Kevin and Heather came over when we first moved in to help get organized.. and they brought beer (cheers!) -- essential to the day's tasks. The kitchen will be a future project; we're learning to live with the faux brick and dark brown 70s cabinets -- though we did demo the exterior wood shingles that were over the stove and cabinets, and painted the cabinets in the work area white and blue.

Here it is, all cleaned up!

Here is the second floor landing and banister, before the floors were done. Carl hand-sanded around each post to create a completely smooth finish.

We just had new storm windows installed behind the stained glass windows on the staircase landing. They make a huge difference in preventing heat loss, and don't impact the way the glass looks from the inside (before this was done, we were getting frost on the interior of the stained glass!) Fortunately, almost all of the original windows in the house were replaced with new double-glazed windows before we bought it, and the few windows that haven't been replaced have decent storm windows. Our contractors also found that the entire house has blown-in insulation already -- excellent! The heating bill is still substantial, but (amazingly) it's no more than we were paying in our old apartment on Prospect Street, which was a much smaller flat on the second floor of a three-family house. There is definitely more we can do to tighten it up; we'll start with a (free!) Bay State Gas energy audit next month.

For the record, here are the paint colors we used... everything is Pittsburgh "Pure Performance" Paint (their zero-VOC line).

First and third floors: Mesa Beige (walls), Mother of Pearl (ceilings)
Second floor: Mesa Beige (hallway), Mother of Peral (ceilings and trim), Pickling Spice, Sand Fossil, Shiny Silk, and Shell Flower (bedroom walls).

A close-up shot of the sconce in the hallway.

Here is the front hall and staircase after renovations-- the Chinese deco sconce light on the wall came from an old house just outside of Philipsburg, New Jersey (as with all of the first floor lights, we bought it from the Old Light Warehouse). The oak stair treads were refinished as well as all of the floors, and all of the radiators were painted silver. The mirror was a gift from my parents, and came from an antique store in Putnam, Connecticut.