• After the New Year, we started working again on our Hamtown rehab project.  By this time it was very near the finishing stages.  In fact, by the end of January we owned a fully functional, 2 bedroom, single-family home with all the good things that you’d expect, including a new bathroom, a new kitchen and all new appliances.  We spent a lot of our own money on this house, and we were eager to rent it out.  One of the last things that we had to do was rebuild the rear steps.  We got this done and soon after we secured an excellent renter.
• In February we got call from Mitch Cope who was working on a project in the neighborhood just north of Hamtramck.  He had secured some funds that were earmarked toward rehabbing a burned out house that was across the street from his.  I remember walking through this house the previous fall.  You could see where gasoline was poured on the carpet.  It made a loopy trail to the steps, where the arsonist left the gas can, and where most of the floor was burned away.  Since that time, Cope had hired a crew of guys to gut a large portion of the first floor.  They had taken down all the walls but none of the blackened ceilings.  Our job was to knock out the ceilings and then tear out all the burned framing and replace it with new good stuff and lastly to rebuild the stairs to the second floor so it would again be accessible.  We worked on this project for about a month.  It was cold and at the end of the day we smelled charred.  That’s a hard smell to get out of your nose.
• Around the time it began warming up we accomplished a bathroom remodel in Grosse Pointe.  We then painted the exterior of this same house. 
• If you didn’t know in April of this year, the EPA mandated that all remodeling contractors take a class and get lead certified.  It’s true.  We took the course and now both Kevin and I hold certificates.  Our company is also registered with the EPA through their Renovation, Repair and Painting program (RRP).
• In late spring, we renovated a kitchen in Ypsilanti.  It was a good project.  We built all our own cabinets.  Really there’s no way you can get the same sort of quality without spending a ton at Home Depot or a cabinet store.  We build very nice frameless units with paint-grade plywood.  We use heavy duty Blum under-mount drawer slides and European hinges.  Our cabinets are square and solid.  It was pleasure to build and install them on this project.
• Early June brought us to Dexter where we accomplished another kitchen remodel.  This one was planned out by the kitchen and bath folks at Lowes.  The cabinets were actually stock units from this store.  We installed them and then built and laminated the countertop.  It was great working in Dexter, really out in nowhere, off a dirt road.  No cell phone service.  Just us and the crickets.
• By the end of the month we started a commercial job in Canton.  We were outfitting a big white room in a mall to become a new fitness club.  Koko Fitclub.  We installed tile and carpet and ceiling tiles and painted the place and put in all the finish work including cabinets, countertops, etc.
• July and August brought us work in Ann Arbor.  What started as a simple wood-rot investigation, exposed a huge mess of soft pithy wood tunneled through by carpenter ants.  We then discovered that roof deck that was supposed to be supporting this post was rotten too, so we ended up rebuilding and re-pitching it and applying new roll-on asphalt material.  Now it’s sealed tight and the bugs have been vanquished and killed.    
• In August we rebuild a screened-in porch on a very modern home that backs up to the woods.  It’s the sort of house that makes an architectural statement.  The homeowners were aware of this and they wanted to stay consistent with the original thoughts for how this structure should look and function.  So we worked hard to maintain the integrity and intention of the original plan.  To do this we had lumber specially milled out at Johnson’s Workbench in Charlotte, MI.  The consistency of vertical grain fir we bought from them was very good.  The boards were straight and the edges were not all dinged up.  We painted a lot of that stock, all that was structural function, but we also used some of it for decking and applied it with and under-mount system after sealing all sides of the boards with Sikkens SRD. 
• Come September we got a call from the artist Matthew Barney.  He was making a film in Detroit and he needed some help on one of his sights.  It was set on some very polluted land owned by the Detroit Water and Sewage Dept.  He explain that there would be some sort of murder scene staged there.  I met him at the sight and he showed me where he wanted the reeds and scrub cleared, and what trees to chop down and what limbs to drop, so it would look like they had always been there, sunk in the murky waters of the River Rouge.  He also had us build a staircase down a steep hill to the water.  He also wanted that to look like it had been there forever.  Like it wasn’t built at all.  We cleared the land with machetes and built the stairs with chunks of broken concrete and big hunks of rusted chain that we found embedded in the dirt.  It was great to work with Matthew Barney.  He was very personable, and very friendly.  He surprised me with a phone call the day before his performance was scheduled.  He asked me to drive his girlfriend around Detroit.  So that was part of the deal too, and that was work, apparently we’re branching out.  We’re tour guides as well.  It really was a pleasure driving Bjork around the city, and showing her the sights.  
• Late September we worked in Hamtramck on a home that had been remodeled in the 70s.  It had drop ceilings in every room.  Each stained and yellowed from all the smoking and good times that had happened there.  When we took down the ceiling tiles and threw away the grid, we discovered that large portions of the old plaster were loose and crumbling.  We knocked out all the bad stuff and replaced it with some very solid, very good new plaster.  Yes, we use wet plaster in lieu of drywall.  It’s tougher and stronger.  We like it better.  We did this to the entire first floor of the house. 
• Fall brought with it two more window projects and another large commercial project.  We built out another white-box unit in a shopping mall to accommodate  another Koko Fitclub, this one in West Bloomfield.

