Visible progress!

Today I had an appointment canceled, which was great news as it put me a full week ahead. I wasn't going to be able to work on the windows for a week. I spent 4.5 hours today, but it was worth it. I once again pushed beyond my limits and got sloppy but I didn't care because the front door film is temporary and a vast improvement over the trash bags. Normally, I'm not a fan of temporary fixes. It's usually not much less time than doing it right, and then you have to do it again later. In this case it was a good decision.

My time to date on the windows is 234.25 hours.

The front door is done except for sanding and buffing. We are going to try the film for a few weeks or months. If we like it, we'll have it done permanently. We want to try it for a while though because we won't be able to see out of it.

I have 10 coats to go to finish the shellac. This includes everything - doors, windows and trim. It is great to be able to see the end when I couldn't for a long time. I couldn't even picture being done, and now I can lay out every task between now and done. The coats themselves, the actual brush time, doesn't take that long for each coat - perhaps 2-3 hours. What takes time is what comes between - sanding, buffing, prepping, installing trim, etc. My last coat was two full months ago (12/26/08), and I really hope the next coat is not so long off. If I can do one coat a week, I'll be done May 8. That is really ambitious, probably not even possible, but even if it's a month off that is still in sight.

In early October 2008, I made a 13 month schedule for Phase 2, which concludes with flooring and the front yard. It looks like we are pretty close to on time almost 5 months in. That would be so great to have flooring and front yard by year end! That would be a really big turning point, and the place would be much more comfortable. The infinite number of projects still to go could be done as we can get to them.

Here is the front door from the outside, before I put the film up:



Looks like crap, eh?

Here is the after shot. Much better, eh?


Here is the front door from the inside, before. It's hard to see because of the light making too much contrast in the camera.



And here is the after shot. Whew, much better.