My Triumphant Return

Hello, internet! Sorry for being MIA, but I have been so busy.

Remember this?



Now it is this.



You guys, I could not love this paint more if I tried. It is perfection, and I love so much how all the paint colors on the first floor finally go together now.









The painter did a spectacular job. SPECTACULAR. He went above and beyond the original estimate too, repainting the remaining mustard walls with a fresh coat, painting the entire ceiling of both the living room and kitchen, doing a bang-up job cleaning up the edges of the baseboards. He had only planned on staying a couple of hours on Sunday to finish up the orange walls but extended to the whole day. Of course, he charged us for the extra work (threw in half the ceiling for free) but even with that, his price still so reasonable. If you are in the Chicago area, I highly highly recommend Matt from Precision Painting (also the owner of Jackpot Charters, an excellent charter fishing boat). Tell him I sent you!

Since my kitchen was torn up anyway, I took the opportunity to do some reorganizing/spring cleaning. The shelving unit where I store all the big kitchen equipment went from this...



to this.



I realized I only use two of the cookbooks, and then my binder of printed online recipes. Made it much less cluttered.

Of course, now that the paint looks so good, I've come to accept I need new cabinets. LOL! Gotta let the home repair saving account fill back up first!

As long as I was on a roll, I finally contacted the shower-grout contractor that I had purchased a Big Deal on Angie's List for; this is our first owned home and we don't know the first thing about home repair, so the shower had fallen into vile, disgusting, moldy disarray. Plus, the grout itself had formed tiny pinprick holes in it and was causing water to leak into the kitchen. (According to Matt the painter, who fixed the crack in the ceiling before he painted it, it wasn't the first time it had happened, because the crack had been repaired before.) 

Anyway, I got on the contractor's calendar and he brought a team over last Friday. I am much too embarrassed to show you a before picture -- I didn't realize how bad it had gotten, but we pretty much looked like we lived in an abandoned crack house. But the after picture is amazing; the whole tub and shower looks like new!




I also highly recommend James from J.T. General Contracting. Reasonable prices, and excellent work. It took a bit to get it scheduled but it was worth it.

Naturally, I also re-organized the bathroom, especially all the junk under the sink (our main storage area), I ended up throwing away 7 bags of garbage!

Aaaaand we need a new bathroom vanity now. Seeing it cleaned out against my shiny new shower and tub, I can see it's made of the same cheap plywood as the kitchen cabinets. Sigh.

But that's for later. First there are a few more non-cosmetic changes to make, like a new water heater and new garbage disposal, and to finish hanging the photos and art back on the walls. Then we're going to enjoy our renovated house for a bit.

It's just so warm and cheery. I love it.







George has settled right back into his throne in the new living room. He approves!



I have more to share about my adventures the last two weeks, but it will have to wait for the next post. I am back on posting track!