2009

• Just at the end of 2008, we got a loan to cover the rehab work that we’d accomplished over the last year on a foreclosed house in Hamtramck.  This house, which was once blighted, was now one of the nicest homes on the street.   It was fully renovated and occupied.  The bank loan came through at a good time for us, because we had just purchased another house that had been the victim of scrappers and general neglect.  We were ready to put our resources and skills to work on this new property. 
• Before we were able to fully focus on our own project we installed a hardwood floor in South Lyon and completed a full house paint job in Ypsilanti. 
• Our new house needed a lot of work.  We coordinated again with local artist Mitch Cope and architect/designer, Gina Reichert from Design 99, who helped us devise a plan which included a new kitchen and new bathroom.  Mitch is responsible for the unique tile patterns in the house and also made recommendations regarding lighting and paint colors.  We began this project in February and worked in the house on and off between other jobs. 
• As luck would have it, we worked again with artist Mitch Cope on an attic framing job in Hamtramck.  The room was long and narrow and Mitch’s plans included building angular soffits and walls with triangular shaped protrusions.  The framing was challenging but never boring.  We kept saying, as we worked on it, “This will be one hell of a drywall job.” 
• When spring approached and it warmed we began working outside again.  We built, trimmed and painted a porch in St Clair Shores. 
• One of our oldest clients had recently decided it was time to fix all the many problems with his 12,000 sq. foot property.  He had us build 2 new chimneys, re-side long stretches of wall, repaint, and rebuild window frames which had rotted out and install new insulated glass too.  A good chunk of our summer was devoted to his property.
• In August we accomplished a kitchen renovation in Birmingham.  We threw out the old and brought in the new and discovered in the process that the only way to support the rear of the house, which had more or less been floating, was to install a long beam from wall to wall.  As we worked on it we kept hearing buzzing.  Finally we realized when we opened the wall that there was a massive wasp’s nest in the rafters.  It was as long as my arm.  Somehow we didn’t get stung, which is weird, because Kevin usually always gets stung.  We decided due to the extreme nature of the situation, we’d call in the experts. 
• One of the more interesting projects we accomplished was a porch rebuild in Hamtramck.  It was one of those large, two-family houses with an attic that extends over a second story porch.  What you have when you look at the house, is a lower and upper porch that mirror each other.  The greatest challenge on this job was running 6x6 posts which weighed upward of 200 lbs from the block foundation wall up 22 feet to the beam that held the roof in place.  It took three of us and some rope and a tall ladder but we got all five of them up without incident.  Then after we reframed the decks we applied a sealed vertical grain, Douglas fir decking.  It looks great. 
• As fall approached we installed new windows in our rehab house project.  Then on one of the last really warm days of the year, we glass blocked our basement windows.      
• Even though it felt like the last warm day had come, we had stretch of good weather in October.  We used this time to install 15 new Marvin windows in a condo complex in Ann Arbor.  The weather held nicely and we got them in without a hitch, and re-trimmed and re-painted the interiors.  
• One of the last projects we accomplished in 2009 was sanding and re-sealing some hardwood floors in Ann Arbor.  This was right around Christmas.  And yes, suddenly it was the holidays and the year was over. 

