Remodeling - Day Fifteen

Today Harry and I got an early start. We got up around 8 am and started packing up the truck. After that was done we headed to Home Depot to pick up more paint and a new painting poll, since Harry broke one yesterday. By 10 am we had reached our new house. The first thing we saw was a little out of the ordinary, the garage door was open. So as we got to the front door I asked Danny our contractor if he had opened the door.. he said yes..because he had brought to more worker and they wanted to start working on the hardwood floor, which is in the garage. This was unexpected news as we didn't expect the floors to go down until next week. So we quickly went inside to see the progress.

They had pulled out the carpet in the TV-Room and started laying down the Hardwood Floor. Our contractor had also made some progress in the Office and the Master Bedroom with re-texturing the wall and he had made substantial progress re-tiling the fireplace.

After checking out all the new construction work, Harry and I started putting up a second coat of paint in the Pantry. Once that was done we started painting the kitchen. When we opened the paint can I wasn’t quite sure about the color. This is the color that Harry wanted on the walls. So we put a little of paint on one of the kitchen walls. I looked at it from several different angels and still wasn’t quite sure if I liked the color or not, neither was Harry. When the color finally started to dry we were happy with it. But it's defiantly not your typical kitchen color.

For lunch we ordered pizza from a local pizzeria and expected that what you usually get in LA. There were 2 surprised with that. First one pizza was about 25 bucks and the second surprise was the size of the pizza. That thing was huge. All five of us barely finished one pizza and we had ordered two, so there are plenty of leftovers.

After Lunch Harry and I finished up painting the first coat on the kitchen walls between the counter top and the ledge. Once that was done, we pulled the tape off the pantry and inspected the quality of our paint job. There were a few places where we had to do touch up work. Once that was accomplished we checked the paint job in the kitchen as it was already dry, so we started putting up a second coat of paint. While we were doing that Danny, our contractor started ripping out the tile in the Entrance. By the time Harry and I were finished with the second coat of paint in the kitchen our contractor had almost completed laying down the floor in the Entrance.

After the the contractor had left we pull tape off in the kitchen where we no longer needed it. Not quite sure what happened, but we had to do quite a bit of touch up work. After that we finished the final wall in the dining room (at least the first coat).

It was around 8pm and we were exhausted so we headed home for the day.

15 days of painting and not an end in sight.

No Painting Today

Today we stayed in our rental as we had Bill (owner of our rental) bringing over a few people who are interested in renting the house. We still have quite a bit of packing to still do. So attempted to finish packing up my toy room. I have done a few hours here and a few hours there but only made a dent. This time I jumped in and packed up about 98% of it. All that is left are some books and that room will be done. We only have a few more things to pack. Most of it is daily stuff that we use and won't be packed until the day before we move.

Our Family Got Bigger

Today in Austria our family grew. My sister-in-law, Harry's sister Greda married Bernd. I wish them all the best.












Herzliche Glückwünsche

9/11

Eight years ago that horrible event took place that changed The United States forever. Today I will take a moment of silence to remember all those we lost.

Remodeling - Day Fourteen

Today we headed out to our house around noon and got there around 1.30 or so. First on the agenda was the a short video for Harry's sisters upcoming wedding (tomorrow). We had come prepared with a speech, but that didn’t make the video any easier. Harry got a kick out of the screw ups, especially me trying to say Congratulations in German. Harry thinks that the ‘Making of the Wedding Video’ is way funnier than the video itself.

Once that was done we continued painting the pantry which went fairly quickly. After that I put a second coat of paint on the trim in the hallway, while Harry started to put the first coat of paint on the remaining wall in the dining room. He couldn’t finish the upper half of the wall since he had broken the long painting pole. So in order to finish the rest of the wall we will have to buy an new pole first and more paint.

Will this every end!!!!!

Video Blog - Paint, paint and more paint

Remodeling - Day Thirteen

Today we went to Home Depot to pick up a couple of supplies. We needed 1 additional can of paint for the living / dining room, 2 cans of paint for the Office. We also picked up more paint rollers. Once we were done with that, we headed to Ralph’s since we needed some lunches and soda for the house. After Ralph’s we headed back to the rental in Reseda. We packed up Harry's pickup truck with another load and headed out to our new house.

Once there we unpacked the truck and checked how much progress our contractor had made. He started to lay out the tile in the Master Bathroom and was dealing with the texture of the one unfinished wall in the dining room.

