Saying Farewell to our First Home.

August 31, 2016September 12, 20161 Comment

Today is the day we officially close a foundational chapter in our lives as “Christian & Melissa”.

Christian and I purchased our first home in summer of 2009. We were 3 months engaged, eager home-buyers looking for that “potential-unlocking” fixer-upper. The up-and-coming neighbourhood of Leslieville still had the grit of the city, but was showing signs of a changing landscape. New restaurants were popping up, families were moving in, and the residents had successfully fended off the terror that is Wal-Mart just one year prior. Movement was afoot.

We put in our bid just before the August long weekend and went to the nearby McDonald’s to assess what we had just done. I distinctly remember the acute need to throw up. Not from the smell of the aforementioned McDonald’s, but from the sheer panic about the decision we had just made. In just a few moments, we made the decision to incur the biggest debt we had ever seen, all hanging on the small nest egg that my uber-responsible husband had scrounged and saved into RRSP’s during the previous few years. Me? I had nothing but additional student loans to throw into the mix. We were betting it all on a desperately sad-looking fixer-upper.

But boy, did we have gumption. That, and a strong sense of purpose: we were going to turn that tiny sum of money into a home, and a life together. Throw in some major DIY skills from Christian and my early exposure to all things design (as a child, we didn’t go to the zoo….we went to Living Lighting and the Kitchen Cabinet store. Not kidding. I could tell you what wainscotting was by age 8) and we could NOT be stopped.

It was, by most respects, the ugliest house on the street. But it was OURS. We were going to turn it into our future.

I will never forget the day we got the keys. We drove to our new home and opened the door. The smell of mould, must and rotten fish was still strong…but it didn’t matter. We were home. We wandered down Queen Street East, bought some fish n’ chips served in styrofoam as our celebratory meal, and popped the mini bottle of bubbly that I had bought just for the occasion.

At 7am the next morning, we would begin.

And so unfolded four years of nearly never-ending renovations. Weekend after weekend after weekend of work. 14 hour days. Aching backs. Bloody knuckles. Loss of sleep. Living in dust and dirt. Saying no to most social events because we had to “work on the house”. Avoiding trips and costly outings because that money could go to a sink or a fixture or some other coveted item at Home Depot. Always the house. Room by room and space by space, we slowly made it our own. Together. I’ve often said that renovating a house with your spouse is like marriage counselling 101. The joy, the tears; pushing you to the brink and then just a little but further. Yelling. Fighting. Laughing. Crying.

“It’s your fault we got into this in the first place!!” I would exclaim to my tireless worker of a husband.

And here I am, 7 years later, writing an ode to that place.

I’ll never forget our first Christmas together at Larchmount Ave. It was early December, and we were scrambling to finish a few final touches on our first (of many) rounds of renovations. Not only was it Christian’s birthday celebration, it was also our first Huggett Christmas Party (which is now an annual ‘do, 7 years later), and a big open house to welcome our friends and family to come see what we had been tirelessly been working on for months on end (and why we had been so darned anti-social). The debutant ball for our home.

It’s 11pm and we are racing to finish in preparation for the party the following day.

“We have to put up the tree”, I said. “It’s the best part…we can’t have a Christmas party in our new home without a Christmas tree!”

I had lovingly picked out ornaments and determined a colour scheme for our very first Christmas tree. We put on Mariah Carey’s Christmas album (what else?), made Bailey’s and hot chocolate, and got to it. At approximately midnight, we were ready to move onto to final part: ornaments!!

I excitedly unwrapped all of our new, sparkling, ornaments from their packaging, only to realize that I had forgotten to buy ornament hangers. It was a real pine Christmas tree, and the ornaments simply would not stay on the tree without hangers.

My eyes welled with tears and my lip trembled.

It wasn’t about the tree, the ornaments, or even Christmas. It was about the fact that we had reached that moment of the JOY of decorating together, in our first home, after months of painstaking renovations, only to realize that we couldn’t finish.

