It's a Great Room

How about a little progress update? Here's Jordan standing in what might be a broom closet.

Remember that big ass beam I mentioned in the first remodel post? Yeah, well that was in place today when I walked in to the house. HOLY. BALLS. It is a big. Ass. Beam.

In progress:

Today:

Welcome to our kitchen! At the top left will be our fridge and a pantry. And along the wall with the window we'll have the microwave built in (sort of) and the stove and a ton of cabinets. The window will be gone because behind that wall will be bedroom #3.

Here's a look at our hallway from before reno and the current status.

Current:

So, in the newer and more improved, longer hallway into our Master Bedroom, our closet (omg, hooray, we'll finally have some sort of closet!) will be situated when you walk in to the right. Down the line, when we regain our sanity and build up our bank accounts, we'll have someone come out and design the space for an awesome built-in closet. For the time being we'll just shove our old IKEA dressers and stuff in there and call it a day. Boom. Once you're in the room we'll have the door to enter our Master Bathroom! For now, you can sort of see the space through the new framing.

I also think the materials used to build this house in the 40s are so interesting. It just looks like old bandages to me. From the outside we used to be able to see this weird wire strapped around the whole house and the sludge that held everything together was poking out of the holes. That's all been removed from the parts that were demoed.

Let's go outside. I was wearing sandals today but there wasn't as much debris so I was able to walk through the new framing of our laundry room and bathroom #2 to get some pics. Before we get to the current status here's a few pics of the progress:

Current:

That's all for now. I feel like demo is pretty much done and now the exciting rebuilding starts! And that's when our $ goes byebye. Floors, cabinets, tile, fixtures, dishwasher, slurpee machine. You know, all the important stuff.

Stay tuned!

Frames

Yesterday, I went to our house to grab the mail. And peek inside our pile of sticks to see what was new. I figured more piles of rubble would be waiting for me to jump over. I was not disappointed! I was wearing a dress and sandals, so jumping wasn't really on my list of things to attempt but I snapped a few photos anyway.

Here is what's left of bathroom #1:

I noticed that this was probably the original front door of our house. At least at some point. What's funny is that we were considering moving our door to this spot last year while we were doing the initial planning but decided against it for miscellaneous reasons that I can't even remember at this point. Bummer! Anyway, you can see on the left that the yellow shelves pop out and the now empty bathroom space pushes back. Our plan is to eventually put a big built-in unit here that houses the TV, books, myriad other things. If anyone wants to build this for us in return for good company and a lot of Dominos pizza, you know how to get ahold of me.

Mmmm, attic insulation. Don't you just want to dive into that pile? Not! Because they removed parts of the ceiling, they pulled down the insulation and I can see the roof of my house from the inside! It's REALLY odd. We have such a cute, tiny house. Looks like it's got good bones. Especially for being 68 years old.

Here's the new framing! This frames out our new Master Bathroom. It also acts as the wall of our closet. Tough to see but you can tell what would is new and what is old. Hopefully. Can you?

And here is to the right of that bathroom! This will be the laundry room and then the 2nd bathroom. Aka for kids and guests. Sorry, guests!

Just for kicks, and bricks, here is a 3 day old photo of what they are doing outside. They have to dig the concrete up in order to create the foundation for the 2 bedrooms going back there. When I went by last night, the dumpster was filled to the top with chunks of backyard patio.

I couldn't get a better photo. See: dress and sandals. I've been ill enough times the past 5 and a half months. No need to add severed leg to the mix. Or tetanus. On a fun note, here is Jordo and me "watching" the demo last weekend.

Cool hair Hansel. Anyway... We're on a hunt to find our bathtub so they can frame that out next week! Stay tuned.

Not Forgotten

It's been months. I've been slacking. Between a full-time job, full-time planning for our upcoming marriage, a trip to the Grand Canyon, and 2 sinus infections, house updates don't fit in so well.

Since April we have cut down the tree in the front yard. It was full of termite damage. Check out this before photo and then check out the crazy termite tree being cut down!

Thank god we had it removed! So now there is a giant circle filled with some leftover wood shavings. Good news though - an awesome neighbor was able to get the DWP to plant free trees! Hopefully, in the next couple of weeks we'll be getting our very own Chinese Pistache! It won't go in the same spot as the tree from termite hell - and maybe this one will fare better! Pictures to come when it's planted!

I was reorganizing part of our kitchen this weekend and decided to spray paint some stuff. Unfortunately, I didn't take before photos. The box was a pale wood and the tray was white. So exciting .. .. ..

I really wanted to make one of those no-sew blinds I keep seeing plastered on all those DIY home blogs. Specifically, one like this! Well, seeing as though I don't have a lot of time these days and our kitchen was boiling by 4pm each day, Jordan and I made a trip to Ikea to check out a quick fix. We ended up with this shade.
Before & After!

I wasn't able to paint the trim before Jordan erected the blind. I'm also painfully aware of the cabinets with NO DOORS! I still have to finish painting them and Jordan has to hang them. Need. Time. My dad is helping us cut shelves for the other kitchen cabinet. It's halfway there. By the time we finish all this it will be time to actually renovate the stupid room. Argh!

Other things that have happened include us moving our big ass coffee table (on loan from the family storage bin) into our junk room and replacing it with Jordan's Bubbee's smaller coffee table. It fits right in! I think I'd like to refinish it - it's got some scratches and things from a lifetime of love. We also got bedside tables from Ikea. And lamps. Maybe I'll put some stuff on my table, make the bed, and take a photo for the next post! It makes the bedroom look more like a bedroom. We still haven't hung any photos or art yet. It's been almost a year. Holy cow.

What else, what else? We planted patio tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, strawberries, and bell pepper. In pots. In the back we moved a couple of trees around and are watching dwarf apples grow. They are awesome!

Other than some small rearranging we haven't been able to accomplish a whole lot right now. With time at a low and funds at a zero we're kind of on hold for bigger and better things. Hopefully, we can draw our wish for what we'd like our house to be in the future - we'll see if actually happens in the next couple of years!

'Til next time.

Just a Door Mat

We finally got door mats. It's been about 10 months or so but we finally got them. Hooray for Target.

Front entry:




Back entry:




Does it look more welcoming? Welcome, but not too welcome. Like, hey welcome, but you have to have a key to get in? No? Anyway... I also picked up a soap dispenser. Exciting for me. Jordan thinks I'm crazy.


I also found a set of pillow cases, place mats, a basket to hold place mats and other junk, and a decorative pillow for our room. Too bad it's only the size of my face and we have a king-sized bed. It looks stupid so it will be returned.



It's like doll-sized. Why?!

I don't have much else to give an update on. We had our trees trimmed the other weekend and the guys did some rearranging of our apple tree, cherry tree, and a fig tree that we think a squirrel must have planted. We have a plan to get rid of most of the rose bushes in our backyard. Unfortunately (well fortunately for us, because yuck), the bushes are so old that when we take them out they cannot be replanted. There are a few that are newer that can be moved to a different location. They just are little too "old" for us. We want something fresh. In the meantime say hello to one of our elderly roses:



I have a plan to get started on priming our kitchen cabinet doors tomorrow. This has been a long drawn out project. It's going to make the kitchen look great!! Jordan promised to take me out for dessert. I'm out of here!