I started taping the trim of the Pantry area. When our contractor Danny went to lunch Harry put a second coat up in the Hallway. The only thing that needs to be done in the hallway is, the trim. It needs another coat of paint. That’s was something Harry didn’t get finished before our contractor came back from lunch and started dealing with this wall again.

By that time I had made some progress taping up the trim in the pantry area (did I mention I hate taping trim) so Harry could start painting the trim. By 4.30 Harry had painted all the trim in the pantry and I had almost finished painting the shelves. We had to leave at 4.30 pm, since our current landlord wanted to show the rental to prospective customers. Tomorrow we will have to finish the first coat of pain in the pantry area, and then put a second coat of paint on the trim in the hallway and maybe we can start with unfinished wall in the dining room.

Contractor will finish the office windows today, hopes to finish the master bedroom and start to work on the fireplace tomorrow and finish the fireplace and start the master bathroom and then finish the master bath and trim in the entire house on Saturday. He will then do floors on Monday and should be done by Wednesday.. at least that is his plan.. if it happens that would be great as I really want to move in next week... guess will wait and see.

Remodeling - Day Twelve

Today we went to Home Depot to pick up the Laminate Hardwood Floor. If we have measured the rooms right we need about 1.000 square feet. That would be roughly 60 boxes. When we got to Home Depot we only saw only 24 boxes. The next thing we did was to look for a sales associate. He found us another palette that had 26 boxes. So we ended up with 50 boxes. We decided that for right now that’s enough and if we really need more we can always go back and get another 10 boxes.

After that we waited for the guy to do his magic with the forklift and bring the palette down from the top shelf. Once that was accomplished I went and paid for the floor while Harry went and got the truck and drove the truck to the loading dock. The forklift guy put the hardwood floor into back of Harry's pickup truck and man that stuff is really heavy. Once we were done with Home Depot we drove back home to pick up Daisy and tie down the flooring with the cargo net that Harry had recently bought. After that we headed to the new house. All in all the hardwood floor cost us, so far, 3.500 dollars. If you add what we’re going to pay our contractor to install the hardwood floor, the entire thing will come to about 5 Grand. Luckily we don’t redo 1000 square feet every day !!!

Once we got to the house we had to unload all 50 boxes of laminate flooring, We put them in the garage for the time being until the carpet is pulled up in the living/dining and TV rooms.

After we were done with that we had to paint again. Surprise, surprise !! First we put up a second coat of paint in the Entrance. We then had to put a second coat of paint on the pillars of the Kitchen. While Harry was busy with the second coat of paint on the pillars in the kitchen, I started taping the trim in the Hallway to the guest room, bathroom and office. Once the majority of the trim had been taped off, Harry started painting the majority of the walls, while I painted the trim. We didn't have a lot of time but got quite a bit done. We're getting closer to finishing and that's good.

Video Blog - The Remodel So Far

Figured out that I can take video with my still camera and can upload to my blog.. so this is the first video on the remodel.

I take you on a tour of our remodel Day 11.

Focus goes in and out.. but what can you expect from a still camera.

Remodeling - Day Eleven

Today we got a early start as well. We packed up the truck and headed out. We got to the house around 10 am. We checked the paint job we did yesterday and we did a fairly good job. But we knew that we had to put a second coat on, since here and there the white still was coming through.

First we finished the two small spots in kitchen that we couldn’t finish yesterday. After that was done we started with the second coat of paint in the living room. I painted the majority of the walls and the upper trim, while Harry did the lower trim and then moved over to the kitchen walls that are exposed to the living/dining room. Around noon we were pretty much done with the second coat of paint in the living and dining room, took us about eight hours to do the first coat yesterday and only two hours to do the same thing today. Shows you how much time taping off trim and ceiling takes.. After lunch I started taping off the entrance way, while Harry finished painting the wall leading to the laundry and did some additional touch up work in the TV-Room as well.

When I was finished taping the trim/ceiling in the entrance way, Harry started painted the majority of the walls. We then turned our attention to the last 2 pillars in the kitchen. While I taped off the trim ( btw I was hating life, taping off trim is not my cup of tea) Harry started painting the pillars. We were done around 5 pm and decided to call in the night, since we both were quite tired. Who knew painting was so physically and emotionally exhausting !!

Tomorrow we will put a second coat on everything we painted the second half of today. Then we have the living and dining room painted as far as we can, since our contractor still has to finish one of the walls first, before we can paint it.

I will keep you guys posted on the progress !!

KOTG Microcast #7 Quest for Blizzcon

Last Month Jenni and I were lucky enough to volunteer for The Guild booth at Blizzcon. We were also lucky enough to record some audio from our days at the con.

