Serious Renovations have begun!

The living room renovation has officially started. First we sealed the doors so the rest of the house would stay clean.


Removing plaster and lathe isn't so much hard, just long and it can get a little boring. Andrew took down the crown moulding. Then we began pulling lathe, starting at the door. The plaster usually just fell off, in chucks that create a lovely smell and dust. We like wearing masks for this job.

Progress wasn't slow.


I'm glad we kept the carpet from the bedroom. It was the newest and thereby the cleanest! And now we're using it to protect the floor (sometimes we think ahead!). As you can see, all that plaster adds up. It's heavy too. We haven't fully decided how we're going to remove this junk. We'll either take it to the city landfill at a cost of $7.25 a cubic yard or have a 10 yard bin dropped off by Environmental Services, Inc. for $205.00 (total for drop-off, 14 days, and pick-up). There are pros and cons to each and we're still wieghing them. The landfill drop-off will cost less especially if I didn't throw the last utility bill away when we paid it. I am told the first 3 cubic yards of junk are free if you have a utility bill (showing you pay for garbage services in the city of Memphis) and a driver's license (with the same address as the one on the bill). But the major con with the landfill trips would be loading the plaster into what? We have to get something to put it in before loading it up- and that stuff gets heavy fast! So garbage cans don't work. I fulled one up the other night and we couldn't even pick it up! So we may go ahead and spend the extra money for the convenience of throwing the plaster and lathe into a large bin that someone else will pick-up.

The most interesting thing about taking the plaster and lathe down is what we've found in the walls. First we found electrical wires that used to go to 2 wall lights. The evidence of their existence had long since been patched up and wall papered over.
Then there is the pipe that goes to nothing in the attic and didn't come out of the wall. It was just hidden behind the wall. It it close to where the radiator used to be, so we are assuming it was part of that.
We've also found writing. Now I was expecting to see a small amount in the form of theconstruction notes and marks, but what we found seems to be different. First we found this "B."


Then we found some very scripty writing, in the same blue-green pencil, that says Miss somebody L-something. It's very scripty so it's hard to make out anything past the Miss.
So the plaster and lathe removal will continue on Sunday!