My brother Brian very generously offered to come down from NYC during his week off from work and pitch in. I figured the right thing to do was not let him pay for anything while he was down here. Until I forgot my wallet when we drove into Harrisonburg to hit Lowes, grab lunch, get gas, etc. (I paid him back when Sarah showed up with some cash...)

We got a lot done, including hanging the closet doors in the basement hallway:




Simplex sent along 20" solid core doors and Stanley mounting hardware. I wasn't really excited about them (I wanted to put in some sort of sliding system with stained plywood or polygal). But you work with what you have, right? And they look pretty good.

Brian also did a lot of grunt work, including caulking almost all the molding in the house and the stairs. We got the bathroom pretty much knocked out (vanity, corian, fixtures, toilet). We got the rest of the mulch down under the deck. (We didn't take very many pictures.) A huge thank you to Brian (and Michelle for letting him get away).