• We start with my intro as I head to Blizzcon.
• I find Jenni and we hear what she did the previous night with the Guild cast, crew and fans.

• We then go behind the stage as the Guild cast wait to go on stage for their panel, both Jenni and I interview cast members.
• Then there are some Q & A from the Panel
• After that we hold a raffle, we gave away 4 Zunes

• And finally we are done and head back to our cars.

The audio is okay, we were using our portable recorder.

Hopefully we brought a little Blizzcon to those who could not make it and for those who did, hopefully we brought back some fun memories.

Thanks, Kenny & Jenni

Other Important Links

• Knights of the Guild Feeds/Downloads http://knightsoftheguild.com
• Knights of the Guild Daily Blog http://knightsoftheguildpodcast.blogspot.com/
• Knights of the Guild Fan page on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/group
• Knights of the Guild Group on Watchtheguild.com http://community.watchtheguild.com/group
• Follow us on twitter @knightsofguild

• Knights of the Guild Cafe Press Online Shop : Where you can buy KOTG T-shrits, magnets, buttons and so much more. http://www.cafepress.com/KOTG

Podcast Promoted in this cast.

• Tuning Into Scifi TV
• Turning Left at Albuquerque
• Upsidedown Happyland

Remodeling - Day Ten

Today we got a fairly early start. We got up at 8.30 am and started packing up Harry's truck. We then headed out to our new house and got there around 10 am. We unpacked the truck and put all the stuff in the garage. First things we did was some touch up work in the TV Room. Our contractor Danny fixed the drywall so we could finish the walls. All we have left in there are the window frames and baseboard.

After the TV Room we put a second coat of paint on the accent walls in the living / dining room. And we have been lucky enough to only have to do two coats on most of the walls, so the accent walls should be good to go.

After we were done with the accent walls, we went to grab a bite to eat at Taco Bell. Then we were off to our new favorite store… Lowes. First we checked out some vanities/sinks, since we are looking for a new one for the Guest Bathroom. We found one or two that we both liked. Guess we’ll have to go back and look at both of them more closely when we are ready to buy. After that we went over to the Hardwood Floors. We went through all the samples they had. The ones that were nice looking and that we really liked were way too expensive and out of our price range. The Laminate Hardwood Floors that were in our price range looked way too fake for our taste. Guess we will be getting the Laminate Hardwood Floor from Home Depot that we picked out a few days ago, which cool with me since I liked it from the first moment I saw it. Not entirely sure when we will be picking up the hardwood floor, but it has to be before Wednesday as our contractor might be bringing a floor guy along.

After Lowe’s Harry and I went back to the house and I started taping some of the walls in the living room while Harry started painting. We both really like the color that we picked as main color. By 6 pm we had painted the walls in the hallway, the wall of the fire place, underneath the breakfast bar and 2 walls in the dining room. We were very happy with the progress. But we decided to keep on painting. So we painted the wall that leads to the pantry as well. Then we hit a snag. Since the kitchen will be painted in a different color than the living / dining room we weren’t quit sure were to make the transition between the colors without making it look funky. We discussed several scenarios and then came up with a solution that we think should be working best. All the pillar, that are visible from the living / dining room, will be painted in the main color of the living / dining room. The ledge on the other hand will be painted with the color that we have chosen for the kitchen. By 8.30 pm we had painted as much as we could for the day.

It was a great day of painting and I feel like we are getting closer to being done.

Stangers in the House

Today we had to take a break from fixing up our new house as Bill (Rental owner) was coming by to fix the toilet and to bring some possible renters. So I spent most of the morning trying to clean up. It's strange having strangers walk through you home, going through closets and drawers. But we have four groups of folks come through today. After that it was too late to go up to the house so Harry and I just hung out at home and watched some TV... so it was a nice break.

Remodeling - Day Nine

Now that we had our paint we got up early and headed to the house around 10am. Once we got there Danny was hard at work. He was finishing up with windows/holes in the office wall and also working on the fireplace. We chatted for a few and then got to work priming the two accent walls in the living/dining room and area under the bar. All were a southwestern orange and we figured it was best to prime first but before we did that we had to fill in all the nail holes and man were there alot. The previous owners really liked hanging things on the wall. Once the holes were filled and the walls were primed we started to paint both accent walls in the steal blue color. One good thing about replacing the carpets is that we didn't have to worry about laying down a tarp or anything, which saved up time. Danny finished patching up the TV Room walls as well as the outside office walls so this weekend will be spent panting the living/dining rooms in the sandy brown and steal blue colors. Lot's a painting to be done but this weekends painting will be dramatic because it's such a big part of the house.. can't wait to see all this come together.

