StuccoHouse

Introducing Tappan Talk

2009-11-08T13:03:00.002-06:00

A few of you have already discovered the link I added to the side bar. I've created a page on my blog specifically dedicated to vintage Tappan stoves.

Not a week goes by that I don't receive at least one email from a Tappan owner looking for information, advice, or just someone to share their Tappan enthusiasm. My record in responding to emails is admittedly spotty. I just don't have the time to reply with info. to each email, and often I don't know the answer to the question asked.

So, I decided to create a page where Tappan owners that end up on my blog can exchange info. & discuss Tappan Deluxe stoves. Selfishly, I also hope to learn a lot about my own stove :-)

Please keep in mind that the Tappan Talk page is very much in it's preliminary stages. I hope to put up posts by category so they are easily searchable and comments are limited to one topic.

I hope you enjoy.

Place Your Orders

2009-11-03T16:17:00.002-06:00

Just a very quick post. I'm dealing with both a busy work life and an ocean of leaves in my yard.

But, I promised last year to let you know when the Epworth United Methodist Church was taking orders for pasties. Consider this your notice. Orders for pasties must be paced by Thursday, Nov. 5th. (ordering done for this sale - next sale is Feb 6, 2010 cost will be $5.00). The cost is $4.50 - specify either meat or vegetarian.

Orders are then picked up at the church on November 7th - 3207 37th Ave. S., Minneapolis.

Another intriguing dinner will be held at the Minnehaha Communion Lutheran Church. Their lutefisk dinner will also be taking place on November 7th - 4101 37th Ave S., Minneapolis. Reservations are required for this one. Call the church at 612-722-9527.

If you attend the lutefisk dinner: 1) let me know how it was; and 2) you are braver than me :-)

Seven Year Itch

2009-10-31T15:27:00.000-05:00

Seven years ago today I moved into StuccoHouse. Some days it seems like it was yesterday, others like it was 15 years ago.

How did I celebrate the anniversary? By hanging some glow-in-the-dark fake spiderwebs on my front door overhang. Yes, I splurged the extra dollar for the glow-in-the-dark version. I hope the added expense was worth it.

Honestly, the spider web looks a whole lot better in real life when the wind isn't blowing.

At any rate, Happy Halloween to all!

Painted Red

2009-10-19T23:07:00.001-05:00

Not much, but the new shelves for my chimney cabinet are now painted red. This is the same red that one day you will see below the chair rail in my kitchen.

I have the bulk of the old paint off of the chimney cabinet itself. But, since my last post on the topic things have become cold here and open window ventilation is no longer possible. I have a fear of working with chemical stripper inside with my gravity furnace.

That said, I'm sure in a few weeks boredom, stupidity & ambition will drive me to come up with some way to get the remaining paint off of the cabinet. Of course, removing the tiny remains of paint in the crevices usually take the most time.

The Change Out

2009-10-11T16:01:00.000-05:00

Pulled my screens out and replaced them with storms this afternoon. I probably won't be so fond of this task when I'm 90, but I enjoy it now. I only change out 6 smaller windows, so it's not overwhelming.

Shown in the photo is the wood trim I'll be stripping and repainting next summer.

Here are the three stages: storm in, screen out, screen in.

Drying Paint and Fake Storm Windows

2009-10-10T18:43:00.001-05:00

Under the gun yesterday, I was able to get my kitchen window exterior trim primed and painted. As predicted, it snowed last night and today it's cold, cold, cold (30's) and windy.

The kitchen windows don't have storms. I took off the awful aluminum triple track storms two summers ago. I have wood screens (salvaged) and the plan was to promptly find wood frame screens. But, I've been waffling between traditional wood storms and Marvin wood frame combination storms (pricey as my windows are non-standard sizes).

As I look back at my posts, I see I wrote another full-of-angst-because-winter-is-coming-and-I-don't-have-kitchen-storms post last year at about this same time. Oh well.

Last year I survived the winter without kitchen storms. I left in the wood frame screens. This wasn't very good on the double hung sashes. So, this year I got a little more ambitious.

This afternoon, I first painted the old screen black. The screen wood frames were originally green and the metal screening was still painted green....and a little rusty. It was time to make them black. (I apologize for the blurry picture - it looked in focus when I took it.)

Then I put on some of that exterior grade winter sheet plastic on the exterior of the wood frames. I was able to pull it pretty tight, so you can't see it from the street unless you look closely.

