Normandy Park Restoration

While the back yard is still a bit of a mess, I have put in a few landscape lights to get the ball rolling.  Here is a dusk shot showing the direction I'm going: I'll leave the back yard natural, but clean up the deadfall, repair the landscape timbers, and clean up.  However having a back yard that is not only enclosed, but very natural looking and where I can't see the homes behind me is ideal.

The main bathroom had some horrible florescent lights above the sink.  The ballast appeared bad as they didn't work so I decided to replace them with some recessed lights from Ikea.  Here is the original fixture: I had temporarily put a different fixture in so that I could have some light, but there was an issue with that light, causing it to flicker.  So, I decided to get cracking on the recessed lights.  Here is the work in progress: And the final result: Lighting is much improved.  I used a piece of wood from the basement and painted it a flat, dark olive green.  The lights are wired in parallel.  I had originally planed to wire them in series, but they were very dim in that configuration.  The fixtures aren't quite sitting flush.  The wire I used was so stiff that it's pushing them out slightly.  I'll have to tinker on that later.  However, overall the look is much better and the lighting is greatly...

Here are some images of the house now that I've moved in: I added some track lights above the fireplace.  There was already and outlet up there that was switched via an awkward switch near the fireplace.  I'll probably move that switch later.  Here is a shot of the track lighting: Cost was about $50 from Lowes.  There also wasn't any effective lighting in the hallway, so I threw up some lantern lights I've had in rentals before.  It's a temporary hack, but it looks nice.

Original offer was submitted on December 5th.  It's now August 19th, and the bank says the deal is in "Final QA" and should have the approval letter in 3-5 business days.  We'll see if that's true or not.  Once I get the letter it's 45 days to close. It's a 2600 sqft mid-century in Normandy park.  Here is an original picture during construction in 1960: Structurally it's in good shape.  The only issue I can see is that the wall on the outside of the carport is slightly tilting inward, but not much.  The main thing is that it's very dated.  It has about 1700 sqft on the main floor, and about 1400 more in the basement.  The basement is partially finished, but the work wasn't done well so it looks crappy and dated.  But the potential is there.  I have plans to change just about everything, and will keep this blog so that I can recall what I've altered by the time I'm done. Here are some images of how the house looks now: ...