When we arrived in the Bay Area back in August, little did we think we'd stay more than 3 months!
The "bungalow" apartment vacated in July required more work than we ever dreamed!
Thank God, we had the direction and assistance of eldest son, Paul Jr. |
|
|
|
We began by washing down walls with TSP, rinsing them- then painting the bedrooms, until we realized we had serious problems with bathroom walls and floor, the "office/laundry room" floor, kitchen counters, floors in living/dining area and the two bedrooms as well. |
The floor in the bathroom had to be gutted down to the studs! Paul Jr and Paul Sr spent a day cutting out dry rot.
| The new base was soon in (shown here). Eventually we put down a good water barrier and Paul Jr tiled the floor - what an improvement!
|
| Eventually he installed a new toilet, sink and stand, wall cabinet and medicine cabinet. Creating a threshold between bathroom and hall proved to be another challenge, but as usual, Paul kept creating small miracles! | |
| After a severe rain/wind storm, we came face-to-face with problems with the clerestories. And so began our "work" seven days a week, from early morning until early evening. | |
We were fortunate to have help from family members. Miriam and Juliana washed down and painted the two bedrooms - before we realized there was going to be more than just painting the place! Miriam also dropped by several times to lend a helping hand.
| Chet and Christina also added their elbow grease to the cause, here Christina cuts away some of the base of the kitchen counter ---
|
| Jamie spent many days helping us out. He replaced a window (putting glass into a metal frame, using "new" glazing was not an easy task. In addition, he installed several light fixtures, and went through the entire apartment, replacing all the electrical outlets. We still miss him! Jesse and Parker also came up and did "dirty work" for us ... cleaning the droppings from the trees behind us, filling almost two of the green waste containers! Jess also took on the nasty job of stripping the paint from one of the doors. They were always agreeable when asked to give up seeing their friend and helping us. | |
| As of today all the new floors are "In", (as well as all the baseboards and quarter rounds). The new closet doors in both bedrooms are "installed"; all the doors have been readjusted to compensate for the higher floor. All the locks are shining in their doors. The electricity has been upgraded, and new electric fixtures show off the newly painted rooms. The window frames are painted and the windows have been washed for the third time! Part of the outside has been washed down and painted. Every crook and crevice has been filled in with caulking. |
| The clearstories have had the original paint removed, primed and now painted. Again, any open crevice has been caulked. |
|
| A new toilet, washbasin, medicine cabinet, wall cabinet, and towel rack, are all in. Shower doors have been installed on the tub; kitchen cupboards have all been painted and repaired, where needed. The patio has been cleaned and improved; flashing and netting are hopefully going to be able to keep the gutters clean and functioning. |
| We won't miss all the dust we've created with our paint stripping and sanding... |
Sometimes it was difficult to tell who that crazy-looking woman was! Besides stripping the paint from the clerestories, it was a very windy day!
| Notice Paul's two-toned forehead... |
| Here's a glimpse of the French Doors and the new porch/deck son Paul put in.
| |
| Oh, there's more than can be done (and we hoped we would have them done) but we'll be back come next summer where we will spend a particular amount of time - and stick to that time frame! |
| And we suspect that Paul Jr is somewhat happy to see us finally leave and have weekends with his family...! |
|
So we are washing linens, clothes and tidying up the rig, which is a total "mess". As we take to the road we'll do a little more cleaning as we travel the roads from Fremont to El Centro!
Because we are so happy to be back on the road, that doesn't speak of the gratitude we feel toward Christina, Chet and girls Becky and Catie for their unparalleled generosity in "taking us in", in worrying about us, for caring for us and for their accepting of our crazy hours and lack of helping them out.
Paul Jr, Miriam, Juliana and Paul David will be sore missed - not only for Paul Jrs fantastic contributions to our pathetic carpentry skills. We enjoyed a couple of Sunday evening dinners with them, and we've come to appreciate Miriam's culinary skills. In addition to preparing memorable Sunday dinners, several days she came by to help us with the work. Her Sunday diners are not to be missed!
We truly regret that work on the apartment has kept us from seeing Jerry and Mary Goudreau, the Noes, the Mullarkeys, Lynchs and a host of other good friends. Hopefully we'll be able to make that up next summer!
But for now we are ready on Sunday to have a final family dinner (courtesy of Miriam and Paul) and then to pull out of here on Monday morning.
Kathleen, in particular, will miss the hugs from Catie and Becky, watching the construction on the historic Melnarik house, visiting with Juliana and Paul David and in even getting to know our other tenants better. We feel very lucky.
But it is time to move on ... and we are anxious to cruise down I-5, stop at the fairly new RV park in ------, crossing over the Tehachapi's, driving across the Mojave desert, going south toward Bear Valley, but veering east and avoiding the climb up to that particular mountain. From the Yucca Valley we can nearly "smell" the Imperial Valley and in no time we'll pass Indio, the Salton Sea, Westmoreland (Bee Capital of the U.S.) and finally driving into Sunbeam RV Park and H O M E!!!
We look forward to seeing Sunbeam friends, getting into our exercise regime at long last, settling into our still not moved into Park Model, and enjoying the good life with which we have been so blessed! |