I waited as long as I could today to let the paint from yesterday dry as much as possible. When the sun started going down, I put in the fake "storms." I like the pale yellow & gray combination.

We're set for another winter...well, kitchen window-wise at least.

In the Nick of Time

2009-10-09T15:24:00.002-05:00

We have had two days of sun with temperatures on the 50's. So, I've had time to prime and paint my exterior kitchen wood trim. I stripped the trim down to bare wood, so the trim details are nice and crisp (not to mention lead free). I've included some close ups of the repaired rot.

You can see that I stripped the exterior paint off of the sashes (and sash channel) - I'll be removing this from the inside, reglazing them, repainting them, and putting in a new rope. But, that's a whole other project for another day.

It never ceases to surprise me at how yellow that paint it once it's on. It looks like a very light creamy yellow in the can (BM Barley).

I'm writing this post as I wait for the first coat to dry. Then it will get a second coat of paint. I also need to run down to the hardware store to buy some exterior plastic to put under the wood framed screens (not in these photos)...as I still don't have wood storms for these windows.

The final photo is what the trim originally looked like. Ugh.

Snow is in the forcast for tomorrow.

The Clock is Ticking

2009-10-05T23:24:00.000-05:00

It was not supposed to rain today. I had plans to put a coat or two of primer on the exterior trim of my kitchen windows. I started stripping & repairing this trim last fall and finished up a few weekends ago. Now I have my fingers crossed that it will stop raining long enough for the wood to dry before we get hit with snow. Stress.

The New Kitchen Light

2009-10-04T13:37:00.003-05:00

As big of a hassle as it was to install, I am totally in love with my new kitchen ceiling light. I finally got the thing installed and working this morning.

Because the light electrical box was kind of sunk into the plaster ceiling...and the ceiling tiles exacerbated this....I had originally installed an extender box. But when the light was installed, this caused it to hang down 1/2 inch from the ceiling.

It finally dawned on me that a better approach would be to remove the extender box and use really long screws to attach the light to the existing box. School House Electric was kind enough to send me some longer screws. It worked, the light sits flat against the ceiling with a tight and solid fit.

You can see the new cabinet in the background. I still need to paint half of the ceiling tiles - if you look closely you can see some of them to the far right are still white.

And just so you remember what the old light looked like.....

Small Stuff

2009-09-23T23:03:00.002-05:00

Two minor events:

I was at Home Depot the other day and managed to charm the guy in lumber into cutting shelves for me to the exact size needed for my chimney cabinet. I had been putting this off forever because I though it would involve hauling home a 4'x8' piece of plywood and having to cut it down. I have them sanded and primed. They are going to be painted vintage red.

The second advancement in home restoration this week was the arrival of longer nickel screws for my kitchen light fixture. After I contacted them by email, Schoolhouse Electric was kind enough to send out a pair of screws to me. The light can now be installed. Hurrah!

More Birch

2009-09-20T16:05:00.000-05:00

Spending some time today stripping a vintage birch chimney cabinet I bought some years ago. You can't tell in the photo, but the glass is original and wavy. I had new shelves cut yesterday.

It's the same wood as my kitchen cabinets, so I plan on shellacking it and using it in the kitchen. The shelves will be the same vintage red that is going on the kitchen's lower walls. I actually have the door and hardware already completed, but will share those photos with the rest.

One Inch Short

2009-09-12T00:37:00.011-05:00

I have the rest of my kitchen ceiling installed. I installed the bulk of it a few weeks ago when the new cabinet was going in. The remaining pieces needed to be cut to size & put up....and to get motivated to do that took me a while. But, its up. Now the remaining tiles just need to be painted.

I was also able to get the ceiling electrical box ready for the new light. I was all ready last weekend to install the ceiling light I purchased from Schoolhouse Electric. I turned off the main electrical switch, crawled up the ladder with the light.....and realized the screws supplied with the lamp were way too short.

Easy peazy, I though. I'll just run to the hardware store and get two longer ones. Four hardware stores later, it dawned on me that these screws were not going to be found locally (slotted, 2", nickel plated). So, I sent off a polite email to Schoolhouse Electric asking them if it was possible they had a couple of replacement screws I could buy....I referred them to my kitchen lighting post.

Well, they checked my blog post....and then promptly ignored my email. No response. Not a peep.

Weary sigh.

So, still no light in my kitchen.

UPDATE 9/15/09: Today I received a call from Schoolhouse Electric and they are sending me two screws. Yeah! I am very anxious to get that ceiling light up. All's well that ends well.

