Category: Life in the Crooked House

Chronicling my adventures restoring and updating a quirky old Philadelphia rowhouse

The End of Year Rush

It’s been hectic people. The last time I updated the blog I was frantic to finish painting the exterior trim and my parents gave up an entire weekend to save me. Since then this stuff has happened: Got all the construction stuff put away and thoroughly cleaned the house. Had my mother and grandmother in…
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Beer Tour and Life After the Kitchen

Well, the beer tour was fun! Ticket sales were down a bit this year, which meant that the crowd fit into my house better than last year. I forgot to take photos but picture about 3/4 of this. Also look at the unfinished banister and the pig tail! Now, some people said that no one…
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Succumbing to the Repo Man

I had goals of fiscal responsibility. Finance the renovation completely out of pocket. And when that failed, pay off the credit card while it’s still interest free. And when that failed, transfer the balance. It seemed like my scheme to give the banks $0 of interest payments was gonna work. And then I had to…
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Baby’s First Christmas

  This isn’t what I meant… No, 2016 was my first time hosting holiday dinner, so I feel very grown up! And I decided to pretend to be Italian because I live in South Philly (even though my part is more southeast Asian than Italian now). I went all out and served the Seven Fishes…
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Parties > Pigtails

So yeah, I had a party! I had a post drafted about it but it was boring, so here’s the tl;dr version. I invited 120 people on Facebook. I panicked. I cooked for 30. 15 showed up. It was nice. I think the Crooked House could accommodate 20 or 25 comfortably for this kind of…
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Yes, I’m blogging about Christmas decorations

And they no longer include that shabby faux holly wreath I used the last 3 years. Most of my stuff came from my paternal grandfather, which means it hasn’t seen the light of day in 15 years. My roommate and I got really lucky and scored a huge Fraser fir that’s not overwhelmingly wide. Most of…
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A Large Decluttering Fail

I was all ready to write something boring about getting rid of stuff after a few triumphant rounds to Philly AIDS Thrift and assembling shelves in my basement. I mean, remember my parents’ basement? Not like this you don’t. And I did a decent job clearing out mine. More organizing will be needed. I put…
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So How’d That Beer Tour Go?

I bet you want to know how the tour/party went, but first one of the last things I did to clean for it. In contrast to what I talked about hearing from my steps last week, the steps themselves wasn’t white enough. It used to be a thing that everyone would scrub their marble steps…
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Of Mice and Bloodlust

I went home Monday after 4 nights with my parents. It was kind of late when I got home and I was tired so I put off unloading non-perishable groceries until right before my bedtime. And then I noticed green dust coating most of the bottom of the cabinet. It was always a little dirty…
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