The Current Project

The biggest project undertaken here during my blog absence (other than having a baby) has been the kitchen.  Here's what the kitchen looked like when we bought the house almost 4 years ago:

By 2011 we had progessed to this:

That's pretty much how the kitchen stayed until this year.  In January we replaced the sink, faucet and counters.  We also added a dishwasher (a much appreciated Christmas gift from Charles' parents).  In June I began painting and replacing hardware on the cabinets.  Starting with the lower cabinets and going section-by-section, I've made it to this:

It's been slow progress - but it's still progress.  : )  

Spring Projects

For the past few weeks I've been anxiously watching the weekend weather forecasts, fingers crossed for good weather.  I've got multiple projects started and more that I'm itching to start.  But a few days ago Charles politely suggested that perhaps I should finish a current project (or three) before I take on anything new.  He's probably right -  if because if there's such a thing as DIY-ADHD than I've definitely got it. 

About a month ago I finally gave up on the blue paint in the kitchen.  I had high hopes for it in the beginning, but after two years I had to admit it wasn't growing on me.  It took several tries to find a new color for the room - the pale yellow in the picture to the left lasted only a few days before being painted over with a more tan/gray beige.  Schwartz, by the way, loved having an 8 foot ladder in the kitchen.

Other recent interior projects included Cecilia's quilt - finished last weekend - and the living room baseboards.  The latter project has been delayed by attempts to match the color of the new baseboard to the original walnut trim.  A local paint store has graciously allowed me to take home various stains, and I'm getting closer but still not quite satisfied enough to finish the new baseboard.

Outside, I spent the first nice day this spring digging out a basement window on the north side of the house.  The yard around the house was raised a foot by previous owners and the basements windows (at least the ones that were not filled in with concrete) were in desperate need of attention.  We had temporarily dealt with this by blocking the windows with heavy foam board secured around the edges with expanding foam.  Classy, I know.  But the remaining north facing window is now dug out and ready to be rebuilt. 

The first layer is topsoil added by a previous owner.  The middle layer is concrete window well poured before the level of the yard was raised.  Below is a closer view of the window opening.  The window sill is completely gone and both sides are rotted beyond repair.

The window itself was salvageable and is currently resting in my mom's wood shop.  I replaced several panes of broken glass, reglazed the window, and primed it.  Cecilia put a first coat of paint on it tonight.  Our masons left a bag of mortar, so as soon as I get more cooperative weather I'll tackle rebuilding the window sill.

In the meantime I've continued on the shed project.  With help from Charles and my mom one of the doors built over the winter is now hung on the shed.

The bottom and inside edges of the door will be cut to size once the second door is hung, but I'm already so tickled with how this is looking. 

And finally, one last project that's in the works.  I've got my mom to thank for this again.  Over the winter she rebuilt the sashes for the springhouse windows.  They're in her workshop now (with the basement window) primed and ready for paint.  But before I primed them mom brought them over to be sure they fit the springhouse.  This is just a hint of what the finished windows should look like, but I'm pretty tickled with this as well.

Based on the forecast for this weekend hopefully I'll be able to share a bit more progress on these projects soon.  :  )

An Old Walnut Grove

The most dominant tree on our property is a black walnut.  It stands just off the drive at the head of the pasture.  Anyone who visits the Einsel House passes under its shade.

The first time my grandpa visited the house he walked through the rooms in the old stone portion, taking in all the beautiful walnut woodwork, and he commented, "This must have been an old walnut grove."  Then he explained to me that walnut trees are toxic to other plants.  He said that as walnut hulls decompose they spread a poison through the soil around the tree.  This poison kills off the any non-walnut sapling that has the audacity of trying to take root within the black walnut's domain.  Over many years, the first 'mother' walnut tree to take root in an area would choke off other encroaching trees, providing benefit to her own walnut saplings.  Once grown, those saplings would repeat the favor for their own saplings.  Ad infinitum, at least until the axes of Noah Rhinehart's generation entered the picture. 

Because of this, grandpa explained, by the time the Rhineharts arrived here it would have been very rare to find a single full-grown walnut tree.  Instead, where there was one walnut tree there were likely many walnut trees - "an old walnut grove."

 In the past I've never cared much for walnut trees.  (They're messy.)  But after hearing grandpa's story, it seems appropriate in way that it's a black walnut guarding the drive to the Einsel House.  I see her as that protective mother, still looking over the other walnuts - albeit they are no longer trees, but the doors, stairs and trim in the house that she is guarding.

