In true Team J fashion, we are doing a number of house projects immediately before the arrival of Bambino #2.
This time we’re being smarter about it and not doing any of the work ourselves. Although perhaps tearing down walls is a good way to go into labor?
Work in our basement pretty much ground to a halt this summer as the general contractor (me) came down with no good, horrible morning sickness for four months. And then things got all sorts of crazy this fall and winter. So no work happened.
You’ll remember that we had grand plans for this space, which would hopefully include new drywall, a mother-in-law apartment (since our guest room upstairs got converted into Ben’s big boy room), and a bathroom with a door (ohhh! Luxurious!). Here are a few ‘before’ tear-down photos, and a task list of what needed to be done.
We got as far as tearing out the old bathroom, getting a new furnace (goodbye costly oil heat!), re-doing the heating ducts, pouring a new floor in the laundry room, and tearing out (and then rebuilding) a few walls before the pregnancy madness set in.
But I digress. Alex’s boyfriend Robbie is in town and is handy with tools so we enlisted his help in pulling up the ole vinyl flooring and taking down the lovely 1970’s era wooden paneling.
Here’s how the great room looks today (that’s the door to the garage on the left):
The great room looking the other way. Pantry door on the left. Chris took out a bit of the wall by the stairs which opened the space up a bit - he also no longer has to duck when going through the doorway so that’s a win for the tall folk!
Looking into the tv room:
This will be the new guest room (former craft room). We left the walls up here because my (very brave) mother-in-law might come down for a bit after the baby is born and it seemed unfair to stick her in a room with no walls. It’s still pretty rough so she’s getting major props for even visiting us. You’ll notice that the water tank has been removed from it’s little white corner and installed in the future utility closet. And those windows will eventually be replaced, too.
Next up is some serious electrical work. Our awesome electrician will redo the entire system in the basement (and add some can lights, so Chris doesn’t bump his head on the light fixtures) and he’ll also be able to access some of the electrical outlets for the main level, leaving us with very little (if any) of the old knob and tube wiring. Huzzah!
Of course there is lots more after that:
-New vinyl windows
-New doors, including one for the bathroom.
-Drywall! and trim. This is a biggie, and another project that we’re going to farm out.
-Beg Robbie to come back into town so he can do flooring
-Install cabinets and a little kitchenette in laundry room...so that we have a usable space when we tackle our next big project: The Dreaded Kitchen remodel. But that’s just going to have to wait.
xo,
Sonja