Christian looked at my face and knew that we had to complete the tree.

He ran out back to where our growing junk pile of renovation debris was, and came back with an arm-load of old electrical wire that we had removed from the house. Without missing a beat, he pulled out his wire cutters, pried back the plastic casing, and started fashioning copper-based Christmas ornament hooks from the electrical wire.

Through my tear-filled eyes, I realized what he was doing, and broke into a huge smile. We hung all our ornaments that night with those quirky, mis-matched copper-wire & plastic hand-made ornament hangers.

Still to this day, we proudly point out the remaining copper-wire ornament hangers on our Christmas tree and tell that story. It’s just one reminder of all the experiences we shared together in those years at Larchmount.

The truth is, I could write for hours about that house.

The creak of the floorboards. The sound of kids playing across street at the school. Getting ready for our wedding in the living room with my sister, mom and closet friends. Sitting in the backyard with friends on hot summer nights. Warding off raccoons. My sister’s “injury incident” on our back steps. Welcoming our first basement tenants. Meeting our amazing neighbours. Watching Leslieville grow and evolve. Welcoming friends into our home for parties, dinners, drinks. Hosting the Larchmount-Caroline laneway sale. Countless Pho dinners at Hainoi. Leaking ceilings, shattered glass tables, halloween haunted “porches”, laughing, crying. So much life. So much love.

[Photo Credit: Claudia Hung Weddings]

Although we moved out nearly three years ago into our new home, a part of us always remained there. Our renters took care of it as though it were there own, and in one of those amazing circumstances in life where things just simply fall into place, they are now the official new owners of our very first home on Larchmount Ave, and we couldn’t be happier.

(Bonus: its actually my colleague, so we get to continue to see the evolution of little Larchmount Ave as they create their own memories and home).

It’s the easiest way for me to say goodbye to a place that meant to much to Christian and I.

Growing up in a family where moving was essentially a hobby, I was surprised by how much that home meant to me. I cried the day we moved out, looking back at our empty living room and family room, and thinking back to all those moments we shared together. I could still see the renovation debris all over the floor from the first demo. I could still see that first quirky Christmas Tree in the corner. Our first hideous Craigslist couches in the living room.

So now we look forward to new places, new moments and new memories together…and all with our son, Harrison. 4 years felt like a lifetime in the midst of those renovations, but it’s just a blip in the history of the Happy Healthy Huggetts!

So…cheers to you, Larchmount Ave. We toast in your honour tonight. May you continue to provide life, love and happiness to your very lucky new owners.

makinghousetoronto – Volume 2!

November 22, 2013March 20, 20163 Comments

Yes friends, we’ve got some exciting news to share! After 4 long years of never-ending renovations, stories to share, pictures to post and general ups and downs, we’ve taken to plunge and bought a new home!

I have to be honest that this happened VERY FAST. It was about a week from the time that we started seriously looking at places, visited the bank for financing, and put an offer in on our dream home. We’re still in shock, and can’t actually comprehend that this baby is ours:

Yes, that’s a brand new build. In Toronto. We are over the moon excited. We have plans to put in a basement suite for rental income, however, that project is a whole lot of nothing compared to what we’ve been through at our original home in Leslieville.

We’re moving a bit north from where we are now, and will absolutely miss the charm the comes with our street and neighborhood, however, we’re so jazzed to start exploring our new ‘hood.

And what do I keep dreaming about, every single night? This. Kitchen.

There are no words. I think I’m going to have to become a professional chef. Watch out, Jamie Oliver.

So, with just a more sleeps until moving day, we are frantically packing and prepping. So stay tuned. While the DIY stories might be slowing down, we’ll still have lots to share when it comes to design, decor, entertaining, decorating for the holidays and beautifying our new (and much larger!) back yard.

Stay tuned!

