A Birthday Present for the House! 🎁🏠

Today is my birthday, and to celebrate one more orbit around the Sun, I have decided to take the Amazon gift cards that some of you have donated (once again, a giant 'thank you' for all the support you give me, it's truly mind-boggling) and buy a couple items for the house, and I thought I'd run through them for you, since it was beause of you that I was able to get them!

First of all I got some stair tread protectors - our stairs are in OK shape, but they're definitely very worn down in the middle where everyone steps (they ARE over 120 years old, after all), and the paint job has worn down to bare wood on many of them... since I don't know if I want to restore them all back down to the raw wood eventually (probably not just since I think they need more protection than that, given their condition), I am hesitant to paint them again if I'm just going to strip it back off, BUT they clearly need to be protected, given that we're climbing them dozens of times each day, often with very heavy objects. The raw patches are extremely vulnerable to being chipped and further destroyed.

So instead I bought some carpet stair treads - not only will it protect them, but it will give Cannelle some bonus traction on the steps. She doesn't NEED it, but she will definitely APPRECIATE it!

Now these are not very attractive, and they were surprisingly expensive for how ugly they are, BUT they're roughly the same colour that the stairs are currently painted, AND additional dirt on them over time will only make them blend in further 🤣

Eventually (if I don't take them back to stained/varnished wood, which again, I don't think they're in the shape for) I'd love to make the stairs something quite attractive - a lovely moment, maybe with some Victorian style carpet rods like the photos below, but for now, utilitarian is the way to go!

Then the other thing that I got was a digital laser distance measure - one of the things that Amber said she could help us with was coming up with some 3D renderings of (and various layouts for) the kitchen and bathrooms. Those are the only parts of the house that will have major work and updating done to them because of the plumbing and moisture issues, and the fact that most of the original plaster is already replaced by drywall, so I don't feel bad taking it back to the studs. Not to mention that part of the house doesn't have a proper foundation, it's just a crawlspace, so some of the structure underneath needs to be addressed.

But anyways, to my point about the laser, she said that if we could take a bunch of measurements and send them to her (she might be able to come out and take them herself, but the way our schedules are chaos, it didn't look like it'd be feasible anytime soon), then she could start working on the renderings. Which would be amazing, because not only would it give all my viewers a really great visual, but it also means we could easily play with various layout options for both the kitchen and the bathroom.

I feel like I could do the kitchen on my own because the layout options are limited, but I admit that my creative juices were feeling a bit at a loss with the bathrooms, so I'm thrilled to have some help with that, and also it's a fantastic way to showcase her expertise and how she can help clients in similar situations. So I ordered the laser measure to save a bunch of time and honestly probably get more accurate measurements too!

So thank you everyone for your continued support -- regardless if you were one of the people who contributed to these purchases specifically... even just being a monthly supporter is incredibly helpful and generous!

I hope you all have a lovely day, and I'll see you next week for some more Halloween fun and further antiquing!