Danny also laid some tile down on the fireplace so we could see what it looked like.. it's going to be beautiful. Stay Tuned!!!!!

Furniture Shopping

After we got home from the painting sample adventure we headed to Living Spaces. We already lost out on the dining table and bed that we had seen a few weeks prior so we planned to buy this time. A wonderful sales person Heather approached us and with her helped we managed to pick out a dining table (pictured to the left, only the table) and four dining chairs.




She also checked and that there was one more bed that we really liked in the La Mirada store so we got that.






We picked out a love seat and a very funky accent chair and matching pillows and finally we had picked out two very comfy recliners but found out that they only had the one (floor model) so we had to choose another one. Which we did and purchased two electric very comfy recliners for our TV room. After two and a half hours we were done and spent roughly $4500 on our new furniture. We still have to buy two desks, accessories, a day bed, side tables and a couch table.. oh and a new mattress for our new Cal King bed... We were hoping to not spend more then $5000 in new furniture but it looks like we are going to go over a bit.. but hey how often do you buy new furniture, well for me.. never.. so it was so much fun.

After Living Spaces we then went to Home Depot and purchased the paint that we liked for the rest of the house. We also checked out more Laminate flooring and I still went for the one I saw a few days ago and I think Harry is coming around to it too.

Remodeling - Day Eight

Our contractor Danny was out today so we knew nothing had changed from yesterday construction wise.. so we headed up to the house fairly early. When we got up there the sky's were pretty good. There was a haze but i think it was just your typical SoCal haze. There wasn't much smoke in the air and to be honest it looked as though the fires were gone (of course we knew they weren't) but they weren't much of a factor today.

We first pulled off all the blue tape from the Guest Room and of course there was bleeding of the paint as we expected. Some spots were worse then others but for the most part it was all fixable. So Harry and I did a few touch ups here and there. We then went to the TV room and pulled up the tape in there and again the paint bleed through some areas so we did a few touch ups. Both the Guest Room and TV Room are done with exception of the window trim

We started with our main living room/dining room colors. We choose a sandy brown color and a stealy blue for the accent colors. We painted them on the wall and both Harry and I knew these were the colors we wanted. They looked great together and gave the feel that we wanted for those rooms.

We then put up the two kitchen colors that we choose.. it's a bold color for a kitchen but we opted for the brighter of the two (the one on the right) and then we painted the living room colors to see if they would all match since the rooms open to each other. And the all looked great together.

Next was the office, my buddy Greg is going to paint a Star Trek mural for us on one of the walls and it's going to be in space meaning a black wall so we wanted a bright color on the rest of the walls. We choose this blue but once on it felt too baby blue and I couldn't imagine that color on all the remaining walls. So we selected another more grey/blue and will get a sample for that later tonight.

Our master bedroom colors were the brown on the right and the wine as an accent and we liked the colors together but we felt that both of those colors would make the room much darker then we intended so instead we pulled the taupe color from our master bath room and made that our main color for our bedroom with the win accents.. and we really like that combination.

The guest bathroom already has the yellow.. which we like but we wanted to bring in an accent color and I don't know what we were thinking but the purple was so not what we wanted and we felt it would look to feminine.

So we took the light blue color that we didn't like for the office and the wine accent color from our master bedroom and painted those on the yellow to see if we liked any combination of those.. and we did.. we liked the yellow with the wine color so that will be the accent color for the guest bathroom.

Last and the hardest room to choose a color was our master bathroom. We had bought the taupe but really didn't like it with the tile and counter of the room. We took the brown that we intended for the master bedroom but that too didn't work with the tile and counter. So we tried the sandy color from the living/dining room and didn't like it.. so we are at a stand still when it comes to paint in our master bedroom. We want to keep the tile and counters because we like them (and cost) but we just need to find the perfect color to compliment them.

So out of all those colors we liked the majority of them and will be buying gallons of paint tomorrow and starting to have fun painting again.

It's All About the Color

Today we spent most of it at home because of the toilet thing and we wanted to pack up some stuff here at the rental. We did get up to the house around 2pm at which time our contractor was leaving for the day. We didn't have really anything to do up there because we had finished painting the day before and we couldn't paint any other rooms because construction was happening in them and we hadn't picked out the paint yet. So that is what we did. We went through each room and selected paint colors that we liked. We already made several mistake by buy a gallon of paint and then realizing you don't like it or it doesn't fit the room and wasting money.. so this time we planned on purchasing small sample paint to see if we like them first. So it took about three to four hours to go from room to room and select what colors we liked.