Lately, grandpa's story had been quietly repeating in the back of my head for a different reason.  Our 'Mother Walnut' is the first thing visitors pass as they approach the house, and she was looking a bit abused.  There is not enough space for the lawn mower to pass between the tree and the pasture fence, so that area had become a catch-all, the most convenient place to toss branches blown from the tree or stones pulled from the pasture. And there are apparently plenty of weeds that are immune to the black walnut poison.

So the last couple of weekends I've worked at clearing the area under our black walnut tree.  My original plan was to plant ivy under the tree, but after considering grandpa's story I decided it would be wise to investigate black walnut 'poison' before planting anything directly under our tree.  I learned that the poison's real name is juglone.  As grandpa said juglone is in walnut hulls, but also in the tree's roots.  And there is a relatively limited number of plants that are not affected by juglone.  Unfortunately, ivy is not one of those plants.  In the end, I decided on ajuga ("chocolate chip").

The ajuga was planted beneath the tree yesterday.  I moved all of the limestones from the pile under the tree, but left a small pile of other rocks for the ajuga to grow around.  So hopefully next spring our walnut tree will be surrounded by a bed of delicate blue flowers.

Painted

Priming and painting are such similar activities.  And yet priming is pure drudgery and painting is pure bliss.  (Well, that may be a bit of a stretch I admit.  But painting is sooooo much better than priming.)

I'm very pleased with how this first wall turned out.  I had a small delay after the first coat of paint when I stepped back and realized that although I had caulked nail holes and imperfections on the beadboard I had not caulked any of the nail holes or imperfections on the trim around the window.  With a coat of white paint on every little hole and crack immediately drew your eye.  So I got up early enough Sunday to finish caulking before church, and then put on the second coat of paint Sunday afternoon.

The wall color makes me a bit uneasy, but I'll finish my existing plans for the kitchen before I make any final decision about the walls.  When I chose that color I was aiming for a 'is-that-blue-or-is-that-gray?' color.   Sometimes, if the light is right, that's what color the walls are.  The rest of the time they're baby blue.  With painters tape up the walls practically screamed BABY BLUE, but thankfully once the blue tape came down the walls seemed a bit less obnoxious about their blue-ness. 

The north wall will be the focus of my attention next, but it will probably be the weekend before I make any significant progress there.

Field Trip

On Saturday Charles and I enjoyed a trip up to Toledo.  We got our Christmas shopping about half finished.  But the highlight for me was our first stop - Toledo Architectural Artifacts.  AA is an architectual salvage business located in an old downtown warehouse.  I've spent many hours on their website drooling, and the place is just as unbelievable in person. 

The collection of vintage bathroom fixtures was one of the 'funnest' areas:

There were more sinks behind me when I took the above picture (as well as toilets in the same range of colors). 

Although AA has items contemporary to our house, in general the late nineteenth century through the mid twentieth century dominate their inventory.  Oodles of Victorian, Arts & Crafts, Art Deco, and a healthy dose of the purely eclectic, too.

We brought with us the one remaning sash from our springhouse windows, but left without finding any matching six pane sash.  I also intended to scour AA's inventory of interior hooks hoping to find some to match our remaining hooks from the boards along the walls in our two front bedrooms and upstairs hall.  This would have been much easier if I hadn't absent-mindedly left the bag with our hooks on the Einsel House kitchen counter. 

I'll be emailing the pictures below to AA to see if they have anything that matches.

(I obviously raided the kids' block basket for that last picture.)  I haven't taken an exact count, but I believe we need around 15 of the top hook and 6 or 7 of the bottom one.  I realize that odds of finding a perfect match for either of these hooks are not great - and the odds of finding 15, or 6 or 7, perfect matches are downright poor.  But that won't stop me from trying!

Here are some of the top style hooks at work in our bedroom:

The ribbons are holding up some new artwork.  There's a third picture that will hang on the left, but I need to get more ribbon before I can hang it.

I suspect at least a few readers are scrunching up their foreheads in puzzlement about the bluebird, or more particularly, about the ribbon holding up the bluebird.  My own forehead was rather scrunched up while hanging the picture.  The problem is that the existing spacing for the hooks is too close for the size of the pictures.  If I put the bluebird ribbon solely on the left hook the two pictures bump into each other.  If I put the bluebird ribbon solely on the right hook the two pictures are just too far apart.  So I split the difference.  Well...straddled the difference I guess. 

