Happy New Year

Happy New Year!

Well, it's now well into 2013 and life marches on.

This picture is a view to our back field, however, last weekend we had record warm temperatures and all the snow melted. Alas, that warm weather does not last and we are getting colder and colder and will expect more snow soon.

Dave and I have created a "to do" list for the month of January. An item on that list is to get the drawers finished for the downstairs vanity and get them installed. This, as with every project at Hardy House, has been more difficult than planned. The drawers had to be cut to work around the plumbing. This we anticipated. What we didn't realize is the poor shape the drawers were in. Dave has been repairing and re-gluing them. A couple are still in clamps and one may be ready for installation tonight. Actually, with the warm weather this past weekend he was able to work on these. The barn is just too cold this time of year, otherwise. It really limits our ability to work on things.

So the rest of the items on the "to do" list for this month are mainly ensuring the designs are solid and accurate for the rest of the built-ins in the house. We also hope to hang the door to the basement. This all doesn't seem like much but Dave's a busy guy at work so time is limited and the weather is limiting. We do what we can.

What are your plans for the next couple of months?

STAIR LIGHT, STAIR BRIGHT

November 27, 2009
One of the things Dave and I hoped to do throughout this project was to reuse, recycle, and repair whatever we could within reason. Sometimes we just couldn't do it because of cost but we gave it a try anyway.

Something that Dave and I enjoy doing together is going to auctions. I am a dealer in vintage linens, quilts, and some other antiques. My little booth is called Come-by-Chance Antiques and I maintain a booth at The Brick House Antique Center (see the link to the right). Dave is interested in antique farm implements, lanterns and tools, and we both seem to have an interest in architectural elements and lighting.

The hanging light you see in this picture came from The Brick House Antique Center. It was an old oil or kerosene lamp that, we believe, had been converted or modified at least once and maybe more. Dave rewired it. We had been looking for an interesting light to hang in our stairwell and we thought this would do the trick. The hardest part was that it really needed to be hung from a chain and the chain from a hook. We needed a ceiling fixture that could look appealing and have a hook on it. We looked around and couldn't find anything that would do what we needed. Dave and Jay, our electrician, tried to come up with some solutions and then the light bulb, so to speak, went off in Dave's brain.

In the back part of our home their was a ceiling fixture that we removed when we moved in. We simply left the cover plate over the hole. Aha! that cover plate was exactly what we needed, hook and all. The only problem with it was that it was shiny brass. Our light fixture was silver, or pewter. Off to Lowe's we went.

We found new wire that blended beautifully with the old silver color and we then purchased a can of silver paint by Rustoleum. The paint was awesome. Rustoleum makes a new spray paint that works on any surface. That's what I used and I sprayed the cover. It worked the nuts and matched the light fixture perfectly. I'll get another picture on here so you can see the finished product. We love the new/old fixture. What is old is new again, or so it is said.