Dining Room Light

Finally!  Goodbye horrible ceiling fan, hello pretty late-Victorian reproduction light!  Who puts a ceiling fan in a dining room?  The mind reels.

In case you can't tell how ugly it is, here's a closeup:

Unfortunately this one didn't come in very focused.  In case you don't speak hundred year old house, I have translated for you.

Yeah, that's right, gas pipe.  When I bought the fixture, which is a gas light reproduction, I thought it would be period-appropriate to the house, but I didn't anticipate having to actually deal with leftover infrastructure (I should have known better).  After trying and failing with the angle grinder and dremmel, Jason broke out the sawsall.

After that, we were able to install a new ceiling box and then the new light.  So pretty!

New Light Switches

Push-button light switches!  (Shout-out to Adam/Lisa/Lois for giving them to us!)  We finally got around to buying switch plates and installing them.  I wasn't a fan of the brass finish at first, but with the stripped doorknobs and the dark wood, they look really nice:

Here's a close-up:

2009 Recap

• Replaced the beam
• Cut down all the scrageldy, half-dead trees and bushes
• Took out all the stumps (so much work it gets its own bullet point)
• Landscaped back yard, planted garden, bought hammock
  
• Painted front porch, installed porch swing (2 major life goals now accomplished)
  
• Installed clay brick pavers in front
• Landscaped front yard
• New roof
  
• Demo'd bedroom closets, framed in attic access
  
• Rewired master bedroom
• Drywalled master bedroom
• Refinished master bedroom and hallway floors, as well as bedroom and closet doors/trim
• Trimmed out bay windows in dining room
• Demo'd downstairs half bath

Punch list, 2010

• Install new ceiling lights
• Restore downstairs bathroom
• Refinish and install new front door
  
• Repair foundation of back porch
• Install new door & windows on back porch
• Squirrel-proof garden (or eliminate squirrels)
• Finish stripping and then refinish downstairs trim (yeah, right)
• Install shoe moulding
  
• Rebuild stairs (a girl can dream...)
  

Downstairs Bathroom

Originally looked like this. The wall tile in no way matched the floor tile, other than both being in the greenish family, though they appear to nearly match in the photo. The wall tile represents pretty accurately here, but the floor tiles are sage/forest green, and clashed horribly with the walls.

Then, even though it pained me to paint the wall tile, it looked so much better:

And now...