I suppose I could drill new bird-picture-appropriate-spaced holes for the hooks, but I'm hesitant for several reasons.  First, I'm always loath to put new holes/cuts/marks of any kind in the Einsel House woodwork.  Second, respacing the hooks would require sanding the wood clean, measuring for and drilling the new holes, filling the old holes, more sanding, and finally refinishing the wood.  (In other words, you could replace that last sentence with 'Second, I'm feeling lazy at the moment.' and that would be true as well.)  And third, I suspect I might actually like my creative ribbonwork.  I'll have to hang the third picture up before I completely make up my mind.

Bat Exclusion, et al.

Thursday night I took the last formal count for our bat exclusion.  The results:

Bats leaving the attics - 0
Bats leaving the south chimney - 0
Bats leaving the bat boxes - 62

I think we've accomplished our goal and can remove the one-way door and close that last access hole to the attic.  But (as the comments to my last post so clearly show!) there's one last step we must take before we can consider our bat issue completely resolved.  Namely, we have to clean up the mess in the attic.  There's bad news and good (or at least less bad) news here.

The bad news is obvious.  Our attic has to be full of guano.  And because handling guano can cause serious illness in humans, cleaning our attic is not a job we want to or should attmept to do ourselves.  I've called a few places who handle this type of cleanup to get quotes and it appears this will be a very expensive job.

Kathy left a comment after my last post asking, "Do you have access to the attic from inside the house?".  The answer to this question is no.  In fact, we don't have access to the attic period.  There are no windows to the attic, no vents, and no opening through a bedroom ceiling beneath.  This is both bad news and good news when it comes to cleaning up our bat mess. Bad news because it means accessing the mess to clean it up will require some type of structural change to the house.  However, it is also good news because this complete lack of access means that the bat mess is currently entirely contained within the attic.  I'll freely admit to looking at our bedroom ceilings and wondering what lies above, but from inside the house there is absolutely no evidence of our former attic residents.  The ceilings are not discolored or sagging.  The only time we found bat droppings inside the house was while working on the exposed stone wall at the top of the stairs (this was also the only time a bat entered the house from the attic).  The top edge of the exposed wall has since been finished, and just to be sure, before we began our exlcusion I ran a bead of clear caulk along the seam where the exposed wall meets the ceiling.

For now, we plan to simply plug the last exterior access to the attic and let whatever is up there stay up there.  Quotes for having the guano removed are quite high, so this is a project we will need to plan ahead for.  We will keep a close eye on our bedroom ceilings for any sign of strain or staining.  And we will keep our eyes open for "bat bugs", who often enter homes after a bat exclusion in search of a new food source.  The thought of these bugs getting into our house is quite disturbing, but I'm hoping that the lack of access to the bedrooms from the attic will keep these tiny blood suckers up in their current home.  The isolation of our attic from the rest of the house is complete - no ductwork enters the attic, nor are there any electric lines or ceiling light fixtures in any of the bedroom bedrooms to provide access.  But we will definately be watching for any signs of infestation.

Ugh.  After typing all that out I'm feeling rather squicky.  So let's move on to some cleaner topics.  So - I mentioned a few posts ago finishing up the back bedroom.  Here's the semi-finished room:

Cecilia is quite happy with it, and the dresser from the Leaning House is a perfect fit:

With Celia moved into her new room I've been able to focus on the hallway, getting the wood floor painted and the handrail and other woodwork finished:

The color and tight grain of the old walnut wood in this house really is amazing.  : )

15,197 Words

Remember – A picture equals a thousand words.

And so, in no particular order, here we go.

First up – matching windows!

Kitchen with new subfloor:

That subfloor is now covered by this tile (they're just self-stick, but they fit the budget):


Refinished bedroom door:

Next up, one of our new curtains for the office, graciously sewn by my Aunt J. (On the bottom half of the window so that we can close them as necessary to avoid sun glare on the computer screen.) Thanks J!

And here's J sewing a curtain. I love the look on her face that says, "You know you really don't need my picture on the blog." (Although I obviously disagree!)

Moving upstairs, here is my mom at work on a little closet tucked into the corner of the back bedroom:

And a blurry picture of the closet taking shape:

Another action pic of mom, this time putting up missing pieces of baseboard in the office:

Still more of mom's work (bathroom closets this time) and more new subfloor:

Two pictures from the south bedroom (carpet goes down in this room tomorrow):

And, finally, two bat boxes on the end of one really long pole:

Of Interest Perhaps

The following was too long to include in the last post without overwhelming it, but I include it here as a footnote of sorts. This is titled "Recollections of Pioneer Days" and was written in the late 19th century by Rebecca (Huddle) Rhinehart's uncle, Elder Lewis Seitz, longtime pastor of the local Primitive Baptist Church. I'll save my own comments for the very end.

