright red...really, people?!), then 2) sponge down the glue with wallpaper remover and scrape. I was able to peel all "latex" in the living room and scrape half that room on day 1. My mom showed up mid-day to help, thank God!!! Wow. My hands ached, my lower back throbbed...I was exhausted.

And of course, Stew had to get involved! I gave him...drum roll...DEMO!!! He knocked out the cheesy-as-all-hell (lots of "all-hell" issues with this house) bookshelves on either side of the fireplace, for starters. He pulled off a lot of outdated/cheap molding, and then started moving out the massive pile of firewood in the backyard. For the record, he was treated to Frisco Freeze afterwards. Very fair trade if you ask me!

After that one day of work, I can see the light at the end of the tunnel...although I am trying to stay focused on the light THROUGH the tunnel during this process, for my sanity.

I went back the next day and shop-vac'd the entire home. My aunt came to visit and said, "wow, I no longer feel like I need a bath after leaving!" Success!

The walk-through with the electrician took place yesterday. It went really well. However, I learned the rewire will also be a two-step process. (Oh, that's right...this isn't going to be an "easy" process ;) First, he has to "delete" the knob & tube wiring, then add the new boxes; then after the drywall guys come in and work their magic, the electrician comes back and actually installs all the fixtures. I'm tired just thinking about it.

So, here is the order of things that will need to be done (** indicates I have to hire someone for the task):

1. Remove baseboards upstairs
2. Demo weird wall near front door (happy, family?!)
3. Remove rest of wallpaper
4. **Rewire 
5. Remove popcorn ceiling
6. **Repair plaster/drywall and texture walls/ceilings
7. **Install electrical fixtures
8. **Install carpet upstairs
9. Replace baseboard upstairs
10. Remove parquet floors
11. **Refinish/stain hardwood floors
12. Change door locks!!!
13. Paint walls/ceilings
14. **Clean ducts
15. Update kitchen...oh boy (early 2016?)
16. Update bathroom...double oh boy (year 2?)

And this doesn't include the "fine-tune" items like repair window strings and screens, doorknobs, yard stuff, etc...I need a nap after just writing this list. :/