Only in Hollywood is it romantic to restore an old house back to it’s former glory. The reality is it’s exhausting, stressful, expensive and then there’s no time left for sex.

So why are my husband and I so addicted to it?

Anyway, since that crummy Valentine’s holiday is coming up, here’s a list of films that make us all want to work on an old house. I feel like I’m missing a few though. Pacific Heights? The Duplex?

1. It’s a Wonderful Life. My top pick. Even though it’s a Christmas movie, I think about Jimmy Stewart every time I come down my stairs and grab my loose banister finial. I never want to fix it because of this movie.

2. The Money Pit. Hey, it’s a happy ending, right? There’s a scene with Tom Hanks hanging there between floors. Been there, done that. When I fell through the floor and was holding myself up on the banister above, my husband just looked over at me and calmly asked “Need help?”

3. Under the Tuscan Sun. Well, let’s just say I know where I want to go when I retire.

4. Gone with the Wind. So much going on in this movie, but isn’t Tara the main love interest? It’s the only thing that matters. The only thing that lasts.

5. The Notebook. Disclosure: I’ve only seen snippets of this on TV. The only thing I remember is the house.

A Walk Through Fort Greene - TRAILER from Diane Paragas on Vimeo.

A feature length documentary is about the black arts movement in Fort Greene from the mid 80’s-early 90’s is currently in production. The film, directed by Nelson George and Diane Paragas, features Lorna Simpson, Kevin Powell, Chris Rock and of course, Spike Lee among others.

Fun fact! My husband and I shared our very first apartment together (without the roommates) in Ft. Greene in 1988. To this day, it was the nicest apartment we ever lived in. A grand parlor floor of a brownstone on Adelphi Street. We lived there for 2 years, paying $825 and had the best landlord evah! In 1990/91 we moved to Park Slope because of the lack of amenities in the area. There wasn’t much going on for a couple of vegetarians back then.

But we’ll always love Ft. Greene.

Wow, some wonderful boro art openings this weekend! Unfortunately, I’ll be working on the Beacon house, so I can’t make it to any of them…but you should! And spread the love!

Tonight! Friday, February 5, 2010, starting at 8:00pm

Breukelen Coffee House,
764A Franklin Avenue in Brooklyn

Group show with my buddy Mike Sorgatz

Another group show at the Climate Gallery in Long Island City. “Putting It All Together” opens Saturday, February 6 from 6-9pm. My buddy Suprina Kenney is in this one. It’s her first group show!

Also opening Saturday (reception is 6-9pm) is a collaboration between another buddy, Liz Heskin Contemporary and Metropolitan Green (remember that video interview?). “Natural Reactions” features 13 artists demonstrating the intimate relationship between artist and environment.

The show takes place at 439 Metropolitan Avenue in Brooklyn. BTW, it’s really easy to get to LIC from there.

Ok, so I’m plugging my friends. Nothing wrong with that!

So, I was passing through High Falls yesterday and went into what I thought was The New York Store to buy some bread. The next thing I know, I’m walking out with a creepy baby sculpture.

The bad news is: The New York Store is no longer there. I have no idea when it closed. Plus, I didn’t get any bread.

The good news: The Last Bite is the cafe that took it’s place and it is suh-weet! They have vegetarian friendly (or meaty) sandwiches and pastries, yada, yada….

But the artwork and tschotskes in there! OMG, I could have bought everything, only there’s some stuff I would totally make myself, so why buy that, huh? I can’t sculpt clay, so I bought this cat baby. I didn’t price the Obama/Bush salt and pepper shakers that I fell in love with, but I may regret that.

My husband and I currently have 6 cats and never wanted have kids. I figured if we DID have a baby, maybe it would look something like this.

The pets love it! The husband, not so much.

Our dining room plaster repair proved a bit problematic as we needed to work around our wallpaper border. We actually laminated the ceiling and repaired cracks in the walls. We’ll need to use a thin crown molding to hide the gap between wall and sheetrocked ceiling, covering up some of the border.