In October, 1825, at the age of twenty-three, with my wife and one child, I removed to my present home....I came from my native county, Fairfield, into an almost unbroken wilderness of forest trees, with less than a score of settlers in advance of me. Nearly all who were here before me had settled along the rich valley of Honey creek. For two or three years before mine was reared, cabins had begun to appear in our wilderness. J.C. Hampton (who came in 1822 with the Boyds and Donalds, from Ross County), informs me that he aided in erecting the first cabin put up in the township. This was for my brother, Noah, on Silver Creek. Hampton made his home for a time with his companions from Ross. Their shelter at first was in a log pen covered with logs split in twain, the under tier being with flat side up, and the top tier covering the cracks with the flat side down. The beds were for the women, on bedsteads, with one post. That is, in one corner of the "pen" two poles were entered in the logs with the other end in this "post". Basswood bark furnished the "cords." The men slept on the ground, with hickory bark spread down for sheets. Hampton says: "Our first supply of flour was brought by us on horseback...through the woods."

During these early days a wilderness of forest trees covered the earth, and the first need of the settler was to clear away space enough for a cabin, and then it was "root, hog, or die." While I brought from Fairfield County enough flour to last two years, very few of my contemporaries were thus provided. One season, however, usually sufficed the industrious prioneer to clear a small field and grow bread to do. As for meat, everyone had his gun to supply him with wild turkey or venison, which were abundant. Often, too, as we lay upon our pillow at night, were we saluted with the howl of wolves, apparently at our cabin door. Not only did they make night vocal with their cries, but woe to the sheep or young pigs not well guarded. An occassional bear passed through, but I think none made their home in our township. There were some otter...A wildcat was shot within one hundred rods of our cabin. Indians often visited us...Our red brother was uniformly friendly, and, as a rule, honest, but a tricky one appeared sometimes...

The pioneer who succeeded best in making a comfortable living, did not make a business of hunting, but chopping and logging and burning was the chief work. Much timber, which today would be valuable in the market, was burned on the ground. No where could finer poplar, walnut, blue ash and butternut trees be found...

The first saw mill was built by Roswell Munsel and the Donalds, on Honey Creek, near the present Kaler mill. Soon after John Davis built another mill, a mile further down, where my first lumber was made. A few years later Abraham Kagy put up a saw mill, and the Steeles a saw and grist mill on Silver Creek. It may be well to remind the reader that in those days our water courses furnished power much more steadily and for a greater part of the year. Through the clearing away of fallen timber and general drainage, our creeks gave short lived spirts of water....

In those days neighbors were neighbors, indeed. Was a cabin to be "raised," logs to be "rolled," or assistance of any kind needed, a simple notice was enough. A "neighbor" could be found at a much greater distance than now. The whisky of those days was not charged with "killing at forty rods" as now, but the "brown jug" or the "barrel" was found in nearly every home, and it was esteemed an indispensible "mechanical power" at "raisings" and "loggings", etc., etc.

On the 27th of May, 1827, the Baptist church, named "Honey Creek", was organized. The "council" was composed of Elders Thomas Snelson, of Highland County, and Benjamin Caves, of Pickaway, and Deacon John Hite, of Fairfield. In 1830 the undersigned was chosen pastor of this church and has sustained this relation ever since. As will be noticed, ministers in those days traveled a great way in the pursuit of the calling. But not as now, cosily and swiftly in a railway coach, but invariably on horseback, equipped with "saddle-bags", with Bible, hymn book, a few "dickeys" (a sort of shirt-front with collar attached), and some provisions, perhsaps. The messenger of "peace and good will," through the cross of Christ, traveled in all kinds of weather, over all sorts of roads (or no roads through the wilderness). Perhaps such experiences, if peresent to many of our clerical brethren today, as part of their labors, would lead to some more congenial calling. But it must be remembered that the privations and trials of pioneer life were shared by all classes, and hence borne more cheerfully. While we may freely admit that this generation is enjoying much that is good and desirable as the fruit of the labors and purposes of their pioneer fathers and mothers, it is a matter of profound regret that the rugged virtues and beautiful friendships could not have been transmitted with the improved culture, conveniences, comforts and luxuries enjoyed by our children. They are enjoying the material blessings for which their fathers and mothers toiled and dared and suffered. Modern improvements have obviated the necessity for much of the personal effort and deprivation of pioneer life, but when we cease to practice their manly and womanly virtues, all our boasted progress cannot save us from the penalties of violated moral law.

