As I’ve continued to grow my football card collection, I’ve had to expand my storage and display space. Around this time last year, I converted two drawers of an IKEA drawer set to store cards in top loaders or graded slabs. This January, I converted the remaining drawers in the two drawer sets that are currently in the library, significantly expanding my storage capacity.
My wife’s new cat Tilly attempted to help, but only succeeded in getting in the way.
I also expanded the number of display shelves that I have in the library:
As I continue to collect more cards and sports memorabilia, I’ll need to keep getting more creative to find storage space. That said, this latest project has given me enough space to last the next several years.
It’s been awhile since my last post… Once fall hit, I took a short break from home projects after all of the pool craziness from last summer. However, since the new year I’ve been busy. One small project involved a pair of TV upgrades with very different circumstances. First, I finally ordered a four seasons TV for the hot tub area and installed it, along with an outdoor sound bar.
It has excellent picture quality and sound, and has made winter mornings watching English football a lot of fun!
When buying that TV from Best Buy, I noticed how cheap 85 inch TV’s have become, and I got the itch to upgrade the main living room TV.
The previous TV had been in a TV hutch, which looked nice but limited the TV in size to around 55 inches. For the new TV, we wanted to go with a TV console that had a built in fireplace insert, and was more minimalist than the previous hutch. My wife found this option, which fits with the rest of our furniture in the living room really nicely:
Once the furniture was selected and ordered, I installed the TV. It took two people to hang it, which was a first for me with a modern flatscreen TV. The sheer size of it makes it pretty impossible for one person to manage. Once on the wall, it dominated the living room space in a good way.
After hiding the wires, it looks really clean even with the old console in place.
After installing the two new TVs, there were a few cleanup tasks to perform. First, I moved the previous living room TV up to the master bedroom.
I also did some work to fix the broken TV lift in the three season room, converting it from a motorized lift (which had been nothing but trouble despite multiple replaced units) to a manual lift with a latch to hold the lifted TV in place.
All of these minor upgrades have had a pretty dramatic impact on the house’s TV landscape!
Once the pool concrete pouring was done, the pool was fully usable but there was still more work to do. First, the fence had to be installed. I went with an aluminum fence in pre-fabricated sections, which made it easy to anchor into the concrete and install.
The end result looked really good, and fit with the aluminum railing style from the deck that went in last summer.
Once the fence was done, the pool cover was installed and I assembled some pool furniture. Given how far back ordered most higher end pool and patio furniture is, I went with what I was able to get from a local big box store, and it ended up looking pretty decent.
The current pool cover is a simple hand-cranked cover, but I wanted the option to install a powered cover in the future. To facilitate this, the electricians installed an outlet on the far side of the pool, that can power the cover as well as future lighting or other things that require electricity.
Lastly, I removed as many rocks from the dirt as I could, then hand tilled the dirt and planted some grass seed and threw down some hay over top of it. In the spring, we’ll do it properly and have top soil brought in and re-plant much of the grass, but I needed to get something growing before winter to help prevent erosion. It’s coming in fairly nicely, and will at least do the job until spring.
In the meantime, there are still three more weeks before we shut down the pool for winter, so my wife and I are trying to get as much use out of it as possible for as long as the weather cooperates!
Once I got there, I thankfully had help to load the extremely heavy card catalog into the trailer, but also to load all of the individual drawers separately.
Once I made it back to Wisconsin, I unloaded the card catalog and moved it into the guest house. I had to remove the metal legs to reduce the height, and then I added a new wood veneer on the sides to cover over some scratches and other damage that it had taken over the years. It fits the space really well, and the drawers are the perfect size for sports cards!
Here are a few more photos of my overall card storage and display areas, split between the card catalog plus other shelves in the guest house, and part of the library:
During the pandemic, I got back into a hobby I’d really enjoyed as a kid, collecting sports cards. The hobby has changed a lot since then, with much higher prices for cards and many more high end autographed and memorabilia cards to chase. I wanted to make a space to display the cards, and the library seemed like a natural fit. Here are some initial photos of what will likely evolve into a much larger project as my collection expands.
One of the main uses I’d envisioned for the new three season room was watching sports with all of the windows open, so we could have fresh air and the feeling of being outside will being shielded from the sun and the rain. The challenge to this is that all of the walls for fully windowed, and I didn’t want to block any views with a TV (at least when not in use). My solution was to install a motorized TV mount, that would lift the TV out of a cabinet when needed, while allowing it to sit below the window frames when not in use.
After the TV and the motorized mount were installed, I had to figure out a cabinet setup. I ended up buying a bookcase from Wayfair that was the right size, with the intention of modifying it to fit my needs. I first assembled the bookcase frame, leaving out the shelves and the back. By leaving out the back, the TV could still be used while in its lowered position, which is great if you just want to have it on in the background while people are hanging out in the room.
This just left the question of how to allow the TV to lift up out of the cabinet. Instead of going with a complicated hinge system, I decided to simply cut the top of the shelf, and then anchor the back of the shelf into the wall to make up for the lost structural integrity.
After some additional work to conceal cables and wire all of the accessories in neatly, the end result worked really well!
My wife and I have used the new setup a lot in the past few weeks, especially as fall weather arrives. The cats are big fans of relaxing with us while watching TV too.
After a short delay, the remaining finishing touches have been put on the three season room. The baseboard trim is done, as are the window and door casings. The last little bit of siding work is done, and the gutters and downspouts are in place along with the remaining fascia boards. With this final polish, the project is done, and I’m very proud of how it turned out!
In addition to the three season room itself, the grill and patio furniture are also in place.
There are a few remaining ancillary tasks to take care of (installing the hot tub and TVs, for example), but for now we’re enjoying spending time in the three season room and on the deck, as are the cats.
Now that the main construction is done, I’ve been able to reclaim the guest house garage for the truck and the Range Rover, and I’ve also been able to fully whip the lawn into shape.
While the deck and three season room project isn’t completely done, it’s definitely getting close. Over the past couple of weeks, the three season room has turned into an actual building, complete with windows, doors, siding, and a (mostly) done interior.
While the interior still needs trim, window casings, and some other minor touches, having the shiplap painted and the furniture plus other decor in place makes it feel like a pretty complete room.
I’ve also got the railing done, and the deck furniture set up.
We had a party last weekend, and our guests were able to use the space and enjoy it. The cats have also really enjoyed sitting out there and looking out the windows.
In August, I’ll wrap up the project with the new hot tub, new TV’s, the remaining trim work, and the outdoor kitchen. It will be a lot of fun to see the vision I had for this project during the winter fully realized!
The theater rug and risers for the back row finally came after a couple of months of waiting, so I was able to get this project fully done. The risers make a dramatic difference in the viewing experience from the rear row of seats, and the rug brightens up the room and pairs well with the dark floors and walls.
As the weather has warmed up and the pandemic is starting to be firmly in the rear view mirror, it was time to open the lake house for the spring.
While this year won’t involve any major construction projects at the lake house (there was more than enough of those last summer, including painting the entire interior of the house and replacing all of the flooring), I’m planning on doing a lot of landscaping, and I also replaced some of the aging furniture in the basement with furniture that had been displaced by all of the remodeling and design work at the Verona house.
I also did some minor electrical work, including adding a switch box for the water heater so that it can be turned off with a switched as opposed to using the switch in the fuse box.
The last thing that needed to be done to truly be open for spring was to get the boat in the water and setup the awning on the boat lift. I picked up the freshly detailed boat from Skipper Bud’s, and with the help of my friend Bret got the awning installed.
This weekend, my wife and I took the boat out for the first time on a beautiful 80+ degree day. It’s time for summer!