• The year began with remodel project in Ann Arbor, which included reconfiguring the walls of a house built in the 1920s. We were able to salvage the trim and reuse it to create walls that looked intended from the day the house was built. At this home we also accomplished a full paint job and window replacement. The old units were inoperable wooden things that leaked cold air.
• Around this time we also purchased a house in Hamtramck.  It's a nice single family home that's been vacant for some years.  The floors are oak and maple and old growth pine.  The base boards are 8 inches high; the door casings have crown moldings.
  
  The first thing we did was put on a new roof.  We fully insulated the attic space and blew cellulose down the walls.  We installed new windows and painted.  Working with local artist Mitch Cope and architect/designer, Gina Reichert from Design 99, we installed new tile in the bathrooms and kitchen and tossed out the old metal cabinets which were rusted and crumbling. We built new wooden cabinets using nine ply cabinet grade sheet goods and painted them. There's still more work to do, but it has been great making improvements to this old home, one that was abandoned for several years and filled with a dumpster's worth of vodka bottles, and had a thick nicotine coating on the walls and trim. The house was in disrepair and a hazard, but we're making it into a desirable home. It is cool and good for the city and the neighborhood.
• Also in 2008 we remodeled 2 bathrooms, one using indigo glass tile accents.  The glass tile glows. 
• We blew 40 bags of insulation into the walls of a house in Hamtramck.  It was a single family house.  We accomplished the job for $1,220.00.  Not a bad price to insulate all your walls. 
• We refaced several decks and rebuilt another that had fallen into disrepair.  We've replaced a lot of windows, painted two houses, and installed skylights.  
• Currently we're working on building an attached garage, with a sundeck on the roof. 
• We're also in the midst of applying for a variance to build a historically styled wooden porch in St. Clare Shores.  By ordinance they're no longer allowed. 
• We annually work at condominiums in Ann Arbor where we find and repair rotten wood, document the problems, and recommend maintenance. 
• We have also scheduled to build and install cabinetry which will contain home theater components. 

• In January, we completely gutted and began rebuilding the long narrow space on 9 mile in Ferndale that would house the new Pinwheel Bakery.  Previous to our work, this building had been used as a clothing store. 
  
  This meant everything needed to be rebuilt, rewired and appropriately vented.  Working with architect Roland Day, we partitioned the space, applied a new ventilation system, added a bathroom, and walk-in cooler. 
  
  Perhaps the most exciting part of this job was seeing the transformation of the front facade.  During demolition we discovered that the sealed area above the indented entrance had once housed a leaded glass window, although it had fallen out of its frame and was stained with soot, it was still for the most part intact. 
  
  Working with the DDA and the business owner, Hughes and Lynn were instrumental in helping the bakery receive funding from the city of Ferndale to restore the leaded window and create a more open and inviting entry to the building.  After several months and 15 different subcontractors the Pinwheel Bakery is in full swing, cooking up amazing brioche, scones, cupcakes and cookies.  If you haven';t already checked it out, visit what Sylvia Rector, Detroit Free Press Restaurant Critic, is hailing as “Ferndale's sweetest new spot.”
  

• By the time summer rolled around we had remodeled two bathrooms in the same house.  Doing two bathrooms at the same is a good way to save money on subcontractor labor. 
• In June we were hired by the Hamtramck Recreation Department to repair their worn playground equipment and the pavilions at Pulaski Park. 
• we've painted one house, installed some really fine Weathershield replacement windows and doors at the headquarters of the Hamtramck Star. 
• We renovated a screen porch and a home office in Barton Hills, and installed a hardwood floor in South Lyon. 
• We were very pleased to be asked by Christ Church Detroit to renovate two chapels in their historic building that dates back to the 1860s.  One of the chapels houses an amazing Tiffany stained glass window.   

  The highlight of the chapel project was rebuilding and retro-fitting an old alter that was salvaged from Saint Anthony’s Church in Detroit.  We also redid the floors, bolstering the framing where it had sagged or was cracked and applied new high traffic commercial tile. We plastered the walls and painted. 
  

2006

2006 may not have been a good year for the Michigan economy, but we still saw a lot of remodeling and renovation work occurring.