Melissa

The Flooring Saga

April 1, 2013November 19, 20131 Comment

On Thursday, the carpet was supposed to go in upstairs. This would have marked a huge step towards the finish line in our upstairs renovation. Notice I said “supposed to”….

Let’s rewind for a minute: two Saturday’s ago we put out the plea to our wonderful friends: Give us a few hours of your time, we will provide pizza and beer, and our floor will go bye-bye. Two bedrooms with laminate flooring + bedroom/ hallway with wood parquet….four hours of work, max. Progress was happening:

As the floor rip-up party continued, we kept running into sections of excessive glue and nails….someone never wanted this flooring to be removed! Then we got to the master bedroom. As Christian and his brother began pulling up the laminate, they realized that for some ridiculous make-us-want-to-egg-their-house reason, the previous home owners of our place decided to GLUE down the wood laminate flooring in our bedroom.

Yep, glue.

For those of you who haven’t worked with wood laminate, it is designed to “float” over the subfloor or old flooring. Nowhere is there ever any mention of glue.

Less than half of it came up, leaving us with this mess:

Some google searching provided several ideas on how to pull it up: we bought a heat gun and slowly melted the glue inch by inch so we could scrape it up (the most painfully frustrating method), we rented a pneumatic
chisel from Home Depot (which is the LOUDEST thing I have ever heard) to try to chisel it up, poured hot water on it (didn’t help), shoveled it (too hard on the back), yelled at it….and then I cried. 40 square feet of laminate flooring was not budging.

We were told the carpet installation company would “assess” the floor and offer suggestions on how to remove it. Didn’t happen. The carpet installers took one look at that stubborn floor and left. We were totally defeated, and stuck with our chaotic mess for at least another week.

On Good Friday, Christian decided to give the floor one last shot. He got his circular saw, set it to a shallow setting, and literally cut out the floor.

It worked. My amazingly patient and persevering husband tried everything, even after I had given up and admitted defeat, and he found a solution.

A few sheets of plywood to level the floor with the rest of the room, an we were set for carpet installation….and a relaxing Easter weekend!

H-2-Ooooooo…Crap!

February 15, 2013April 1, 20134 Comments

The bathroom Reno saga continues. The past few days, we’ve been feeling like we are on one of those HGTV shows where drama comes at every turn, and the home owners continue to find problems behind every wall….or floor board.

To fill you in on the back-story: in addition to gutting the bathroom at our place, we’ve also ripped out the entire upstairs hallway including ceilings and closet. Our house is nearly 100, so age-old plaster and lathe, plus who knows how many layers of paint on the walls, were starting to take their toll. The walls were peeling and cracking, and the ceiling uneven. It was the perfect “well, while we’re at it….” scenario – it was time for it to come down.

After dealing with some not so good news with our roof earlier this week, we got the call yesterday that I had been dreading: our bathroom tub drain had been leaking for….years? Yep, water in the floor of the second floor and better still, funneling down into the powder room walls and ceiling below. Allow me to explain the photo below: there is a larger Tupperware basin in the floor that is attempting to catch the leak:

Can we also pause for a moment to consider how this ENTIRE pipe is made of smaller pipe elbow? I am the farthest thing from a plumber and I can tell you right away what is wrong with this picture. NO WONDER the pipes were leaking!? Unbelievable.

We had to send Christian is to start bailing:

It was a nerve-wracking 48 hours to say the least. Thank goodness for a phenomenal contractor. Yes, all previous projects have been 100% DIY, however, this one was biting off more than we could chew so we brought in help on the demo and drywall side. Rob, owner of Rob’s Renos, was at our place until 10:30pm the other night ensuring that things were taken care of. It was pretty impressive and we’re relieved that things are looking up. Thanks Rob 🙂

As for the main floor powder room…..? An who knows what’s behind THAT wall….