The Retraction

2009-09-09T00:35:00.004-05:00

It appears that the Evil Squirrel may have been falsely accused of the cabbage incident. New evidence has come to light that appears to exonorate him, and I am forced to retract my previous post's accusations.

Although, in my defense there was a lot of evidence that pointed directly to the squirrel. And his behavior in the past quickly moved him to the top of the list of usual suspects. Moments before I discovered the cabbage head in question, I saw the squirrel suspiciously close the to garden and could have sworn I saw a slight satisfied smirk. Also, every morning I open my front door to see a spilled pot of parsley & the flowers bitten off of my potted mums. Clearly this is a squirrel accustomed to behaving badly and without regard to the rules of common civilized living.

But as it turns out, a commenter to my previous post mentioned a little phenomenon called "split cabbage." Karen Anne's comments in my previous post provide a link with a photo of someone else's split cabbage. I have to admit, she appears to be right.

I have been watching CSI for enough years to know that you have to follow the evidence.

As a result, all charges against the Evil Squirrel for this event have been dropped at this time. I retain the right to resurrect said charges if new evidence surfaces.

The Sauerkraut That Wasn't

2009-09-05T15:30:00.000-05:00

The little snot. And that it *not* the word I want to use, but this is a G-rated blog.

After I spent the entire summer watching over these four cabbage plants - protecting them from cabbage bugs & slugs. I even squished a few slugs with my bare hands to save those plants. This is how the Evil Squirrel behaves.

He had better not show his face to me any time soon or his time on this earth will be short.

Buying for the Bungalow

2009-09-04T09:56:00.027-05:00

Received an interesting email today announcing a Twin Cities Bungalow Club event.

They are sponsoring a talk Buying for the Bungalow: A Shopping Trip Through Time. The guest speaker is a historian for Rejuvention Lighting and House Parts.

Sunday, September 13, 2009
2:30 to 4:00 p.m.
Bungalow Club members free; non-members $3
Hillcrest Community Recreation Center
1978 Ford Pkwy., St. Paul

More detailed info. about the event can also be found at the Twin Cities Bungalow Club Website

Images used with permission

From The Pages of A Magazine

2009-08-29T11:05:00.008-05:00

When I first bought my house, I spent hours looking through magazines trying to get ideas of how I wanted to decorate my house. When I bought my house, I didn't even know it was a bungalow. I only discovered this when I saw a house that looked a lot like mine on the cover of American Bungalow.

When I found pictures I liked, I tore out the pages and put them into a folder.

After a while I started to get a pretty good idea of how I wanted the house to look and what was appropriate for a bungalow, so I stopped saving magazine pages. I haven't looked in the folder since the day I stopped tearing out pages.

Last week I was cleaning out some papers and I ran across the folder I had kept. I pulled out all of the magazine pages & looked through them. Some of them I looked at and thought..."what on earth was I thinking?" But there was one that made me stop and pause.

It was a picture of a vintage stove that I tore out of a magazine whose name I can't find on the page (possibly Storage 2004)....

I had to laugh. Recognize that stove?

It's the exact Tappan Deluxe I have been restoring in my living room. Note the salt & pepper shakers on top.

Somehow, I found this vintage stove picture to give me an idea of how it would look in my kitchen. Then years later the stars aligned (long after I had forgotten about it) to have that exact stove be the one I found on Craigslist for the right price at the right time.

All I need is the speckled bowl & yellow stock pot.

Scored Plaster

2009-08-25T00:08:00.006-05:00

I'm in the middle of the thankless job of stripping all of the paint off of the scored plaster in my kitchen below the chair rail. Whose bright idea was it to do this? Oh, that's right. Mine.

I have one wall completely done. I will admit that the scoring in the plaster looks much crisper now that 5 layers of paint have been removed. The scored plaster is very cool. One of those small details you only find in an old house.

I think I'm going to paint this one wall the vintage red to see how it looks before I move on to stripping the paint off of the rest. Just to give me some hope & motivation.

The plan: New chair rail to replace the mysteriously missing one. Wallpaper above the chair rail. Paint below.

Oh, and I managed to fit three complete sets of dishes (Dansk, Sargadelos & Fire King) into my new cabinet.

Is That The Truck Coming?

2009-08-06T18:24:00.004-05:00

Super quick post. This has been an ongoing problem at StuccoHouse resulting in long periods of a garage filled with many, many bags of newspaper and plastic bottles. As well, as mad dashes out to the alley in the dark hours of the evening and the wee hours of the morning.