Of all my first neighbors, Abraham Kagy, J.C. Hampton, Mrs. Thomas West and John C. Martin alone remain. The rest have passed to that "bourne from whence no traveler returns." We, too, shall soon pass away, but may He who guides the destinies of men and of nations, bless our children and our country with civil and religious liberty, and every good resulting from the reign of truth and righteousness is the prayer of Yours truly Lewis Seitz.

Several items from this account drew my particular attention. First, Elder Seitz arrived here in late 1825 - three years after Jacob and Susannah Rhinehart came to this township. In fact, Seitz states that 1822 (the year the Rhineharts came) was the year the very first cabin in the township was built. Clearly, the Rhineharts arrived to an unbroken wilderness when they reached their new home. I also noted Seitz's praise of the neighborliness of the pioneer settlers. Although knowing that Jacob Rhinehart died at a neighbor's barn raising, I was struck by Seitz's admission that whisky "was esteemed an indispensable 'mechanical power' at 'raisings' and 'loggings,' etc., etc.".

Two other sections of Seitz's recollection drew my attention. Since our house is full of some amazing walnut woodwork, the line "No where could finer poplar, walnut, blue ash and butternut trees be found" definately made me smile.

Finally, and perhaps most interestingly, I was struck by Seitz's statement that "in those days our water courses funished power much more steadily and for a greater part of the year". Although our springhouse still stands (thanks to some amazing work by our masons) it would currently not be able to properly serve its original purpose again. The creek that provided the water necessary to keep the springhouse cool is now often barely more than a trickle. Much of last fall the creek bed was entirely dry. A neighbor who has farmed near us since the 1940s tells us that the flow of water in our creek has diminished noticably even in the last 60 years. He speculates that farmers tiling their fields is the primary cause for this change. It is very interesting (and a bit sad I think) to note that this phenomenon was noted as far back as the 1880s.

And with that I'm off to the house for another 48 hours of toil and labor. Something that I think Elder Seitz would approve of. :)

Back to the House

As promised, I'm moving back on topic. The masons were back at work on the springhouse yesterday, and I'll have another post on their progress coming soon.

In the house, my mom has been busy putting her carpentery skills to work. In the dining room, she put up baseboard and chair rail in the corner with the new boxed out duct work. Once I finish get it all shellaced, it will look like it has always been there. Mom has also put up various pieces of trim in the living room. The past couple of days she has spent back up in the back bedroom, building a small closet into the northwest corner of the room.

Charles has been busy with the play, but he did find time to haul off two more loads of scrap metal. So far Charles has made over $200 just cleaning scrap metal from the property.

My uncle J has also been back at the house. As we get each room painted, he follows along replacing outlets and switches. It makes such a huge difference to see clean plates go up over new outlets. Pictured below is a sample of my uncle's work. Two outlets in the living room were in boxes installed on the woodwork. J removed these sections of baseboard and cut holes to install new recessed boxes. He also had to carefully chip into the stone wall behind each outlet, making just enough room to allow for this change. He then put brown outlets and covers on each (we're using ivory in the rest of the house, but thought brown would work better since these are in the walnut baseboard.) The light colored rectangle in the floor is the site of the first outlet in this room, it was installed in the floor rather than the wall. We removed the outlet and my mom patched the floor. Right now the patch is still bare wood, hopefully it will blend in better when we put the next coat of finish on the floor.



As for me, I've been painting. I hope to finish the second coat on the office walls tonight. The color is called Spring Forward. It's something of a muted teal.


And I've been painting in the Book Nook as well. The purple here is called Kimberly (how appropriate!). The nook will get carpet and then small baseboards, but other than that it is basically finished.

Some Then and Now (And One Very Happy Little Girl)

As promised, here is a selection of pictures showing how far we've come in six months. These are tagged before and after for this post, but the title "Then and Now" is more appropriate. In spite of six months of work, not a single one of these pictures is a true "After". (But we're definately much closer!)

Front of the house:

Looking up from the creek:

A window in Neil's room:

In the dining room:

More dining room:

I'll have to put together some kitchen and living room pictures for another post, but the second half of this post will be devoted to the back bedroom. It was painted yesterday, which made one four year old little girl thrilled to pieces.

(Can you tell she had a piece of pink frosted birthday cake just before she took over painting?)

Our daughter's future bedroom provides some of the most impressive photos for comparison:

There will be more pictures of her room coming (and the book nook as well) but before I head to the house here are a couple of in progress pictures from Cecilia's bedroom: