something saved, something replaced

When we purchased the house we are working on now, we put new flooring in the estimate.

There were holes in the flooring and it was baddly scarred in places. After some time looking at the floors and the problems with them, I decided to try to save the old fir floors.

Got out the "Rock Hard " wood putty and filled holes. Then got out the orbital sander to sand them smooth. That is when you find out why they call it "Rock Hard" wood putty. I went through a few sanding discs.

Stained the scratches and the wood putty. I have one room ready for a coat of polyurathane. Floors over 100 years old and still looking pretty good after some work.

The kitchen floor was roll linoleum. It had to be replaced. Bought 12 mil thick flooring at Modern Floor Covering. Matthew installed it and it is a beautiful floor. I do hope whoever the tenants turn out to be, they will treat it well.

We are still a long way from finished with this house and we have 4 more to remodel after we get this one done, but we have the bathrooms finished. Shower is tiled, vanities and toilets are in. Still need to caulk around tub and vanity tops but that is a quick job

 

We have been purchasing larger 2 bathroom houses which take longer to remodel, but they are in high demand.

We decided to save most of the floors even though it will trake some work, but we gutted the bathrooms and started over. That is the way most of life is, some things can be saved if you are willing to put in the work, and some things just need to be thrown out so you can start over.

I see a lot of relationships fail. Got a call this week from a young woman looking to rent a house. It saddened me becasue the only reason she would be looking for a house is she is leaving her "fiance". That means their little child will growing up with her parents in 2 different homes. I wonder could the relationship be saved if they put in some work, or was it doomed and needed to be thrown out. 

They had never made the committment of marriage. That does make it easier to throw out the relationship instead of putting in the work to make it shine like new. 

I know there are relationships that need to be ended but we live in a culture where the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence. Reality is, change and abondment is seldom better.

small changes count

We finished the last ceiling that needed to be fixed this week

The hot water radiators on the second floor had leaked and left cracked and stained ceilings on the first floor. I hate working over my head so it was a great relief to get the last one done. The truth is I had forgotten about this one until Sharon pointed it out last week. I think Matthew was ignoring it, maybe hoping it would fix itself.

This is the best picture I have of the kitchen when we purchased the house. There were no upper cabinets and that strange cut back into the wall to recess the fridge. They might have done that because the island was too close to the fridge. We are shortening the island, moving the stove out of the corner, and moving the fridge over as well.

We added a lot of cabinets. This is the best picture I had. The cabinets stretch another 5 feet to the right of this picture. I do love the new floor in the kitchen "work" area. The kitchen is huge. There will be seating by the island, room for a table on the tile floor and a table on the oak floor. I wish we had this kind of room in our kitchen.

One of our remaining big projects is the countertops.

The original shower upstairs needed a little help.

We have it tiled, grouted, and sealed. It was a double shower when we bought the house and the boys were adamant that we keep the double shower. We showed the house to a prospective buyer yesterday and they loved the shower.

Matthew built all the bathroom storage and vanities for both bathrooms.

Solid wood construction

We have been working on this old house for a long time. Micah asked on Friday if we had owned it for a year already. Nope we bought it in August and remodeled 2 other houses after we purchased this one.

It has been, and still is a big project. We are used to houses 1000 square feet or less, this one is 3300 square feet. More than 3 times larger than our normal projects.

We hope to wrap it up in the next month and move on to a couple of other houses we have purchased that need major work.

When I look at this house at the end of any week it feels like we have made no progress. Every week it looks like we have only made small improvements, but those small improvements are adding up over time. That's a lot like life. Small changes in attitude and behavior add up over time and make life a lot more enjoyable. Those small changes in my life might make life more enjoyable for those around me as well. Some think they want to relive their youth. I don't. I don't think I would approve of the person I was at 20 years old any more. I would tell that guy to be kinder and more thoughtful of the people around him. I do hope 10 years from now I don't look back and think the same thing about the person  am now.

 

2021

Started the year putting the finishing touches on a house purchased in September 2020. Previous owner had health issues after the sale so it took us a while to get possession, then we had to wrest possession from all the flees left behind by their dogs. 

February our first grandson was born. Welcome to the world Caleb Spoelstra.

In March we finished the first house purchased in 2020.

Sharon and I headed for a short get away in the Quad Cities. Had an apartment downtown Davenport right by the river. It was kinda cold on the rooftop terrace.

Painted a house that was finished in November of 2020. When I bought this house, everyone thought I had finally made a bad purchase. No one is complaining anymore since the house is looking much better and is quite nice inside.

In April Sharon and I went for a driving tour of State parks in Northern Iowa. We stayed in a cabin by a lake in Clay county.

Then we remodeled a house we had pretty much rented as it was when we bought it 4 years ago.

In May we finished one of the larger houses we had bought up to this point. Rented it to a couple with a real need for housing and it has worked out well so far.

I spent June and July doing volunteer work fixing housing for nonprofits. Started spending my evenings on our patio enjoying our fire pit. I had not done that for several years. Now I am looking forward to Spring intending to spend more evenings out on the patio this year.

                                           

                                 In August we had to put in new flooring and fix holes in walls, and totally repaint a couple of houses.                  

                                        

                                           The tenants had trashed the houses before moving out

In September we did a major road trip. Down to Oklahoma, swung over through northern Texas, back up through the Oklahoma panhandle and traveled around Kansas. A lot of interesting land formations out there on the "flat" plains.

On our return we finished up a house that was simply horrid when we purchased it.

In October we took possession of the "Big" House. Did some outside essential repairs between working on another purchase.

We finished up this house in November and then could turn our full time attention to the "Big" house.

Our first Thanksgiving with a Grandson. My, how he grew during those few short months.

Then it was onto fixing the "Big" house. It seems like everything in and on it needs repairs.

Just the front door, which is 8 feet tall, needed to be fixed. It had 2 handles, neither of which worked well. It had holes in it that allowed the outside air to come right on into the house. Had to cut blocks of wood to fill holes and apply Bondo to get it air tight and looking presentable. An 8 foot tall door with beveled glass windows was worth all the effort to repair.

The outside is just about all fixed

At least a good month and maybe more to get the inside fixed.

After that we can move on to our next project.

We picked up the windows today.

A whole pickup load. Looks like it will be Spring before we are finished with the projects we have lined up.

I hear a lot of people complaining about the last 2 years. I know there have been difficulties, I spent some time in the hospital in 2020 with Covid, but over all God has been good and He always will be. No matter what happens in your life, God is good. Look for His gifts and His hand in your life. Sometimes everyone needs to look back and see what has happened. Now the perfect time to go back over your last year and see the gifts God has given. 

 

Filling holes

I feel like I spent my whole week filling holes

This was the front door of the house we are working on when we purchased it. It is an 8 foot tall door so we did not want to replace it.

That meant the cracks and missing wood needed attention. Bondo car body filler is the carpenter's friend. The door is ready for the finish coat of paint (except for a couple a pieces of wood to hold in the lower left glass pane).

We are replacing the doors to the bedrooms. The door jambs are also 8 foot tall with transoms over the doors. Our plan is to put new doors in the old frames. That meant all the old hinge and lock cut outs needed to be filled before we could cut new ones. Yep, Bondo again. 

They are all filled sanded and painted.

Then there were the floors. The hot water radiators had leaked and in a couple of places the floors had  swollen up.

Took out the pieces that were raised and trimmed them. Then put them back into the floor. 

There were the holes where the pipes had gone to the old radiators

A total of 23 holes to fix.

There were a couple of times I thought I had them all and then I moved the carpet I had down while painting and there were more.

I hope they are all filled now.

There are 2 door ways to the bedrooms where the flooring was painted. Why, just why? I checked today to make sure it would sand down. Hopefully tomorrow we will start putting the new flooring in the hallway and I wanted to know if we would have to go into the doorway. I am thinking not at this point. 1 hole we don't have to fill.

There were no upper cabinets in the kitchen when we bought the house.

We have put in several and we still need to purchase another 3. I put the first coat of polyurethane on the inside of the doors this morning.

Also put a coat on one of the new bedroom doors.

A neighbor to another house we have purchased, but haven't worked on yet, told Sharon Wednesday evening there was a window out of the house. She was concerned because squatters had broken into the house in the past. I was concerned because we had the furnace on and I didn't want to be attempting to heat all of Oskaloosa.

When we purchased the house the sellers said they would give us 5 windows they had bought for replacements. I thought I would just quickly screw one into place Wednesday evening to close the house up. 

Yea, that didn't happen because not a single one of those new Pella windows will fit anywhere in this house, or in any other house that we own. Fact is, I would like to see the house these windows would fit in. So there is a piece of plywood covering the hole now until the new windows are delivered to the distributer.  

I dismantled one of the new windows that were part of the purchase and I think at some point in the future I can use the parts as fixed windows that do not open to replace old picture windows and garage windows. 

So I spent my week filling holes. Holes in a door and in door frames. Holes in floors and holes where there should be cabinets. A hole where a window blew out.

It isn't always easy to fill holes in houses, but it is a lot easier than filling holes in people's lives. When I was teaching Bible classes to junior high students, I told them if you are being harassed by a bully, remember this, that kid is a bully because his or her life stinks elsewhere. They have a hole in their life and they don't know how to fix it, so they are taking their pain out on you.

A lot of adults have holes in their lives as well. Many can't figure out what the purpose of their life is and live in despair. Many want to be loved and are looking for love in all the wrong places.

God made humans with a hole in them that only He can fill. Everyone needs to be loved and God is love. Everyone needs a purpose in life and God can give your life purpose. 

The paradox of life is you need to give everything up to gain everything. If you want a fulfilled life you have to say, "God fill me with your presence, I give myself to You."

That's the only way to get all your holes filled.