To our home’s successors,

The list is long, but we had to start somewhere. I took the train in from Boston and started to clean one weekend while Matt was away. I felt it was essential to clean as much as I could prior to our move-in and unpacking. A few of the rooms were covered in plaster dust or a thick layer of dust.

If you’re reading this before moving in, we suggest you do the same. Pick 1-3 rooms as your sanity rooms. You will hopefully not be doing a long laundry list of neglected work since we are doing it all for you 😉 but can imagine you’ll want a fresh start at least. We chose the nicest bedroom (at the time) and the parlor. We also needed to clean a bathroom so we would feel comfortable showering… this was not an easy decision because they were both in rough shape- but such is the way.

I started in the parlor and cleaned the built-ins first because I felt it would be the most rewarding start that could motivate me to tackle the downstairs bathroom…
Once that was done, I moved to the bathroom and the primary Bedroom. 

A little over a week later, we needed to tackle this fridge cabinet that left an opening large enough for probably a 1950’s fridge (how a fridge that small fed a family of 13 is beyond me). If we wanted to move in, we wanted a means to eat which meant getting a new fridge installed. There’s only 2 of us, but future planning- I wanted a larger fridge. I’m hoping by the time you read this, this fridge nook will be cleaner than it is right now…

With the fridge installed and our lease in Boston ending, our parents helped us move in at the end of February 2019. 

We continued to tackle cleaning, unpacking and contacting contractors to help us get things rolling while we waited for spring.

At the time, our largest concern was the knob-and-tube wiring and the jerry-rigged wiring throughout the house, and thought we would be working room by room and doing each room over at a time starting with the room with the biggest curse. By word of mouth, we were able to locate our electrician and get him out for a walk-through at the end of February after moving in. 

After consulting with him, we decided we would trench in new service to the house and remove the overhead wires feeding the house. We were told that in order to do the room-by-room rewiring, we would need to gut the rooms to ensure all knob-and-tube was removed and for the best access.

This would be one of the first lessons we would learn the hard way, and it is the room I expect you to have the most issues with. This- is the reason we’ve decided to start telling our story. We hope you will understand why we’ve done what we’ve done and give us some grace with our decisions and hopefully inspire you to make better choices.