Although I liked the original color, I wanted to brighten it up some. I’m not loving this turquoise, it’s too greeny. It looks more beach cottage than Victorian, but it looked really good on the paint chip! I think my biggest problem with it is that it’s not completely flat. When Home Depot tells you they have a flat enamel that’s washable, don’t believe them! It’s not flat, it’s more eggshell!

As you may know, we own two homes. And as you also may know, we are getting ready to sell one of them. Not the best market to sell, especially when it was purchased near top of the market.

Going into this, my thoughts were “No way we’re selling for less than what we put in! We’ll rent it if we have to.” Then I did the math. Not that I’ve given up on the idea of getting my price just yet. The house won’t be on the market for another few months, but even if we “lose” $100k (including the renovations), we still come out way ahead of the game.

And so, I’m learning the importance of letting go.

At first, when my husband said “Yeah, but we lived there for 5 years. Think of it as paying rent.” that wasn’t enough to change my mind. What did it was figuring out exactly how much extra money we would have to play with by only owning one house. The mortgage payments, the taxes, insurance, gas and electric, extra car plus insurance, gas and train to go back and forth, maintenance and renovations, even food.

So my friends, if you are thinking of selling your house in this market, do not despair. Do the math! It just might make sense to let go of your pride, swallow the loss and live happily ever after!

I’m sure we all know someone who has been affected by the Haiti earthquake. When we heard about it, my husband and I went through a list of Haitians we knew and wondered if their families were ok.

We forgot about Darnelle.

Darnelle is the cheerful young woman who meets and greets everyone at Kush Cafe in Clinton Hill. She lost several family members, including her mother, when her childhood home was destroyed.

Kush is holding a fundraiser this Wednesday, February 3rd. All profits go to the Dasne family. It’s $20 for an all you can eat buffet.

If you cannot attend but want to contribute, I’m looking into how to do that. I’ll leave it in the comments.

via Brownstoner

So now that Bloomberg has decided he doesn’t want the 9/11 trials in NYC, Mayor Nicholas Valentine of Newburgh, NY is offering his hospitality.

As an NYC transplant in the Newburgh area, I’m putting in my two cents.

Personally, I thought it would’ve been a fine idea to hold the trials in NYC. It would have been cathartic for us to see these guys brought to justice right near the scene of the crime. Punishment if found guilty? Parade them through the streets of Bensonhurst or Maspeth. End of story.

NYC would’ve probably been a tad too busy to hold these huge trials. But Newburgh? There’s NOTHING going on there! Seriously, as long as it doesn’t cost the City of Newburgh anything, they should totally do it!

The Mayor knows that this would put Newburgh on the map. There’s a 20% unemployment rate, a ton of boarded up buildings and a handful of wonderful businesses struggling to survive. There are plenty of hotels in the area, an international airport, major roadways and oh, did I mention a military base? A friggin military base! Plus, West Point is just down the road a bit.

If commuters are inconvenienced by traffic on the bridge, they can hop a ferry across the river to Metro North. Problem solved.

So, who is against it? Orange County Executive Ed Diana says “Not in my backyard!” He wants it outside of the U.S. and says he will do everything in his power to stop it from happening in Orange County. “Forty-four Orange County residents lost their lives on that most horrific day, and to bring these monsters to Orange County is an insult to our residents,” Diana told the local Record newspaper.

Unemployment. High taxes. Struggling businesses. High crime rate. In a beautiful location on the river within an hour of NYC. With gorgeous architecture. Nah, better keep the status quo. Let’s keep Newburgh off the map.

Oh BTW, Mr. Diana, that was sarcasm.

After a short holiday hiatus, Reclaimed Home will finally be returning to the world of winter fleadom. Brooklyn Flea at One Hanson (aka The Willamsburgh Savings Bank) has been packed to the rafters with vendors, but they managed to squeeze me in for this Sunday.

So, come visit! I’ll be in space #35. That’s the gorgeous main floor. There are 3 levels of vintage and handmade vendors, plus I think they are adding some more food vendors this week!