Once we got home we dropped off Daisy at the rental and then went to Home Depot to purchase samples of all the colors we decided on. Will paint samples on the walls tomorrow and see if we really like the color combinations that we choose. While at home depot we also checked out sinks and vanities for the guest bathroom and the Bamboo flooring that we really liked. Unfortunately we wanted a darker floors and the Bamboo only came in the light wood color (though you could strip and stain it). So we started looking at Laminate wood flooring and most of it looked fake but there were a few that we thought would work and one that I really loved that was darker and more rustic looking. Harry wasn't convinced but he did like it.. will have to keep looking. Oh forgot to mention we are re-flooring out TV room as well since it's kind of opened up to the living and dining room.

Surprise!!!

Well it's 7am and like most morning I have to get up and use the bathroom. As I leave the bedroom I hear this high pitch sound, of course I'm half asleep and I'm trying to figure out what is going wrong but it only takes a minute before I step into the bathroom and into two inches of water. Suddenly it's like being woken out of a deep sleep.. I spring into the action and walk over to the toilet and notice that the tube that goes from the wall to the back of the toilet has come off and water if firing out hitting the wall and bouncing up to the ceiling. I quickly turn off the main water and survey the damage. Besides the two inches of water on the bathroom floor the entire hall carpet is soaked. I quickly grab some towels and drop them on the carpet to try and pick up some of the water. I then attempted to take a cup and bucket and gather the water off the bathroom floor but soon discover that this is pretty useless. So I run to Ralphs to rent a wet vac and vacuum up the water. So about 45 minutes later I'm sucking up a ton of water from the carpet and bathroom. Of course alot of the water went through cracks in the floor and started bubbling up the laminate floor. But I did my best to clean it up. It's still damp and it's starting to smell musty but I'm hoping everything will work out.. it's not how I imagined starting my morning but life sometimes throws you curve balls. Our toilet is operational but you have to turn on the main valve to fill it up every time you flush and when it's not in use turn it off because the tube is back on but is loosely fit. The owner of the house will be coming by this weekend to fix.

Remodeling - Day Seven

Today we got a rather late start. When we left our rental in Reseda it was completely overcast / smokey, but considerably more humid than the past few days. The increased humidity should help the firefighters battling the Station Fire. When we were driving up north the smoke was so thick that you couldn’t even tell that there were foothills around. On the 14 the air quality got so bad, that we had get our air through the AC only. When we got off Sierra Highway exit air quality started to improve. Once we got to the house the air quality was sorta acceptable. You still could smell the smoke in the air, but there were no billow’s of smoke visible, and that's always a good sign.

We talked with our contractor Danny about the way we wanted to have the tiles in the bathroom and on the fireplace. We also were talking to him about having the the carpet in the Living and Dining Room torn out and replaced with Bamboo flooring. Yesterday we found some nice Bamboo flooring at Home Depot that we liked for a really reasonable price. We haven’t made any final decision about that yet, but it looks like we will end up doing bamboo flooring in the Living and Dining Room.

Later we dealt with some touch up work in the Guest Room (Green room). While we were doing that the air quality got worse and worse. You barely could see the ridge in front of our house and Sierra Highway was nearly invisible. It pretty much looked like as if the entire Western Angeles National Forest was on fire. But I knew that wasn’t the case since Harry was keeping informed about the fire situation online. It’s great having a working Internet at our new house. The sound of Super Scoopers and helicopters flying back and forth to the fire line and dousing the flames helps to keep your mind somewhat at ease. The reason that the smoke got so thick was that we got the wind out of the south east during the afternoon hours (Acton area) where currently a lot of the active wildfire action is happening. Once the helicopters had completed a lot of their water drops, the air quality started to improve significantly. But we persisted and finished painting the nook in the Guest Bedroom the same color of the accent wall.

By the time we were done for the day, the air quality had pretty much returned to normal and no smoke billows were visible anywhere. We still didn’t want to take the chances so we packed up Harry's truck with more of my toys that we wanted to bring back to our rental in Reseda… just to be on the safe side. When we got home Harry checked the latest Fire Perimeter Map and it turns out the the north flank of the fire appears to be pretty stable and that the Northern Fire Perimeter is still south of Soledad Canyon Road. In essence that means that there are still at least between 10 and 11 miles between the Station Fire and our house. That certainly puts our minds at ease… But you never say never with fires.. could change at any moment.