Water = 4
Christian & Melissa = 0

Draining our resources

August 22, 2011February 7, 20132 Comments

From my recent update a few days ago, I shared a very important lesson learned:

concrete + pipes = BAD

Our house seems to have a love-hate relationship with water. The majority of things that have gone wrong in this house relate to water, so I suppose it’s become some sort of sick joke. From the major roof leaks in our guest bedroom and office, to a burst pipe leaving water pouring out of the ceiling in our basement laundry room, to a backed up clean-out that had to be replaced in late 2009…with our latest little endeavour, I’d have to estimate that we have spent close to $5,000 in water-related “incidents”. Oh, the joys of home ownership.

So, to summarize our recent adventure, here’s what happened: as Christian and I tackled the latest of our reno projects (most recently, the front porch reno), Christian was busy mixing mortar for our tiles, and, although dating farther back but still having impact on this story, Christian had also been doing some concrete work on our back steps.

Well, with our built-in-the-1930s 3-inch diameter pipes that twisted and turned under the floor of the basement apartment, concrete and mortar “bits” don’t fare too well when it comes to those small nooks and crannies. What had happened over the past year or so, is that bits of concrete and mortar had gone down the drain and had found a new home in which to expand = our pipes.

What ensued was that every time it would rain, the water would come down the steps towards the basement door, and instead of going down the trench drain that Christian had put in, or even down the drain in the downstairs laundry room, it basically pooled and overflowed.

So we called our friend Neil at Drainforce (they don’t have a site, but we’ve used them twice and they’ve been fair and reliable so wanted to provide a number for y’all) to come on down. The conrete in our pipes was so bad, that he couldn’t even get his scope through to “scope out” the situation (get my joke? Scope out? Yep, barrel o’ laughs over here…)

Neil and his team were great, although Christian and I were super depressed to learn that the problem extended through our newly finished floor. All in all, the team had to break up about 30 square feet of concrete and tile, replace the pipe, and re-pour the concrete. Here’s a “drying-stage” photo….I love the added drama of the CAUTION tape:

And here’s another angle of the damage – you can see the big trench drain I was talking about. Please, try not to focus on the ugly conrete steps…there on the “down the road” list, we promise:

While Christian typically chooses to do this type of work himself, time was of the essence, and it turned out we fixed this in the nick of time, as Toronto and surrounding areas were hit was a serious storm on Sunday. This was the ultimate test. Christian and I were actually in the downstairs laundry room when the heavens opened and Noah’s flood came down the stairs…well, our $$$ were well spent – not a drop flowed onto the floor! Everything went down the shiny, new, non-concrete filled pipe! VICTORY! Thanks Neil!!!

The hardest part for us was trying to match the floor tile. Seriously, has anyone tried to do this before? Impossible. We were lucky enough to find about 9 tiles leftover in the garage that the previous home-owners had left us, but we needed about 29. So off to Lowe’s and Rona we went, sample tile in tow.

I wish I had a picture of this, but it was such a work-night rush to get what we needed that I forgot the camera. I was litterally on all fours in the middle of the aisle, comparing and contrasting 6 different tiles. Good rule of thumb that I learned: go for the overall colour tones of the tile and try not to get too caught up with the pattern. When it comes to grout, go darker than you think, espeically when replacing new tiles within an old floor – the older grout will always look less clean (it took me two trips to Home Depot to figure that one out).

And thus concludes our water-logged drama….and the basement has returned to normal (mis-matched yet barely noticeable tiles and all):

I sincerely hope that we are done with water drama for the next several years….and you know what, Madonna, I do not want to sing about rain right now, or think about any more water in or around our house. At all. Thank you, and good night.

Good rule of thumb: Pipes + Concrete Don’t Mix

August 17, 2011March 20, 20161 Comment

Sorry I’ve been a bit MIA for several days – there’s a good story behind it, I promise! It seems that we’re having a little bit of…er….water drama. Christian and I have managed to avoid major house melt-down for some time since our initial massive overhaul way back in the fall /winter of 2009 (we don’t miss those repeat moments of leaking ceilings in multiple rooms, flooding basements and so on).

