Renovations: Week 6

It is now the end of week 6. It's hard to believe how far we've come - the house is so different now. Demolition is over - it is all new construction and finishing now. The drywall is done although there are still a few rough spots and there's some small additional patching to do. The old doors have mostly been removed and a few new ones are in. The oak will look fantastic when it is finished. The electrical is mostly done and the plumbing is ready to receive our new fixtures.

This week we'll show a few videos of the progress. First, here is the outside of the house from the front. Nothing happened here this week (all work was indoors) but it was a nice, sunny afternoon when I took this video showing where we are now:

This view shows the rear. Nothing happened here this week either, but it's a good overall view:

Here is the master bedroom suite. A lot happened in here this week; the drywall is all finished, primed and some painting has happened. The room will be a light sage green with one darker green wall. The old door is removed, the master bathroom has received one coat of paint and the concrete tile base is in for the shower. Rocky ran the wiring for the heated floor but the element was too long; he took it back out to swap for the right length.

Finally, here is the kitchen and much of the downstairs work. We're almost ready for the new floor and the cabinets. A first coat of paint has been applied to most of these walls - you can see the color choices.

That's it for now. Next weeks photos and/or images should really showcase some bright new materials!

Renovations: Week 5

Rocky calls our house a "craft house" and it sure doesn't look contemporary anymore. Here's a link to an HGTV article about the "Arts and Crafts" Architectural style: http://www.hgtv.com/home-improvement/arts-and-crafts-architectural-style/index.html We now seem to have some elements common to that style. I find it interesting that the article prominently mentions Frank Lloyd Wright as the most famous architect who defined Arts & Crafts. Our house is no FLW, but the corner windows do remind me a bit of things I've seen in his Falling Water and Pope-Leighy houses.


The most interesting part of this transition is that we really added very little space - we only added about 40 square feet upstairs (extending over a small patch of low roofline) and about the same downstairs (the new laundry room is in former garage space). Yet WOW! what a difference - we love the stone, the siding and the new front entrance.




Suddenly it is time to select paint colors. Pat worked really hard on this; two of her best friends helped with color and theme selections - thanks Bobbi and Katie! We went to the Benjamin Moore store and selected from THOUSANDS of colors then brought home samples to paint. Pat is busily painting our test panels. Good thing we did - only two of our in-store choices will go on these walls!




Here is the loft prepped for paint. It sure has been fun (NOT!) walking around up here this weekend (my office is the door in the back).




The master bedroom drywall is all in; master bath to the left and closet off to the right. We love the new view out the front and side windows!




The kitchen drywall is in and the first coat of spackle is on. As you can see we'll have all recessed lighting.




Here's the new laundry room. One more window will go on the back wall providing a view into the back yard. We'll be re-hanging our old laundry room cabinets (they are in excellent shape) above the washer and dryer.




Before all the drywall sanding starts, we had to move EVERYTHING else into the basement. What a weekend! We emptied all the living room shelves, five closets (including our master bedroom closet which until now had been taped off), and we moved lots of furniture out of the way. Whew! It all fits in our basement - look!



It will be fun putting it all back. No, really - and you can help! Volunteers??????

- Chuck and Pat

Renovations: Week 4

Here is another one of the many full spaces - the garage. To the left are our old kitchen cabinets; We will eventually install them in either the garage or basement in a work area. Buckets of spackle await the drywall hanging, and our Amish masons are loading grout into the garage for next week's construction of the stone facing in the front and on our chimney. Maya in the foreground is supervising the project.



Rocky's trailer sank deep into the mulch off the edge of the driveway when he delivered it. The siding sits in a stack ready to go, and the yellow scaffolding will be erected around the chimney by the masons.



At left below, looking through the plastic sheeting for dust control, Chuck is checking out the fridge in our temporary kitchen. Hey, anything good to eat in here?

Below right - the new kitchen - all studded out. We just passed the electrical inspection, next comes the insulation and the thermal inspection. Then it's drywall time...



Here's a neat view: the photographer is in the new laundry room, shooting across the hallway (door to garage is on right), through the new powder room, through the new kitchen and out the new front windows.



Pat is checking out the garage from the new laundry room. She won't be able to do that anymore after the drywall goes up, but there will be a new window to the backyard to her right (after it comes in; we added that detail later, as a change order).

On the right, another view from inside the new kitchen. Power room is to the left and you can see out the garage door and out the garage window in the background.



Living in a stud house is fun. You can see what the spaces will eventually look like but it is so light and airy!!! Ha Ha - it's also buggy and dusty!

New week - DRYWALL!

Renovations: Week 3

So...what do you do with all that stuff that used to be in your kitchen, your laundry room, your closet, your pantry and on, and on, and on? Answer: move your daughter back to college and take over her room! Well that's part of it - the basement is pretty full too. Here's Chili's room now:



Our New Kitchen: Below you can see the dining room that is now serving as our current kitchen. We moved some basic food items and the microwave in there, followed by the stove and refrigerator. First though, Rocky had to enlarge the doorway to fit the fridge (and that was going to happen anyway) and then he built a tent around that doorframe. For now, we're washing dishes in the basement utility sink.



This tent, complete with zipper access, went up between the new kitchen and the living room. For those of you familiar with our house, the loft is above at the left. Before the renovations, there was a small pass-through window from the kitchen to the family room adjacent to the living room. Now, behind the plastic and the temporary studs, you can see that we've opened the wall all the way to the ceiling. You can see the light from the new kitchen windows at left coming through.



At left, below, you can see the new laundry room taking shape behind the studs separating the garage. At left was the former back door out of the garage, now to become a new window. The washer and dryer will go against the wall opposite the studs.

At right, below, Rocky (our general contractor) is stepping off the stepladder after adjusting a bulb in the new light fixtures in the kitchen. The view out the new windows is to the right, the new opening to the family room is on the left and the entryway to the dining room is off to the upper left in this picture.

One of the biggest surprises early on was that the floor joists above the kitchen ceiling ran perperdicular to what we, the architects and our contractor originally thought. This necessitated installing a massive composite beam in the ceiling to take the bedroom load; it along with some new wiring and plumbing is shown below left.

Below right, the new powder room is framed out. You can see the space for the fridge with the icemaker water supply towards the right; a floor-to-ceiling pantry cabinet goes behind that. In the far reaar of this image is where the laundry room goes

Back outdoors, meet a few of our other contractors: Nick is Rocky's father and he's a skilled carpenter. He shares his knowledge with his grandson Josh, on the right below.



Here's how the front looks this week: the new front porch is finished and the roof is going on. We chose a moderately brown, architectural shingle with a textured look. We;ve had great weather for the project so far - and this week was great with temps in the upper 70's and nice dry air. Hope it holds until the outdoor work is done!



- Pat and Chuck