State of the Art
At first glance, the house and yard was a nightmare. Crap everywhere. In the bushes, carport full... All-in-all about seven dumpsters worth. I guess it's easier to throw shit in the yard than pay a couple of bucks hauling it to the dump.

Then there's the dead appliances. A stacking washer & dryer and a chest freezer full of long thawed, food. Sweet. Far from the end, the list grows daily. Part of the chimney cap fell down the flue. Rats ran amok in the crawl space, ripping down all the insulation. The yard is a jungle... which is why it hid all those wheels and tires, batteries, twisted bicycle, rotting dresser, shredded mattress, pickup-bed lockbox full of styro peanuts, miles of wire, crumpled fencing, gas cans, oil cans, beer bottles, pvc pipe, construction debris... did I leave anything out?

The hardwood floors throughout were ruined. It looked like someone rebuilt their engine in the living room. Seven days of sanding brought it close to great, but I think we'd have worn through the flooring before all the dirt was out. Liz put four coats of finish on while I was on a road trip to the SW. She also painted most of the interior as the decor needed serious help. Tenants started a lot of projects but I don't think they ever finished one.

Since we were on a roll, I tore out the bedroom closet that was framed out into the room rather than recessed in the wall as usual. This necessitated ripping up some of the hardwoods and reinstalling them, knocking out the wall between the closet and pantry behind , reframing the back wall and the opening for bi-fold doors.

Now. With the closet in the wall where it belongs, the door opened on the wrong side and the light switch would be behind it. Up into the attic (through the new attic access hole) and drop wires down the other side of the door then re-hang the door on the opposite side. Whew! Almost there. Liz threw a few coats of finish on the floor. With new windows (throughout the house) and exterior paint it'll look like a house rather than a garden shed.

Oh yeah, We re-roofed the carport, cutting six inches of rotten overhang off all along three sides. Liz scraped a roof garden of moss of the main house so that should last another couple of years. She also added lots of insulation to the attic and is tearing out the insulation in the crawl space that the rats (deceased) ripped up. We'll have new in there before long. Now all the vents are screened and a yummie treat is waiting, should any of the four legged varmints manage to defeat our defenses.

Hopefully, there'll be some summer left when we get the bigger projects done! Maybe we can actually move out of the guest cottage (hooch) into the main house and have some time to play.
Be sure to go to the 'Gallery' for pics.