Well, our lucky streak is over and we have learned a good lesson: concrete + pipes = BAD.

To keep it short and sweet for now: do not, I repeat, DO NOT rinse anything that has mortar or concrete in your laundry sink. Even if you think “hey, this is just a little bit at the bottom of the pail…no bigge”. It’s a biggie. Don’t do it!!!!

More to come on this, (with some photos, of course), but let’s just say there is some serious upheaval happening in the basement and we are not happy campers.

Water has continued to be our #1 enemy when it comes to our happy little home. All will be fine in a few days, we’re certain, and I’ll be sure to fill you in on all the dramatic details soon!

Stay dry!

Inspiration all around us!

July 29, 2011February 8, 20131 Comment

Sometimes, it’s hard to get started on a project. You just aren’t sure what colour to work into a room, and walking into decor stores or even big-box stores can be extremely overwhelming, and cause you to spend 45 minutes considering the life and times of mailboxes (yes, I’ve done this…more on that another time).

So, where do we find inspiration for a room, design, or project? Well, everywhere. Start taking notes of things that make you go “Hey, I really like that!” If you see something you love, nab a picture on your phone and make a place to file your ideas and inspirations…it doesn’t matter if it doesn’t match anything right now, or perfectly fit into the guest bedroom you’re dying to dress up…just keep it….you never know when that idea or inspiration will come in handy! Here are a few quick examples:

I nabbed this fabric during a recent trip to Fabricland (during their down-town location closing-out sale…*sniff*) and was immediately drawn to the colours. I’m pretty certain it is going to be the inspiration for our office make-over project. So pumped!

This next one is all things funky. I was out for dinner last night with some girl-friends at Southern BBQ style restaurant, Harlem, on Queen West in Toronto.

Near our table was an array of funky prints, and this one caught my eye immediately. Welcome to DIY-ville, population: YOU! (or me). It’s a really cool twist on a large picture frame, involving what seemed to be an old window, handle and all, with distress marks for good measure. The classic print that is framed just met its match with this one! This is the kind of thing you can create with awesome garage sale, antique or auction finds.

Finally, a little vay-cay inspiration. Christian and I recently went on a little road-trip to Essex County, Ontario. En route, we stopped at the WindJammer Inn, in Port Stanley, ON, an adorable B&B with out-of-this-world food. Our room was cozy, and had a great rustic-cottage-meets-contemporary vibe to it. Right away I was drawn to the curtain head-board. I apologize that I don’t have an amazing picture of it, but here’s this one from their own website (they have since changed the cover to crisp white and light blue strip rather than this busy guy, which looks really awesome):And here’s one of me shortly after launching myself onto the giant king-sized bed (we have a Queen at home, and it never ceases to amaze me just how big King beds are). So for the quality…our camera was really acting up. But you get the idea, plus, who doesn’t love dorky pictures like this one on a Friday?:

Finally, here is a waaaaay better version to help with your headboard inspiration from (where else) Apartment Therapy:

Love the yellow-teal-chocolate brown combo!

So, there you have it – go out this weekend and get INSPIRED!

To enclose, or not to enclose: PART 2, the Grand Finale!

July 27, 2011August 24, 20117 Comments

For those of you who had the chance to read my recent blog on our flip-flopping decision relating to our porch enclosure, you will be pleased to know that it’s time for the grand reveal. There are, of course, several tweaks, finishing touches and final projects to be completed (it’s the renovation that keeps on giving, remember?), but you will get the overall gist of our latest renovation experience momentarily.

Before I get to the grand reveal, let’s review the stages of progress, shall we? As I’ve already shared with you, Christian and I would consider ourselves to be renovation vets, having already tackled a complete basement overhaul, re-wiring of our old knob-and-tube electrical (NOTE: we didn’t do the wiring, but cleaned up the massive mess afterward by patching and painting all the walls!), giving our kitchen a serious facelift, removing walls on the main floor, installing flooring and refinishing our stairs (oh, the blog stories to come!). Now, Christian and I decided to work on the porch enclosure and front-of-house over our main upstairs bathroom for two key reasons:

1) it would be faster, and,

2) it would be cheaper.

