Skip to main content

Welcome to the McBerkoBlog!

By

Emailing pics or sending links to SnapFish was getting tiresome, so welcome to the McBerkoBlog! This will hopefully be an easy way for me and Bill to share updates about progress on the house, provided we actually take some time away from working to post.

Immediately after closing, we started tearing stinky old cat carpet out of the entire place, hoping to find decent wood floors underneath. Lucky for us, there were nice oak floors throughout the first floor. The second floor was way cooler, if you ask me - various widths of old pine boards. To get to those pine floors, however, we had to remove the particle board nailed in every room. (Ask Steve what a fun day that was.)

After ripping out the carpet, we did a quick paint job on the kitchen to make it temporarily livable (an expensive kitchen redo will have to wait a while!). We then decided to start the first real projects - 2 bedrooms and the living room.

At this point, it's been about 3 months and we have these 3 rooms done. Another year or so and we might just have a nice place to live!
Labels:

Popular posts from this blog

Have I mentioned that Bill rocks?

By
The original clawfoot tub now has a new faucet and a shower!, which gives us a full working bath upstairs. We first thought the tub would require professional reglazing, but it turns out that some sanding/painting on the outside and a serious cleaning on the inside was all it needed. Shower conversion kit arrived last week and Bill set about the super-fun task of removing all the old parts and hooking everything up. Boy, does he love plumbing! Old faucet and previous "shower", a short length of garden hose with a plastic sprayer on the end: New faucet (which is so bright and shiny, pic doesn't do it justice, love it): Ready for shower curtains and final touches: It did take 5 trips to Lowes and 3 trips to Home Depot IN TWO DAYS (damn those old, non-standard plumbing sizes), but it works! In other news, I think the second color on the hallway is going to work (first one = too beige), so Bill will start on trim this week. Full final before and after pics are here .
Read more

Before & After - Front Door

By
Quite the transformation with the new color scheme! Since our house is located in a historic district, the colors had to be approved by the historic district commission.  Front Door After The colors and products used here are (not affiliate links): Door - Sherwin Williams Cajun Red ( link , a pretty red-orange in real life, looks slightly more brown here) Siding - Sherwin Williams Rookwood Blue Green ( link ) Trim (white) - Sherwin Williams Pure White ( link ) Trim (teal) - Sherwin Williams Still Water ( link ) Porch floor - Sherwin Williams Pewter Tankard ( link ) Brick foundation (not shown) - Sherwin Williams Rookwood Dark Brown ( link ) Mailbox - Ecco E4 in Bronze ( link , available via Amazon and elsewhere) Similar Craftsman-style Door With Dentil Shelf ( link ) Front Door Before
Read more

Next Trip Coming Soon!

By
 Today's post was written by my 7-year-old daughter, Zadie: Hi, I'm going to tell you about our trip to Costa Rica that we are going on in 12 days also I'm the youngest daughter of the person who wrote this blog so the day after school gets out we go on our trip. It will suck. I don't even get a day to relax before our trip. At least it is not like another of our trips when we had to wake up at 3 am. But we still have to get up at 6 am. When we get there, our house only has three bedrooms so I will have to sleep with my sister and I don't want that and she does not want that. But at least we get a tv and our own beds. Oh and the planes we take there are one to Charlotte which is less than an hour long and then one to Costa Rica which is 4 hours long. I don't know the activities so bye. PS - I hope you liked my writing because I cannot see half of the letters on my mom's keyboard so this was hard to type.
Read more