Until now!

Look up your Minneapolis recycling schedule online.

CSA - Take Two

2009-08-05T16:02:00.008-05:00

We joined a CSA again this year. We were gun shy after our "series of unfortunate CSA events" last year. But, we found a new CSA that provided quite a few more boxes at half the price of our previous farm. So, we put aside our reservations & joined.

We are now on box 10. I waited this long to post to make absolutely sure we liked our new arrangement.

We really do.

Eener's Farm.

Our boxes have been solid, fresh and usable. We like the personable feeling of the newsletters and their entertaining farm blog. We are definitely getting our money's worth this year. Best of all, no one has been reprimanded yet ;-)

This week's box: Pie apples (enough for an actual tart), yellow onion, squash, summer savory, swiss chard, green peppers and carrots.

We have a half-share (22 boxes).

Chair Rail

2009-08-03T19:29:00.004-05:00

I feel a little silly posting this as "progress," but I've learned that if I don't break things down into smaller steps......I'm left with writing one monster post trying to remember exactly what I've done.

So, this past weekend I stained the new chair rails for the kitchen. For whatever reason, one of the previous owners removed sections of the orignal birch chair rail. The carpenter who built my kitchen cabinet, also cut some replacement boards for me.

One issue with these boards is that they will meet the old chair rain in the corner over my sink. This means that the colors will have to match very well. I've done the base stain and will not do a multiple coat wipe on amber shellac finish. Fingers crossed.

The plan then is to paint below the chair rails & put up wallpaper above.

Bits and Pieces

2009-08-02T15:33:00.009-05:00

I haven't written about the Tappan Deluxe restoration lately. It has been continuing behind the scenes. Over the past few months I have been able to track down two missing parts.

The first was a replacement for a stove burner flash valve. It the little valve that carries the gas from the manifold to the burner & creates the pilot light for the burners. The original had a stripped screw hole. The photo shows the old (dull) and the replacement (shiny).

The next part was a small brown knob that was totally missing from my stove when I bought it. I knew what was supposed to be there after saving countless photos from folks selling stoves on Ebay.

I was lucky enough to locate a guy who was dismantling (RIP) a Tappan Deluxe & selling the parts. I sent of an email with photo asking him if he had the needed part. He did. On my stove, this bottom knob is used to turn the oven light on & off.

As an aside for others restoring stoves, this same brown knob can be found under the stove top to control the Visiguide. I believe they are interchangeable.

I *still* have to order new insulation, burner valve cream, and one burner knob. Then it's pretty much a matter of putting it all back together again.

Moving In

2009-07-27T12:13:00.006-05:00

I have the new kitchen cabinet shellacked now. Three coats of wiped in amber shellac. I was nervous to shellac a piece with so many details, but it went very smoothly and actually needed no sanding.

I've started to move my dishes in. This is a first, because my vintage cabinets are too shallow to accommodate modern plate sizes. Until now, I've been storing my dishes in the dining room buffet. I even had canning wax on hand to wax the rails of the drawer.

It's been hard to photo the kitchen because it's relatively small (approx 10'x11') and for some odd reason, when I don't use a flash I get a weird amber glow on everything...and when I do use a flash, everything is overly stark. Imagine somewhere in between.

I still need to hunt down vintage latches for the three doors. And the carpenter is going to come back to cut the crown moulding.

Another Shade of Green

2009-07-24T00:13:00.004-05:00

I may have posted pictures of these when I first bought them a few years ago (okay, 5 years ago). But, here you go again. Photos of the lights going up in my kitchen.

I made one little discovery the other day. For some reason when I ordered the lights for over the sink (the double) and for the wall, I forgot to have a switch/chain added as these are not connected to the light switch. So, I think I'm going to bring them to LightWorks Lighting to have them added.

Fingers crossed that when I remove the current sink & wall light, I find updated wiring (I did in the ceiling).

Out of Sight

2009-07-23T18:00:00.005-05:00

Quick little fun project last night. I stenciled a quick little "frame" on to the bottom of my new kitchen cabinet's drawer. Same colors as my soon-t0-be-installed wallpaper.

My Mom was the one who motivated me to get going on this whole project, so I thought I'd ask her to write a little "dedication" of the new cabinet.

Fun to just know it's down there...and will add some unexpected historical interest for future owners.

A Recap

2009-07-22T11:13:00.005-05:00

Here are the vintage 1924 birch cabinets currently in my kitchen:

Here is my newly added cabinet, stained & awaiting a shellac top coat: