September 24, 2009 -- Day 19 -- Goodbye Sheetrock and Appliances!

Kitchen before.

Kitchen during. Notice James' green ladder and that all the cabinets are gone.
Kitchen during. We're taking away the laundry room, so we had to take the sheetrock off some of the walls.
If you want to get rid of old appliances, go to Craigslist. I posted that the appliances were free, and possibly not working and had 15 responses in the first two hours!

We were a little concerned about the guy who took them away. The first thing he said to us was basically "hey did you hear a bunch of people were just stabbed in San Jose." Great. Please don't stab us, sir. He was a talker-we learned all the places he has lived, that he has 6 children and how hot it was going to be that weekend (he was off by about 15 degrees though). But, we were glad he was taking the appliances.

There they go. Off in the truck to their new home, or whatever the guy is going to do with them.

September 17, 2009 -- Day 12 -- Termite Elimination!

This isn't related to the tenting, but I was proud of using a power tool. There were a few jade plants around the house that were old and yucky and needed to go. Wonder Woman had her lasso and invisible airplane, but I have powertools!

To get ready for the tenting, James had to go up on the roof to remove the antenna. I thought we had some sort of digital switchover that outlawed antennas and all things low-tech, but I may be wrong.

This is the house being tented. When I was a kid, I'm *sure* these looked more like circus tents than they do now. This one is boring and green. No clowns, no stripes, no fun music.

September 6 and 7, 2009 -- Day 3 and 4 -- Work begins!

There are decorative bricks in the yard that looked a little too much like a Loch Ness Monster swimming through the yard. So, I started the work on removing them and the mortar that had been holding them in place for at least 10 years!

Luckily, the previous homeowner left us 3 full bottles of sake in the fridge. We decided not to drink it that day, but may hold on to the bottles for an emergency situation.

September 6 and 7, 2009 -- Day 3 and 4 -- Work begins!

James started working on the kitchen. We're saving money by refacing and reusing the old kitchen cabinets. James pulled the old cabinets off the wall for us to resurface.

September 6 and 7, 2009 -- Day 3 and 4 -- Work begins!

Today we began our work at the house. The walls were newly painted a deliciously unappealing hospital white so we decided to paint them "Canvas Natural" by Ralph Lauren. RL has great paint colors, but their paint is too expensive for the quality that is lacking. So, we took the color to Kelly Moore to have an eye match done.

Overall painting is fun, but there is a lot of prep work like masking the baseboards.

I painted with the roller while James did the more difficult "cutting in" work.

September 4, 2009 Day 1 -- Escrow Closes

Escrow closed today on our 3 bedroom, 1 bathroom home in Santa Clara! Sadly, we can't get in the house right now because the only key is locked in the electrical panel box. James may have to climb in the window again....