Good News/Bad News

The GOOD NEWS...

Yesterday we shared that the appraiser had checked out the cabin on Monday morning and buzzed through with his camera, saying that everything looked great. And it did! We worked very hard on the weekend (1/8-1/9/11) to get the final tasks checked off, with Chris and Kelly's invaluable help!

Chris, almost singlehandedly built a great stair railing. It was meant to be a temporary fix, but looked so good and is so solid, it may stay in place for some time!

 

Then Kelly painted the stairs. What a huge improvement!

Doug and Chris hung the doors. These are the wonderful pre-hung, pre-finished oak doors we got at Home Depot for $99 each before they realized what an amazing deal it was. They realized the error of their ways and now cost $199. Bummer, cuz we switched the swing on one of them and need one more! Do ya think they'll do an even exchange?

Sandy (with Kelly's help) tiled the bathtub surround. Naturally, we ran out of mastic and couldn't completely finish the job. Thank goodness for Menards in Alex, though not always our favorite place, they've become our backup supplier for last minute needs. Just hate going there and getting that horrible jingle stuck in our heads!

Sadly, we didn't think we had enough of the ship-lap wood left to complete both the bedroom and mud room.  So, Kelly painted the floor of the main level bedroom.

 And Sandy painted the mud room floor. 

 We'll cover these rooms with rugs for now and see if there might be enough ship-lap to do at least the mud room floor...later! For now, we're doing the quick fix, cover it up, git-r-done job!

Besides assisting all of us, Doug hung ceiling fans/lights, installed other lighting fixtures,

 and finished up all the  electrical needs, including several crazy three-way light switches and switched outlets.

Chris has become quite an electrician too and helped to ease that burden for Doug.

Then we worked on lots of decorating details, like curtains on the windows...

Master bedroom

More master bedroom

Upstairs second bedroom

and closets...

We decided to have the sheet rock on the closet corners finished so that we could use curtains temporarily to cover the closet openings. Target clearance was great for shower curtains at $2.48 a piece!

And we had some left over Eddie Bauer curtains that'll do the trick too!

We hung mirrors and cabinets...

Main floor bathroom

And placed rugs and carpet remnants around...

The foyer. Note the awesome hutch cabinet we got from Dick and Jane Schirmacher! Without upper cabinets in the kitchen, this is perfect for holding our dishes, AND it looks great!

The carpet remnants and rugs were from garage sales throughout the summer. Not knowing how everything would go together, this point in the process was kind of a crap shoot. But Sandy's spent many sleepless hours at night picturing where each one might fit best. It's amazing how it all work out!

Upstairs landing. This old hutch was purchased when we were newly married at one of Mike Anderson's first auctions. It was painted white, but it's tiger's eye oak secret was revealed when Sandy scratched some paint off the back. Through all her sweat and anxiety Sandy waited impatiently for it to come up on the auction block only to find that none else bid on it and she got it for her first bid of $10. She refinished it and placed it in our dining room. It served us well holding our china for many years, and most recently has been a dresser in our guest bedroom. Nestled in its new home at the top of the stairs, it hold linens and toiletries. Love this piece!

Here is the gorgeous log bed that Spencer built! Sturdy as can be and super special, knowing he made it. We think it was just made for this cabin!

We love how cozy the living room looks with the old floor. This great rug was another fun garage sale find for $50. It is so thick and big and pulls everything together. The funny thing about the green velvet curtains, which are wonderful, is that they cost $7 for the pair at a sale. Unfortunately, they needed a bath, and by bath we mean they were a bit crusty in places and had to be dry cleaned (I hate that!). So, even with a 25% off coupon, it cost $35 to have them cleaned. Oh well!

We don't have enough beds for each of the bedrooms, so the main floor bedroom offers a hide-a-bed, courtesy of Doug's parents. They had given this couch to Lauren and Adam and now it has moved up north to live with us! We also inherited the lovely blue 70's recliner in the foreground from them years ago. It's one of those not-so-in-style chairs that is super comfortable and probably will never die! You gotta love it! The oak rocker is from an estate sale for $25. When this room doesn't have sleep-over guests, it provides great extra living space on the main floor, just off the living room.

Here's the upstairs half bath, minus the door, of course...who needs a door on a bathroom anyway? Our little secret is that both the sink and toilet are just plunked in place, not so much in working order yet. But...they look good, huh?

We're so happy about how kitchen turned out! There is enough room for the big table (which is actually a banquet table with a piece of plywood with rounded corns screwed to the top of it - thanks, Spencer!) , the bakers rack (which has shelves made of the ship-lap wood) and the butcher block island. There's even room for several cooks which, we hope, is the way it is always is!

Doug did the grout in the shower and hung the shower curtain...

And hung the towel ring. So fun to put in all the little details!

So, we've done all that we can do...

Now we wait for the appraiser's approval and look forward to many relaxing days like this at the cabin, waking up to the sun and coffee and the beauty of Little Chip in one of its splendid seasons!

We were so relieved that we went out for dinner to celebrate at Biaggi's. That's GOOD NEWS, right?

The BAD NEWS is...

Yesterday, we heard from the underwriter for the mortgage that we had to have EVERYTHING done. In other words, it's not over. We have yet another weekend, if not more, of work to do. We have to have all of the trim done, the last three doors hung upstairs and the ceiling to the lake-side porch done. Not sure we have it in us. We have mentally shut down and dragged ourselves past the finish line. Now we have to turn around, pick ourselves up and keep plugging away...

So, the saga continues. Just LIVIN' THE DREAM, right?