Turns out, we were pretty much wrong on both fronts.

Weekend #1: May Long Weekend

– Friday afternoon: demolition of old front porch enclosure

– Friday evening: start framing and replace front window on original exterior house wall

NOTE: Christian basically drills into his own thumb at this point; we probably should have gone to the hospital but he’s too darned stubborn so tough and manly that he forged ahead.

– Saturday all day: more framing, thanks to our friend Merv and neighbor Mike for the extra hands!

– Sunday all day: ply wood up and wrapping started, windows in! Christian’s brother shows up just in time to help install the double front doors

– Monday: finishing up framing, wrapping and starting on the electrical (again, get a pro to do this!)

NOTE: wondering where I am during all this? Oh, I remember, I was chiseling out all the old ceramic tiles and mortar that once was the floor of the enclosure. Worst. Job. Ever. Seriously, right up there with taring (water-proofing) our basement walls…more on that another time.

Yep, this was me. All weekend long. chip chip chip ow. chip chip chip ow. ow. ow. chip bang. bang bang chip chip.

What I learned later was that there is a power tool that does this job. In just hours (honestly I’m guessing I spent a good 20+ hours on this). One of our contractor friends said we “could have borrowed it”. Or, we could have even gone the Home Depot Tool Rental route. I can’t help but wonder if Christian was with-holding this information in order to keep me completely occupied for the weekend and out of his hair. I’m still laughing about this one. ha. ha. ha.

With weekend #1 behind us, we were already feeling behind. The siding wasn’t in yet (it was on special order). I was still chipping away at the tiles. We had clearly forgotten what it felt like to work 10+ hour days on weekends. The little projects were adding up to one massive to-do list.

Weekend #2: May 28-29th

Getting the siding up on the exterior (woo! the vision is coming alive!)

Insulation (another one of my not-so-favourite jobs),dry-walling and more dry-walling.

Let’s not even talk about the experience we had installing the ceiling dry-wall. Honestly, either get poles for extra support or hire a professional….that was not one of our finer renovating moments.

Weekend #3: June 4-5th

Finish drywall, followed by extreme muding and taping

Weekend #4: June 11-12th

We. Are. Over. This. Renovation.

How much time can a 200 square foot space to renovation? Too long. The little jobs just kept coming, and poor Christian was taking extra days off of work to help push our *little* project along.

Accomplishments:

– building the cedar landing and stairs at the front

– sanding the drywall

– priming and painting the walls

Weekend #5: June 18-19th

Ironically, June 18th marked the first year of marriage for us. We should take a break, right? Wrong. It was pretty fitting for us that we should spend our anniversary working on our house. Instead we:

– installed lights, finished electrical

– cleaned tiles and grout

– put baseboards in, windows trimmed

*We did indulge in a much-deserved dinner at the 360 restaurant that night…a 9pm reservation. We were literally falling asleep at the table after a full day of work. Ah, marital bliss….allow me to take a minute to share one of our favouriate wedding pics that I know you will all love and appreciate:

Photo Credit: Claudia Hung Weddings

*sigh* the good ol’ days.

Back to renovation-reality: The most rewarding moment of the entire process? Arriving home after our dinner in the sky at the CN Tower and seeing our newly installed lights, shining like a beacon in the night! Although it was a lot of work and not our first choice on how to spend our anniversary, we felt a sense of pride when we arrived homed, walked up our newly-built, cedar-smelling stairs and used our new front door for the first time! Kind of a touching moment, isn’t it? All together now: “awwwwwwww”:

Thanks for reading – share your comments below!

happy healthy huggetts

a lifestyle blog for those looking for a bit more "happy" in their life.

Tag: house