Day One-eighty-eight: past the six-month mark

After too many false dawns that we can count, we are officially in the home stretch now. This weekend was full of painting trim, staining doors, and sealing wood in the basement. The painting and sealing aren't very photogenic, but here's the progression of the doors (you have to look very carefully).


Here's unfinished, which is how we bought them:

This is with two coats of pine stain, it's a tad too orange for our taste.

And here's the nearly finished product. This has one coat of oak stain on top of the pine and will get one more coat before being declared "done".

We had a visit from a company that installs gutters (among other outdoor things) and improved the look and performance of our garage. No more water pooling along the foundation. Before:

After (the birdhouses conveyed with the garage and are used quite a bit by the locals):

Finally, remember when we emptied the vegetable/herb garden that the previous owner had planted? Well, with this temperate climate and us focused on the house, the plants took advantage to stage a comeback.