The New Apartment, Part 1.

So, I'm moving. Slowly.

A month ago, my room mate John informed me that when our lease is up, he's going to get a place with his girlfriend. So, this means, that at the end of June, my home of three years is basically done. Which is fine with me, it was a great apartment, perfect for what it was.

So, I'm moving back home. Kinda. Recently, my Mom was laid off from her job of 42 years, and has no plans to go back to work anytime soon, so I'd like to help them out if they need it if things get rough. Now, my parents own two homes in Brooklyn, right next door to each other, and two blocks away from where I live now. Both of them are two family homes, attached to each other. My parents live in one, with family friends as tenants. Next door, my grandmother lives in the other one, and until last week, the other one was filled with my Dad's baseball book collection (Photos here).

Now, it's not.

This is the house my great grandparents settled in after they came over from Italy in the early party of the last century. They lived in the now vacant apartment. It's where my grandmother was raised, and eventually, she moved into the first floor apartment, and where my Mom was raised. My parents eventually moved into the house next door, and it's where I was raised. When my great grandmother passed away ten years ago, my family decided to leave that apartment empty, because they didn't want strangers moving in, and they didn't need the income or hassle that would come with it. So my Dad moved his collection in there, and it became a baseball museum.

Now, here's the tricky part. The house has no heat.

When my great grandparents bought this house, every house in the neighborhood, was heated by a wood-burning stove in the basement. When heating systems were installed in the other houses in the neighborhood, my Grandfather declined, since he made his own wine in the basement, and the heat would have screwed with his wine. Now, all we have is a rotten old wine press in the basement, and no heat in the house. My Grandmother has lived that way all her life, and is fine with just the wood burning stove, and a bunch of space heaters, but I want heat.

So, along with heat there's a bunch more work to be done. New windows. new floors, new appliances, a wall I want taken down.

And that all starts this Monday.

Here's how the place currently looks:



This is stairs up there. I am so keeping the stair chair.



The hallway.



The way in, there's a bathroom on the left.





The fridge and the stove are going since no one has used them since 1997.



The kitchen opens up into the dining room, which I'm doing major changes to.



The wall on the right? Going. Monday, the wall comes down and the ugly yellow floor goes with it. The plan is to open up the two rooms, and make a giant living/dining room.



The other side of the room will be getting new windows, and whatever that thing above the windows is, well, it's going too.



Bye, bye wall.



These closets on the other side of the wall are going as well.



Beyond what will be the giant living/dining room are two other rooms, the farthest one will be my bedroom. The other will be my library. Right now, it's filled with furniture that used to occupy the baseball museum that either needs to be thrown out or placed somewhere else.



I'm planning on filling it with bookshelves.



My new bedroom. I'm planning on taking down the doors that will separate my bedroom from eventual library. Also, this furniture needs to be either redistributed or thrown away.



Located off the bedroom is another small room, which already houses something awesome.



34 long boxes of comics. This room will be my comic room. Well, it's not like the other rooms also won't be filled with comics. But this will at least be a great place to stick my singles.

Now, where did all the baseball stuff go?



Well, it's scattered between my parents place and my Grandma's place.



Baseball legends great you from the rafters as you enter my eventual house.







Photos line the hallway, and the closet is now full of books.





But most of the good stuff ended up in this room in my Grandma's place that my Dad was allowed to decorate. It's kinda nuts, but I love it.

So, like I said, it all starts Monday. I'll keep you updated.