![]() September 6, 2015 It is Labor Day Weekend. Although we spent several days at the farm working prior to it officially being ours, today was the first day that we actually began working on the house itself. [This summer Phil cut down close to 20 trees in the yard with the help of his dad's tractor and loader. These were Chinese Elms and Cedars. It is a shame, but they were dead, so they had to go. The kids were a great help; they pulled a trailer behind our golf cart to haul branches in to our tree pile. Samantha and I spent a lot of time taking down the fence that went around the west and south sides of the house. Phil and the boys helped as well. Mowing, and cutting down big weeds with trimmers along the fence line south of the barn was a job also. Ice cream cones from the local ice cream shop were a great treat at the end of a hot day's work!] We started tearing out the plaster walls in the southeast bedroom upstairs, with the help of Phil's dad, Ron, his sister, Sara, and our nephew Carter. We weren't for sure if we wanted to tear out the plaster walls, feeling guilty for destroying something that presumably took much time and labor to construct by my ancestors. However, we knew it was what we preferred. This was a very slow-moving task, with crow bars and hammers. Phil set up a chute out the window down to a trailer on the ground. Discarding the plaster and lathe was much easier this way! We had to tear down paneling, ceiling tiles, and burgundy floral wallpaper in the southeast bedroom, before getting to the plaster. Having no experience with tearing down plaster, I was intrigued to see the horse hair throughout all of the plaster. Phil explained that it was used to help hold it together. These people were truly intelligent and resourceful. The southwest bedroom was our next room to "tackle", even though we were no where close to being done with the other bedroom. This was the "blue room" that was my FAVORITE when I was a little girl and visited my great-aunt Colleen! This room had blue floral paneling. Samantha discovered the cursive alphabet in orange crayon written about knee level on the east wall. Colleen had told us that her father's brother had done this, as she had seen it before. Very neat to see! We left that wall in hopes of figuring out a way to keep the plaster that the letters were written on. Not sure if this is going to be possible, though. Sara found a perfume label between the floor board and the wall, which I will attach a photo of.
Horse hair in the plaster
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AuthorI'm just your ordinary small-town type of gal. My family is my world. Gardening, running, camping, and boating are my hobbies. Teaching youngsters is my career. Archives
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