I’ve vowed to take off for the month of October since it seems every October since we bought the house we’ve had some massive time critical project to do seriously impacting our Halloween costuming abilities.  With a few days left in September, there are still projects to do before it gets cold.

First off is the bathroom window.  This wasn’t a huge priority, but it is one of the few things that would really suck unless its already open window weather.  The main problem is that the wood frame is rotting away and letting water in which has ruined the bricks under it.  To fix it I decided to take it all out down to the bricks, relay the bricks that are loose, point the joints around the ones that I can reach and then re-frame the window.

Refamed. You can see the width of empty space beside the new frame where the old counter weights would have been.

Needs some paint.

First round of bricks went well until I realized that the old mortar wasn’t going to harden.  It all had to come out and be redone.  That set me back a few days, but I powered through and got the bricks (re)done and framed it up.

I added 4 studs as well on the sides of the windows.  These are to be used to hang a window box.  We may or may not close it in. It’s main purpose is to hold plants to give us a little more privacy from our neighbors who have a window just oppose ours.

While the weather held out I also knocked off some loose mortar from the alley bricks and Siri painted it up.

Also refurbished our non-venting stove vent to actually vent outside.  This involved disassembled the whole thing, washing it inside and out, blocked off the front vent, opened up the rear vent and adding some ducting.  I’m no longer shy about making holes in my walls so out came the impact drill.  I circle of 1/2″ holes later and I was through the brick wall to the alley.  Finished it up by spray foaming the inside and rebricking the outside.

We bought our base boards for doing trim in the fall the same day we had the truck for getting the steel and joists used on the stairs.  They’ve sat in the shack since them until I could catch up on some things.  Finally that day has come.  Having painted boards little by little over the last few weeks, and making some little corner pieces, I was all ready to go.  My brother came over and brought his trim nailer, chop saw and air compressor.  Six hours later we finished the trim in the bedroom.

With the trim done I could finally move the bed across the room.  This was a bed we built out of IKEA shelves and leftover strips of wood we tore out of the 1st floor ceiling. Previously it was against the end unit wall and got really cold in the winter.

Also, it was opposite was the chimney which meant that I had all of 12 inches to squeeze past every night leading to many bruised knees.  Moving it across the room lets use wrap it around the chimney a few inches giving me 24″ at the end of the bed to maneuver.

Over the next few days I added trim in the kitchen, hallway and living room.  Eventually I had to return the air tools and could take a break from the madness for a few months.  It was until September that I got a chance to finish up the front of the living room.

<ADD TONIGHT!>

This seems like a short, maybe insignificant post, but this is HUGE for us.  We’ve stared at the gaps between the walls and the ceilings for nearly 3 years.  It was obviously something we could live with, but it was obvious and sloppy to anyone who visited.

Goodbye ugly gaps