July 2008 - Here is the area that Dad fixed – you can’t even tell that the plaster was falling down; he did such a great job!
Maybe dad was supposed to be plaster-man all this time!!!
July 2008 - Here you can see the plaster work about 95% done! The walls are smooth, there are no more holes, and the corners are perfect!!!!
We can’t wait to paint!!!
Here is the same shot with the first and second coat of plaster work done – trying to hide those pesky buttons and patch jobs (June 2008)
Here you can see the upstairs hallway before the major button reattaching began (March 2008)
June 2008 - But the answer to our prayers arrived from
Jen’s Dad took on his plaster role with great enthusiasm and a smile and “got plastered” with Jen every weekend for two months, until the job was done! Here he is tackling the damaged area at the bottom of the stairs (no small feat).
March 2008 - The white area you see here was done by a professional plaster-dude we hired since the wall was so damaged and we were still unsure of our plaster-skills. The areas below the white section was also in such bad shape that if you touched it… the plaster turned into sand.
OH BOY!
March 2008 - About every 6 inches, we drilled in these buttons into the plaster and lathe to reconnect it to the house. Easy enough!
BUT!!! Then 6 layers of plaster had to be applied to ensure that all of the buttons are hidden! Looks like we better learn how to plaster – and fast!!!!
March 2008 – OH NO!!! Much to our disappointment, in early March (2008) we discovered that ALL the plaster walls were separating from the lathe - and either needed to be completely ripped out (renovation style) OR slowly reconnected and replastered (restoration style).
Guess which option we choose? Yup – you got it – the slow restoration way!
March 2008 - The ugly ceiling tiles are down (finally) and the new drywall ceilings are up and plastered…. We are moving along!!! 
June 2007 - Next we focused our attention to the fabulous acoustic 70’s tiles on the ceilings in both the upstairs and downstairs hallways. Why anyone would purposefully install these in their home, is beyond me!
February 2007 - Working in stairways can be a little tricky…. especially when it involves taking 7 layers of wallpaper off the wall while on top of a ladder.
January 2007 - Wallpaper is coming down and at first glace the plaster walls look great – especially to a California Girl who always thought huge cracks in the walls were normal. 
January 2007 - We did not even begin working on the hallways until a year after we purchased our sweet Belle. The first order of business – take down the wallpaper. 
January 2006 – This is the original hallway downstairs when we bought the house…. The carpet on the stairs was so scary no one wanted to walk on it even with shoes!
January 2006 – This is the original upstairs hallway when we bought the house in 2006. The wallpaper is hiding the fact that the plaster is falling off the walls…which we discovered much, much later.