Ok time for bed.. remodeling is hard work.

Remolding - Day Six

Today didn’t quite start out the way that we had initially planned. We had planned to leave around 9.30 am but when we checked out the Station Fire conditions allegedly the Sierra Highway had been closed. According to that Info there was no way for us to get into town. Shortly after we had found out that our Contractor (Danny) had gotten there via an alternate route. So Harry checked with CalTrans and got no info about road closures, so we decided to drive up to the house and see if we could make it. Turns out that the story about the road closures, that we had read online, was greatly exaggerated. We got to the house without any problems and it looked even better than the day before. There was hardly any smoke visible, most of the smoke was to the northeast (Acton area). Of course here and there you could see dark smoke rising but you could see the large fixed wing air crafts as well. Certainly makes you feel better.

When we got to the house we saw that our contractor had made a lot of progress. He had started prepping the 2 holes in the walls of the office, removed the tile from the fireplace that we want to have refinished, taken the carpet out of the bathroom and dismantled most of the built in’s in the bedroom. I was very impressed with the progress he made. While our contractor was working on other stuff Harry and I put a second coat of paint on the accent wall in Guest Room. And later we put a 3rd coat of paint on the remaining 3 walls in the Guest Room. After that was done we painted the closet doors in the color of the accent color. I have friends who ask why we continue to paint and have a contractor doing work when the house could possible burn down. But both Harry and I look at is as we have to keep positive. The house is currently in no danger and we have to move by the end of September. Positive thinking will lead to a positive outcome... But just in case it doesn’t we brought some of my toys and some of the stuff that is irreplaceable back to our rental house in Reseda. Tomorrow we will assess if we take more of the stuff back to Reseda or not. That will depend on how the wildfire is behaving.

By the time we left there was no smoke visible. Apparently the firefighters have made some progress. Additionally the wind had been blowing all afternoon long in a north east direction. That means it had been driving the fire away from our house and we are very happy about that. On the other hand there are still 11 miles between the fire and our house and the fire is still in the hills above Acton.

I guess that's it for today report.. will keep you updated on our house progress and the wildfires.

Panic

Today when I got up I was reading on twitter that Agua Dulce was under mandatory evacuation. My heart dropped and I immediately went online to find out more info. The "Station" wildfire is out of control and is moving closer to Acton and at a slower pace it's moving north west and that is where Agua Dulce is located. The closed the Agua Dulce off ramp on the 14 freeway so the only way you could get into the city was through Sierra Hwy. It seems that the east side of the city is under mandatory evacuation but where we live is not. So I spent the morning cleaning and continuing to pack up stuff but checking the news often to find out the status of the fire.

Around 2pm Harry and I decided to go up to the house and check everything out. When we got up there is actually looked better then it did yesterday but there was alot of smoke north of us (in Acton) but our place looked okay. It eased my mind a bit. The fire was still 11 miles or so away from us. We didn't do any painting and we also didn't bring anything else up to the house (just to be safe). We cleaned up the place a bit as the contractor will be starting tomorrow.

We headed home and I continue to clean and pack. We plan on going back up tomorrow and start painting once again. Of course I listen to the evening news and it made me worry about the house again.. but to be honest there really is nothing we can do.. just hope the firemen stop this fire before is reaches us.

But I guess living in the hills we need to get use to this.. but I don't think I ever will.

I'll keep you all posted.

More Packing and Cleaning

Today we stayed home (rental) and continued to clean and pack up this place. Bill (the owner) said he was placing ads about the rental and that he would want to show people the house. And I would be super embarrassed if they saw it like this. We have stuff all over the place as things are half packed and dumped in corners.. so today I cleaned the kitchen from top to bottom, finished the bathroom that Harry started yesterday, finished cleaning and packing the living room and did a little bit more packing of my toy room. All in all it was a good day of packing.

The scary part of today was this "Station" wildfire that is slowly moving in the direction of Acton which is next to Agua Dulce (where our new home is). We look to be okay but it's still very scary.. Let's hope everything works out.

