My Dad the Stucco King

When I was very little my father had his own stucco business.  He was extremely good at it and had made an impressive name for himself within the city.  For many reasons he decided to sell off the business and start a different career path.  When we bought the church we really wanted dad to stucco the bottom of the church where William pulled off the old stucco.  We discussed this with dad and he agreed to do the work.

Dad ordered the sand he needed and we picked it up together the day before he was going to do the actual stucco work.

When we got to the church dad asked why William had not put up stucco wire and covered it.  This was totally my fault as I thought dad just wanted William to patch the big hole near the old window.  I am very much a "just let me do it" in almost every situation.  This is something I totally got from my father as when he saw it wasn't done, he decided to take care of it right then and there instead of getting William to do it when he got home from work.  I couldn't even convince him to change into old clothes.

First the stucco wire on the windows.

Then to mix up the cement.  It isn't just a bag of cement, add water and go.  He needed to add the sand and a powdered lime as well as the cement.

Then it was covering the windows that dad had put stucco wire on.  Good thing he had brought out his tools that day, otherwise he could not have gotten the work done. (Two of the three pieces are reminisce of dad's business.  Never know when you will need them.)

 

Once that was done, dad scratched the wet cement so when it was time to stucco it would have something to "hold" onto.

Dad had some of the cement mixture left when he was finished with the windows.  If you know my father, worked with my father, are a family member or pretty much have spent long enough with him you have heard "waist not, want not".  Dad refuses to waist ANYTHING.  It wasn't originally part of the plan but since he had extra he decided to see what he could do with our cement stairs.

Quickly into him playing around with the stairs, it was obvious that he could make them look MUCH better.  He decided that if there was enough materials left over, he would patch all of the stairs.

So dropping off the sand turned into an afternoon's worth of work, and in good clothes!  Day two started around 9:30am.  Dad came over with all the equipment.

Once everything was mixed, dad could begin.  First he needed to put up a base/undercoat of the cement mixture.

When he finished the basecoat, what he had done at the beginning was just dry enough for the topcoat. 

He still has it.  I was so impressed to watch my dad use a skill he hasn't needed since I was little.  He even had enough material to do the stairs,

Everything looks AMAZING!  We could not have done anything like this without my daddy's help.  Daddy-O, thank you so much for taking time out of you schedule to do this for us!  I enjoyed our couple of days working together just the two of us.  And now I have some of your work just for me!  I love you.

Upstairs Hardwood Floors...Everything Old is New Again!

Our lovely contractors finished everything they could do for us and were on their way a few weeks ago.  Although we were sad to see them go as they are two of the nicest men I have had the privilege of spending time with, this to us means that we are very close to being done and officially moving in. 

The biggest job we have had to wait to complete has been the hardwood floors upstairs.  With numerous tools and people around we did not want something to happen then have to fix our work.  Better to just wait.  This past week and into this weekend we were finally able to get these done.  First we needed to sand the outer edges with the palm and mouse sanders.

This took FOREVER with the hand held sanders but it needed to be done this way.  We knew we were going to rent the large floor sander and it can't get too close to the walls.  Renting the floor sander was some of the best cash we have spent.  One full day and we had the majority done.

While all this sanding was going on, we also needed to remove the screws and nails that were from the plywood/carpet that someone ages ago decided was a good idea instead of leaving the hardwood.

Once all the screws and nails were removed and everything was sanded, we needed to fill the holes that were left with wood putty.

There was no better way but to lie on the floor, and fill each whole individually.  This job was a little messy, and VERY tedious.  By the end I was SO done with it.  William caught a photo of me and Atlas filling holes and you can just tell how much I wanted this to end!

After days and days of sanding, pulling, filling and feeling like you've smoked packs of cigarettes from all the dust here was the final look of the wood.

Sorry to say but we were still not done with this little project.  From there, we needed to vacuum up as much of the dust as we could, then mop up the remainder.

Finally today we were able to varathane the wood.

First room done.

And here is the hardwood with its first coat of varathane.

We have coated with a second coat of varathane but I forgot to bring my phone with me to take a picture, and now we are waiting for it to dry.  We are planning on three to four coats total.  Finished pictures to come.  With this done we are feeling like we are in the home stretch!  Fingers crossed we will officially be Indian Head residents by the end of the month!