Home Security

One of the first things I did as soon as we closed on the house was changed the locks.  I ran down to Lowes and bought a Schlage deadbolt:

If you look a little closer, you might notice that the deadbolt is of a different shape than the oval of the handle. That's because I substituted the original single cylinder with a double cylinder for greater security.  Because we have a little one who is enamoured with sneaking away from the house, I can't begin to tell you what a blessing it is to add these locks to our home.  These locks allow me to lock the door from the inside with a key, and not have to worry about Avander sneaking away from the house.  The peace of mind of knowing he can't sneak away is well worth the extra cost!

Interior View

A double cylinder lock was also installed on the fire door.

I've just discovered that Schlage actually makes a double cylinder lock in the plymouth style. You can find it at Home Depot:
http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-5yc1v/R-202357027/h_d2/ProductDisplay?langId=-1&storeId=10051&catalogId=10053

Here's what it looks like:

Sigh... live and learn.  One of these days, when I have some extra money that I don't know what to do with, I'll replace the lock with this.  Too bad this wasn't available a month ago!  Ah, well.  That's ok.  From the street our door and our new lock set really don't look half bad:

"Maintenance Free" Really Does Mean Maintenance Free

It's been a few weeks since the time we finally closed on our house, and despite it being in generally good shape, here and there I find that there are a few things that need to be taken care of, and a few things I simply want to do.  After waiting 14 years to buy my own house, I have plenty of wants, but every day, this house teaches me that the needs better get taken care of first...or else!

In the short amount of time we've owned this home, I've already had to address several home keeping and repair issues.  I've had pest control come out and take care of the carpenter ant situation in the kitchen, I've had a repairman ( I only know the guy by the name Kim... I know I have his business card somewhere) fix our air conditioner, I've had to have our garage door repaired, and the plumber (Chris) and I already know each other on a first name basis.

Once the waterlines in the master bath were replaced, the leaking garbage disposal replaced and the toilet in the kids bathroom replaced, I assumed my plumbing issues were over.  Apparently, our house has a mind of it's own: she made the point of letting me know that yesterday morning, for lo and behold, a pipe busted near the water meter!  Water was just flowing out of it into the street like there was no tomorrow.  The utility company sent a representative out the house right away to investigate what was going on.  After chopping up the sod  around the meter, and showing me where the leak was coming from, the representative announced (quite solemnly) that I would need to get a plumber to come out here and fix it. He then turned off the water to the house and drove away, leaving me to wonder what in the world to do about the grass he dug up.  Anyway, I called Poppy to let him know what happened, and he came out to the house that afternoon to see what should be done.  Upon inspection, he determined that he could fix it himself, so I wasn't going to need to call Chris, and he'd take care of it in the morning.

This morning, Poppy was at the house early, and about 12:00 this afternoon, he called to say he was finished and to come by and take a look at his handiwork. We have since learned from a neighbor (mind you, after Poppy had already finshed working on the pipe), that the HOA handles all that, and all we needed to do was just call them up and they would have sent someone out the repair the pipe since it's covered by our fees.  Sigh.  Well, what do you know?  I suppose "maintenance free" living really does mean maintenance free after all!