Remodeling - Day Five

Another early day, got lots moved over as we packed up Harry's truck every time we go up. Once there we did a second coat on the Guest Bedroom and did a first coat on the Guest bathroom. Also our contractor Danny stopped by to pick up the tile and go over other construction things, as he is starting on Monday at 6am. We talked about the fireplace and he suggested putting wood over it to make it look more rustic as this was something I wanted and I loved the idea.. so now we are doing that also. So construction wise we are getting the office windows drywalled up. getting the carpet taken up and tile laid down in the master bathroom. Removing the two side closet built-in's in the master bedroom and having the fireplace re-faced and tiled. Along with Harry and I painting every room. Today while at our new place the air got so smokey you would think that there were fires all round us, but fortunately they were miles away and the wind was blowing our way. I had to drive home to grab my check book and had to drive through a down pour of ash. Harry also said there was ash falling at our house. It's a fact of living in the hills that fire are fairly common.. let's just hope they are never close to us. So things are moving along nicely.. hopefully in a few weeks everything will be done and by that time almost everything will be moved over to the new house so we can set everything up and move in full time.

Remodeling - Day Four

Today we got an early start and headed out around 9 am. We got to the house around 10 am. After unpacking the truck we started setting up all the paint stuff in the Guest Bedroom. We still had to paint the borders and corners of the 3 walls we had painted yesterday and on top of that we had 2 window frames to paint. After we were done with that Harry and I headed to Lowe’s to pick up more paint and paint supplies. While we were at Lowe's we finally decided on the tiles for the Fireplace and the Bathroom. Both of us really liked the tile we choose.. the fireplace is going to be AWESOME. After Lunch we started setting up the TV Room for another coat of paint. To our surprise the second coat of paint went fairly quickly and actually covered the walls. So it only took two coats and the TV Room is complete and I have to say looks great. Around 5 pm Harry and I headed back to Reseda to get some more packing done. While I continued with the Toy Room, Harry started packing up his Desk in the Office. All in all it was a good day.

KOTG Microcast #6 - Quest for the Music Video

KOTG Microcast #6 Quest for the Music Video

This is a special Maxi-Microcast about the Hit music video from Felicia Day ‘Do you want to date my Avatar’ Both Jenni and i worked on set during the filming of this.

For this microcast:

• We talk to Greg Aronowitz, who created and built the Weapons used in the music video

• We then have audio and written fan feedback about the video
• And finally Jenni and I talk about our experience working on set during the 14 hour shoot.

Hope you enjoy it…

Please send your audio or written comments to knightsoftheguild@gmail.com or you can leave your comments in the comment section of this site.

Thank you again for all your support, we do this podcast because we are fans and more importantly for the fans.

Kenny & Jenni

Other Important Links

• Knights of the Guild Feeds/Downloads http://knightsoftheguild.com
• Knights of the Guild Daily Blog http://knightsoftheguildpodcast.blogspot.com/
• Knights of the Guild Fan page on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/group
• Knights of the Guild Group on Watchtheguild.com http://community.watchtheguild.com/group
• Follow us on twitter @knightsofguild

• Knights of the Guild Cafe Press Online Shop : Where you can buy KOTG T-shrits, magnets, buttons and so much more. http://www.cafepress.com/KOTG

• The Guild - http://watchtheguild.com
• Greg Aronowitz’s Blog - http://barnyardfx.blogspot.com/
• Greg Aronowitz’s Twitter - http://twitter.com/gregaronowitz
• Alien Ninja - http://alienninja.tv/
• Labou The Movie - http://www.laboudvd.com/
• Labou Merchandise - http://laboustuff.com/

• Watch the Music Video on You Tube

Help support The Guild by buying the music video and the MP3.

Get the Video here on Itunes http://bit.ly/itunesvideo

Get the MP3 here on Amazon http://bit.ly/amazonavatar

Cleaning up the Rental

Today we took a break from painting our new house to work on our rental. They will be showing it to potential renter and it needs a good cleaning. We also did a bunch of errands that we have been putting off because of the new house. I also edited and released a new podcast. I miss the new house but it was nice to do something different.. but back to painting the house tomorrow..

Remodeling - Day Three

Today we got up, packed up the truck and headed to our house. But first we had two stops. First stop was our escrow company up in Valencia. We had to pick up a check for overages that we paid at closing. Unfortunately they dropped the check in the mail just a half hour before. So we left there and headed to Lowe's. We needed to buy more paint for the TV Room and while we were there I picked up another three paints, one for our master bathroom and two for our guest room.

Once at the house, we unloaded the truck and started painting by finishing up the window frame and the remaining wall in the TV Room. Once that was done I started taping off the Guest Room, while Harry did some touch-up work with the first 2 walls in the TV Room. We had planned to do the guest bathroom next but I decided that there would be less taping and I really wanted to get at least one room done.

