This was my main house selling project, took hours and hours. The before pic was took after I had stripped the 60 years of paint off them. I am quite proud of my efforts though

Yes, great work, looks very good, and I love the ornament!

He he, I went round the house taking pics. The ornament appears on 99% of them:curse:, but I have to love her

So she's not stuck to the stairs then?

No but I'm sure I've varnished a few of her hairs onto them

....and so you should be - very nice!

LOL - that was my first thought, too! Reminds me of my Boxer, Cindy.

Maybe I'm a heathen - carpet all the way but yes, nice ornament on the stairs ... it's not one of a matching pair is it?

Woah Calgal - you have my sympathies and my everything-a-thies ! Hope that great big hole gets patched up soon

Love the ADT decal!

LOL - hadn't thought of it like that Just come on in through the hole...lol

Thanks for all the sympathy and karma, guys! I really have felt like joining Souv on that bridge at times over the last year - it's just gone from bad to worse....

Actually the hole is pretty much filled in for now and we have a tarp over the entire section . We're at the point where we need some extra muscle as the new window is much larger and VERY heavy as it's triple glazed. Can't find any decent help and don't want to damage it trying to be clever

Fortunately it's also off a raised deck (which did have stairs but they were so rotten we pulled them down earlier this year). So what started out as a simple window replacement job, and some cosmetic updating inside, has become new windows, new siding (because many parts of wall have to be replaced), and new deck/stairs - it's a BIG deck built into the roof as well! ALL because of poor building practices in the first place!!! But hey - guess it saved them some time and money.... God knows what it's gonna cost us to fix though

We also have to replace the roof as it is on it's last legs and also leaking, at least until we had some patch repairs done. The guy inspecting it, noted that the skylight over the bathroom - had NO NAILS or SCREWS holding it in place!!!!!! WTF?!?

The only good thing about it, was all the rain two summers ago brought it all to light right before we were about to install new hardwood in three rooms. Hardwood is still in it's packing!

All this on a ten year old house (or should I say 'shed'...lol).

Where is Mike Holmes when you need him?

(sorry for ranting on - now where IS that bridge...)

Honey I do sympathise (and Shazza -great stairs)... but hey isn't this typical of Canadian building standards? When we bought in Calgary the surveyor/home inspector looked at the jagged crack in the cement floor of the basement and said it was "superficial".

We bought. We then wanted to "finish" the basement. It turned out the original builders had failed to "backfill" all areas of the basement foundation. Cue $85,000 of remedial work (yep organised long-distance, on trust, from London).

In the end our "hole" was filled, all the underfloor heating was replaced, new concrete floor installed, floating wood floor above, etc. etc. and now it looks great... but compared to Tudor/Elizabethan/Stuart/Georgian/Victorian... how long is it really going to last?

Oh god! when we pulled up the carpet recently, we found some of those, too

Pass me the noose....lol

What happened for you to find out it was more than superficial? Did you have a builder do the basement who said so?

Interesting what you say about the inspection, we have found this to be the case, too. Inspections aren't worth the paper they're written on, either in our experience. The home owner had one done on this place - none of the problems were picked up on! Amazing really - money for old rope and the owner gets left to deal with all the crap!

Carpet & ornament..............Don't mix well together. Neither did the amount of time I had to spend hoovering them, so easy now. The estate agent was impressed with them. Not quite matching ornaments, the other is below.

Calgal & Newshoney My sympathies with the house horror stories, our was falts when we bought it, you start to dread doing anything else beacuse it will be something else to fix.

Mmm, didn't think of that !