Kitchen Upgrades from DIY Kits. This Old House

10 DIY Tips for Kids. Charles and Hudson

Wallpaper by NYer Cartoonist. Retro Renovation

Stainless Appliances. In or Out? Hooked on Houses

Williamsburg Marketplace Tour. Apartment Therapy

Kitsch is awesome, but kitsch plus pop culture kicks ass! I’m lovin’ these crafty items I found.

The Johnny Cash switch plate is only $8 on Etsy. It’s just the most fabulous photo ever.

Once upon a time I found a crocheted Elvis at a tag sale for $7 and sold him at the flea market for $120. I still regret letting him go. If you can crochet, here’s a pattern for ya!

As if the thought of Adam Lambert isn’t horrific enough, check out this scary embroidered portrait. There’s a how-to on the Craftster forum if you must have one.

Um, maybe I should have titled this post “Scary Celebrity Crafts”.  Zombie M.J. and E.T. Did they have a thing? It’s a spray paint stencil and silkscreen for $80.

And what pop culture collection would be complete without the Liberace prayer candle? $15 on Etsy.

FYI, There’s a Canadian company called Ecorad that converts antique steam and water radiators into modern electric systems. Imagine not having to look at those Home Depot baseboards! And it’s green because they’re recycling the radiators.

The drawbacks?  Well, they’re in Canada, for one. Cost is $475 per radiator transformation. Shipping to US would probably cost more than that. Electric heat, although cleaner than oil or gas, is the most expensive way to go.

On the other hand, they sure are pretty!

On the other hand, you can go to a salvage place and install an antique radiator of your choice. Below is my hallway masterpiece in Bed Stuy, under $200.

Via Planet Green

Jeez Louise, what we are going through to save some Bradbury wallpaper border that we don’t even like!

We have some major plaster work going down in our dining room at the moment. Unfortunately, the ceiling wasn’t worth saving, so we laminated and lost the border up there. We even contacted Bradbury to see if there was a way to steam it off and reuse it, but they didn’t recommend that.

In any case, we were determined to keep the wall border alive and well. It took the better part of a day to prep the room for plastering and painting. Between covering the paper, the mantel and all of the wood moldings, it doesn’t look like there’s a hell of a lot of wall space left to work on.

After all is said and done, the border will lose 1-2 inches because we’ll have to put molding on the top and bottom since we don’t want to go near it with the plaster.

By the way, of course what we thought would be a simple “chasing out a few cracks and plastering” turned into a nightmare. It will most likely need a skim coat now, not to be done by us as we are not master plasterers. We found out that it’s not so easy to find hardcore plaster supplies in this neck of the woods (Beacon). Must be something to do with the renovation vs. restoration thing. Crappy new sheetrock for everyone!

PS: How much do I love my new scaffolding?

We all know that Brooklyn is the new Manhattan. Just ask Stacey Toussaint and Sheila Collins. They revere their native borough so much that they started up a business taking tourists to untouristy destinations.

Inside Out Tours offers bus and walking tours of Afro-Caribbean neighborhoods, gospel churches, Underground Railroad stops, urban farms and of course The Brooklyn Brewery. Because what tour would be complete without beer?

I think it’s a great idea. I’m just jealous I didn’t come up with it first. So, I have to mock.

* “Sample ethnic cuisine.”

Where are these tourists from? The mid-west or something?

* “Hang out with hipsters in Brooklyn’s trendiest and hottest neighborhoods.”

Oops, just puked in my mouth.

* “Enter a historic brownstone.”

Hey, can you bring them over to my house? They can help restore a historic brownstone!

Actually, it sounds like fun. Maybe they can hire me to give the Jewey Brooklyn tour.

Lifted from Brokelyn.

Last we checked on Craig and Yvonne’s Victorian House, it was on the market for $799k. Well, it looks like it’s still up for grabs. Down to $699k. Totally worth every penny, but alas…still not affordable for the likes of moi.

But here’s the good news! Craig has gone pro. Blackstone Architectural Restoration LLC works in Central Jersey. There’s not much on their website yet, but hello, have you seen his house? I’d say this guy does meticulous work.

Check out the video walk through of their house. It will bring tears to your eyes.