While we were doing that, Mike, the Internet guy, stopped by to set up the Internet. He uses our hill side for a tower that feeds the valley below and because he uses our hill and electricity we get free internet. Once he was done we were eager to check out how fast the Internet was since he said it's faster then dial up but not quite as fast as DSL or Cable. This worried Harry and I but we were both surprised at the speed. One thing going for us was that we have our very own connection. So there are no other users on our line.

Once we both checked our Twitter we got back to work. Harry finished up the TV Room and I continued to tape off the guest room. The TV Room now has one complete coat, with exception to the area near the base board that had drywall damage. We have to let everything completely dry before putting on another coat. Harry then moved into the guest room and painted as I finished up the taping of baseboards. Once I was done there I helped with the trim work. We got the three walls covered with one coat (there is an accent wall that we did not do). But we were happy with our progress. We now know that painting is tough. It's tiring and take lots of patience and time. Well get it done.. might be a few weeks.. but will get it done and it will look great.

Remodeling - Day Two

Today we are up, packed and out the door by 10am. We planned to finish the TV Room and get a start on the guest bathroom. When we got there the paint was alot darker and looked good. It needed a few touch ups here and there but both Harry and I jumped in and started painting. Around 1pm our contractor Danny stopped by to go over everything that we wanted to do to the house. That took about an hour. Both Harry and I knew we had alot of property 2 1/2 aches but when walking around with Danny and standing on hillsides looking down at it, it hits you on how much 2 1/2 aches really is. Once Danny left we were hungry and needed to also pick up some more paint supplies. So we headed to Lowe's once again and on our way back found one of our favorite fast foods El Pollo Loco so we picked up some lunch. Once we were finished eating we continued to paint the TV-Room. And once again daylight started to disappear and we had to call it a night. We were almost one with 1 coat on all the walls. The painting looks so easy.. and HGTV makes it look like it can be done in hours.. this is day two and we are still finishing up just 1 coat on 1 room. Maybe will finish it tomorrow.. but I'm not making any promises.

Remodeling - Day One

Wow.. what a day.. now that we got the house we want to paint and do some small construction remodels before we actually move in mid September. We planned to be on the road at 10am but I figured since we would be at the new house for the next few weeks the majority of the time that we needed to go food shopping. So instead of heading up to the house we went food shopping. After we got back and split up the groceries between our rental and our house we got back on the road. We also agreed that when we drive up we will always take a load of boxes with you.. so we loaded up Harry's truck, but before we could head north I have to go to Kim Evey's (The Guild) Producer and return the BTS camera I was using for shooting season three. Once we dropped off the camera we head up north to our new house. We got there around 1:30pm and unloaded the truck. We then had to make a trip to Lowe's (the closest hardware store) but first we wanted to teach Daisy about the doggie door that lead out to a small enclosed area for to do her business. Well she figured it out fairly quickly but our little "Houdini" also figured out how to squeeze through a gap at the top and get out which she attempted as we were leaving. So we had to leave in inside the house until we were able to block that exit.

We get to Lowe's and head to the paint department, we try and find the matching colors that we had picked up from Home Depot but couldn't find the exact colors (we had previously gone through the house and picked out colors for all the rooms). I remember that they can color match so we asked if they could match these color, they said of course and that it would take ten minutes. During this time we walked around and picked up other painting supplies like, rollers, brushes, etc...

By the time we got out of Lowe’s we were both starving and looked for something to eat. We found a Carls Jr. that was on our way home. We headed back home and were greeted by a totally overexcited Daisy. By the time we were done with our lunch and started working it was about 5 pm... where did the day go?? We pretty much knew that we wouldn’t finish the room, but we wanted to get as much as prep work done as possible. The first room we decided on painting was our TV Room. We went with a darker color called Butternut Wood but it looks more like a dark Olive Green. Both Harry and I really like it. We figure it's the TV room so a dark color would be best. There were these plastic strips that covered the cable running along the baseboard that we didn't want. So we went to pull them off. They were being held on by double stick tape and when pulled off took off some drywall as well. So I attempted to patch up some of the damage while Harry started taping off the six windows. I came to realize that my patch work wasn't going to work and that we would talk to our construction guy about fixing it so I started to paint, I wanted to a little paint on the walls to see what it looked like. I started with the Window surroundings. About and hour later we had to stop, because we ran out of daylight, we had 2 window frame painted. The day didn't go exactly as planned and we didn't get nearly as much done as I was hoping but it was still a great day working on improving OUR house. Can't get any better than that. Going back tomorrow and hoping to finish the TV Room and if were lucky our guest bathroom.