One of our readers, Natalie, asked an excellent question a few days ago. She wondered what type of paint you use on radiators, and what special brushes you might use.
Thus far, we have only painted one of our radiators. We spray painted the upstairs bathroom radiator with Rustoleum’s High Heat spray paint (found at most […]

This past weekend, Teague took some time out from his day/night/weekend job to clean our boiler and preform some general maintenance. We have a one-pipe steam heating system, which is highly efficient when it’s running properly but requires quite a bit of fidgeting & futzing. We spent many a night falling asleep to the clangs, […]

We’re working hard to earn a black belt in frugal winterizing. Living in Central New York, it’s a necessary skill - unless you’re willing to sell a kidney to keep the pipes from freezing. Everyone has their tactics. There’s the “layer-up” method, whereby you force everyone in the house to wear 3 pairs of long […]

This year, we bought 4 pumpkins from a campground in Ithaca. They were only $2-$3 each so at that price we couldn’t resist bringing home the biggest, bestest ones they had. But big pumpkins are thick and meaty, making them much harder to carve.
Luckily, we’ve got a lot of carving experience. Back when we had […]

Fall has always been my favorite season, and Halloween my favorite holiday. Christmas is cool and all, but it doesn’t involve costumes and candy so it really can’t compete.  I have an entire closet dedicated to Halloween costumes; I’m that girl at the party that obviously spent wayyyyyy too much time hand-crafting the perfect get-up, […]

I can’t live in my world of denial any longer…. it’s fall here in Central New York. The leaves are turning. Mornings are frigid. Fresh apple cider and craft fairs abound. It’s my favorite time of year, but with fall comes the threat of winter and  a list of chores that prepare our house for […]

Historically, what I’ve ever heard from people who have worked with contractors (aside from my husband, of course) is about 90% negative. They’re messy, they’re never on time, they raise the price mid-project, they disappear for weeks, etc. Luckily, I’m married to a contractor who refuses to let an outsider touch the house anyway so […]

We’ve been living without a master bedroom closet for quite a while now. It’s become quite natural to walk down the hall to one of the spare bedrooms and rifle through the closet in there, using the entire bedroom as a changing area and place to pile up dirty clothes. It’s luxurious, really, having an […]

Old houses NEVER have mice in them. Of course not, how would they get in? Certainly not through the 8.3 billion little cracks and crevices throughout the house. And then were would they live? Definitely not in cozy little nests in your walls. Nope, never.
We had a few mice keeping residence in our upstairs bathroom […]

When we gutted our stairwell and hallway about a year ago, we got rid of any door and window trim that wasn’t original. Basically, we got rid of a bunch of 1″x4″ boards that had been haphazardly nailed up. That left us with 3 doors and a window looking incredibly sad and trimless, and 2 […]

In part one of our little fence adventure we dug holes, poured concrete, and set our posts. Part one was kinda drawn-out and sucky, and carrying the 2-man digger around made my back hurt. So I wasn’t exactly looking forward to part two - putting up the panels. But it turns out this is […]

We installed a new porcelain tile floor in our kitchen about 1.5 years ago. It has held up beautifully, and I’ve never once regretted the color or style. The dark, varying color and rough texture hide almost everything, except for mysterious muddy boot prints that no one cares to claim responsibility for. (My booties idea? […]

When we gutted a third of our upstairs in order to remodel the bathroom, we had a golden opportunity. Restructuring this area of the house meant we could put the walls wherever we wanted. So we made the bathroom about 4′ wider, and used the leftover space to make a closet.
All old houses lack storage […]

This weekend, we puttered around yet again with the craft room and closet. Skim coating drywall is B-O-R-I-N-G. I hate waiting for one coat to dry just so we can go put another thin-as-can-be coat on it. Teague is great at drywalling, and good technique means very little sanding. That’s the only reason I haven’t […]

Nadja and Sean of American Four Square Renewel took our “wallpaper on the ceiling” cheat one step further, painting it copper. And the pictures look amazing! We’ve thought about doing a copper-colored fake tin ceiling in our living room, so I had to bookmark their post.

You might recall that we did a quick fix on […]

Note: This is Teague’s second post in 2.5 years! Let’s all make him feel welcome, and maybe he’ll come share his how-to’s (which are much more thorough than mine, since he tends to lead the process while I follow along) more often! - Mindy

STEP ONE:
The first step to installing our free-standing chrome fixture (a Sunrise […]

When our Sunrise Speciality shower enclosure came in the mail a few weeks ago, it felt like Christmas. It was a welcome sight, those boxes filled with shiny chrome goodness piled high on our porch. We ripped into them like maniacs, taking each piece out to examine and admire the fixtures inside.

But of course, nothing […]

Adding trimwork and molding is one of the best ways to add elegance to a plain room; I can’t tell you what a difference it makes. It’s one of the main reasons historic houses have so much charm… they have layer upon layer of built-up trim throughout the house accenting the windows, doors, and walls […]

Haven’t read part one, which covers cement backer board, tile layout and mortar? It’s right here.
Once the mortar is fully set, you can move on to grouting. We chose charcoal gray grout to hide our dirt and grit; white grout would look pretty for a week or two, but I know after that I’d regret […]

Yes…….. happy days are upon us, because we’re finally getting to the really fun part of the bathroom remodel. Beadboard went up last weekend, and this weekend was tile-o-rama!
We chose white hex tiles from Home Depot, and mixed a few black accent pieces in to make it interesting. The tiles have a very historic feel […]